Announcing Trouble Read online

  Table of Contents

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  Chapter Fifty

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Discover more of Entangled Teen Crush’s books… The Crush Collision

  The Boyfriend Bid

  Offsetting Penalties

  All Laced Up

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Copyright © 2019 by Amy Fellner Dominy. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.

  Entangled Publishing, LLC

  2614 South Timberline Road

  Suite 105, PMB 159

  Fort Collins, CO 80525

  [email protected]

  Crush is an imprint of Entangled Publishing, LLC.

  Edited by Stacy Abrams and Judi Lauren

  Cover design by Bree Archer

  Cover photography by

  Look Studio and LightField Studios/Shutterstock

  ca2hill/GettyImages

  ISBN 978-1-64063-843-3

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  First Edition August 2019

  Dear Reader,

  Thank you for supporting a small publisher! Entangled prides itself on bringing you the highest quality romance you’ve come to expect, and we couldn’t do it without your continued support. We love romance, and we hope this book leaves you with a smile on your face and joy in your heart.

  xoxo

  Liz Pelletier, Publisher

  To Terry Lynn Johnson for always reading, listening, commiserating, understanding, encouraging, supporting and inspiring me.

  Chapter One

  For a cold day in hell, it’s unseasonably warm.

  I squint against the sun, but unfortunately that doesn’t change the view of what’s ahead—or the fact that I’m heading there of my own free will. A baseball field. The one place I swore I’d never step foot again.

  Mai stops me with a hand on my arm. “How do I look?” A breeze ruffles the spiky edges of her chin-length bob.

  “Nervous,” I say.

  “This is a bad idea, isn’t it?”

  “Yes,” I tell her. For about the tenth time. “I’ve never seen you this crazy over a boy before.”

  “I know, and I don’t like it.” She’s wearing her usual—a button-down shirt over leggings and sneakers—but she’s added red lipstick. She never wears makeup. Mai is one of those naturally beautiful girls who doesn’t try and doesn’t care.

  Until Anthony Adams turned his million-watt smile on her six days ago.

  “We can still leave,” I say, making it sound like the best idea ever. Because it is.

  “I can’t,” she groans. “My girl parts have staged a coup and taken control.” She glances to the field where our baseball team, the Cholla High Wildcats, is now jogging out for the start of the first inning. She grabs my hand and holds it against her chest. “Feel how fast my heart’s beating?”

  “He’s a jock, Mai. You don’t even like sports.”

  “I know.” She looks at me helplessly. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. Mai is the kind of person who’s intense about everything. It makes sense that when she finally decided to fall in lust, she’d fall hard.

  But Anthony is the complete opposite of Mai’s dream guy. I know. I’ve seen her checklist. I get the whole bad-boy vibe with the longish hair, the tees that hug his muscles—even the heavy chain he wears around his wrist is kind of hot if you like that look.

  Which Mai never has.

  But Anthony is also a player—in every sense of the word. This year I have to pass his locker, and a few of his teammates’, to reach mine. I’ve seen the constant rotation of girls. Maybe it’s innocent, maybe he’s a great guy, but I grew up around baseball and I’ve seen enough that, I’m sorry, but they’re guilty until proven innocent.

  Especially when it comes to my best friend.

  But even though I’ve warned Mai, here we are. This is so far from her comfort zone, I’m hoping that watching a game will be enough to crush her crush. But still…baseball. There’s a clear crack as someone’s bat finds the ball and then a cheer from the crowd on the bleachers.

  I shudder under the warm Phoenix sun. I vowed it would be a cold day in hell before I ever watched baseball again. But Mai is my best friend. You do not send your bestie into enemy territory without backup.

  I grab her arm. “Let’s get this over with.”

  Hell, here I come.

  We’re in the fifth inning. Anthony Adams is, as I predicted, uninterested in the brainy girl mooning at him from behind home plate. The bleachers are surprisingly crowded, which is why we’re so close to the action. My seat is partially blocked by the elevated broadcast booth, which I didn’t mind at first, but now I’m getting annoyed. I can hear everything the announcers are saying, and these guys are awful. I’m sure the only people listening are parents and grandparents, but even so, they deserve better.

  “That’s a hit from Clemens.” It’s the one with the higher voice. He must be right by the door because I hear him the loudest. “Too bad it was caught by the right fielder.”

  I knock my knuckles against my forehead. “It’s not a hit if it gets caught.”

  “Shhh,” Mai says. “Don’t distract me with actual information about the game.”

  “I thought you liked learning new things.”

  “Not about this.”

  “Mai Senn.” I add her last name because I know she hates it. It sounds like you’re saying “My Sin.” Her first name is actually Maya. It has something to do with a Greek goddess, springtime, and the month of May—which is when her parents adopted her. But everyone calls her Mai.

