Love of the Game (6 page)

“Fridge,” Mom directed.

“Hey, Stretch.” Suki wriggled her fingers at Kasha on the way past.

“Hey, Short Stack.”

“Kasha, could you take this platter of corn on the cob out to the picnic table?” Mom asked.

“Sure.” Kasha carried the corn outside, mentally gauging her chances of getting her parents alone to tell them about Emma. Odds were against her.

Table the discussion for another time. One more day wouldn't make much difference. Enjoy the party. Go home. Get some sleep. Get up tomorrow, and go do her job. She was good at keeping her lips zipped.

Too good, some might say.

Dad came over with a pair of tongs in his hands to give her a peck on the cheek. “I put some portabella mushrooms on the grill for you.”

“Thanks, Dad.” She hugged him hard.

“You're in a sweet mood. What's up?”

“Just happy to see you.” Her mind drifted back to Axel, and the knowledge he'd lost his young son. Life was so short and so precious. “I'm grateful to have you, and so glad you're still here.”

Dad gave her a sideways look. “Something troubling you?”

Before she could tell him that she wanted to talk to him and Mom later, sixty-something Trudy, adorned in colorful tattoos and multiple piercings, sashayed up to them. Over the years, Trudy had been something of a surrogate, avant-garde grandmother to the Carlyle sisters, and she was like one of the family.

“Did you hear my big news?” Trudy's eyes sparkled.

“I did. Congratulations, Trudy. You deserve this so much.”

“I knew eventually my passion would pay off.” Trudy chuckled. “I got a new tattoo to celebrate. Wanna see?”

To be polite, Kasha nodded.

Trudy tugged the corner of her shirt down her right shoulder to reveal fresh ink that said: “Live passionately or not at all.”

“It's a statement,” Kasha said. One she didn't agree with. She'd spent a lifetime squelching passion, because she knew how much damage it could do.

“You've got to let go of the reins sometime,” Trudy said. “And just let yourself feel.”

A bubble of resistance pressed up Kasha's throat. She ironed on a smile. “I'll keep that in mind. Congrats again, Trudy.”

“Thanks.” Trudy beamed.

Kasha caught sight of her sister Breeanne sitting on a lawn chair by herself, underneath the elm tree where a tire swing used to hang when they were kids. Breeanne looked forlorn. Kasha grabbed a lawn chair and went over to sit beside her sister.

Breeanne had been the first child their parents had adopted, even though she was younger than Kasha and Jodi. She had a heart condition that had been a constant part of family life when they were all growing up, but today, at twenty-seven, after multiple surgeries, Breeanne had made a full recovery.

“Why you are sitting over here by your lonesome?” Kasha asked.

Breeanne made a halfhearted attempt at a smile. “Just needed a little time to myself.”

“Do you want me to leave?”

“No. You're the one person I do want to see. Just being around you calms me down.”

“Is something wrong? Are you and Rowdy—”

“Oh no, no. Rowdy and I are fine. In fact marriage is the most amazing thing.” Breeanne perked up. “I love him so much.”

“I can see it on your face.”

Breeanne reached over to pat Kasha's hand. “I know you're going to find your true love too.”

Kasha shrugged. “I'm okay even if I don't.”

Breeanne's mouth turned down and her eyes went sad. “Honestly?”

“I don't need a man in my life to be happy.”

“Have you found a key to the hope chest yet?” Breeanne asked.

“To tell you the truth, I haven't been looking.”

It might seem an odd question to some, but two years earlier, Breeanne had found an antique hope chest at an estate sale. It was an unusual trunk, possessing five individual compartments contained inside one wooden box, each compartment with its own lock. On top of the lid, a cryptic message had been carved.

Kasha had it memorized because for the past year, ever since Jodi married Jake and she passed the hope chest on to her, it had been sitting in her living room functioning as a coffee table.

Treasures are housed within, heart's desires granted, but be careful where wishes are cast, for reckless dreams dared dreamed in the heat of passion will surely come to pass.

Kasha didn't have to worry about passionate wishes backfiring. She never did anything in the heat of passion. She knew firsthand just how destructive passion could be.

The elderly woman who sold Breeanne the hope chest had told her that if she made a wish before she unlocked the compartments, her wish would surely come true. Romantic, Breeanne had fallen in love with the silly legend. The old woman had no keys for the trunk's locks, but on a wish and a prayer that any skeleton key might work on a skeleton lock, Breeanne bought the hope chest.

