LONG SHOT: (A HOOPS Novel)

This feeling is sorcery. Her touch is a spell, and Iris? She’s my witch.

It’s just me and the man I love.

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Strength. Dignity. Courage. All these things belong to you. Take them back. Your soul is yours. Your heart is yours. Your body is yours. Yours to keep and yours to share.”

I can’t articulate how I feel. Hurt, but numb. Lost. What do I do now? Next? Where should I go? I have to find my place

Well if she’s trouble, it’s trouble I want to get into,” I

I’m not religious. I’m not a high priestess. I’m not a believer in much of anything anymore. I can’t buy into Lotus’s superstitions or wrap my mind around MiMi’s mysticism, but every time Caleb touches me, the same words come to my lips, an un-whispered prayer that echoes in the cavernous chamber of my heart.

God, deliver me from this.

Save me.

The heart speaks in whispers.

I heard too late.

Can you miss someone you’ve never had?

“If you were mine, Iris, there would be no doubt what position you’d hold in my life. You’d be center. I’d play you at the five.”

“August, I love you,” I say, twining my fingers in his hair.

“I know that.” He closes his eyes, surrendering to my hands. “I love you, too. More than anything. More than everything.”

He said he’d play me at the five, at the very center, and he’s lived up to that promise every day that we’ve been together.

“I trust you with my life, with my future.” Emotion scalds my throat, so I pause to steady my voice. “With my daughter.”

He slowly opens his eyes to watch me. “I know that, too.”

“And I want to wake up with you every morning.”

“Youuuuuuu . . . do?” He settles his hands at my hips, splayed across my bottom, and narrows his eyes on my face, assessing.

“Yeah, but . . .” I search for the right thing to say—to let him know I’m ready. “I want the pancakes. Okay? I want the pancakes, August.”

“Babe, I’ll make you pancakes. Any time you want.”

“You’re not hearing me. What I’m saying is . . .the kids! You know, bursting into our room every morning? Your kids, August. I want to have your children. Our children.”

He frowns and blinks at me like I might have been body-snatched and replaced by some amenable stranger.

“That makes me . . . happy.” He looks more uncertain than happy, though cautiously ecstatic might be accurate, too. “But what do you mean? Are you saying . . .”

He watches my face with the same focus his father probably watched that game clock counting down. I’ve had reservations and fears based on the past, based on my mistakes, and on bad calls I made. But August is no mistake. He’s not a bad call, and all that he wants, I’m ready to offer. All that he has, I’m ready to receive. One step forward will take me into the future, and I’m ready.

“What I’m saying is this, August.” I tip up on my toes and smile against his ear. “Take the shot.”