The Setup

Book : The Brentwood Baseball Series

by Meghan Quinn

Genres: Sports; Sports Romance

Synopsis

I’ve fallen victim to a heinous act. An act so vile, so downright dirty, that I’m not sure as a twenty-year-old man I'll ever recover. Brace yourself, because what I’m about to tell you might have you gasping in secondhand horror. Ready? Here it goes...I’ve recently become the pawn of a meddling mom. Yes...A MEDDLING MOM—who's been trying to set me up all summer. Now, I understand it’s not a crime for a mother to want her child to fall in love, but when she makes it her relentless MISSION, the heinous act should be classified as a misdemeanor at least. Of course, my mom, the evil matriarch in the devil’s leggings, made her final stab at finding a girl for me days before I went back to college. And I hate to admit it, but she saved a doozy for last. A titan in black skinny jeans. A boss of nonchalance. And a girl who would not only turn my life upside down, but do it while juggling a soccer ball, looking effortlessly gorgeous around campus, and is one hundred percent against relationships. Of any sort. Thanks, Mom.

Release date: September 10, 2020

Publisher: Hot-Lanta Publishing, LLC

Print pages: 410

Sample

Prologue

 

LINCOLN

 

I’ve fallen victim to a heinous act.

An act so vile, so downright dirty, that I’m not sure . . . 

as a son,

as a member of society,

as a twenty-year-old man . . . I will ever recover.

Ever.

I see the concern in your eyes, your hand wandering up your chest to clutch the collar of your sensible cotton shirt, scared to find out the truth.

Brace yourself against something sturdy, because what I’m about to tell you might just knock you back on your ass in horror.

*Deep breaths, everyone*

I’ve recently become the pawn of a meddling mom.

Yup, you read that right. A MEDDLING mom.

The bane of a son’s existence.

I know what you’re wondering . . . what did she do? Make me pick up my socks during summer break?

*Eye-rolling*

*Woe is you*

*Grow up*

You grow up!

Ehhh, that was a little harsh. But before you go and put your judgy face on, you need to know the difference between a nagging mom and a meddling mom.

A nagging mom is one who storms into the living room while you’re trying to watch the series finale of Game of Thrones, complaining about the dishes in the sink you swore you’d take care of once you found out who took the throne.

Nag, nag, nag—part of the daily routine of the person who birthed you, or in this case, one of two moms who adopted me.

But a meddling mom, oh boy. They’re a fresh kind of hell wrapped up in high-waisted leggings and muted tunics. This isn’t some everyday mom who texts you GIFs of squirrels playing with a hula hoop. Nope, meddling moms have an agenda.

An agenda that they believe benefits their children. But it really benefits them . . . and only them.

In this case, my mom’s agenda: get Lincoln to fall in love.

I understand it’s not a crime for a mother to want her child to fall in love, but let me tell you. When she makes it her mission when you’re home from college, it should be classified as a misdemeanor.

That’s right, all freaking summer, my mom has made it her duty to set me up with girl after girl, all of whom she’s met in our hometown Kalamazoo, Michigan. I’d like to say I’m exaggerating that she made a list and set me up with every eligible girl—one by one—but I’m not.

I saw the Excel spreadsheet on her computer.

Girls who were highlighted in red were a no-go.

Girls in green still had a fighting chance.

Girls in yellow? Apparently, I had lukewarm interaction with them, but they showed promise.

Why is she so desperate for me to fall head over heels?

Can you believe she’s been spending time on the Internet, researching relationship statuses of major league baseball players? Well, she has. Too much time. And she said she didn’t want me to end up forty, about to retire, with nothing to say for my life other than that I was able to throw a ball off a mound.

She also wants a girl to fawn over.

When my mothers were adopting, Mom hoped for a girl, but Mama hoped for a boy. Don’t get me wrong, my mom loves me more than anything—hence the meddling and nagging—but she always wanted to do girly things with me, like have tea parties, get our toenails done, shit like that.

Side note: I’ve done the pedicure thing with her, and it’s not that bad.

But she wants a daughter, and apparently, a daughter-in-law is the next best thing.

