Page 129 of Wild Pitch
“Is that so?” She smiles while her teeth scrape over her bottom lip and, ah, shit. I feel that everywhere. “Well, where do they stray?”
Breathing out roughly, I respond factually, “I’m very, very weak for your thighs.”
She bends forward to look down at herself. “What about them?”
“Hmm.” I tuck my tongue against my cheek as she straightens up again. “I’m not sure I can answer that honestly with so many families nearby.”
Hope gasps. “Oh my gosh, Cade!”
“I’ll just say this…” I grin. “They’re a work of art that I’m really glad they’re not in a museum, because that way I get to touch them.”
“Cade.” She smacks the fence as if it was me. “You’re bananas.”
“So, what’s your favorite part of me? Surely there’s something that makes you, er, bananas.”
Narrowing her eyes, she asks, “What do you intend to do with that knowledge?”
“To show off, of course.” I shrug.
A corner of her lips lifts into a little smirk. “I appreciate the honesty. However, the issue is that it’s not just one part.”
I retreat one step to put my hands up. “Okay, don’t get me wrong. I don’t salivatejustover your thighs either—they just happen to make me putty. But I assure you the rest of you makes my blood boil too.”
Hope throws her head back and laughs from her belly. The gorgeous, gorgeous sound floats me from the ground and maybe I start losing oxygen from the altitude, because I keep running my big mouth.
“I’m very partial to how your butt fits in my hands too, but honestly I almost lose it at the dip in the small of your back. And you know I love your hair too.” I demonstrate with my hands. “Next time I kiss you I intend to wrap it around my hand like this.”
Her breath hitches.
My face splits into a grin. “And let’s not even talk about your lips because it’ll get me kicked out of this family friendly place.”
“I’m sure you can come up with ways to keep it PG.”
I curl my finger and she steps closer. I lean down until we’re more level and I can whisper. “I can’t stop staring at them and remembering what they taste like. The fact that I have this knowledge now feels like a miracle.”
“See? That’s pretty safe for work,” Hope says slowly, sounding out of air.
“But my favorite part is your eyes.” I lean my helmet into the fence, observing precisely those brown eyes deeper than an ocean, just as alluring in the uneven lighting of a batting cage in the nighttime as they are when the sunlight hits them directly, making them transform into spun gold. I don’t know how to translate that feeling into words that give them any justice, so all I say is, “I don’t want to stop staring at them.”
She sighs long and hard, one of her hands rising to curl her fingers around the chainlink fence but right below mine. “Geez, no need for so many compliments.”
“On contrary. This is nowhere near enough.”
Her eyes shift down, cheeks pink enough that I know she’s embarrassed. Clearing her throat, she admits, “I like your butt.”
My eyebrows take off. “Huh?”
“It’s just—baseball boys’s butts are the most perfect butts in sports. This is a hill I’m willing to die on.”
I choke back a laugh. “Wait, baseball boys’s or my butt?”
“Yours is pretty superior, not gonna lie.” Slowly, she lifts an almost shy grin. “I can’t wait for yourSPORTYissue to come out so I can study it in detail.”
“Why wait?” I shrug. “You can visually and tactfully inspect it any time.”
Her jaw drops. “You’re kidding?”
“Am I laughing?” I pause. “At least on the outside, I mean. This is really tickling me on the inside.”
