Luca: Not as adorable as me and Brooks. *selfie picture with Brooks*
Henri: Oh my gosh! Your pajamas! Dogzilla needs a pair. Dogzilla definitely needs a pair.
Luca: Who named your cat?
Henri: Confucius.
Luca: Your…made-up character?
Henri: He’s very real in my head. And no, I don’t need to see a therapist. This is normal for writers.
Henri: But. For real, how Dogzilla got her name… One day, I was driving along and I saw this dead cat in the middle of the road, so I stopped, because it deserved to have a proper burial, except it wasn’t dead. It was Dogzilla, and she was sleeping in the middle of the road. I took her to the vet, and it turned out she was microchipped, but her last owner died, and nobody knew it until Dogzilla and the vet and I tried to track her down.
Luca: Jesus on mozzarella.
Henri: Okay, that was all a story. *giggling emoji* Sorry. I actually got her at a shelter after my third wedding didn’t happen. I went in for a dog and came out with Dogzilla because we made eye contact and I knew it was right. And Confucius did name her. He was all up in my head like, This cat is so lazy, it would be ironically beautiful to name her Dogzilla. And so I did.
Luca: You are a very unique woman.
Henri: I know. It takes one of a kind to get dumped by this many fiancés.
Luca: Why do you keep trying?
Henri: I’m not. Remember?
Luca: But you did. For five times.
Henri: Well…if a person can’t believe in the simple purity of love, what can they believe in? Don’t get me wrong—I still don’t want to get engaged again, or plan a wedding again, and I know I need to learn the difference between “I love you as a person” and “I love you enough to want to spend the rest of my life with you,” but don’t we all want someone to love us?
Luca: Baseball loves me.
Henri: For today. What happens in ten years?
Luca: I was making a joke.
Henri: I think you’re hiding because it’s easier to protect yourself than to risk being hurt again. And you have a great career and great teammates and a great life already, so it’s easier to enjoy that than to wonder if things could be even better, or to think about what life will be like when you’re too old to play anymore.
Henri: Sorry. Ignore that too. Love sucks. People only want to hurt each other. I mistakenly think it’s great because I’m a love-aholic, but really, I’m probably using my own weddings to compensate for feeling like I should’ve done something to help my parents stay together when I was a kid. I know I’m wrong. I’m working on it. And thank you for your help. I don’t know who else in my life I could turn to for this.
Luca: Maybe your sister’s bird?
Henri: *laughing emoji*
The bus pulls to a stop, and I blink at being pulled back to reality, realizing I’m smiling.
Brooks lifts a brow, then shakes his head.
I ignore him.
One, because he was his own brand of screwed up a few months ago.
And two, because oddly enough, I have a better puzzle to work on.
And that’s the mystery of the many facets of Henri Bacon.
Because I’m going to help her.
Maybe not the way she wants, exactly, but I’ll still help her the only way a guy like me can.
18
Luca
Four days later, I get home late Sunday night to a house that smells like pine and something I can’t identify until I walk into the kitchen.
Also apparently known as the library.
There are books everywhere.
On the table. On the floor. On the chairs. On the counters. Inside open cabinets.
Seriously. There are books stacked where my pots and pans and Tupperware would go if I owned more pots and pans and Tupperware.
That smell I’m smelling?
It’s books.
“Wha…?”
Henri pops up from behind a stack. Her hair’s tucked under a Fireballs bandana, her eyes are wide, her cheeks are flushed, and—is that my Boring Distillery T-shirt she’s wearing?
Without a bra again?
“Hi, Luca! Welcome home! Sorry about the books. I have a launch next week and I was taking signed pre-orders off my website and it kinda got out of hand while I wasn’t looking. My readers are very enthusiastic, and after I posted in my fan group that I was struggling to get excited about the book coming out after my wedding got called off, they sort of went crazy promoting the book for me. It’s weird, because it’s not like this is the first time they’ve seen me dumped on my wedding day, but my readership’s grown some, and do you know that romance readers are the most amazing people in the entire world? They’re making teasers and sharing all over social media and I thought nobody would get excited anyway because everyone wants the next Confucius book, but I got this hair to write How to Train Your Vampire, which is a total standalone not in the Confucius world, when I was with Jerry after he accidentally gave himself a concussion with an open cabinet door, and I guess people are into hot mess heroines and hot amnesiac vampires. Who knew?”
Stacks.
And stacks.
And stacks of books.
I wave a finger around the room, and she blushes and does this weird thing with her eyebrows that makes it look like two stylish caterpillars are playing charades to answer my unasked question. “Usually it’s around two hundred, but this time, there are five hundred? And I have four questionnaires I still need to answer for bloggers, and two virtual video chat interviews to prep for…so I’m sorry if I miss one or two of your games this coming week. Also, great job! You hit a home run today! I got so excited I accidentally signed a book that was supposed to go to Lisa as To Luca.”
I don’t know anything about the book business, but I know that on season ticket holder appreciation days, or during team conventions when we all sign autographs for fans for hours, it always feels like I’m signing ten thousand balls and jerseys when I know management won’t let us sign more than a few hundred because they don’t want carpal tunnel derailing performance on the field.
Also, how the hell is she getting this many books to the post office?
“Am I annoying you already? I’m annoying you already, aren’t I?”
I shake my head. We texted while I was on the road, and I’ve learned a few weird things about her that could potentially be annoying, but are strangely intriguing, and what’s more, she’s been funnier and more relatable by the day.
I kept telling my teammates I was looking forward to getting home to her, and the weirdest part is…I think it was true.
I wave at the books again. “Is this normal?”
“Signing books?”
“For all authors to do this at home. Doesn’t your publisher have a place you could go?”
“I am my publisher.”
I glance at the books again.
The cover features a broody, dark-haired guy with a hairless chest and a six-pack baring his fangs at the world as he wraps his arm around a slender dark-haired woman in an apron splattered with what I sincerely hope is cake batter.