Which brings me back to my summer of “not love.” I wanted nothing to do with these girls and after my mom’s eighth attempt to set me up—yes, eight—I told her enough was enough. I was done.

And thankfully she listened . . . until the last Saturday before I left for school.

The evil matriarch in the devil’s leggings made her final stab at finding a girl for me.

And I hate to admit it, but she saved a doozy for last.

A fucking titan in black skinny jeans.

A boss of nonchalance.

And a girl who will not only turn my life upside down, but do it while juggling a soccer ball, looking effortlessly gorgeous, and is one hundred percent against relationships. Of any sort.

Thanks, Mom.

*Thumbs up*

Your meddling has made me absolutely miserable.

 

 

Chapter One

 

LINCOLN

 

“The party is going to be epic, dude. You have to come back.”

I slip on my jeans and button them up while the phone is on speaker. “My moms won’t let me go back early. You know that. Why do you even ask, man?”

Hartley Dashel, my best friend, sighs. “Can you tell them there’s some sort of sweetheart dance happening with a speed dating twist and you’re afraid if you don’t go, you’ll miss out on meeting the love of your life?”

It’s a solid attempt, knowing what my moms would like, but they’re not stupid.

Laughing, I say, “If only they’d fall for that. Sorry, man. I have plans with my mom. She wants to take me out one last time before I head to Brentwood on Monday.”

“You’re breaking my heart.”

“I’ll make it up to you when I return.”

“Are you talking Frankie Donuts making it up to me?

Looking around my room, I see a white shirt draped over an armchair and pick it up. I give it a quick sniff. Clean. Perfect. I slip it over my head, find my cologne, and then give my chest a spritz. Got to smell good for my mom.

“Frankie Donuts with a coffee, while walking down the boardwalk hand in hand.”

“You won me over with hand in hand.” He sighs. “I’ll hold down the fort until you get here. Hurry home, sweetie,” Hartley says sarcastically.

“I will, shnookums.”

Laughing, we both hang up, and I slip on my white Adidas and head downstairs.

When I reach the kitchen, Mama is sitting at the table in front of her computer, glasses on, and a concentrated furrow to her brow.

“Everything okay?” I ask, catching a glimpse of the code on her computer. I’ll never understand how she grasps that shit. It’s all just a bunch of letters and numbers to me.

She leans back and presses her fingers to her temple. “The porn site I’m working on won’t search butt plugs, and I have no idea why. It’s frustrating.”

Oh, did I mention she takes on any job when it comes to website design? I mean . . . any job. Oh, and my mom, yeah, she does the graphics for Mama, making them quite the team.

The logo for this website is an erect dick, so helping them scour mockups for said dicks has been horrendous, to say the least.

“Look,” Mama says, switching over to the website where a man’s bouncing in front of a camera, holding his penis.

“Jesus . . . Christ.” I hold up my hand so I don’t have to see a random dick flapping around.

Ignoring me . . . and the penis—I guess an easy job for my lesbian mom—she clicks on the search feature and says, “I type in butt plug and when I press enter, we get butt play but no plugs, and I know there are plugs on this website. I tagged them.”

I run my hand over my forehead. “A real conundrum. But, uh, if you don’t need my assistance, I’m going to the car to wait for Mom.”

“No need to wait, I’m right here.” Mom appears, wearing leggings and a button-up black and red flannel with the sleeves rolled up to her elbows. Of course, she has the same shoes as me—which is normal at this point—and she’s wearing her signature red lipstick. “Look at our handsome boy. He’s so grown-up.”

Mom places a kiss on my cheek and then turns to Mama, who has her hand on her chin, deep in concentration, while the dick aerobics happen in front of her. Not batting an eye, Mom bends down and kisses her on the lips. “I know you’ll be able to find the glitch, honey. You’ll soon bring butt plugs to all.”

Huffing and turning back to the code, Mama adjusts her glasses and studies the screen. “Thank you. Have fun, you two, and bring me home some potato skins. I’m going to need them after this.”

“As long as you don’t eat them while watching that man jiggle his penis,” I say.

“Oh honey, when we eat potato skins, we watch cock ring stimulation. Obviously.”

