“They’re great.” Then he narrowed his eyes at her. “What?”
She must look as bewildered as she felt. It was just hard to imagine the arrogant, womanizing Dax coming from a nice, normal family. He seemed like the kind of person who had been raised by wolves. In a mansion.
“What?” he protested again. “They are. They’re kind of insane, mind you, but I love them.”
Huh. The easy, casual way he said he loved his family surprised her. “They must be really proud of you.”
He nodded. “Ridiculously so. It’s actually a little embarrassing—you should see my mother’s Christmas letter.” He stole a fry from her. “I just wish they would let me help them.”
“What do you mean?”
“They still live in the tiny house I grew up in, in a not-great area of Scarborough.”
That surprised her. He was such a force, so confident and capable—and rich—that she just assumed he’d come from money.
“It’s fine,” he continued. “It’s just that they could be so much more comfortable. And they’re getting old. It would great to have them somewhere they don’t have to shovel or take care of the lawn. But they won’t move.”
“They sound great.” She meant it, even if she was simultaneously a little jealous. What would it be like to be surrounded with people who loved and supported you, people you didn’t have to constantly be managing? People who thought you were enough?
A jeer went up from the crowd around them.
“What’s happening?” Dax asked.
Amy had been paying attention as they talked. “Buehrle struck out the last two batters, and the count was two-two, but that guy just hit a single.”
“Ah.”
She glanced at the scoreboard and grabbed a handful of fries. Just because Dax had inserted a premature fry course into her normal routine didn’t mean she was skipping her bottom-of-the-second-inning snack. She handed the basket to Dax. “Eat up. After the next out, it’s time for ice cream.”
He grinned. “Yes, ma’am.”
Chapter Six
Damn, Amy knew baseball. Dax wasn’t particularly a fan, but he’d thought he had a good enough handle on the game.
Still, in the sixth inning, when she grabbed his arm and shrieked with delight, squealing, “RBI with no swing!” he was forced to say, “What?”
“The bases were loaded,” she explained without looking at him, sitting forward in her seat and beaming down at the field. “And there was a full count. The last pitch was a ball, so the batter walked. Since the bases were loaded, the runner at third walks home. The batter gets an RBI, and he never even swung the bat!” She clapped her hands. “It’s one of those weird baseball things.”
“Yeah, ninety percent of baseball I understand fine, but there is some arcane shit, isn’t there?” Though possibly part of the problem in this case was that he was watching Amy more than the play on the field.
“I’ll give you arcane. Listen to this one! What is the weirdest way to get a runner to first base?”
It had to be something more than just the usual hit or walk. He searched his memory. “Ah, the batter is hit by a pitch?”
“No!” She bounced up and down in her seat. “A runner is on first when a game is suspended. If that runner is traded before the game resumes, a new runner gets to go in. So he gets to first without ever picking up a bat!”
“Has that ever happened?”
“I have no idea!” She laughed and slumped back in her seat theatrically, clutching her hands to her chest. “I love baseball.”
She loved rules, this one. Systems, plans, routine. It’s why she was such a baseball nut—and why she had rules about when she ate which snacks. It was probably also why she was so good at real estate. Until a few days ago, it used to annoy the shit out of him. She was always rearranging stuff in the office fridge, making it impossible to find anything. But now, for some reason, her penchant for order seemed strangely…hot. Which made no sense, because Dax had always been more of a go-with-the-flow kind of guy. Too bad he couldn’t have come to this realization sooner, back before she was all vulnerable and heartbroken. They could have had some fun together. Well, except for Mason. But still, it was nice to see her so unreservedly happy.
He checked himself there. Being concerned about a woman’s happiness was not generally a practice he wanted to embrace. He’d tried to make Allison happy, to fix all her problems, and look how that had turned out. He shifted in his seat, watching Amy watch a game on the Jumbotron, where a seat number was drawn and its occupant answered trivia questions. When the hapless fan got the first question wrong, Amy buried her face in her hands, crying out as if personally wounded by the wrong answer.