Sweet Spot by Rae Lynn Blaise Page A

anything. Maybe once I believed her, wanted to believe her, but when she died, most of my faith died with her.
    My mom would want me to seek him out. My mom would want me to go to church and find her there. My mom was an amazing, selfless woman. Even if I prefer to attend the church of Kauffman on Sundays instead of a cathedral, I know she’s in Heaven. Someone like her couldn’t not be.
    I crack open the cover and stare some more. Words just swim before my eyes and suddenly all I can hear in my head is sweet Ally’s voice, saying she’ll pray for me and that she wants to comfort me. She’s Heaven-bound, too, that sweet girl with a heart of gold.
    She makes me want to be better. It’s horrifically corny and cliché, I know, but it’s true. I want to be the guy who hangs the moon and pushes the sun to rise. I want to sweeten the air she breathes and give her a life of comfort and pleasure. I want to be the man she can rely on, cry to, love in the darkest, quietest moments.
    How can I do that, though, when we aren’t even supposed to be together? When the mere touch of my skin to hers thrusts me over hallowed ground and into damnation?
    There’s a knock on my door before I can turn the page to actual text. I ignore it, because I don’t want to deal with Jamie’s shenanigans or another round of hearing the guys call me a pussy. Instead, I pull out my phone and Google “best chapter to start reading the bible.” The internet directs me to Mark, and I flip through the pages until I find it, still unsure if I’m actually going to read it or not.
    The knocking continues. Instead of getting louder, the knock stays soft. My feet are out of the bed before my brain catches up.
    She’s beautiful, as always, framed in my doorway.
    “I didn’t order a pizza.” I can’t help myself. I never can. That’s part of the problem.
    “I didn’t bring any pizza.” She smiles at me. “But I thought you might want some company.”
    “What makes you think that?”
    “Oh, something about losing a game and spending half the night with ice on your knee.”
    “Someone is ratting me out.”
    “There are perks to being the coach’s daughter.” She winks at me. “Can I come in, or shall we continue this witty banter in the hallway?”
    I wave her in and peek my head out to make sure no one saw her standing at my door. The hotel does a good job of keeping the paps away, but anyone can see anything and throw that shit on twitter.
    Though that traitorous part of me wishes Coach would know just so it would be over.
    I close the door behind me and find her sitting in the desk chair, spinning around.
    “Did I really look that bad out there?” I ask, leaning against the dresser, trying to keep us safely apart. “So bad you needed to come console me?”
    “You didn’t score for me.” She pretends to scowl and it’s the cutest thing I’ve ever seen. “I figured something was really wrong.”
    “It was a bad night for all of us, I guess.” I don’t mention Coach’s total rip on us, but I know I don’t have to. She had to have gotten the worst of it.
    “Yeah.” She scratches her leg and doesn’t look at me. “Off nights happen. You guys will bounce back.”
    “Here’s hoping.”
    She looks across the room and spots the open Bible. Ally goes to pick it up and I try to dive for it, but she gently pushes my arm away and flips through the pages.
    “Mark? Very nice.”
    “I wasn’t really reading. I just opened it.”
    “You didn’t strike me as religious.”
    I pause. “I’m not.”
    “So what made you open it?”
    “You.”
    Ally turns to look at me, and in the moment our eyes lock, it feels like the sky explodes and everything shatters around us. There’s no one else but the two of us, held in this moment as if nothing else matters. She drops the Bible on the bedside table and places her soft hands on my cheeks.
    “What are you looking for?” she whispers.
    “Answers,” I whisper back.
    “Did you find