“It’s cool. Thank you for inviting me to the concert. I’m sure we’ll have fun.”
That was it? I wrapped my arms around her and pulled the blanket more securely around us. “You’re not all weirded out?”
Jordan shook her head. “Nope. I mean, wow. But she isn’t really a part of your life.” She leaned against me, laying her ear against my chest over my heart. “Knowing who your mom is doesn’t change who you are. And I’m more interested in you.”
“Oh, really?” I asked, rolling onto my back and pulling her with me.
“Really,” Jordan giggled.
“What exactly are you interested in?”
Jordan’s eyes sparkled in the soft light from the moon. “I’m interested in this.” She kissed my chin. “And this.” Her lips grazed my jaw. “And this.” She reached for my cheek, but I turned my head so she kissed my lips instead. She giggled against them, but only for a moment before I deepened the kiss.
Forget falling. I’d already fallen.
Epilogue
Jordan
Two year later
Asher: Where are you?
Me: Calm down. We’re almost there.
Asher: I can’t see you.
Me: There are thirty thousand people here!
Asher: Just hurry. I need to see you. I swear I’m going to throw up.
Me: I’m coming, babe. Just breathe.
I could picture Asher pacing backstage. Jarom and the other guys never seemed to get as nervous for some reason, but Asher turned into a complete basket case just before walking on stage. Of course, this show would be unlike anything Breakout had ever done before. Tonight was their first night opening for Carly Ryan on her new tour.
As Carly’s security guys carved a path for me to the seat reserved for me, front and center of the stage, I thought back to the night two years ago when Asher made good on his promise to Payton and took us to see Carly’s concert. We’d collected our tickets at will call and almost immediately Carly’s assistant, Amanda, appeared out of nowhere and ushered us backstage where we met Payton’s favorite band, Carbine. We spent about ten starstruck minutes talking to Carbine before their set started. Once they left to go onstage, Amanda escorted us to Carly’s dressing room.
Asher hugged his mom, his clammy hand still gripping mine. He wouldn’t let me go. He acted tough, but seeing her wasn’t as easy for him as he let on.
Carly hadn’t at all been what I expected. From the way Asher described her from those early days, I thought she might be aloof, distracted. But she was warm, welcoming, and thrilled to see Asher. Her eyes lit the moment he walked into her dressing room and she couldn’t stop touching him. Caressing his shoulder. Brushing his hair from his forehead. She must have hugged him ten times in the twenty minutes we visited with her.
He was right.
She did love him.
So did his dad. After the concert, Asher began seeing more and more of his mom. She took an interest in his songwriting and even sang a couple of his songs on her last album. Derek hadn’t been very excited about Asher’s plans, but recognized a losing battle when he saw one. Asher would never play hockey the way his dad wanted him to, and he’d just had to accept that. Shari helped.
“Here you are, Miss Parks,” one of the security guards gestured toward a roped off section beside the sound guys with a single padded chair. I’d invited Natalie and Kelly, but neither of them could get away.
“Thanks, guys.” I climbed over the ropes into my secluded area. It wasn’t very big and not as conspicuous as it felt.
“We’ll be back as soon as Mr. Sloane is finished to take you back to him.” Asher worried about me getting trampled or something, I guess. I thought the security and special seating arrangement were overkill, but Asher insisted.
I nodded to the security guards as I pulled my phone back out of my pocket. Two more texts from Asher. Surely, he should be concentrating on what he was about to do! Still, I was the same way before every hockey game. I’d been playing for the University of Wisconsin. Asher couldn’t always make it to my games, but he tried. And when he couldn’t make it, he always texted me right before to wish me luck and tell me he loved me.
Me: I’m here. Can you see me?
My hand shot up in the air.
Asher: Yes. Can you see me?
I scanned the left side of the stage where I knew he would be. He stood in the shadows, but I’d recognize that silhouette anywhere.
Me: Yes, babe. You’re going to be amazing.
Asher: I love you.
My heart leaped in my chest. He’d said the words before, many times, but it didn’t matter. Each time felt like the first.
Me: I love you, too. Knock em dead.
I looked back up and Jarom, Adam, and Bash had already found their places on stage. I marveled that Asher could send me a text message one second and stride out in front of thousands of screaming fans the next. But that’s just what he did.
Who needed a padded chair? I couldn’t sit down if my legs fell off. With my heart in my throat, I watched Asher point out into the audience, right to me. Our eyes connected.
“This is for you, baby,” his silky voice said into his microphone. “Always for you.”
The End.
Thank you for reading Jordan and Asher’s story! Keep reading for a free sample of the third book in the series, Playing the Field, by Christina Benjamin. And if for some reason you didn’t read the first book by Maggie Dallen, check out Playing the Enemy.
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Playing the Field
By Christina Benjamin
Prologue
Alex’s Story
I don’t know how to describe my first kiss to you. I also don’t know if it was so incredibly mind-blowingly magical because the lips to first touch mine belonged to Grant King, but I’m not going to dwell on that. I’m going to dwell on how we finally got there. Because this play took some extra innings.
Chapter 1
Alex
“What do you mean there’s no softball team?” I demanded, my hands instantly balling into fists.