  I’m thinking about how to get her out of here when she squeezes my arm. “Did you see that? Anthony almost caught the ball with his mitt-thing.”

  “It’s a baseball glove.”

  Mai has to
be the only one here who knows less than the announcers. To be fair, the guy doing play-by-play knows his stuff. But the guy who’s supposed to add color with his commentary—hence the title “color commentary”—could have his brains completely removed with a teaspoon. “He’s terrible,” I complain.

  “Who?” Anthony is adjusting himself at third base, and Mai is riveted.

  “He’s wearing a cup,” I say. “It’s not real.”

  “Do not kill my buzz.”

  I swallow a laugh. Mai is kind of adorable when irrational. Who knew.

  Then I hear the announcer again, his words setting me on edge. “That should have been called a balk. That pitcher didn’t come set.”

  I shoot to my feet. “I can not listen to this for one more second.” I take two steps down and tug the door open. Both guys turn at the noise. I ignore the blond who’s doing the play-by-play and point a finger at the blithering idiot closest to me. “You. Stop. You are terrible.”

  “What?” He gapes at me.

  “My ears are bleeding. I can’t take it anymore.”

  He yanks down the microphone piece attached to his headset. “You can’t come in here!” He looks to his partner for support.

  I recognize Blondie. Even if you hate sports, it’s hard to avoid knowing who the star athletes are at our school. Not to mention he’s one of the other players whose locker I walk by every morning. His name is Garrett Reeves and he’s hurt this year, which is probably why he’s in the booth. I’d heard broken arm, but other than a scar on the inside of his elbow, he looks ridiculously fit. If he’s supposed to carry me bodily from the booth, he could do it.

  He adjusts a knob on the equipment, then swivels his stool toward me but makes no move to get up. “And you are?”

  “Annoyed,” I answer. “You can’t have a balk without a runner on base. This guy obviously has no idea what the infield fly rule is, and that foul ball he was raving about? It was a hit by pitch.”

  A slow smile works across Garrett’s face. “And you could do better?”

  I scoff. “In my sleep.”

  “Big talker. Should we see if she can back it up, Nathan?”

  “What? No way,” Nathan blusters. “She needs to get out of here. Now.”

  Garrett is still grinning. I roll my eyes. Dark blond hair and denim blue eyes. Completely gorgeous. He’s such a cliché. “Shouldn’t you be doing your job?” I ask. “Number 54 just walked. We got a sub coming to the plate. You want to tell the listeners?”

  Eyebrows a few shades darker than his hair shoot up. He studies me another second with a look of approval and something else that makes his eyes spark and the back of my neck warm. Then he tips his head at Nathan. “She’s right about the balk. And you were wrong last inning when the pitcher struck the hitter’s hands.”

  Well. Blondie knows his baseball.

  “Come on, Nathan,” he adds in an easy voice. “She obviously knows her stuff. Let’s see what she can do when we’re live.”

  Nathan yanks off the headphones. “If I leave, I’m not coming back. You’re on your own. For the competition, too.”

  There’s a silent exchange I don’t understand. It lasts long enough for the player at the plate to foul off the next pitch. Then Garrett shrugs. “Do what you gotta do.”

  Nathan tosses the headphones on the counter and manages to jab his elbow into my arm on his way out.

  “Ow! Jerk face!”

  “Sorry about that,” Garrett says. “You okay?”

  “Fine,” I mutter, rubbing the sting out of my arm.

  He gestures to the now vacant stool. The backstop rattles at the impact of another foul ball, and he glances down at the field. “Let’s get you on air.”

  On air.

  I take a steadying breath. I’m thrilled that the bad smelling cologne was Nathan’s and not the guy I’m left with for the next two innings. But the next two innings? My heart drops like a breaking ball and I realize I’ve just committed myself to calling the rest of this game.

  I blame it on this sport. It makes me lose my mind.

  “You sitting?” he asks. “Or was all of that a show?” He crosses his arms over his chest. I wonder if that’s a practiced move to make his biceps flex. Which they do.

  I shake off my nerves. I’m not one to back down—and no way am I backing down from a ballplayer. His smirk is too much like all the self-centered players I grew up around.

  Too much like my father’s.

  I sit and lift my gaze to his. “Plug me in, Blondie.”

  Chapter Two

  Garrett stares a second in surprise—not sure if it’s my tone or the nickname—but I like that I’ve thrown him a curve. Then he starts fiddling with a panel the size of a long computer keyboard, and I take a second to look around. The broadcast booth is bare bones and no bigger than a walk-in closet. It reminds me of a house someone forgot to finish, with plywood walls, a cement floor, and a brown laminate countertop that looks glued on. Expensive-looking equipment is spread out on the counter, cords running like veins from one thing to another. I’m not a techy person, so I really hope I’m not expected to touch any of it.

