This Heart of Mine (29 page)

Jocks 0, Last Kids to Be Chosen in Gym Class 2.

She sauntered past him as her team came in from the field. "Nice day."

"I thought you said you weren't any good at sports."

"I said I didn't
like
sports, jock boy." She flicked his chest. "There's a difference."

He couldn't let her get away with that one, so he gave her some prime NFL sneer. "Next time you stare at my zipper, jock girl, you'd better be on your back."

She laughed and ran off to join her team.

Lilly was first up. She was all Guccied in coordinating colors with diamonds flashing from her rings and bracelets. She kicked away a pair of leopard-print sandals, slipped off sunglasses with interlocking C's at the hinges, and grabbed the bat. She took a couple of practice swings, then stood up to the plate as if she owned it. Right then he knew that he hadn't gotten all his athletic ability from the rodeo rider.

She arched an eyebrow at him, and her eyes caught the light. Green like his.

I know you're my real mom and I love you very much…

He didn't try to burn her. Instead, he sent it nice and easy over the plate. She took a great swing, but she was rusty and didn't catch it all.

"Foul ball!"

He gave her the same pitch again, and this time she caught it clean. The bat cracked against the ball, and as her team whooped, she made it to second. He was startled by the burst of pride he felt.

"Nice going," he muttered.

"Past my prime," she said.

Captain Goodheart was up next, all solemn and serious, with the same worried look on her face he sometimes saw her aunt wearing. Hannah's straight brown hair was a little lighter than Molly's, but they had the same stubborn chin, the same slight tilt at the eyes. She was a serious kid, as well as being neat. Her American Girl T-shirt didn't show any sign that she'd been playing with a couple of poodles and eating chocolate cake. He spotted a tiny notebook sticking out of the back pocket of her shorts, and something inside him melted. She seemed more like Molly's daughter than Dan and Phoebe's. Was this the way his little girl would have looked?

Out of nowhere his throat tightened.

"I'm not very good," Hannah whispered from the plate.

Oh, man, not that
… He was dead meat. He threw wide.

"Ball one."

She looked even more worried. "I'm better at drawing. And writing things. I'm pretty good at writing things."

"Cut it out, Hannah," her insensitive jerk of a father called from second base.

Kevin had always considered Dan Calebow one of the best parents he'd ever known, which just proved how wrong he could be. He shot him a quelling look and threw a lob so soft, so gentle, that it didn't make it to the plate.

"Ball two."

Hannah bit her bottom lip and spoke in a helpless whisper. "I'll be so glad when this is over."

Kevin melted, and so did his next pitch, just as it passed over the plate.

Hannah bunted it with a choppy little swing.

Kevin went after the ball, but he didn't hurry so he could give her enough time to make it to first base. Unfortunately, Cody missed the catch, and she made it to second.

He heard a chorus of cheers go up and saw Lilly slide home, Gucci pants forgotten.

Last Kids to Be Chosen in Gym Class 3, Jocks 0.

He cocked his head at Hannah.

"I'm not a very good batter," she said in her lost-little-girl voice, "but I can run really fast."

"Brother," Dan said in disgust.

Kevin was about to say something comforting when the little girl exchanged a look with her aunt that just about knocked him off his feet. It was only a smile. But it wasn't an ordinary smile. Oh, no. It was a sly little hustler's smile!

An expression of such perfect understanding passed between niece and aunt that he nearly choked. He'd been conned! Hannah was a world-class mischief-maker, just like Molly!

He turned on Dan, who looked faintly apologetic. "Phoebe and I still aren't sure if she plans it ahead of time or if it just happens."

"You should have told me!"

Dan gazed at his youngest daughter with a combination of irritation and fatherly pride. "You had to see this for yourself."

Sports sometimes had a way of making everything clear, and right then it all fell into place—from Molly's almost drowning and the incident with the canoe to Marmie's uncharacteristic trip up into that tree. Molly had been stringing him along from the very beginning. Cody came forward, clearly unhappy with his pitcher's lackluster performance, and the next thing Kevin knew, he was standing on second base while Dan took over at the mound.

Hannah the Con Artist exchanged a sly glance with Molly, and Kevin saw why. It was Phoebe's turn at bat.

