Chapter Fourteen #2
Jake leaned back, concern etched on his face. “Okay. And how did that go?”
“Good? She heard us in my room. I didn’t tell her. But she doesn’t mind. She thinks it’s great, actually. And she won’t tell, don’t worry.”
“I trust her. I always liked your sister.” He traced his finger over Nico’s cheeks. “You feel good about it? About talking to her?”
“Yeah. Surprisingly. We talked about a lot of stuff.” He inhaled, relishing the lack of resistance in his chest, his guilt over his mother faded. Not vanished, but maybe eventually.
“Glad to hear it.” Jake’s phone rang, and he groaned, rolling out of bed. Standing there naked, strong and steady, he answered, and Nico let himself look.
Jake listened to whoever had called, a low rumble of a distant voice.
“Okay. Yes. I understand. Right.” He glanced at Nico.
“I think Agresta would certainly be able to pitch Thursday if you want to bump him up. Even without the all-star break, he’s young.
He bounces back faster than the rest of the rotation. ”
Adrenaline zooming through him, Nico bolted up like an arrow. One of the other guys in their five-man starting rotation had to be hurt. Shit, fuck, shit. Was it bad? Who was it?
Jake hung up and faced him. “Carter strained his hamstring. He’s going on the DL, so they’re bumping up Palmer in the rotation to today.
Bullpen’s shallow right now, so they need to look at the roster and figure out who to send down to bring up another arm.
I’ve got to get in there and go over Chicago’s lineup for this afternoon with Skip, Palmer, and the coaches.
I was expecting to DH today since Baldoni catches Carter. ”
“Shit, hope he’s okay.” Nico and Carter didn’t talk much, but Carter was a good guy.
Even if he wasn’t, Nico never wanted to see another pitcher end up on the disabled list. “Yeah, of course I can pitch Thursday. It’s only Sunday now.
Easy.” As if to spite him, his shoulder twinged, and he rolled it, tension stiffening his spine.
Jake crawled back onto the mattress. “Don’t start worrying.”
Nico’s mind spun through Boston’s likely batting order. It would have probably been the same Friday, but now that it was a day sooner, his plan felt compromised, and his pulse galloped.
“We’ll handle it. Okay?” Jake rubbed Nico’s knee.
He nodded, but his breath came faster, and he scrubbed his nails over the back of his neck.
He’d been feeling so much better, so relaxed.
But suddenly he wanted to leap out of his skin.
What the fuck was wrong with him? So he was pitching a day earlier than planned.
It didn’t matter! Why was he freaking out?
Frustration clawed at his throat, and he wanted to scream.
“Hey, hey. Breathe.” Jake smoothed his palm over Nico’s leg, pressing down, his fingers curling over Nico’s tender inner thigh. “Don’t psyche yourself out. Take it one pitch at a time. I’ll be there with you.” He squeezed gently. “Okay? Pitch by pitch.”
Nico licked his lips, his breathing slowing. “Okay.”
Jake kept his hand on Nico’s leg as if he could ground him. “I have faith in you. You can do it. Just don’t get ahead of yourself. Don’t start thinking about a million other things.”
Inhaling and exhaling slowly, the panic receding, Nico tried to smile. “When it’s just you and me like this, I can almost believe it’s possible.”
“It is possible. If I could, I’d fuck those worries out of you on the mound. But I think Skip might object. The league too. Police. Public decency laws and all that.”
Nico’s shoulders shook with laughter, tension easing bit by bit.
“Hey, I can give you a sign.” He pressed firmly against Nico’s inner thigh. “When I do this to my own leg, imagine it’s you I’m touching. That I’m right here with you, and you can breathe, and everything’s okay.”
Nico looked down at where Jake’s hand cupped his thigh. “Our own sign? Just for me?”
He pressed firmly. “Only for you. It’ll be quick, but you’ll feel it like you do now. You’ll remember how good it is when you let go. When you let me take control.”
Nico swallowed thickly. “I’ll feel it,” he whispered, his gaze locking with Jake’s.
Jake kissed him then, his palm still heavy on Nico’s leg as their lips met. There was only the next breath and wet sweetness, baseball a million miles away.
Nico lunged for his phone on the coffee table as the screen lit up, tuning out the too-loud horse race his dad was glued to.
There were two couches in the large, sunken living room, decorated in dark leather everything.
Dad sat back on the other couch, paying avid attention to the prerace buildup, his slacks and button-up shirt neatly pressed as always.
He scanned the text from Jake:
Landed in TO. Dreading this charity dinner, but duty calls.