Breeanne, Jodi, Suki, and Kasha had gone through every skeleton key they could find in Timeless Treasures, and none of them worked. Oddly, neither of the two locksmiths in Stardust could open up the trunk without drilling into the locks. Nor could they adequately explain why they couldn't unlock it.

The hope chest sat unopened for several days after Breeanne bought it, until Suki came up with the idea of making skeleton key necklaces. Suki sold the necklaces in her online Etsy store to great success, and used up all the keys in the store. She'd put a sign in the window offering to buy skeleton keys for a dollar.

The next day, a mysterious customer brought in a key that had fit the lock on the trunk's fifth compartment.

Taking the saying on the chest to heart, Breeanne had made a wish as she'd opened the compartment, asking for a boost in her writing career. Right after that, she'd gotten a call from the agent who'd snubbed her for over a year, telling her local sports hero Rowdy Blanton was looking for a ghostwriter from their area.

Inside the compartment, Breeanne had found a
smaller box with another cryptic saying etched into that lid, and when she opened the smaller box, Breeanne discovered a cheetah scarf that felt soft only to her and Rowdy. To everyone else, the scarf felt rough and scratchy.

Breeanne took it as a sign that she and Rowdy were meant to be.

Romantic, yes, but it didn't really mean anything, at least not to Kasha's way of thinking.

But then Breeanne gave the trunk to Jodi after she and Rowdy married. Jodi found a skeleton key in an antique evening bag she'd borrowed from Timeless Treasures on the same night she met Jake while crashing a high-society wedding.

The key had fit the fourth compartment in the trunk, and when Jodi opened it, she'd found an exotic perfume that only she and Jake could smell.

Still, Kasha remained unconvinced that the trunk had special wish-granting powers. In her mind, it was self-fulfilling prophecy, and nothing more. How could it be more than the power of suggestion? Her sisters had wanted to fall in love, so their minds had invented a fantasy to match what they found.

Kasha wasn't interested in searching for a key. The last thing she wanted was a passionate relationship. If she ever did get married—not that she was even thinking along those lines—it would be a sane, sensible agreement. Not some wild, ardent union based on overwrought emotions.

Breeanne put a hand on Kasha's knee. “You can't give up on love.”

“I haven't given up because I was never looking for it in the first place.”

Breeanne clucked her tongue. “Love is the most wonderful thing in the world.”

Kasha shifted in her seat, and wished she hadn't gotten into this conversation. “Forget me. What's got you down in the mouth?”

“I saw the doctor today—”

“Is it your heart?” Kasha's pulse jumped, and she wrapped a hand around Breeanne's thin forearm.

“No, no. I didn't see my cardiologist.” Breeanne nibbled her bottom lip, and pushed a lock of long blond hair behind her ear.

“Who?”

A tear slipped down Breeanne's cheek, then another, and another.

What now? Kasha's chest tightened. Felt helpless in the face of her sister's tears. She dug around in her purse, found a tissue, pressed it into her sister's hand. Awkwardly, she patted Breeanne's shoulder. “There. There.”

Breeanne swiped at her cheeks, but it didn't staunch the flow of tears.

Fear twined around Kasha's throat. “What is it? You gotta tell me.”

“Rowdy and I went to see a fertility specialist . . .” Breeanne paused. Hiccupped. “And the tests came back.” She hitched in a breath, closed her eyes. “Because of my longstanding health issues, and the medications I was on for so many years, I most likely won't ever be able to have children of my own.”

“Oh, Bree,” Kasha whispered. “I'm so sorry.”

Breeanne pressed the tissue against her nose, her shoulders wobbling with the force of her grief.

“Have you told Mom and Dad?”

“Not yet. I was hoping to tell them this evening, but I can't bring myself to put a damper on Trudy's great news.”

“It's a blow. I can only imagine how much it hurts.
But there's always adoption. Look how well we turned out.”

“I know, I know. I'm trying to be practical and mature about it.” Breeanne blinked. “And I don't want to suggest that adoption is somehow less than having your own children. I don't believe that, not for a second, but there's some biological need inside me to have someone that's my blood kin. Do you know what I mean?”