Oh, and didn't the good times just start to roll then? There was more butt wiggling, lip licking, and breast thrusting than anybody under the age of consent should be allowed to witness. Dan started to sweat, Phoebe cooed, and the next thing he knew, the Stars' owner was perched on first while Miss Hannah claimed third.

It had turned into a bloodbath.

The Jocks finally managed to beat the Last Kids to Be Chosen in Gym Class, but only because Captain Cody was smart enough to replace Dan with Tess, who was immune to butt wiggling, plus being nobody's fool. Tess made short work of the nursery set and politely but firmly put the oldsters out to pasture. Even she, however, couldn't stop Aunt Molly from hitting a homer in the last inning.

For someone who hated sports, Molly sure did know how to handle a bat, and the way she ran the bases left Kevin so aroused he had to bend over and pretend he was rubbing away a leg cramp to keep from embarrassing himself. As he rubbed, he remembered how crowded Molly's bed would be this week with all the kids snuggling up against her. The way he understood it, this was Julie's night, tomorrow it would be Andrew's, then Hannah's, then Tess's. Maybe he could sneak into the cottage after bedtime and kidnap Auntie M. But then he remembered her telling him Julie was a light sleeper. He sighed and resettled his ball cap on his head. Face it. There wasn't going to be any joy in Mudville tonight.
Mighty Kevin had struck out.

The woods were spooky, and Daphne's teeth chattered. What if no one ever found her? Thank goodness she'd brought along her favorite lettuce and marmalade sandwich.

Daphne Gets Lost

Lilly leaned back into the chaise and listened to the tinkling of the wind chimes hanging from the redbud tree that grew next to the patio. She loved wind chimes, but Craig had hated them and wouldn't let her hang them in her garden. She closed her eyes, glad the guests at the B&B seldom visited this quiet spot just behind the house.

She'd finally stopped asking herself how long she was staying here. When it was time to leave, she'd know. And today had been such fun. When she'd slid into home plate, Kevin had almost seemed proud of her, and at the picnic he hadn't deliberately avoided her the way Liam had.

"Hiding out from your adoring public?"

Her eyes snapped open, and her heart skipped a beat as the man she thought about far too much came out the back door of the B&B. His hair was shaggy, his clothes the same rumpled khaki shorts and navy pocket T-shirt he'd worn earlier at the picnic. Like her, he hadn't yet cleaned up from the softball game.

She gazed into those dark eyes that saw too much. "I'm recuperating from this afternoon."

He sank into the cushions on the redwood chair next to her. "You're a pretty good softball player for a girl."

"And you're a pretty good softball player for a sissy artist."

He yawned. "Who are you calling a sissy?"

She stopped herself from smiling. She did too much of that when they were together, and it encouraged him. Every morning she told herself she'd stay in her room until he left, but she'd go downstairs anyway. She still couldn't believe what she'd done with him. It was as if she'd been under a spell, as if that glass-enclosed studio had been part of another world. But she was back in Kansas now.

She was also mildly irritated by how much he'd enjoyed himself without her. If he hadn't been laughing with Molly, he'd been flirting with Phoebe Calebow or teasing one of the children. He was a gruff, intimidating man, and the fact that they hadn't been frightened of him somehow annoyed her.

"Go get cleaned up," he said. "I'll do the same, then take you out to dinner."

"Thanks, but I'm not hungry."

He gave a weary sigh and rested his head against the back of the chair. "You're hell-bent on throwing this away, aren't you? You're not going to give us a fighting chance."

She eased her legs over the side of the chaise and sat straighten "Liam, what happened between us was an aberration. I've been alone too much lately, and I gave in to a foolish impulse."

"Just time and circumstances, is that it?"

"Yes."

"It could have happened with anyone?"

She wanted to agree, but she couldn't. "No, not with anyone. You can be attractive when you put your mind to it."

"So can a lot of men. You know there's something between us, but you don't have the guts to see what it is."

"I don't need to. I know exactly why I'm attracted to you. It's an old habit."

"What do you mean by that?"

