“You look even better through both eyes,” she said.
He cupped her cheeks in his hands and kissed her without further pretense or warning, and she sank into him, her arms curving around his waist and up his back. They hadn’t seen each other in two days, which was more than normal before they started…whatever this was. People who just met were dating. People who’d been in committed relationships for months or years were together. But this thing with her and Jamie had a definition all its own, and they were still figuring out what that was. Not that it mattered. All Brynn cared about was his lips on hers after two days of not being on hers, and…
She let out a soft “Mmmm” against him. What was she thinking?
“I missed you,” he said. Then he stepped back to take her in.
“Brynn Chandler, are you wearing a White Sox T-shirt?”
She did a slow twirl for him, his smile giving her encouragement.
“You like?”
“I love,” he said. “Though I didn’t expect such team spirit to go sit at the ale house to watch the game.”
Brynn’s smile threatened to fall, but she held it in place, reminding herself that what she was about to tell Jamie was a good thing.
“B?” he asked. “Why are you smiling like you’re going to murder me?”
Okay, so maybe she wasn’t quite pulling off the happy nonchalance she’d been hoping for.
Her teeth grazed her top lip.
“See, that’s the thing,” she started and then grabbed his hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze. Though she was the one who needed reassurance right now.
She slid the two playoff tickets out of her pocket and held them up for Jamie to see.
“We’re not going to the ale house,” she said. “We’re going to the game.”
…
He was still holding her hand. Jamie was sure of that—her skin on his, keeping him grounded. Tonight was game seven, and he was pretty sure the Sox weren’t going to the Series…again. That didn’t stop him from hoping, and having Brynn watch the game with him would make whatever the outcome was worth it.
But at the park?
“Okay, you’ve been quiet a long time,” she said. “So, let me start by telling you that, yes, the tickets cost a few bucks, but Annie got them from one of the shop regulars who couldn’t go at the last minute, and I just thought…it’s been so long, Jamie. And you love baseball more than anything, and I hoped…”
He still hadn’t said anything. He probably should before she continued her nervous verbal vomit, but it was kind of adorable.
The tension eased in his shoulders, and he felt a tentative grin spread across his face.
“You’re wrong,” he said and watched her expression fall. This only made his smile grow wider. “There’s one thing I love more than baseball.” With that he pulled her to him again, obliterating the first kiss he’d given her with one he hoped said everything he couldn’t articulate with words.
“Get a room already,” Holly said as she walked by. But Jamie didn’t relent, only smiled against the woman he’d loved for ten long years, who stood in his arms kissing him back. Loving him back.
“Brynn Elise Chandler,” he said, “I love you more than anything.”
The corners of her mouth quirked up.
“More than baseball?” she asked.
“More than baseball.”
“More than beer?” she added.
He scrubbed a hand across his lightly bearded jaw, but a few seconds was all she would take. Brynn backhanded him on the arm, and he chuckled.
“More than beer,” he said, “but let’s keep that our little secret.”
She took off his hat and rested it backward on her own head, her wild curls spilling out from underneath it. She ran her hands through his hair, over his cheeks, and down to his neck.
“And it’s okay…the tickets? I thought it would be good for you. For us. To do this together.”
Jamie nodded and kissed her forehead. A lot had changed in the past ten years, even more so in the past two weeks.
“I don’t want to be stuck where I was for a decade,” he told her. “Not anymore.” She pulled him tight and rested her head on his chest, and Jamie let his chin fall to the top of her ball-cap-covered head. “There’s no one I’d rather do this with—go to a place I once loved with the girl I love more than—”
“Baseball and beer,” Brynn interrupted, and they both laughed.
“Baseball and beer,” he confirmed.
The Sox were down by four with two outs at the top of the ninth, but that didn’t stop Jamie from loving every minute he sat in the stadium. Perched above home plate, a Lagunitas in one hand and Brynn’s palm in the other, it didn’t matter that his team wasn’t going to the Series, not without a miracle. In fact, his eyes had turned from the game after the last out, focusing on the woman beside him instead. He observed how she watched the game with sheer delight, and he knew it had nothing to do with what was happening on the field and everything to do with what made him face her now.