Page 71 of The Virgin Game Plan (Rules of Love 2)
“Except when you’re playing against us,” Declan says dryly.
I growl. “We’ll destroy you tonight. Rest assured.”
Shane laughs out a “Don’t bet against us,” but his words are cut short when his phone rings. He grabs it from his shorts pocket, glances at the screen, and says, “My agent. I’ll catch up with you in a few.”
He falls behind as Declan and I continue at our pace, chatting briefly about family. Declan’s a private guy, and has never said much about his parents. I gather his dad is out of the picture, though I’ve no idea why. But he’s close with his mom and his stepdad. “How’s your mom and her hubs? Is she doing well?”
He flashes a smile. “They’re great. They still come to a lot of my games. I fly them out here often. But I miss San Francisco a lot.”
Does he miss someone in particular? But it’s not my place to ask.
“What about you?” he asks. “Are you still all nose to the grindstone, focused only on baseball?”
I arch a brow as we climb a hill. “Takes one to know one. You’re the same way.”
He scoffs. “Maybe that’s true. Or maybe it was true. And if memory serves, last time I saw you, you hadn’t had a date in a long, long time.”
I flash back to our last convo—other than at the Sports Network Awards, it must have been in the fall when I played his team as a Bandit and we grabbed some grub after. No point lying. “Fine, you got me there. I haven’t seen anyone for the last two years. Well, except for this one woman,” I admit, and it feels good to say it, even though Reese and I aren’t technically anything.
We could be. But for now, I don’t know what we are.
Text buddies?
No.
Work friends?
Not that.
One-time lovers?
That feels all wrong.
Declan arches a brow. “So there is someone?”
“Sort of,” I say with a shrug.
He shoots me a skeptical stare. “Why is that a ‘sort of’? You either know or you don’t know.”
I scrub a hand over the back of my neck as we hit the straightaway in the path. “She’s somebody I knew before, and then I ran into her again.”
“Ah, the plot thickens. Is she the reason you didn’t date anyone for two years?”
When he puts it like that, direct and frank, there is no other way to answer but with the truth. I nod, absorbing the intensity of the realization, saying it aloud maybe for the first time. “She’s the reason. I’m not sure I was entirely aware of that as it was happening. But yes, she’s definitely the reason. She was out of the country. Crazy, because I didn’t even know her that well, but now I do. So, yeah, in some ways, I was waiting for her to come back.”
“And waiting to get to know her more?”
“Yeah, I think so.”
“And she’s back?”
“She is.”
He whistles appreciatively. “Man, you’ve got a second chance with someone you waited two years for and you’re only on the sort of path with her?”
I swallow roughly, his bluntness cutting me to the core. “It’s not that simple.”
“Second chances never are, but if you’ve got one, don’t squander it. Do everything to make it happen,” he says, his tone more intense than his hitting last night. “You don’t always get a second chance. If you get one, don’t let it slip by. Trust me on this.” He shoots me a meaningful stare with his dark eyes, waiting for an answer.
Maybe I’m not ready to give one. I toss the ball back to him instead. “I’ll take your word for it. After all, a man can hope.”
“I hope it works out for you.”
“Me too.”
I’ve got a ton of hope. Trouble is, I don’t know how to channel it. What to do with it. How to weigh it against everything else.
The sound of sneakers slapping on the dirt grows louder, and seconds later, Shane returns, clapping Declan on the back, then me. “I don’t just have speed on my fastball. I’ve got it in my feet. I am motherfucking Hermes. I am the winged god.” He thrusts his arms skyward.
“Glad to see you still have an ego the size of Jupiter, Shakespeare.”
“No other way to be, mate.”
That night, Declan’s words hang over me. And Saturday morning too, until I get on a plane that afternoon heading back to San Francisco.
Before we take off, I think about second chances, about moving on, about what-ifs.
I replay the day I met her, how our first night was cut short. We made plans, but those were scrubbed too when she moved to South America. Then she came back to the States, and I ran into her again, only to find out who she was. That stopped us, but only for a few days.
Fate keeps bringing us together.