Kasha thought of Emma, felt her throat squeeze in empathy. “Yes,” she admitted. “I do.”

“I know it's selfish.” Breeanne tore the sodden tissue in half. “But it's the way I feel.”

“It's not selfish,” Kasha said. “It's human. You've been delivered a blow and it's okay to grieve. You shouldn't feel ashamed or guilty for it. And I'm sure Mom and Dad will say the same.”

“I don't want to hurt them,” Breeanne said. “Do you know what I mean?”

Yes, she knew exactly what her sister meant, which was part of the reason why she hadn't already told her parents about Emma. She'd been waiting for the perfect time. Clearly, the perfect time was not now. Breeanne's news came first.

Relief rushed through her, and if she were being honest, she'd admit she was grateful for the reprieve. But postponing the inevitable wrapped a hard skin around the pebble knotted in her stomach, growing dread the way an oyster grew a pearl.

And fleetingly, for one awful minute, she wished she'd never found out about her half sister.

O
n Friday morning, Kasha grabbed a can of V8 juice from the fridge, and drank it in lieu of breakfast on her way up to Rowdy's sprawling ranch house. During the drive over, all she could think about was what Jake had told her the night before about Axel and the loss of his son, Dylan.

When she arrived, Mrs. Creedy, the petite, gray-haired housekeeper in Harry Potter glasses, answered the door. “Axel's around back.”

She followed the housekeeper out the back door through the courtyard, rich with native East Texas plants, to find Axel pitching into a baseball rebounder on the other side of the swimming pool.

What? She rubbed her eyes in disbelief. Was he freaking kidding her? She'd specifically told him to rest his shoulder. Pitching was not resting.

“From the look on your face, I'm guessing he's in a mess of trouble,” Mrs. Creedy said.

“Trouble isn't the half of it,” Kasha muttered, and sank her hands on her hips.

“Honey, if you think you can make that one toe the line, you're in for a world of hurt. Mr. Creedy and I are off to run errands. You're on your own with him for the next couple of hours.”

Mrs. Creedy shook her head and went back inside, closing the sliding glass door behind her.

Kasha wanted to cling to the housekeeper's hand and beg her not to leave her alone with him, because
she simply didn't trust herself around him. Instead, she donned a Miss Badass persona, squinting hard and shading her eyes with the flat of her hand.

Axel wore loose-fitting gray gym shorts and a white T-shirt so worn she could make out every honed rib beneath the thin cotton. Athletic shoes clad his feet, and his dark thick hair—damp from either sweat or a recent dip in the pool or both—was slicked back off his forehead.

The sun caught his cheekbones, showcasing his profile. He was lean and hard, and every time he threw a pitch or caught it on the rebound, he winced.

Dammit, was the man intentionally trying to undermine her efforts to heal him? Or was he just that ruthlessly stubborn?

When he turned and saw her standing there, his face dissolved into a hot smile that gave the sun a run for its money. He was utterly irresistible.

Easy, she told herself.

No matter how irresistible he might be, she
had
to resist him. Axel was her patient, and any sexual feelings had no place in a professional relationship. She had a job to do. No ifs, ands, or buts. She wasn't here to be charmed. She wasn't some simpering groupie who lost her mind every time he flexed his muscles. She was here to rehabilitate his arm.

End of story.

The knot in her stomach had everything to do with the fact he was not following the protocol she'd set up for him, and nothing to do with the fact that her heart was pounding so hard she could barely think straight.

He dropped the smile, turned back to the rebounder as if daring her to do something about it, and flung the ball again.

Oh dude, it's on like Donkey Kong.

Squaring her shoulders, Kasha marched closer until she was only a foot away, crossed her arms over her chest, glowered, and said, “Ahem.”

He kept pitching.

Big surprise. The man was mulishly stubborn.

She cleared her throat again, louder this time, and dropped her hands to her hips. He had a glove on his left hand but kept fielding the ball with his right. He stared straight ahead, not glancing her way, continuing to rhythmically toss and catch the ball. Testing her?

“How long have you been doing that?” she asked quietly.

His shrug was a casual glide, so polished he didn't miss a beat with the catching and throwing. “An hour or so.”

“Is there something about the word ‘rest' that you don't understand?”

“Not in my vocabulary.”

“Ah,” she said. “So all you need is a definition. Try this one on for size. Rest: to cease work or movement in order to relax, refresh oneself, or recover strength.”