She twisted her rings. "I mean that I've been there and done that. The alpha male. The stallion who rules the herd. The take-charge prince who makes all Cinderella's troubles go away. Men like you are my fatal weakness. But I'm not a penniless teenager anymore who needs someone to take care of her."

"Thank God. I don't like teenagers. And I'm too self-centered to take care of anyone."

"You're deliberately minimizing what I'm trying to tell you."

"That's because you're boring me."

She wouldn't let his rudeness distract her, especially since she knew it was calculated to do just that. "Liam, I'm too old and too smart to make the same mistake again. Yes, I'm attracted to you. I'm instinctively drawn to aggressive men, even though it's their nature to run roughshod over the women who care about them."

"And here I thought this conversation couldn't become any more infantile."

"You're doing it right now. You don't want to talk about this, so you're belittling me to try to get me to shut up."

"Too bad it's not working."

"I thought I'd finally gotten smart, but obviously I haven't, or I wouldn't be letting you do this." She rose from the chaise. "Listen to me, Liam. I made the mistake of falling in love with a controlling man once in my life, and I'll never do it again. I loved my husband. But, God—sometimes I hated him more."

She hugged herself, astonished that she'd revealed something to him she could barely admit to herself.

"He probably deserved it. He sounds like a son of a bitch."

"He was just like you!"

"I seriously doubt that."

"You don't think so?" She jabbed her hand toward the redbud tree. "He wouldn't let me have wind chimes! I love wind chimes, but he hated them, so I wasn't permitted to hang them in my own garden."

"Good judgment on his part. The things are a nuisance."

Her stomach clenched. "Letting myself fall in love with you would be like falling in love with Craig all over again."

"I really resent that."

"A month after he died, I hung a set of wind chimes outside my bedroom window."

"Well, you're not going to hang them outside our bedroom window!"

"We don't have a bedroom window! And if we did, I'd hang as many sets there as I wanted!"

"Even though I've expressly asked you not to?"

She threw up her hands in frustration. "This isn't about wind chimes! I was just giving you an example!"

"You're not getting off that easily. You're the one who brought the subject up." Now he was on his feet. "I've told you I don't like the damn things, but you've said you're going to hang them up anyway, is that right?"

"You've lost your mind."

"Is that right or not?"

"Yes!"

"Fine." He gave a martyr's sigh. "If it's that important to you, go ahead and hang the damn things. But don't expect me not to complain. Bloody noise pollution. And I'll expect you to give in on something that's important to me."

She clutched her head. "Is driving me crazy your idea of seduction?"

"I'm trying to make a point. One you seem unable to understand."

"Enlighten me."

"You're not going to let any man run roughshod over you, not anymore. I just tried, but you wouldn't let me, and if I can't do it, no one can. You see? We don't have a problem."

"It's not that simple!"

"What about me?" He touched his chest, and for the first time he looked vulnerable. "What about my fatal weakness?"

"I don't know what you mean."

"Maybe if you'd think about someone other than yourself, you would!"

His words didn't sting as Craig's would have. Liam's were intended to goad her, not to wound. "You're impossible!"

"What is a man like me supposed to do, tell me that. I don't know how to pull my punches, and I'm too old to learn, so where does that leave me?"

"I don't know."

"Strong women are my weakness. Tough women who don't fall apart just because a man doesn't always say what they want to hear. Except the strong woman I'm falling in love with doesn't want to put up with me. So where does that leave me, Lilly?"

"Oh, Liam… You're not falling in love with me. You're—"

"Have a little faith in yourself," he said gruffly. "In the woman you've become."

She felt trapped by his brutal honesty. He didn't know what he was saying. The person he saw when he looked at her wasn't the person she felt like inside.

He moved to the edge of the patio, his hands in his pockets. "You've been slamming doors in my face for long enough, I think. I love you, but I have my pride, too."

"I know that."

"The painting's almost done, and I'd like you to see it. Come to my house on Thursday evening."

"Liam, I—"

"If you don't show up, I won't come looking for you. You're going to have to make a decision, Lilly."

"I hate ultimatums."

"I'm not surprised. Strong women usually do." He walked away.

