Love of the Game

by Lori Wilde

  Damn! Her perception was uncanny. His last relationship—albeit not a serious one—had broken up because of all the time he spent working out.

  “Lady,” he said. “You don’t know me at all.”

  She looked at him with such pity it made him mad. “Who’s Dylan?”

  He slapped a hand over his heart, over the tattoo, even though his T-shirt hid it from her prying eyes. “Let’s get something straight. You don’t get to ask me about that. Ever.”

  “He was very important to you.” Her eyes were sad, but she wasn’t taking it personally.

  Axel was not going to talk about Dylan. He made a verbal U-turn, switchback. “So the heartless, rusted Tin Man. That’s me in your book?”

  She paused, nodded, her head gliding loose and smooth. “Balance. You need balance in your life. That’s what I’m saying. You’ve hit the wall.”

  “And?”

  “Now comes rest. Or you could run after Truman Beck and tell him you changed your mind about the surgery. It’s your choice. I have no vested interest in the outcome. In fact, if you went through with the surgery, it would get me off the hook.”

  “You didn’t seem to have much trouble putting yourself on the hook in the first place,” he pointed out.

  “I have to speak up when I see something that needs speaking up about.”

  “You’re the crunchy granola type.”

  Amusement lit her eyes. “I strive for peace, harmony, and balance in all things.”

  “So then you go and rock the boat with management? Contradictory.”

  “Some things are more important than peace, harmony, and balance.”

  “What things?”

  “Principles. I couldn’t let them bulldoze you into something that you were obviously on the fence about. Sometimes, you have to put up a fight.”

  His muscles tensed. “Why am I the battle you’ve chosen to take on? You don’t owe me anything.”

  She took a deep breath in segmented parts, filling her belly first, then her mid-chest, finally the tops of her lungs. Strong. In charge. Her breasts rose brilliantly, swelling with air, alive with it. He’d never been fascinated with anyone’s breathing before, but now he was.

  “Because you’re on the verge of crashing and burning,” she said.

  “Really?”

  “You know it too. Deep down. That’s why you put off the surgery. And it’s why I offered my opinion.”

  “You didn’t offer it, Sphinx. I pulled it out of you.”

  “You took my advice.”

  They stood there staring at each other and he had the most overwhelming urge to kiss her.

  Kiss her hard. Kiss her long. Kiss her deep. Kiss her until both of them were hot and sweaty and panting for air.

  She must have seen the desire in his eyes because for the first time, she looked uncertain and stepped back.

  That move made him want to close the gap she’d created, span the distance, rub the corner of her wide, peach-hued lips with his thumb, and coax out a smile. But he wouldn’t. If she was going to be his therapist, he would keep his hands to himself.

  “This place is impressive.” She dodged his gaze by glancing up at the domed ceiling that let in a flood of sunshine. “State-of-the-art facility. Cutting-edge equipment. Highly trained therapists. It’s adding to your sense of failure.”

  “Huh?”

  “You’re thinking, hey, I’ve got the best of everything to heal and I’m not healing, what’s wrong with me?”

  “Busted.” He laughed even though it wasn’t funny. “So what are we going to do about that?”

  “Take you away from all this.” Finally, she surrendered a hint of a smile. “I’ll file a treatment plan with Dr. Harrison, and we’ll use Rowdy’s house in Stardust for your rehabilitation.”

  “I’m not much of a country person.” Axel shook his head. “I grew up in Houston. I’m a fast-paced urbanite. I’d rather stay in Dallas.”

  “All the more reason to get out in nature. It’ll help. I promise.”

  “Why can’t I rest at my condo where I can call for takeout whenever I want?”

  “Precisely because you can call for takeout. A healthy diet is part of the healing process. Rowdy has a couple who look after his ranch. Mr. Creedy keeps the grounds. His wife is the housekeeper and cook. I’ll make a meal plan for you that Mrs. Creedy can follow.”

  “I eat healthy …” he said. “Most of the time.”

  “With me on your case, you’ll eat healthily all of the time.”

  “So you’re a nutritionist too?” Yeah, okay, his tone was smart-assed, but she was talking about dragging him to the hinterlands of Bumfuzzle Nowhere.

  “Actually, I do have a certificate in nutrition.”

  “Overachiever.”

  “No more so than you.”

  “Let me guess. You’re a vegetarian.”

