My stomach dropped. “What?”
“Yeah. It’s not uncommon for a torn rotator cuff to end a career, but I’d hoped I’d be a few years older before I had that particular conversation with my doctor. It’s why Dylan is really moving nearby. His job is to try and change those odds up.” His eyes never left mine. “But I’m not going to pin my entire life on a twenty-five-percent chance when I know I’ll never be the same player I was before. It’s not like it’s a pulled muscle where you’re fine after a couple of weeks.”
“Are you giving up?”
“No.” He laughed quietly. “I did not work this hard to give up, but I’m also being realistic. If I can’t play again, that’s fine. It’s nobody’s fault. I’ll just teach it instead.”
I smiled.
“I’m going to plan ahead for a life without being on the road, and that’s okay. But either way, no matter what happens, I just know I want you to be a part of it. However it works out.” He tilted his head to the side. “So what do you say? Will you give it—us—a chance?”
“Can I organize your kitchen? And the boxes in the garage?”
“Is that really your criteria for this?”
“Perspective: you’re rich and famous and all I want from you is to organize your kitchen.”
“When you put it like that…” A grin slowly broke out over his face. “Fine, you can organize my kitchen. The garage I’ll hold for later.”
“Oh, so mean.” I pouted.
He took that as a cue and kissed me again. He slid his hands down my body and pulled me against him, wrapping his arms around my body. My hands were flat against his firm chest, and as his lips moved against mine, I was completely lost to this moment.
And to him.
And I had no idea what to do about it except roll with it.CHAPTER TWENTY – HOLLEYrule twenty: really, as a bookworm, you should know how this story goes.“Well, thank God for that,” Saylor said, swinging her legs from the table. “It’s about time. I was getting really fed up of all your lollygagging.”
“Lollygagging?” Kinsley raised her eyebrows.
Say picked up her book. “Grandma wanted me to read this.”
At. That explained it. It was a historical romance.
I squinted at the cover. “That’s book… four? Right?”
Kinsley took it from her. “Yeah. It’s book four of the Potters. Why are you reading book four?”
“Because I read book one, then two, then three, and now I’m on four. Any other stupid questions?” Saylor grumbled. “It’s pretty good.”
“Do you want me to add book five to the order?” I asked.
“No!” She looked at the book. “Yeah. Damn it.”
I laughed and opened the order software. A quick search brought up the whole series. It was nine books in, so I took the liberty of adding the others, too.
“Hey, do we have the first book in stock?” Kinsley asked. “Remember when we had Abigail here for her signing?”
We both nodded.
“We read the book early, right? People loved it that we recommended it. Why don’t we do that with the Potters? I think the next book is coming out just after Christmas. We could try and drive sales.”
I met Saylor’s eyes for a second.
“Like a ‘we recommend’ kinda thing?” she asked.
Kinsley bounced. “Yes! We could put it by the register on a little table—”
“Or move the magnets since it’s not tourist season,” I interjected. “We aren’t really selling them in store.”
“That,” Saylor said. “I hate those magnets.”
I was with her on that.
“Okay, that works. We could order, like, five copies, and if they sell well, do a rush order for more.” She looked to me. “Can we do that? Is it possible?”
I typed it into the website where we ordered books and checked the book price. “Rush pricing isn’t worth it—we won’t make more than a dollar a book after the rush shipping markup… Hold on.” I did another quick search. “They have an offer on where if you buy the first three books in the series you get a five percent discount.”
“Oh, no, not five percent,” Saylor droned.
“That’s a considerable saving if you buy a few sets.” Kinsley peered over my shoulder. “If we used the same pricing tactic by giving a discount for buying the first few books…” She grabbed the calculator we kept at the register and hit the buttons, then turned it to me.
I looked at the number there and then on the screen. “It’s basically the holiday season. We do really well from now since everyone always buys books for people for Christmas, so if we were to do this, I’d say now is when we pull the trigger.”
“It’s a good marketing tactic,” Saylor said, scrolling on her phone. “I’m looking online, and I can’t find any bundles of this series. Unless one of the major stores does a huge discount for those lunatics who wake up at four a.m. to go shopping on Black Friday, I think we should do it. If it goes well, it’s something we can do for future series. We sell enough of them.”