Page 61 of The Virgin Game Plan (Rules of Love 2)
“Black tea, please,” I say, relief washing over me. We’ll have something to center the awkward around—tea, and then soon, food.
Becky pushes up with an oomph, but my dad shakes his head, pats her thigh, and says, “I’ve got it.”
She sinks into the couch. “Thanks, hon.”
Hon. They have nicknames for each other.
As he heads to the open kitchen, he tosses out to me, “You always loved your caffeine, sweetie bear.”
My brow knits. “I didn’t drink tea or coffee when . . .”
When you lived with us.
“Diet Coke, sweetie bear,” he adds quickly. “You loved it.”
Yeah, when he used to take me out for Diet Coke and veggie burgers after my volleyball games.
I can’t even go there.
Time to turn on my media skills.
Dial ’em up.
Crank them well past one hundred.
“What made you decide to take the job with the Dragons?” I ask like he’s on my podcast. This is how I’ll get through the morning.
“The offer came in at the last minute. I wasn’t expecting it, since they had someone during spring training, but I got a call the day before the first game. I was looking for something in sports broadcasting. I didn’t think I’d get such a great opportunity to be a major league manager though. It seemed like serendipity, since we’d already moved back here for Becky.”
“And I’m so glad we did. It’s so great to be near family,” Becky chimes in as my dad heats the kettle.
Next question, Reese. You can do it. I turn to the redhead carrying my half-sibling. “Do you have family here?”
“Two older sisters. They’re all here with their families. Janie runs an animal rescue, and Cassie is a vet. I guess I’m the odd woman out,” she says with a laugh.
“Oh? Why’s that? Are you a corporate lawyer?” I say, opting for lightness. At least, I think it’s lightness.
“I work at a genetic research company. Doing all sorts of research on genetic diseases and developing therapies for them.” Her expression is animated, her eyes alight with excitement. She must love her job. I know that feeling.
My dad beams as the kettle whistles. “Becky has a doctorate in science. She heads up a research department. She’s whip-smart.”
Great. Just great. She has a fascinating job, she’s a woman working in science, she’s close with her sisters, she loves her career. I want to hate her, but I can’t.
“And when did you meet?” I ask with a smile, marching down the interview path.
“Twelve months ago,” she says.
I do the math. He wasn’t married twelve months ago. Maybe, just maybe, he didn’t cheat.
When he returns with the tea, I pepper Becky with more questions—that, I can do forever. As I sip the English breakfast, I learn that she volunteers at her sister’s animal shelter, walking dogs and cleaning kennels.
“But not much heavy cleaning at the moment,” she says, gesturing to her bump. “Which means mostly I just talk to the dogs and cuddle them.”
“They must love that,” I say.
“They aren’t the only ones,” Becky says.
I learn, too, that she and my dad go for a two-mile walk every morning before her workday begins. Most of the time, they talk, but now and then, she listens to her favorite podcast while he listens to leadership skills audiobooks.
“Which podcast is that? Your favorite?”
“One of my girlfriends told me about it, and we’re addicted now. It’s called Badass Babe,” she says.
I blink. Swallow. This feels like the moment in a movie when a critical clue falls into the heroine’s lap. But she isn’t sure what to make of the evidence. “My friend Tia listens to that podcast,” I blurt out, the first thing I’ve said other than a question in a while.
“Do you listen to it too? It’s so empowering.”
“I’ve listened to a couple of episodes. And it’s great.” I half-wish that I hated it. That we didn’t agree on something badass. That I weren’t living in an alternate world where Becky and I have anything in common, where we have similar tastes, views, perspectives.
She’s supposed to be . . . an airhead.
A homewrecker.
A bitch.
Instead, she’s . . . interesting, progressive, positive.
There must be something wrong with her.
Maybe she’s too young.
That has to be it. She’s got to be my age. I can hate her for that. “How old are you?”
“Forty,” she says, with a smile and a shrug, then a downward glance at her belly. And a look crosses her eyes that says, I’m on the older side for a first-time mom, and I hope it goes well.
She’s older than me by a decade and a half.
She’s still much younger than my dad’s fifty-six years, but not by a gross, hairball-retching amount.
I turn to my father, ready to employ the same bluntness I’ve leaned on when talking to women, when talking to my friends, when talking to Grant.
Even when talking to Holden.
