Love Realized (22 page)

Since they were standing there in the front doorway of his house, a little too closely, she forced herself to look up into his eyes to see what he wanted. When her eyes met his, she felt herself now staring at those.
First the lips, now the eyes?
Mesmerizing. Jake was simply mesmerizing, and she couldn’t help the fact that for some reason she was now seeing him in a different light. He cleared his throat, and she blinked a few times to focus again.

“I wanted to say thank you again. Not just for taking care of me this morning, but for looking out for Ryan. I love that you know me well enough to know that I wouldn’t have wanted him to see me like that. I really appreciate that.” She could smell the mint of his toothpaste—he must have just brushed his teeth. This reminded her that she just had a bunch of hot sauce and hadn’t brushed hers.

Suddenly self-conscious, since he hadn’t let her go, she brought her hand up to cover her mouth before speaking, “You’re welcome. I always take care of the people that are important to me.”

“You do more than most people, Gillian, and I am lucky to have you in my life,” he said before he leaned in and placed his lips against her forehead. He kept them there for a few moments longer than a simple friendly gesture. No, this one was different, and not just for him. It felt different for her, too. She closed her eyes and felt her body sway toward his, seeking a little more contact than what they had. She felt his hand apply a bit more pressure on her waist as he confirmed with this gesture that he liked that she had done that. He wanted her body pressed against his. His lips lingered and remained pressed to her forehead a moment or two longer before he took in a deep breath just as he pulled them away.

Her hand that had been covering her mouth had moved its way to his chest. Their bodies were still pressed against each other, and she glanced up to see him looking down at her. She knew that she should move away, but he wasn’t doing so either, which must have meant that he wanted to be pressed up against her. Once again making eye contact with him, something passed between them that she didn’t recognize, but it was there nonetheless. She thought she felt his body tighten against hers as he began to lower his head again, but this time it was aiming for her lips. She started to close her eyes as she prepared for what was about to happen, when they were both startled by the boys running into the room.

When she pulled away from him this time, he let her. But he reached out and took her hand and squeezed it while positioning it out of view from the boys. She wasn’t sure what he was trying to tell her with his eyes, but she knew that he felt something pass between them, too. She turned to face the boys as she tried to calm her racing heart. The feeling of almost getting caught by the boys, combined with the heady sensation of being pressed against Jake’s body was enough to make her a little breathless. Her voice sounded funny when she said, “You guys ready to go?”

They, of course, both looked at her because she sounded funny, so she cleared her throat. “What?” Jake helped by saying, “Batting order is decided by whoever gets to the car first.” And just like that, they took off running out the door. She went to follow, but realized that Jake was still holding her hand. Turning her head back to look over her shoulder at him, he didn’t let go of it—he just looked back at her.

“You coming, too? Or are you trying to cheat and prevent me from getting there before you?” she said in her cool, flirty voice she discovered the other night. This kind of surprised her since she hadn’t intended it to come out that way, but it felt … okay.

Jake must have picked up on it because he used his grip on her hand to hold her in place as he moved in close to her again. He leaned down and placed another gentle kiss on her forehead, before whispering, “I would always put you before me, Gillian.” When he pulled back and looked down at her, she could see the full meaning of the words he spoke. He wasn’t talking about batting order anymore. A thrill of excitement tingled its way up her spine as she absorbed what he was saying. Or at least what she thought he was saying. She was fully aware of the fact that she could totally be seeing something that wasn’t there … but for some reason, she really hoped it was. All she could do was give another little smile.

“We better get going.”

“Yeah, we better,” he agreed, and they both made their way out the door. Jake had to let go of her hand in order to lock his door, since his injured hand seemed to have a little trouble. She looked down at her now empty hand and didn’t like how empty it felt. For about a second, she thought to wait for him and then hold his hand again, but figured that she might be out of line doing that, since she wasn’t so sure what was going on. Instead, she made her way to the car.

As she climbed in, she asked, “So who made it first?”

“It was a tie! So we are going to have to get two cages … if we can,” Dylan, the mastermind, said. She knew her son well enough to know that he came up with this approach so that both boys could bat at the same time. So either her son lost, or they wanted to bat at the same time to compete. Gillian was no fool, and her son knew it. Since Ryan wasn’t speaking up, she knew it was true. Not that it mattered—getting two cages would only be a problem if the place was crowded; however, this was most likely the case since it was a Sunday morning.

“Odds on getting more than one cage on a Sunday are pretty slim boys. So how about the two of you quietly decide who gets to go first, and we will get the cage for an extended time.”

Both boys slumped a little in their seats as they said, “Okay.” She just smiled as she turned and put her seatbelt on.

Jake climbed into the driver’s seat and it occurred to her that he might not be able to drive. “Can you drive okay?”

“I'm pretty sure I can. I’ll just use the heel of my hand to push the shifter, but if I need help, you can do it.” He looked over at her and gave her a flirty smile. She had never been on the receiving end of that smile before, and it made her body tingle again. Jake started the car, and they were on their way. She was shocked at the fact that, for the second time in a twenty-four hour period, she was pressed up against a man and getting tingly all over because of the attention. Thinking that she was seriously out of control and must be horny or something, she tried to focus on other things. Things like trying to show a little self-control before she started to rub up against random strangers, simply because they said hello.

After a quick stop at her house to grab Dylan’s stuff, and her cell phone, they arrived at the batting cages in no time. She loved going there with the kids and was really looking forward to doing it with Jake. It’d been way too long since they had done something like this, since the boys were usually together, it was either one parent or the other on these outings.