  Garrett adjusts his headset and says, “Sorry, folks. A little change going on in the booth today. Nathan had to step out, and just up from the minor leagues we have…” He pauses for me to answer.

  “Josie.”

  “Josie,” he repeats into his mic. He gestures to the headphones that I hope aren’t crawling with Nathan germs as I settle them over my ears and shift the arm of the microphone.

  “All right, folks,” he says. “We’ve got Evan Harris up at the plate. Tucker Lewis is on first with a walk, and Cooper Davies is stretching a lead at third base. You with me, Josie?” He gives me another cocky smirk. The boys must practice that in Little League. I ignore him, repositioning my stool so I can sit on the edge and lean my elbows on the counter.

  Field awareness. It’s one of the first things my dad taught me. I was still in diapers when I’d stand beside him at the fence of a ball field. I’d stick one sneaker through the metal links the same way he did.

  See what’s there, but see what’s coming next.

  My father lied about everything else, but never baseball.

  Now, I quickly scan the situation. The booth is elevated to give us a view of the field and the scoreboard through a huge cutout window. There’s no glass, so I’m not sure how they cover it for the five days every year that it rains here, but it does give us great sightlines.

  I’m not an expert at sports broadcasting, but I do know it’s Garrett’s job to update the audience on everything happening on the field. As the color commentary person, I’m supposed to add in stats about the players and opinions on how they’ve been doing. It doesn’t help that this is my first game in four years at Cholla. On the other hand, it’s not as if I can’t talk baseball.

  “The catcher is setting up outside,” I say. “Looking for Evan Harris to chase one.” Sure enough, he swings at a ball that’s at least a foot off the plate.

  “Harris’s swing catches nothing but air. The count is Oh and One,” Garrett adds.

  Two more balls follow along with another strike. “The Tigers’ pitcher is throwing really well,” I say. “He’s got a sharp curveball with great depth to pair with his sinking two-seam fastball.”

  Garrett nods. “You have a good eye.”

  “Better than Evan Harris. He just swung at what would have been three balls.”

  Garrett winces as Harris does a walk of shame to the dugout. “The Wildcats leave two runners on base. We head to the seventh, down four to three.”

  He turns two knobs on what I think is the soundboard. “We’re on mute.” He swivels toward me. “Not bad.” He measures me with his eyes, taking in my messy brown ponytail, Jane Eyre T-shirt, and my comfy but clunky sandals. He’s wondering where I fit. Five years ago, I would have said right here.

  I watch the teams change place on the field. It doesn’t feel real that I’m here. In a stad
ium. At a game. I blink as if the field might disappear, but it’s there along with the sound of the ball smacking gloves as the players warm up their arms. It even smells like baseball. I used to devour the scents of grass, sun, chalk, and sweat like they were cotton candy. Now, I feel slightly nauseous. Everything is tainted by memory.

  I study the equipment, looking for a distraction. “How does this work?” I ask.

  “It’s pretty basic. Laptop. Mixer board with channels for our two headsets. The video camera and the crowd mic.” He points to a microphone strapped to the window with bungee cord.

  “So you’ve got audio and video?”

  “Yep.” He gestures to the laptop, and I can see the video feed of the stationary camera, along with audio levels.

  “Everything’s plugged in to the school’s wifi, and the broadcast is available through a link on the school’s website. The video is grainy, but most families tune in for the commentary.”

  “And Nathan was the best color guy you could find?”

  He fiddles with one of the knobs. “It’s a new program. Started this season, home games only. This is our fifth broadcast.”

  The pitcher is done warming up, and a player for the Tigers steps into the batter’s box. Garrett unmutes us, and we’re back on.

  I’m immediately in the flow, a little surprised at how quickly all the nuances of the game come back. Without realizing it, I find myself leaning forward, a sharpened sense of sight…a sharpened sense of everything as I tune in to Garrett and to the ebb and flow of a game that apparently still runs through my blood.

  For most of my life, I loved baseball as much as I loved my dad.

  Now, I hate it as much as I hate my dad.

  And just like that, I’m anxious to get out of here.

  The Wildcats pull out a win in the bottom of the seventh, and the crowd is still cheering when Garrett says, “That’s all from the booth. I’m Garrett Reeves and my partner today was Josie…”

  Again, he looks to me for a name. I don’t give it to him because I don’t want it to be official. I want to forget I was here. I pull off the headset as he turns off the mics.

  “How come I’ve never seen you out here?” he asks, pulling off his own headset.

  “Because I’ve never been.”