Kevin spent most of the next two days trying to catch Molly alone, but what with his trips into town for bikes, attending to the guests, and the kids who kept popping up every time he stuck his head out the door, he didn't have the opportunity. Twice Dan tried to talk to him, but the phone interrupted once and a guest's dead car battery the other time. By Tuesday evening he was so grouchy and out of sorts that he couldn't concentrate on the game film he'd stuck in the office VCR. Five weeks to training camp… He nudged Roo off his lap and got up to go to the window. It wasn't even seven o'clock, but a few rain clouds had rolled in and it was getting dark.
Where the hell was she
?

Just then his cell phone rang. He snatched it from the desk. "Hello."

"Kevin, it's Molly."

"Where have you been?" he snarled. "I told you I wanted to talk to you after tea today."

"I spotted Phoebe coming up the front walk, so I dodged out the back door. She's getting more persistent. Then I ran into Tess, and she started talking to me about a boy who likes her."

Yeah? Well, what about the boy who likes you?

"The thing is… after Tess left, I decided to take a walk in the woods by myself, and I started thinking about this idea I have for Daphne. One thing led to another, and the next thing I knew, I was lost."

For the first time all day he relaxed. "You don't say." As he loosened his grip on the phone, his stomach rumbled. He realized he hadn't eaten anything since breakfast, and he headed into the kitchen to fix himself a sandwich. Roo trotted along.

"Lost in the woods," she said with emphasis.

"Wow." He tried to keep the smile from his voice.

"And now it's getting dark."

"It sure is."

"It also looks like rain."

He glanced out the window. "I was just noticing that myself."

"And I'm scared."

"I'll bet." He tucked the cell phone under his chin and pulled some lunch meat from the refrigerator, along with a jar of mustard. "So you found a nearby convenience store and called me?"

"I happened to bring Phoebe's cell phone along."

He grinned and grabbed a loaf of bread from the pantry. "Smart of you."

"At camp we were taught to wear a whistle around our neck if we went walking alone. Since I didn't have a whistle…"

"You took a cell phone."

"Safety first."

"God bless the power of telecommunications." He went back to the refrigerator for some cheese. "And now you're lost. Have you looked for moss on the tree trunks?"

"I didn't think of that."

"It grows on the north side." He began to assemble his sandwich, enjoying himself for the first time all evening.

"Yes, I believe I remember hearing that. But it's a little dark to see."

"I don't suppose you tucked a compass in your pocket, or a flashlight?"

"That didn't occur to me."

"Too bad." He slapped on some extra mustard. "You want me to come look for you?"

"I'd really appreciate it. If you bring your phone along, I might be able to direct you. I started out on the path behind Jacob's Ladder."

"That'd be a good place for me to start then. Tell you what—I'll call you from there."

"It's getting dark fast. Would you mind hurrying?"

"Oh, sure, I'll be there before you know it." He disconnected, chuckled, and settled down to enjoy his sandwich, but he'd barely managed three bites before she called back. "Yeah?"

"Did I tell you I might have sprained my ankle?"

"Oh, no. How'd you do that?"

"Some kind of animal hole."

"Hope it's not from a snake. There are some rattlers around here."

"Rattlers?"

He reached for a napkin. "I'm walking by Jacob's Ladder right now, but somebody must be running a microwave, because I'm getting interference. I'll call you back."

"Wait, you don't have my num—"

He disconnected, gave a whoop of laughter, and headed for the refrigerator. A sandwich always tasted better with beer. He whistled to himself as he popped the cap and settled back to enjoy.

Then it struck him. What the hell was he doing?

He snatched up his cell phone and punched in Phoebe's number from memory. There'd be plenty of time later to teach her a lesson. This was the first chance he'd had in two days to get her alone. "Hey, Molly?"

"Yes."

"I'm having a little trouble finding you." He tucked the phone under his chin, grabbed the beer, along with what was left of his sandwich, and headed out the back door. "Do you think you could scream?"

"You want me to scream?"

"It'd be helpful." He took another bite of sandwich and hurried toward Jacob's Ladder.

"I'm not really much of a screamer."

"You are in bed," he pointed out.

"Are you eating?"

"I need to keep my strength up for the search." He waved at Charlotte Long with his beer bottle.