Her excitement began to climb even more when her body physically responded to his as he took off his sweatshirt. He was wearing a fitted shirt underneath that gave her the most decadent view of his strong upper body as he began to warm up and swing the bat. His body rotated at the waist as he swung the bat with one arm and gave his injured hand a few stretches, testing it to see if he could grip the bat well enough.

The tight short sleeves bunched up closer to his shoulders as his upper arms would flex and relax with each swing. Gillian had never noticed the definition in Jake’s arms before now, which was a shame because they were amazing. But it wasn’t until that moment, sitting there, watching him, that she realized how she had now moved Jake from the
just-friends
category to the
eye-candy
category. She shook her head at this interesting development. She was still staring at him, maybe even lusting over him a little bit, when she was tapped on her shoulder by a small hand. Quickly swiveling around, she saw Ryan. “Aunt Gillian, Dylan wanted me to ask you to watch him swing.”

Trying to pull herself out of the lust-induced fog she seemed to be swimming in, she reluctantly got up and made her way closer to the batting cage where the boys were hitting.
After watching her son hit a few balls, she glanced over her shoulder to the where she had left Jake, and just watched him hit the ball for a few moments. It was such a beautiful thing to watch.
He
was beautiful. And as the tingles once again erupted all over her skin, the butterflies started to dance in her stomach, and the weird sensation in her chest returned.
Could she be more to Jake? More than just friends?
His time must have run out because he relaxed his batting stance and glanced back to where Gillian had been. The disappointment at her absence was evident on his face, and that ache in her chest constricted. He quickly shot his gaze toward where the she was, and when his eyes met hers, he visibly relaxed. She once again found herself smiling like a fool in response to his smile as he held the bat up in her direction letting her know it was her turn to bat. She was moving toward him, without even knowing it, and before she knew it, she was in front of him. He bent over, picked up her helmet, and placed it carefully on her head.

“Got to put your helmet on,” he paused as he gave it his full attention to make sure it was secured.
“Wouldn’t want anything to hurt something so precious to me,” he finished his statement with a delicate tap of his finger to her nose. This managed to snap her out of whatever hold he seemed to have on her, as she just stood and gazed at his face. Oh yeah, she knew was falling for her friend—she just didn’t know if that was a good or a bad thing.

Before he knew it, their time in the cages had run out. Time sure did fly when having fun, he thought, because he could’ve stayed there all day watching her. Of course, it was even better now than it was when they were in high school. She was packing up the gear the boys brought with them when he heard her phone vibrate on the bench next to him. When he looked down, the screen showed she had a text.

“Hey, Gillian, you have a text,” he said to her.

She looked up from what she was doing and responded, “Can you check it and see who it is?”

He opened the message folder on her phone screen, and saw that the most recent text had come from Allie, which only said ‘
call me.
’ But the text in the line below hers was the one that grabbed his attention since it read, ‘
Just so you know … it isn’t over
.’ Jake thought that was a weird statement, especially since it came from a number that wasn’t programmed into her phone. He thought it sounded kind of threatening, but knew that it could sound that way if you didn’t know what exactly
was
over.

He was still staring at her phone when she placed a baseball bag at his feet and asked, “Who was it?”

“It was Allie, she just said to call her. But what is this other text here that came in late last night?” Mentioning last night reminded him of the guy she went out with, and he briefly wondered if it was possible to have come from him, but hoped not.

“A text from last night?” she questioned as she took her phone from him. He felt a little guilty for glancing at her texts, but for whatever reason, that one bothered him. She shrugged her shoulders as she examined her phone before looking up at him and saying, “I have no clue, it must be a wrong number. It doesn’t make any sense to me. Should I reply to it?”

“No. If you think it’s a wrong number, then just leave it alone.”

“Okay,” she agreed. She turned off her phone screen and shoved it into her pocket before looking at up at him. “The boys are hungry for burgers. They want to go to Brody’s.” The smile on her face was a dead giveaway that it was her that really wanted to go there.

He let out a small laugh and shook his head at her attempt to pin it on the boys. “Is that so?”

“Sure is, and you wouldn’t want to disappoint them, now would you?” she asked, batting her eyes at him and giving him a pleading look. He couldn’t help but notice that it appeared she was flirting with him. His heart accelerated slightly at the excitement of that, and he decided to flirt right back.

“Well that’s true,” he said as he stepped a little closer to her, forcing her to look up at him. “But honestly, it’s you that I don’t want to disappoint, Gillian.” He finished this off by gently sweeping the back of his hand across her cheek. When he saw her shiver at the contact, he had to make sure he didn’t pounce on her then and there. Seeing her physically respond to him was such a rush, it was hard to focus on anything else around them, which is why he didn’t notice how they were standing in front of the entrance to the batting cage, blocking it. The sound of a man clearing his throat caught his attention, forcing his gaze from Gillian’s to that of the random stranger next to them.

The stranger motioned toward the batting cage and said nicely, “Sorry to interrupt, but our cage time has already started. You mind stepping out of the way?”

Gillian jumped out of the way and immediately started apologizing for both of them. “I am so sorry. We were distracted because I was trying to persuade my friend here that we needed to go get burgers. You know how it is when there’s a great burger involved, everything around you seems to pale in comparison. You could’ve been George Clooney, and I wouldn’t have noticed.” The way she smiled at the stranger and fanned herself dramatically as she mentioned George Clooney was cute, and
so
Gillian.

The man clearly agreed, judging by his answering smile and response, “That’s quite all right, great burgers deserve that kind of attention.”