Page 39 of Perfect Playbook

Chapter Fourteen

It’sdark and late when we park up at Shay’s house. The moon and a few dim porch lights barely illuminate the path of what feels like a thousand steps to her front door. Memories flood back like an unstoppable tide, and nostalgia crashes through me.

I really liked Luis and our times out in the pastures on this ranch.

He was a kind but tortured man, and in those hours we mended fences, wrangled cattle and bulldozed manure, mostly silence passed between us. Still, we somehow felt comfortable in each other’s presence. I knew he missed his wife soul-deep, and once, in a rare moment of himtalking instead of me, he told me he wasn’t sure he’d last long without her.

I thought at the time how tragically sad it was and yet how similarly I felt about his daughter. But he managed. And so did I. Though it wasn’t without so much change, some might say I left behind the old me altogether. Has Luis had to change, too, in order to survive the heartbreak?

The curtains from the living room snap aside, a tuft of hair appears before they shut again.

“Looks like Nino’s still up.” Shay glows.

With a mere glimpse of her child, Shay radiates with something beautiful I haven’t ever seen before.

Tiny footsteps thud softly toward the front door. But it’s Luis who opens it.

“Logan!” He throws the door open and pushes himself out, embracing me, slapping me on the back. He pulls back with my arms in his hands. “Dios mío… what news! I have another son!”

It looks like he hasn’t changed. His embrace is the same welcoming temperature as the first time I walked into his home. While still wrapped in Luis’ arms, the door cracks open more, and there, hidden behind the limbs of his grandfather, Antonio peeps up.

Shay crouches. “Baby… you’re up so late!”

Antonio rushes through and into his mom’s open embrace. His voice is high and raspy and so damn adorable. “I missed you.”

Shay holds him like she’s been gone for longer than a day. She holds him like she didn’t breathe that entire time. She holds him like I want to hold a kid someday.

Luis and I stare at the beautiful sight until Nino draws back from the hug and looks up at me, curiosity beaming right through his tiny round glasses.

“You’re the man from the coffee shop and you play on the Scorpions.”

I crouch down to his level. “How did you know? Are you a mind reader? That’s some superpower.”

Nino giggles, and it’s a sound that tickles my heart. “I can’t read minds! I saw you at CCs and Fright Night! Mom makes us watch all the Scorpions games even if there are better things to do.”

I glance up at Shay. “You do?”

She says it a bit too quickly: “Everyone watches the Scorpions.”

Her dad, clueless on what I was really asking Shay, jumps in. “Tell me one person in Starlight Canyon who doesn’t want to see you win. Am I right?”

I hold out my hand for Antonio. “I’m Logan. Nice to meet you.”

He laughs again, maybe at the formality of my offered hand, maybe just because he seems like an incredibly happy kid. Either way, he takes my hand and squeezes it pretty damn hard for a five-year old.

I flick my hand as if it hurts. “Wow. Firm grip.”

“Papá Luis says there’s nothing worse than a wet fish handshake,” he says, matter of fact.

I remember Shay’s brother, Santi, nearly crushing my palm with a shake. The Mendez family takes greetings seriously. “Your grandpa is a wise man.”

Shay scoops Nino up into her arms, standing at the same time, and kisses his cheek. “You, mister, are going to be very tired tomorrow if you stay up any later. It’s nearly ten o’clock.”

She carries him inside. Luis ushers me in and closes the door behind us.

Antonio protests. “But I went to bed for two hoursbefore and then got back up to see you. So if I go to bed at eleven then I’ll still get ten hours of sleep which means I can stay up one more hour.” He turns his wrist around to read a tiny watch. “One more hour and eighteen minutes with you. And Logan. He’s the one you used to be in love with but now you’re friends. Right?”

There’s a touch of embarrassment hidden in her laugh, but her eyes shimmer with affection. She explains to me why she spoke to her son about me. “He asked who you were after one of the times we ran into each other.”

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