“You don't say.”

“I do say. That's why my lips are moving.”

He turned to her, caught the rebounding ball without looking, and met her gaze, a wicked gleam in his eyes; dangerous business, but having fun.

Air stalled in her lungs, and her pulse popped painfully in her throat. Why was she doing this? What did she know about supreme, high-performance athletes? What if she was wrong about rest?

Great. Now he had her second-guessing herself.

Don't think of him as a supreme athlete
, she reasoned.
Think of him as OCD. He can't stop testing
limits. Think of him as an injured guy who'd lost his son and was using work to keep his grief at bay.

Her pulse skipped and her gaze shifted to his heart, to the dark ink of the tattoo she could make out through the thin white T-shirt. Scolding him wasn't going to work.

Kasha smiled gently and forced herself not to gnaw on her bottom lip. Maybe she could turn this around.

A long moment passed, and a bead of perspiration pearled on his forehead. She deepened her smile to show friendly teeth, vague and nonthreatening.

He smacked the ball into the pocket of the glove, closed his fingers around it, and dropped his left hand to his side. His stance was loose-kneed, but aggressive. “You got a point to make?”

He was such a big guy, tall and solid. Kasha wasn't accustomed to men towering over her. She was five-eleven and a hundred and fifty-five pounds, bigger than a lot of men. But beside him, she felt downright fragile, and that was disconcerting.

“You know if your arm doesn't improve by next week all you have to do is have surgery. But I'll be out of a job.”

“They won't fire you,” he said as if she was being ridiculous.

“I'm a probationary employee who went out on a limb. Of course they'll fire me.”

He ducked his head, ran his hand up the back of his neck, shifted his weight. He used his smile to apologize. “I got up this morning and I intended to take it easy. I was going to go for a walk and then I saw this rebounder in the garage and I got excited and . . .” He shrugged like a kid caught playing hooky. “I was going to toss the ball around for just a few minutes, and time got away from me.”

“Be honest. You planned to stop just before I got here.”

“Guilty as charged. My bad luck you showed up early.”

A clot of anger lodged in the center of her chest. “If you don't give a damn about your long-term health, fine by me. I'll tell Truman Beck I was wrong about my ability to help you, and ask him to assign you another therapist.”

“You're not going to do that.” He grinned as if he just decided he liked her better when she yelled at him.

Nothing doing. She wasn't giving him the satisfaction of losing her temper. Purposefully, Kasha ironed her expression blank. “As if you know me so well.”

“You're an open book.”

“That's the last thing I am. You're just trying to rile me.”

“Is it working?”

“No it's not. I get what you're doing. You're deflecting attention off yourself and onto me.”

“Pitcher's gotta pitch,” he said.

“You think that's clever?”

“Yeah.” He spread his grin like plaster, thick and rough. “I do.”

“If you're determined to pitch,” she murmured, lightening her tone. “At least do it safely.”

“Meaning?”

“Throw underhanded.”

“Like a girl?”

“And pitch to me instead of the rebounder.”

The contours of his face tightened. “I can't pitch to you.”

“Why not?”

“I throw hundred-mile-an-hour fastballs for a living, Sphinx.”

“Not right now you don't.”

“Go ahead. Rub it in.”

“I'm beginning to think you really do want that surgery,” she said.

“I don't.”

“Then why are you being so difficult?”

“I can't pitch to you.”

“Why not?”

“I might hurt you.”

Kasha clenched her jaw. “Do I look soft and delicate to you? I can take anything you can dish out.”

He eyed her up and down. “Oh yeah?”

“Absolutely.”

“Okay.” He chucked the glove to her. “Here you go.”

She snagged the mitt in midair. “You need a glove too.”

He rolled his eyes. “Fine. Rowdy's got extras in the gym.”

“I'll go get it. You take a break.” She picked up the rebounder and carried it with her to the gym, and wondered where she could hide it to keep him from doing this again. Maybe she could enlist the Creedys to keep an eye on him whenever she wasn't around.

When she came back with the extra baseball glove, she found Axel sprawled in a chaise longue poolside, a pair of mirrored sunglasses over his eyes, and she knew with absolute certainty he was staring at her legs in the chino Bermuda shorts that were part of her uniform options.

