In the kitchen, I put on a kettle for some tea… and waited.
When she got back, I peed on the stick… and waited.
Three minutes later, it was confirmed. I was going to have a baby. Ace’s baby.
I was going to be a mother.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Ace
The summer of my life was also my summer of hell.
On the field, I was a Beast.
Off the field was another matter altogether.
It was the last day of August, and I hadn’t seen Holly in months. Not that I didn’t want to. God, I wanted to. I couldn’t because she would know I hadn’t kept my promise to her. She’d see it in my eyes. On my face. In every move I made.
She knew me too well, and I couldn’t take seeing the disappointment in her eyes.
From Calvin, I’d found out the address of the little store she and Whitney had found. I bought it for her before anyone else could, but she didn’t know it yet. Because I wasn’t clean.
I’ll probably never be clean.
So Holly’s dream just sat in my safe, waiting for a day that probably would never come. For her or for me.
On the field, we were still ahead in our league, taking down team after team. We were the darlings of the media. Coach and Rhett were thrilled. Every guy on our team was bringing it every game.
Including me — with a little pharmaceutical support.
Calvin stood on the mound, tall and proud. I watched his fingers roll around the leather and trace the seam. The batter was a leftie, and there was a man on base ready to steal, so I knew I had to be ready.
He wound up and let go with a powerful pitch. The crack was deafening when the bat made contact with his knuckleball. It went high, and I ran backward, trying to keep my eyes from watering as I looked up at the sun. Everything turned into a blur, the sun blinding me as I held up my glove in search of the ball. They had two strikes, we needed this.
C’mon, Ace, dig deep.
With one more step backward, the sun released my eyes from its painful trance and the ball was falling from the sky right where I’d judged it would. It dropped into my glove like a gift from the Gods, and the fans went wild.
Calvin was the first one to grip me around the waist and lift me from my feet. “Good fuckin’ job, wild man,” he shouted, crazy with excitement.
He hadn’t been so friendly lately, because of Holly I knew. So it felt good to see him happy, and even better to know it was because I’d put that smile on his face. I patted him on the back as he put me on my feet, then lost my smile as I felt the tiny package of cocaine slide from my cup and inch its way down my leg. Fuck!
For anyone looking at my life from the outside, it still looked like one giant party. What they didn’t know was that I went home alone every night, drinking my sorrows away, forcing myself down from a high so I could sleep a little and do it all over again the next day.
I needed the coke to play. That was the bottom line.
It was the bottom of the ninth, and the Braves’ last chance at redemption. We were up 12-6, a steep lead, so they had some work to do. My body was slowing down, and I missed a hard grounder, letting one man steal while another got on base. Coach yelled something at me — I didn’t know what and I didn’t care. I just focused on the next batter.
The next three batters all got base hits, loading them up like a baked potato at TGI Fridays. And just like that it was 12-8. C’mon, Calvin. Fuck. We had to win this one, had to. Looking toward the bullpen, I didn’t see a relief pitcher warming up. Calvin must be tired. Why was he even still in the game? What was Coach thinking?
Singleton showed up at the plate ready to rumble. He was a massive guy, just a few inches shy of seven feet. The man loved to swing left-handed, even though he could hit a mean ball with his right as well. Calvin had issues with him before, offering up a home run ball to him on several occasions. We couldn’t afford that now. Not if we were gonna stay number one in the league. I could taste the victory already, as well as the drugs draining down my throat.
Calvin wasn’t fucking around, throwing out his first pitch at just under one hundred mph. Hell yeah, maybe Calvin still had the stuff. The look on Singleton’s face when he missed that by just a nanosecond was priceless. He shifted at the plate, spit over his shoulder and then stared Calvin down.
Another swing and a miss. This time, it was a slower pitch, curved and designed to look faster than it actually was, often tripping batters up. This was it. We could win the game right here, or possibly tie it up and end up handing it to them in a designer basket.
Another fastball, and this time contact was made, and that fucker shot back like a missile coming in my direction. Instinct kicked in, and I caught it, the blast of it stinging my palm even through the mitt.
The team was on cloud nine. It was like we were unstoppable. Coach congratulated us, even patted me on the back with a smile. Everyone was celebrating in the clubhouse, dancing to the loud music blaring from the sound system and planning their next victory against Detroit.
“You goin’ out for a beer tonight?” Luke asked from behind me.
“Nah. I need to get some rest.”
Luke shook his head with a smirk. “Gettin’ old and soft, wild man.”
I knew he was teasing, but those were scary words — old and soft.
“I can’t believe you’re not gonna hit up the Atlanta clubs tonight,” Calvin said, laying an arm over my shoulders.
“I’m trying to straighten up my act.” I smirked, making the lie a little more believable.
He grinned bigger. “Oh yeah? Thinking about settling down, are ya?”
“You seem to like it.”
“Yes. Yes, I do, very much.” Calvin had a look in his eyes that I was beginning to envy. He was at peace, happy, and wasn’t afraid of his future, but looked forward to it. “You thinking about Holly?”
My smile faded a bit. I had a baggie of cocaine sliding down my leg, enough in my system to kill a small horse, so at this moment, no, it wasn’t about Holly. It couldn’t be.
“How’s she doin’?” I asked.
“She’s been baking a lot. I guess her business is taking off.”
Shit. “Oh. She get a place?”
“No. She found this place… actually, the place I told you about. She really liked it, but somebody bought it before we had a chance to.”
Guilt blossomed in my chest. I was keeping her from her dreams.
“What’s she going to do?” I asked him.
He lifted a shoulder. “She got the permits to bake out of her kitchen. Seems to be doing well, so she’ll probably keep doing that for a while.”
He wouldn’t look me in the eye when he said it, so I wondered what he was keeping from me.
“Have you tried calling her lately?” he prodded, but I shook my head, unable to look at him.
“She deserves better than me. I just don’t think I’m the man she needs.”
“You know you could be. Look at ya now. You’re a Beast, not just because the name’s on your back, but because you have torn the shit out of the league this season,” Calvin encouraged.