Page 50 of The Baller

“I bet Special Agent America back there wasn’t happy.”

“No,” she chuckled.

“What happened to them?”

“One ran off, the other got invited back to the Secret Service H.Q.”

We moved to the side as a group of power-walking, stroller-pushing moms passed by, taking up most of the path.

“Shiiit. I’m lucky that invite wasn’t extended to me. And now Ace is fully healed and back to his usual annoyingly handsome self, it’s like it never happened.”

Except if it hadn’t, I wouldn’t be here with her now. And I would let Special Agent America throw me to the ground another thousand times if it meant I had more time with her, especially when she giggled.

“Do you have siblings?”

Radley slowed until she was walking, and stopped. I stopped too. So did the agents.

The expression on her flushed pink face was kind of confused, and a little wary. Her brows knitted together as she looked up at me. “Do you really not know?”

The disbelief in her tone stopped me from answering immediately, because something told me she wasn’t asking if I knew whether she had siblings. She was asking if I’d read every column inch, and every mention of her name, saw every picture. It was a feeling I knew well. My name had millions of hits if you googled it, but they were limited to mentions alongside baseball, or something mind-numbingly dumb like the ‘hottest sport star’.

But I didn’t make the mainstream news like Radley did – or her mom.

I shook my head, slowly. “I don’t. During the season, my focus is on baseball. I exclusively read sports pages, and whatever book I’m working through when I get into bed. My knowledge of you is limited to what one would normally know about the President of the United States, and half of that I’ve forgotten. So, I’m askingyou, because I want to hear it fromyou.”

“Oh,” she replied, scuffing her sneaker on a loose piece of gravel before looking up at me. Her eyes had darkened to a golden bronze, reminding me of the fire which burned the first night I saw her. “I have two brothers. Henry is twenty-six and he works for a lobbyist firm in D.C., and Ben is about to graduate from law school.”

“You’re the baby.”

“And don’t I know it.” Her shoulders dropped with a heavy sigh, and whether she meant to or not, her eyes flicked to where the agents were standing with their backs to us, making it clear exactly how she felt like the baby of the family.

“You’d have these guys anyway, right? The president’s family always has protection?”

“I have more than my brothers,” she replied, and I watched tension slowly rise back through her until one of her shoulders jerked up in a defensive shrug. “I dated the wrong guy, and my parents got a little more protective than usual.”

I didn’t say anything, because I knew she wasn’t done. Her eyes flicked down and she looked at her hands, reminding me of the night I’d seen her in the bar.

“I’m not this party girl the press makes me out to be.”

Gently, I reached up and freed the lip she was chewing down on. Her eyes tracked the motion of my hand dropping back. “Radley, I was telling the truth before – I haven’t read anything about you, and I’m not the person the press makes me out to be either, so I understand.”

Anger flared in her eyes, the fire burned bright and her jaw clenched. “Bet they’ve never called you a slut, or posted naked pictures of you. Stolen pictures.”

Her words sucker punched my gut, but me reacting with the rage now coursing through my veins wouldn’t help her. “No, they haven’t.”

She shrugged again, and the anger vanished as quickly as it arrived, way quicker than I could process her words still ringing around my ears. “Anyway, I’m sure you’ve been wondering why I’ve been a little slow or standoffish. But spending time with you… this is a big deal for me. I find it hard to trust people, if you hadn’t realized.” Her laugh was dry and devoid of humor.

I dipped my head, so she had nowhere to look but my eyes. “I wasn’t wondering, and I never have. This – us – spending time together… we will take things as slow as you need. But I will promise you this, Radley, I will earn your trust, if it’s the last thing I do.”

“Thank you,” she repeated again, like it was ingrained in her to be grateful that someone behaved like a decent human being. Then she smiled as though the conversation had never happened. “Shall we run again?”

I blinked, slightly confused at the abrupt change, but managed a smile. “Yeah. Get going.”

She turned and nodded to Agent Hernandez, who took off ahead of us.

As I matched my pace to Radley’s, one single thought bounced around my brain: I’d met her for a run, but now I was on a mission… because somewhere between our first steps and the almost dead sprint I seemed to be in now, I’d decided that I was going to show Radley what a real man was like.

Oh, who was I kidding? I decided the first time I laid eyes on her and got my ass kicked by the Secret Service.

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