Free French Kissing (Restless Hearts) by Hunter J. Keane Page B

then and there, or risk losing the other person forever.
    And now I don’t feel like such a fool for holding onto that dream for all these years, because that exact thing happened to me last night.
    * * *
    Jake never called me back. I couldn’t really blame him though. He’d done nothing but try to be there for me since the beginning of our friendship and I’d done nothing but push him away. I caught a couple of his matches on television and he was struggling. Compared to the match Macy and I had gone to, he looked like a different player.
    When I wasn’t busy obsession over Jace’s every swing, I was busy sketching. I filled three different pads with my designs and after a lot of internal debate and hesitation, I finally showed them to Evelyn.
    She didn’t throw her arms up in defeat, whaling that my work made hers look like childish drawings. But she also didn’t say they were crap. She studied them carefully, picked one from the pile, and said, “This one is better than mediocre. This one I can do something with. It’s going in the show.”
    The “show” was Evelyn’s event on Saturday night to raise money for her charity. It wasn’t as huge as one of her seasonal shows, but it was a big deal for me. This was the first time one of my designs would be shown at a public event. I was floored.
    When Saturday rolled around, I was a mess for multiple reasons. One, because of the event itself. Evelyn had put me in charge of the runway portion of the event. It was a lot of responsibility. Two, my design had made it in and I was anxious about how it would go over. But the last reason was one that had come to me just the night before.
    I was going to watch Jake play in the title match of the tournament. He hadn’t invited me and he didn’t know that I was coming, but I hoped that would make it an even grander gesture. I had to drop quite a bit of cash for the ticket, but when I saw him walk onto the court it was totally worth it.
    I realized that not seeing him or talking to him for a week had made me miss him like crazy. I wanted to jump out of my seat, over the wall, and onto the court. But I also knew that it was better if I didn’t do anything at all. Jake was facing off against Merrick, and he needed to focus.
    He stayed focused all through warm-ups. His eyes never flitted to the crowd, not even when a gaggle of girls yelled his name in unison.
    Throughout the first set, he continued to struggle to find his game. His serve was erratic and his volleys were terrible. Someone next to me commented that they had never seen him play so poorly. Merrick wasn’t even playing that well, but he was winning each game handily.
    At the end of the set, Jake walked over to the sidelines with his head down. He had lost. Badly.
    I couldn’t help it. I had to say something. “Come on, Jake!”
    It was barely a yell. More like loud speaking. Other people around me were being much loudly. But somehow, Jake managed to hear me. His head shot up and he looked directly at me.
    His eyes widened in surprise and I smiled. After a long moment, he returned it with a dazzling smile of his own.
    The second set went much better. He started killing his serve, delivering ace after ace. His volleys were nailed with precision. He never looked into the stands again, but I knew that he knew I was there, cheering after every shot.
    When it was all over and Jake was presented with the trophy, he finally looked at me again. He said something to one of the staff members, pointing in my direction.
    A few minutes later, I was escorted down to the court where I waited for Jake at the sideline. He finished posing for pictures and answering questions and then set down the trophy, almost like he didn’t care about it at all.
    “You came,” he said as he approached me.
    “Why are you always so surprised by that? I wouldn’t have missed this for anything.” I loved the way his damp hair curled at the ends, the way his smile was just slightly