“Calm down, sweetie,” my mom said, brushing off my outrage like she hadn’t just dropped a bomb on me. “Your dad will put a call into the school. We’ll get this sorted out.”
“Mom!” I exclaimed. “Softball is my life! I’m a junior this year. If I don’t play softball my chances to get an athletic scholarship will be nonexistent!”
“I know, sweetheart. No need to be so dramatic. We’ll sort something out for you.”
I bit my nails as I glared out the car window. I hated when my mom talked about my future in sports like it was no more pressing than her grocery list. She probably thought she could swap items out just as easily as replacing Double Stuf Oreos for chocolate chip cookies. ‘No softball at your new school, sweetie? No problem. We’ll just swap it out for scrapbook club.’
Why didn’t she understand, for some things in life, there were no substitutions?
My mom would never dare treat my brothers this way. But then again everything in life was easier for boys, wasn’t it?
I was still trying to absorb the bitter reality my mom had just served as my new high school came into view. The unimpressive brick building was barely visible between the lush, green pine trees. It was a stark difference from my last school in Arizona, and the one before that in California. Before that was New York, then Massachusetts, then California again, then Nevada, then . . .
Honestly, it’s too exhausting to recount.
To say I was used to starting over was an understatement. Each year brought a new school, a new start, a new team. That’s the deal when your dad is David Prince, retired MLB legend turned college baseball coach. He had to go where the jobs were and we had to go with him.
Well, not all of us.
Not anymore.
This was the first time I’d be starting at a new school alone. I was used to having my brothers with me to help ease the transition. But as of last year, I’m the last of the Prince kids without a high school diploma.
Sometimes being the youngest is the worst. Actually, it’s always the worst.
I love my family don’t get me wrong, but there are a few things you probably need to know to understand where I’m coming from.
First of all, I’m the youngest of five children. All of them boys. Except me of course. The funny thing is, I was supposed to be a boy. Or at least that’s what the doctors thought.
How they could get something like that wrong in this day and age is beyond me, but it’s just my luck that they did.
My parents were expecting baby number five to be another bouncing baby boy. One more to add to the Prince brood of blue-eyed boys; Sam, Zach, Luke and Will. But what they got was a big old surprise.
Me.
The crazy thing is . . . sometimes I think my life would be a heck of a lot easier if I’d just been born the boy everyone was expecting. Because being a tomboy isn’t easy.
By the time I was born my name had already been painted on my blue nursery wall and printed on my token Prince infant-sized baseball jersey. Luckily, my parents picked a name a girl could rock—Alex.
That’s me—Alex Prince.
Actually, my name is one of my favorite things about me. It has swagger. It’s probably the best thing to come out of my doctor’s gender blunder. If my mom had known she was having a baby girl, she would’ve named me something ridiculous like Rosebud or Petunia. As it was, she’d made my dad repaint my room pink, and traded out all my practical baby boy clothes for frilly things made of ruffles and lace.
I get it. I really do. My mom had been an army of one in a house of testosterone for a long time. When I came along, she thought she was finally getting reinforcements. The trouble was, she got me, a total tomboy.
By the time I could walk she knew she could kiss her ideas of pedicures and princess parties goodbye. My idea of dress-up was putting on my dad’s old baseball jersey and playing catch with the boys.
At sixteen, not much has changed.
My mom still desperately decorated every new bedroom of mine in powdery pink pastels and I still wore baseball hand-me-downs and played catch with boys. But now, I wasn’t toddling after them—more like running circles around them.
The truth was, I was a good athlete. More than good. Thanks to the tough love of my brothers and tutelage of my dad, I could outplay just about anyone who stepped foot on a baseball field with me—male or female.
But if the sinking feeling in my chest was any indicator, I wouldn’t be doing any of that at this new softball-less school of mine.
I wasn’t sure how my dad was going to pull a softball team out of thin air, but he’d never let me down before. He didn’t seem as bothered as my mom that his daughter had turned out to be a tomboy. I decided not to waste time dwelling on my current sports dilemma. I had other things to worry about. Like not being pegged as the weird new girl.
Here goes nothing!
Playing the Field releases on November 13!
Also by Stephanie Street
Young Adult Novels
The Perks of Dating You (Perks Book 1)
The Perks of Hating You (Perks Book 2)
The Perks of Kissing You (Perks Book 3
The Perks of Waiting for You (Perks Book 4)
Dating: One on One (Eastridge Heights Basketball 1)
Dating: On the Rebound (Eastridge Heights Basketball 2)
Dating: For the Block (Eastridge Heights Basketball 3)
Dating: For the Assist (Eastridge Heights Basketball Book 4)
Save Me
Us at the Beach
Clean Billionaire Romance
Marrying the Football Billionaire
Humbling the Spoiled Billionaire
Contemporary Romance
Chasing Paris
Find Stephanie Street
Stephanie Street - Author Instagram Feed
Stephanie Street - Facebook Page
Email Address:
[email protected]
Website -
www.stephaniestreetauthor.com
Playing to Win (The Trouble with Tomboys Book2) Page 17