I throw up a little in my mouth, as both my moms laugh and then give each other one more kiss.

Mom takes me by the hand and leads me to the garage where she tosses me the keys. “Care to drive your old lady around?”

“Depends. This is just a date for you and me, right? No hidden agenda?”

We both get in the car and after she buckles up, she tilts her head and says, “This is my last night with you before you go back to Brentwood. Do you really think I’d forfeit it to another woman?”

“Yes.” I start the car and back out of the garage. “I really do, Mom.”

“Then you obviously don’t know me.” She turns away, and I swear I catch a glimpse of a smile on her lips.

This better not be a set up.

 

***

 

“These potato skins are positively orgasmic.” Mom licks her fingers and moans.

I die slowly inside.

“Can you not do that shit, Mom? Jesus.”

“What?” She looks around, confused.

Leaning in and whispering, I say, “Call things orgasmic and then moaning.”

“Is that not appealing to you?” She laughs out loud.

Even though with me she’s massively inappropriate most of the time, I still soak up these moments with her. The sound of her laugh, so familiar that it feels like a warm blanket wrapped around me when I hear it. The adoration in her eyes when she looks at me, a look so full of love I don’t think I could ever do wrong. And that smile. I have so many pictures of that smile staring back at me, and it reminds me what happiness looks like.

“Not appealing.”

“Such a shame.”

“You know, if you really want to talk about that kind of stuff, I could talk to you about it. Give you a taste of your own medicine.”

She rolls her eyes. “I’ve been working on a porn site with your mama for two months now, so I’m pretty sure anything you have in your arsenal is going to go in one ear and out the other.”

“Maybe,” I say, biting the corner of my lip, trying to think of anything shocking from my vanilla sex life.

Yeah . . . vanilla.

I didn’t lose my virginity until I was a freshman in college. I was too goddamn scared of getting a girl pregnant, thanks to my mama who showed me videos of childbirth and made me walk around with a fake baby on the weekends. She thought it was a good form of birth control.

It was.

Until a girl touched my dick during my first week of college at a baseball loft party.

Yeah, one touch and I was done for. Two weeks later, I lost my virginity, came within a minute, and embarrassed myself completely.

Thanks, parents.

I then did all the research I could about sex. I read about clitoral stimulation, until I actually felt like I had a clit from the number of pictures I looked at.

After that, I was smoother with every encounter until I was known around campus for giving girls amazing orgasms. Yeah, sure, being known as the guy who delivers orgasms is great and all, but when I come, it feels . . . subpar. Like I’m missing something. I don’t have that blackout moment, that toe-curling, I-might-die moment.

Concerned for the well-being of my penis, I asked Hartley if he’d ever come so hard, he blacked out. He said once, and then reassured me my dick wasn’t broken, but maybe I hadn’t found the right girl yet.

Which, of course, made things worse, given my mom’s meddling, because all I could think about was . . . does her vagina have the magical blackout powers?

“Trying to think of something to scare me away?” Mom asks, smirking while finishing off the last potato skin.

“Is it pathetic that I can’t come up with anything?”

She laughs and pats my hand. “Just makes me love you even more. Don’t worry, Linc, you’ll lose your virginity someday.” When I give her a look, she laughs harder.

“I’ve had plenty of sexual encounters, thank you very much.”

Smirking over her drink, she says, “Maybe your problem is that you call them ‘sexual encounters’.”

I lean back in my chair and say, “Being roasted by my lesbian mom about using my penis isn’t boding well for my self-esteem.”

Mom throws her head back and lets out a wallop of a laugh, just as someone says, “Laura, is that you?”

Slowly, Mom focuses on a woman over my shoulder and the corners of her lips turn up. “Beth, how lovely to see you,” my mom says. “I didn’t know you were a Boondoggles kind of girl.”

A woman my mom’s age, wearing high-waisted mom jeans and a frilly blouse, comes up to the table and gives my mom a hug. “We can’t get enough of the potato skins. They’re what wet dreams are made of.”

Smiling even wider, my mom says, “I was just telling Lincoln here that they’re orgasmic.”

