Sure Bet (Out of Left Field #1)

1. Liam

Chapter 1

Liam

“ D og poop!” my sister hollered, causing me to freeze mid-stride before I stepped in yet another mound of life’s shit. “Watch out, it’s to your left. Oh, wait. That might be human. You never know in this neighborhood.”

Fantastic.

“Do people not clean up after themselves?” I lifted the moving box over my head to get a clear view of the pavement. Dog crap aside, the cracked and pothole-riddled sidewalks were a hazard. “How did Grandma not die sooner? This would have given her a heart attack.”

It had been three years since I visited my twin sister in Seattle, but Shana’s impatient sigh remained unchanged. “I’m sorry. Allow me to set expectations before you come inside: it’s a dump, but it’s better than being homeless, which is still possible if I kick you to the fecal-filled curb. A simple, ‘Thank you for taking me in when my life has collapsed’ will suffice.”

Oh, how the mighty had fallen.

“Thank you for allowing me a room in a condo that is part of my inheritance,” I said, scooting aside for her to take the lead as I followed up the stairs. “Though Brenden offered his guestroom.”

Shana snickered. “Yeah, but then you’d also have to stay with Karen.”

Fair point. My best friend’s wife was insufferable—and aptly named. I’d rather drag my sorry self and a box of clothes to my dead grandmother’s apartment, feeling like a loser, than subject myself to being roommates with Karen. Besides, with baseball season starting, he’d soon be traveling for games, and the last thing I needed was to share space alone with a woman who would murder me.

Not that the condo was much safer, given Shana wouldn’t be my only roommate.

“It’s supposed to rain later this afternoon. Nature’s cleanse!” Shana inherited the lion’s share of optimism.

I complained about the dilapidated state of the complex and its surroundings, but I was grateful for a place to crash until I got my shit together. With a bruised ego, empty pockets, and a touch of depression, Seattle provided a new opportunity that I wouldn’t waste—couldn’t waste, to be honest.

I stepped through the door, greeted by a familiar musty scent. A stale, lingering presence that lit up a litany of childhood memories of visiting the cantankerous grandmother who scared me with her wicked cackle.

Glancing around, I dropped the box beside the door and stretched my lower back. “You ever get a little PTSD being here?” I traced a finger over the faded wallpaper, once a vibrant magenta floral print, now peeled at the edges like the cracked skin of that old witch. “Do you bring guys here? What’s it like staring at the same ceiling as Grandma when you’re entertaining company?”

Shana smirked. “I’m never on my back.” She slapped my shoulder, gesturing toward the galley kitchen. “Taunt all you like, but I’ve already worked on practicing my mental shields from your bullshit. Don’t you dare eat my gluten-free bread, and Brooke will castrate you if you touch her goat milk yogurt.”

My sister’s best friend would castrate me regardless after a lifetime of torment. I made a note to put a deadbolt on the guest room door.

“Gluten-free bread? Goat milk yogurt? What the fuck is going on in this hellscape?”

The floorboards creaked beneath my weight, protesting each step further into the condo as if to remind me I didn’t belong there—or, more likely, as a warning to get out while I still could.

Living with my sister and her pain-in-the-ass best friend, whom I’d teased a teensy bit growing up, even in a temporary situation, may very well end in my death.

Who was I kidding? I had tormented her. They would bury me under the fir wood floors, the scent of mothballs and mildew hiding the stench. Nobody would come looking for me.

“I’m not staying long.” I scanned the living room. I’d have sold this place by now, but Shana wanted to move in, and thank god—paying rent wasn’t high on my list of priorities. “I’ll apply for financial aid if I’m accepted into UW.”

“You’ll get in. You managed a solid GPA in Boston while playing ball. Imagine what you can do if you’re slacking like the rest of us in life.”

The last few years of my life had been filled with plenty of slacking.

“It’s your place, too.” Shana kicked off her shoes and collapsed on the couch. Guess she was done helping me move in. “Stay as long as you want, but with Brooke moving out, I’ll need to find a new roommate. Property tax is no joke.”

“Wasted money, given the state of your sidewalks.” I strolled through the cramped living space and examined the bookshelf against the far wall. Of Mice and Men and other titles I pretended to read in high school and never did. “Brooke is moving out?”

That sounded casual, right?

Shana yawned. “I think so. She’s at the point of no return in her relationship. You know how that goes.”

No, I’d never gotten there myself.

“She thinks her boyfriend is going to ask her to move in, and she’s hyperventilating about it. It’s Brooke. Overthinking is the only thinking.” My sister rolled her eyes.

I didn’t bother hiding my grin. Brooke lived in her head. I’m not sure how she would manage to live with a boyfriend, not that I cared where she settled with her weird goat milk yogurt.

“Guess things haven’t changed.” I held onto a tight smile.

Brooke’s measured and deliberate nature contrasted with my more reckless tendencies, and she hated me for it. Sharing space with her had always meant navigating a social minefield.

Almost always, anyway.

Wars occasionally had a ceasefire. My eyes drifted to the hallway closet, remembering a time when I proposed one. ‘What if I told you that you don’t know me at all? Maybe you’re wrong, and I do want to kiss you?’

But she’d shot me down.

“Well, things are about to change for her, dear brother, and until she moves out, I don’t want to live on a battlefield. She expects you to come out swinging. Can you please surprise her by acting like the almost twenty-five-year-old adult that you are?”

She expected me to come out swinging, huh?

So much for white flags.