Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 97875 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 489(@200wpm)___ 392(@250wpm)___ 326(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 97875 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 489(@200wpm)___ 392(@250wpm)___ 326(@300wpm)
“Hello, you’ve reached Eve, lady proprietor of the Gilded Garden. Lucky you. Leave a message and make it brief. I don’t have all day.”
Beep.
With a fond half smile on her face, Skylar left a message. “Hey, I know you’re super busy this week, just wondering if you had time for coffee. Would love to catch up. If I don’t hear from you, I’ll just show up at the lounge later this week. When you least expect it. Boo.”
Deep in thought, Skylar took a quiet shower, dressed, and brushed her teeth. Fashioned her wet hair into a braid and, for old times’ sake, slid her feet into an old pair of cleats that still held clumps of dirt from senior year of high school.
Then she tucked her planner into the back waistband of her yoga pants and snuck outside to pitch. The sound of her spikes on the front porch steps was familiar enough to raise a pebble in her throat, as was the rusted lock on the shed adjacent to the house, where the sporting goods were kept. The black wire bucket of dirty softballs that waited for Skylar made her sigh with pleasure. And after dragging out the nine-pocket practice target she’d been using since middle school, she got to work.
Relax into stance, breathe, wind up, release.
Relax into stance, breathe, wind up, release.
It would be so easy to let herself become distracted. To think about the Page Stakes kicking off this afternoon, the pressure of competition, the high expectations of her family, even when they were only battling against one another. It would be so easy to think about the man who’d slept on her floor last night, mumbling in his slumber about forechecks, his face softened by sleep. How she’d lost her battle with curiosity and reached down in the middle of the night to test the texture of his beard. Just a teeny, little finger graze.
Why did it have to be the perfect combination of bristly and smooth?
Women must love it.
Skylar missed the target completely on her next pitch, the ball disappearing into the trees. “Damn.”
“Brought my glove, if you’d rather pitch to a human” came the voice behind her.
Madden.
She hadn’t heard him approaching from the house next door, which had been passed down to him following the death of his aunt.
Skylar’s stomach tied itself into seventeen complicated knots. A familiar feeling, considering this was a familiar scene plucked straight out of her high school years. One she looked forward to reliving on an annual basis during the Page Stakes. Pitching to Madden’s steady glove, experiencing that ripple of approval across his furrowed brow whenever she landed a strike. His quiet strength. The sense of camaraderie.
Just the two of them, no Elton to tease and remind her she was the annoying younger sister. Perfect.
Oddly, her fingers tingled where she held the next ball, the memory of Robbie’s soft bristles making itself known at the least opportune moment.
Not now.
Forcing herself to play it cool, she tossed a smile over her shoulder. “Sure, thanks.”
Madden nodded in that slow, easy manner of his, striding past her to the target, moving it aside and taking its place in front of the towering oak she’d christened the Pitching Tree long ago.
Skylar shook the nerves out of her arm and threw a decent pitch, the imaginary umpire in her head calling it low and inside.
Retrieving another ball from the bucket, she bobbled it in her hand a moment, trying to work up the courage to start a conversation. Considering how long they’d known each other, exchanging words shouldn’t be so hard, right? There was normally a buffer of some kind. Or they just played in silence in the name of concentration. But this was her week to get his attention, to break free of the patterns that made her nothing more than Elton’s little sister in Madden’s eyes. Seize your chance.
“Is it nice being back in your aunt’s house for the week?” Skylar asked.
Nice job bringing up his deceased aunt. Ask about his absent parents next.
Madden stood and returned the ball, her glove receiving it with a slonk. “It is nice, yeah.” She wasn’t sure he’d elaborate, but after a moment he kept going. “I forget some of the smaller things about her. Like the dishes she kept everywhere for candy. Every once in a while, I find a hair curler stuck in a couch cushion or behind a stack of books.” He hunkered back down, punching the center of his glove. “Good reminders.”
“Those are good,” she murmured, swallowing the twinge in her throat.
Another pitch. A perfect throw back in Skylar’s direction.
Odd how conversation didn’t seem to come easily between them. Obviously, they just needed more time alone. To get comfortable with each other.
Obviously.
“Listen, Skylar,” Madden said, kind of abruptly. “About this hockey fella.”