After unlocking his phone, Nico’s thumbs flew. He wanted to say: MISS YOU ALREADY! YOU’RE GOING TO THINK I’M CRAZY, BUT I LOVE YOU!
Instead he typed out a message without all-caps, telling Jake to try and have fun and get to bed early.
As the message was delivered, he chewed his thumbnail.
Was that too naggy? Too…boyfriendy? Were they boyfriends?
Were they dating? Did Jake want any of that?
He’d stayed single so many years, and maybe he had no desire to change it. Maybe—
The three bubbles popped up, undulating.
Don’t worry, no partying for me tonight. Are you back home? Enjoy the cannoli, you bastard. Jealous.
Nico exhaled and typed: Yeah, staying until Wednesday. Morning flight back to Ottawa. He weighed his next words. Guess I’ll see you then? Was that too casual? Wish you were here. No. Too…clingy, or something. Finally he just hit send without another line. He waited.
Cool. Talk to you soon.
As his dad muttered something about gait, Nico read Jake’s last text repeatedly, as if he expected the words to change at some point.
Would Jake call later? Should Nico? Did “talk” mean actually speak, or did it mean text?
Should Nico go to Toronto and surprise him? No, that was definitely too clingy.
He checked the screen again, forcing himself to put the phone in his jeans pocket. Nonna’s garlic tomato sauce that had been simmering on the stove for days permeated the house, rich with onion and fresh herbs Nico couldn’t identify but smelled like home.
Valentina and Marco wouldn’t arrive for dinner for a few hours, and even though a bunch of cousins were coming too, maybe he could get Val alone for a minute to get her advice about Jake.
He and Jake had fucked twice that morning before Jake had to catch his flight, and Nico’s ass still felt it. His lips looked normal in the mirror, but felt deliciously swollen.
“What’re you grinning about over there? There’s no way Idlewood’s going to win this race. Forget the Triple Crown.” Socked feet on a wide leather ottoman, Dad gulped from his beer bottle.
After breaking down and checking his lock screen—still empty but for an aerial shot of the Caps’ stadium—Nico sipped from his own beer.
Nonna was weeding out in the massive garden, and maybe he should go help her, even though she’d swatted away his earlier offer. She was probably too old to be kneeling so long, but no one dared tell her that. And more power to her. That garden was her baby, and she still hummed when she tended it.
“Maybe if they didn’t have this fairy riding her, Idlewood would stand a chance. He won’t use enough crop. I know it. Too light-wristed like they all are.”
Nico’s bottle clattered and almost tipped as he slammed it onto a marble coaster.
“What crawled up your ass now?”
You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. Not that Jake had crawled so much as hammered. God, he wanted Jake’s cock again. He wanted it all day, every day.
“The silent treatment, huh? Okay.”
“No,” Nico grumbled. “First I’m too happy, now this.”
Dad popped a few sunflower seeds in his mouth. It’d been tobacco back in the day, but Nico’s mother had forbidden it when they married. Sometimes Nico wondered why Dad hadn’t gone back to it once she was gone.
He spit the husks into a little bowl. “I didn’t say that.”
“Fine, whatever.”
Attention back on the TV, Dad groused, “I’m telling you, this guy’s too much of a pussy to get the job done.”
Nico bolted up straight, on the edge of the couch now. “Would you stop with the name-calling?”
Shoulders shaking, Dad had a good laugh. “What?”
His whole life, Nico had never objected. Never said a word. But suddenly it was too much, and something hard inside him gave way, snapping right in half this time. “Stop with the homophobic and misogynistic bullshit! Stop calling people names. Stop being such an asshole!”
Any traces of laughter vanished. “What did you say to me?”
Nico’s heart drummed. “You heard me.”
“So you’re offended? Is that it? You sneeze nowadays and someone’s fucking offended. Tough shit.”
He kept his voice even, little more than a whisper. “What if I was a fairy? A queer, a faggot, a cocksucker?”
Dad stared, not blinking. Then he picked up the remote and muted the TV on the wall. “What did you say?”
“You heard me.”
He scoffed. “Cut the shit. I get your point. I’ll try not to offend your delicate fucking sensibilities in the future.”
Broken glass coated his tongue, but Nico went on. “You don’t get it. I’m all those things. I’m those awful, disgusting things. You don’t want queers in baseball, but you’re looking at one. A queer in the family too. Sorry to disappoint.”
Running his tongue over his teeth, Dad turned back to the TV, breathing hard through his nose. He was silent for a few heartbeats, going completely still. “I never said that.”