Jesus . . . Christ.

“Oh goodness, is this Lincoln?” Beth says, turning toward me. Because of our bar-height table, I come eye to eye with a very done-up lady. Brown hair curled and sprayed down with hairspray, purple metallic lipstick, and bright blue eyeshadow.

Whoa.

“Yes, this is my Lincoln. Lincoln, this is Beth, my hairdresser.”

Because I was raised right, I take her hand in mine and say, “It’s very nice to meet you.”

“Oh, what manners . . . and look at these hands, they’re huge.”

Okay, this is uncomfortable.

“And who’s this lovely lady with you?” my mom asks, with a coy smile.

Oh

Sweet

Mother

Of

God

I know that look, that smile, that tone of voice.

I’ve seen that twinkle in her eye all summer. I’ve been subjected to that evil grin over eight dates. And that lilt in her voice, like she’s about to do something purely spontaneous, but it’s actually contrived to the very last second.

Yup . . . I’m about to be set up.

“This is my daughter, Indie.”

I don’t even look to my side. Why bother? Plus, I don’t have it in me.

Instead, I press my forehead into my hand and rub it back and forth, feeling the tension move up my neck to the base of my skull where it starts a low thrumming beat, a thrumming I know will grow into exponential annoyance.

“Indie, how lovely to meet you. Your mom has told me so much about you. You play soccer at Brentwood, right?”

What?

I release my head and look to the side to see a slender frame. My eyes travel up her torso. Tight-fitting yellow shirt, medium-sized breasts, smooth, tan skin . . . clenched jaw.

Ha, I know that clench.

When I reach her face, I can practically feel the daggers coming out of her mossy-green eyes as Indie stares down her mom, her long brown ponytail swishing behind her. She’s not wearing makeup, but she doesn’t need to. She’s gorgeous, and those lips . . . fuck, they’re enticing. Plump and pouty.

Okay, I’ll give it to my mom. Indie’s hot.

But that doesn’t mean I condone this type of behavior.

“I do play soccer,” Indie says, arms folding over her chest, pulling down on the V of her collar, showing the smallest amount of cleavage.

The attitude in her voice is intriguing. Her mom notices it because she laughs nervously and says, “She just loves it at Brentwood. Hey Lincoln, don’t you go to Brentwood as well?”

Would you look at that . . . two meddling moms. They should start a club.

“He does,” my mom answers for me. “How crazy is that?”

And there it is . . . 

The setup. The hook.

And how coincidental that my mom got her hair done the other day. Wonder what they talked about for two hours.

My guess is, how can we get our two kids together before they go back to school?

Played again . . . by my mom.

“Yeah, that’s so crazy,” I say through clenched teeth, giving my mom a look that she completely ignores.

“Lincoln, why don’t you go play some games with Indie while I talk to Beth? I meant to ask her something private while I was getting my hair done and completely forgot.”

“Why don’t you grab her number and call her instead of talking about the private thing in a public restaurant surrounded by arcade games and potato skins?” I try to give her my best I will murder you tonight look, but she’s unfazed.

She tosses the game card at me and says, “This isn’t phone-conversation material. It’s face-to-face stuff.”

“Isn’t it great that we have FaceTime now, so we can have face-to-face conversations without being in the same room?”

“Beth has an Android.” Mom shoos me away with her hand. “Now go on.”

Beth nearly scoots me off my seat and sets her purse and phone down—her iPhone—kicking me out, and without blinking an eye, starts gabbing with my mom.

It’s really disturbing how fast my mom had me on my feet. The lies.

So many effing lies.

Awkwardly, Indie and I stand off to the side together, staring at our moms who’ve put up some kind of invisible shield to block them from the world around them.

They laugh.

They use their hands to talk.

They ignore us completely.

On a sigh, I turn to Indie and say, “Do you want to play air hockey?”

She gives me a slow once-over, arms still crossed, and says, “Fine,” on a less than amused sigh.

Great.

“This is my last night with you before you go back to Brentwood. Do you really think I’d forfeit it to another woman?” Well played, Mom. Well played.

This is going to be a fan-fucking-tastic night.