“You don't have to wear your uniform when you're working with me,” he said.

“I prefer it,” she answered. “Helps to keep things professional.”

“Uh-huh,” he said in a sultry voice so sexy it curled her toes. Now that was unprofessional. She
had to stop letting him affect her like this. Making her stomach melty and her breath quicken.

She tossed the extra mitt to him. He reached up as effortlessly as if he were swatting a fly. But she noticed he reached with his left hand, not his dominant one. Was his right arm hurting from pitching against the rebounder? Or had using his left arm become a defensive strategy?

“Do you still want to do this?” she asked, punching her fist into the pocket of the well-worn leather glove.

“You bet.” Languidly, he drooped one leg over the chaise, pushed off with the other leg, and straightened upright.

Once again, she was struck by his height, and his presence. She tossed her head, the end of her braid swishing against her spine, and crouched like a catcher.

“Ready?” he asked.

“Yes.”

He lobbed her an underhanded ball so soft she had to stretch out long to reach it before it hit the ground.

“While I appreciate that you're taking it easy on your arm, you don't have to treat me like glass. You're pitching underhanded. It's okay to put a little power into it. I'm tough as an old boot. Toss the ball to me as if I were a guy.”

“But you're not a guy.”

“Seriously? Are you a chauvinist on top of being a hardhead?”

“Sphinx, in case you haven't noticed, there are physical differences between men and women.” He ogled her. “I'm all for equal rights and equal pay and equal whatever, but biology is biology.”

“Throw the damn ball with some force,” she
growled, confused as to why she was goading him to put more power into the pitch. She should be happy he was taking it easy. Why wasn't she happy?

The next pitch came in hot, blasting hard into her glove. Kasha caught it, but the momentum caused her to rock backward, and if she hadn't been a dedicated yoga devotee, she would have lost her balance and ended up on her butt on the cement.

“Better?” He smirked.

“Perfect. How's your shoulder?”

“Fine. Feels loose. Easy.”

“Great.”

The next pitch that he let fly was harder than the last, but she was braced for it this time, or so she thought. It was higher than his previous pitch too, and she had to spring up to catch it. She stretched her arm high overhead, kept her eyes on the ball, moved—back, back, back.

Her heel came down on something firm but squishy, and her first thought was,
Snake!

Freaked out, Kasha jumped, stumbled and realized too late it was a garden hose. She felt her feet go out from under her. She windmilled her arms in a vain attempt to right herself. The baseball glove flew off her hand, and she was airborne.

Falling in midair. A weightless, surreal, holy-crap sensation.

And she tumbled over the edge of the swimming pool into the deep end, her body breaking the surface of the water. At the shock, her heart momentarily stopped.

The impact wrung the air from her lungs. Stunned, she batted at the water, her mind whirling. In that split-second drift of panic, she heard a loud splash,
felt waves slap against her as strong arms encircled her waist and hard-muscled legs entwined with hers.

“I've got you,” Axel said, his voice muffled and watery.

At his touch, a warm peace spread over her and she grinned idiotically.
Seriously, Kasha?

He lifted her up, tugged her head out of the water, and whispered, “Oh shit, you're bleeding.”

She wanted to tell him it was no big deal, but she was feeling a little woozy. Why was she bleeding? Where was she bleeding?

Eyes closed, she did a little mental inventory. Feeling out her body. But honestly, she was so distracted by his arms around her that she couldn't really process anything.

She tried to look around, to see the blood for herself, but he had her in such a tight grip she could hardly breathe, much less swivel her head.

Axel towed her toward the side of the pool. She thought about protesting, breaking free, but it felt kind of nice here in his arms.

Warning! Dangerous thoughts ahead. Pull out. Pull back.

“Stop thrashing,” he growled. “Just relax, dammit.”

Oh yes, because that was so easy to do when the hunkiest of hunks is hauling you soaking wet from a pool.

Kasha willed herself to go still and let him be in charge, which, granted, was not easy. She was used to being in control. Her hair was in her face, plastered against her eyes, and she couldn't see. Apparently the band holding her braid had broken. She blinked, making a motorboat noise, blowing out her breath through wet lips.

“Here we are,” he said when he reached the ladder, treading water to keep them afloat. “Can you grab hold?”

“Yes, sure.” She was alarmed to hear her voice come out wobbly and small.