Page 4 of Honey Undone
But I had gotten a taste for driving him insane and the way it made me feel was like a rush of adrenaline. I wasn't quite ready to give up just yet. The inning went by fast, the defense shut them down hard and the opposing team only brought in two runs before they were switching out. Every inning got harder to watch as the teams traded runs and the sun dropped in the sky. The last inning came around and as the lights in the stadium flickered on with a resounding buzz the Hornets were up for their last bat.
It was hard fought and by the time Jensen came out to bat, the bases were loaded, and Harbor needed every single run to win the game. He didn’t even bother to set up on the plate that time, he walked toward the fence and stared across the distance at me. His hair was sweaty and stuck up in messy brown peaks as he curled his fingers into the cage.
“Let me take you on a date,” he pleaded instead of being phased by the rowdy crowd and even more pissed off teammates. “You say we’ve never met, prove it, let me take you on a date!”
“Jensen, I will bench you!” His coach hollered from the dugout.
“You aren’t a very good baseball player,” I said with a smile.
“Ouch,” he said in a lower tone that stirred an unknown heat in the pit of my stomach as his brows furrowed together and a smirk formed on that unreasonably handsome face. “Give me one chance,” he said, that same husky tone carrying through all the noise.
“Fine.” I looked out at the bases, ignoring the desperate pleas for Jensen to play the game before he got fined or kicked off the plate.
“Yeah?” he smiled, his body pressing against the cage.
“I’ll go on a date with you if you bring everyone home,” I challenged him, and he looked behind him at the bases.
“Child’s play,” he said, his cheeky smile growing confident.
“With a bunt,” I added, leaning on the railing that separated us. “And I get to pick the date!”
“Get in the box, Number Twelve or you can leave the game and give your team an out,” the Ump ordered but Jensen just stared me down with that dumb look on his face.
“Deal.”
JENSEN
“Jensen I swear to—”
It didn’t matter what Coach said next, the entire stadium was silent when she smiled at me. I could have sworn I heard her agree to the terms, but anything after she said fine was just useless details.
Dealcame out of my mouth in between the rapid beats of my heart, and it only hit me after I said it, that I realized the gravity of my decision.Shit.I turned back to the plate and surveyed the field. Van was on third with a tight jaw, Cael on second with an unreadable expression and Louis was a bag of nerves on first. The three fastest guys on the team. It could work. I was screamed at as impatience got the best of the dugout. I looked over my shoulder at her again and couldn’t help but grin seeing her leaned forward in her seat watching.
If the prettiest girl in Harbor wanted a game-winning bunt,I’d give her one.
Dean hissed from my left as I delicately planted my feet in the loose sand. Looking at him was a death wish. He would burn a hole through what little confidence I had to pull off the move. I rotated my hands on the bat, it felt heavy in my hands, but the weight made me feel at home in the batter's box.
All I had to do was hit the ball.
Colhan stared at me like I was an easy out, rolling the ball in his pitching hand with a nasty smirk on his face that meant trouble. I had one shot to get the swing right. I tapped my foot on the plate and inhaled. Timing it exactly to how he pulled his arm back and released the ball with power behind it.
As the ball came at me, I turned my back like a flicker, sticking my arm out straight and tapping the ball with just enough force. In the same second, I pushed off my back foot and took off running as fast as I could. It didn’t matterwhere I made it. The second the ball bounced, everyone scrambled. Colhan tripped over his step in the panic, missing the ball as it rolled through the infield. The entire crowd was screaming as Van made it home with Cael on his tail. Coach was screaming at Louis from the dugout as the infield finally got control of the ball. I slid across the divide and crossed second before Louis slid home just beneath the hard whip of a ball from pitcher to the catcher.
As I collided with the third baseman, the ball hit his mitt, and the Ump called me out. The baseman shoved me hard, flying off insults as I scrambled backward to the dugout with my arms in the air. I didn’t want a fight, I just wanted the girl.
I stumbled a step, the smile on my face so big it was starting to hurt as I looked over at her. Puffing up my chest and rolling back my shoulders, I pressed my lips into a knowing smirk and gave her a wink.
The girls beside her burst into laughter and screams as she stood there staring at me. Her head shook gently in disbelief and my chest lit up with fireworks as the stadium ceased to exist around us.
A hand cracked across the back of my head and I knew that Arlo had met me at the entrance of the dugout from the way it stung in the back of my eyes.
“That was ballsy.” His bite was definitely worse than his bark that time. I rubbed the spot he slapped with a smile on my face. “Good job,” he added, the serious look still pulled tight across his face.
“A bunt?” Coach was the next in line for the berating, the bridge of his nose between his fingers as he worked to control himself. Other players clapped me on the back and celebrated. “You’re an idiot, Jensen.”
“It worked.” I shrugged, narrowly avoiding the daggers flying from Dean from across the dugout. He wasn’t actually mad he was just putting on his best Captain glare to make me think he was.
“It was a fluke,” Coach corrected and tossed his clipboard on the bench behind him. “Handshake,” he snapped at everyone. “This conversation isn’t finished.”