  “You say that as if it were a dirty word.”

  “No, just boring.”

  “Are you planning on fighting me every inch of the way? Because if you are, let’s stop this right here, and you can call the GM and tell him you’ve changed your mind about the surgery.”

  Axel cocked his head, studied her. Her expression was neutral, her eyes noncommittal. Did anything ever rock her serene cool? He had a mad urge to do something, anything to rustle that glossy surface, to find the jagged edges hiding below the water’s surface because he knew those edges had to be there. “It depends.”

  “On what?”

  “Whether you can make this thing happen or not.”

  “Have a little faith,” she said. “I know what I’m doing.”

  He paused, still stuck on his dilemma. His instinct was to push. Always. Passion and determination had carried him this far, and it was hard to resist. But he’d hit a wall, and she was right.

  “Okay.” He raised his palms. “Let’s do this. Haul my ass out to Mayberry. I’m putting my career in your hands.”

  But even as he said it, he knew keeping his word was next to impossible, because he had no idea how to slow down. None.

  He’d been going full bore since the moment he could walk and nothing stopped him. Even when Dylan got sick, he’d kept going because working through grief was the only way Axel stayed sane.

  He studied Kasha, felt a twinge of pity. Whether she knew it or not, the woman had her work cut out for her.

  CHAPTER 3

  Five hours after she got stuck being Axel Richmond’s physical therapist, Kasha sat in her car outside the group home where her half sister Emma lived. This was her fifth visit to the renovated Victorian on the corner of Moonglow and Pearl Street in an older part of Stardust filled with stately houses and long-limbed sheltering trees.

  She was still struggling to wrap her head around the miraculous news that she had a biological sibling. The lawyer’s out-of-the-blue call six weeks ago had changed everything, including the way Kasha saw herself.

  Remembering that world-rattling phone call, she closed her eyes.

  “Kasha Carlyle?” asked the polished-as-glass male voice.

  She had stopped to answer the phone on the way to put a load of laundry into the washing machine, and she had dropped the basket at her feet. Her first leery thought was Oh crap, I don’t remember giving my number to any guys recently.

  “Yes,” she said, injecting her tone with a distant, don’t-much-care note.

  “My name is Howard Johnson—”

  “Howard Johnson? Like the hotel chain?”

  He sighed, mumbled almost imperceptibly, “I should have changed my name years ago,” before he said in a louder voice, “Yes, like the hotel chain, and the Mets switch-hitting third baseman.”

  “That’s got to be annoying.”

  “You don’t know the half of it,” he muttered, but marshaled his professionalism and went on. “I’m an attorney for the estate of Jane Compton.”

  “I don’t know a Jane Compton,” she said, but she tightened her grip on the cell phone.

 
; “You might know her by her stage name, Bunny Bongo.”

  “No,” Kasha said, realizing that she wasn’t breathing, but she felt no urgency to take a breath. “Sounds like a stripper name.”

  “She was.”

  “Oh well, there you go. What’s this Bunny … er … Jane Compton got to do with me?”

  Howard Johnson exhaled sharply. “She asked that I contact you in the event of her death.”

  Kasha’s chest grew tighter and tighter and tighter and still, she couldn’t seem to make herself breathe. Her voice came out high, and streaky from lack of oxygen. “Why?”

  “Because she was the mother of a twenty-three-year-old mentally challenged daughter, named Emma, who happens to be your half sister. Emma has been living in a group home for the past year while her mother was in hospice, and you’re her only living relative.”

  Kasha had dropped the phone, sat right down in the middle of the laundry basket, and instead of breathing, she’d thrown up.

  Even now, nausea swept over her again.

  Opening her eyes, Kasha practiced a breathing technique she’d learned in yoga class. Inhale to the count of four. Hold the breath to the count of seven. Exhale to the count of eight.

  Calm down.

  The past was over. It had been out of her control, none of it was her fault, and it couldn’t be changed. Accept. Forget. Forgive.

  All that mattered now was Emma.

  Clutching the car keys in her palm, Kasha got out and strode up the sidewalk, her stomach shaky the same way it had been the four other times she’d visited. She hadn’t yet told her adoptive parents about Emma. Didn’t know how to start the conversation. The last thing she wanted was to hurt them.

  Be honest. You’re not ready to relive the pain. As long as she didn’t have to talk about the past, she could handle it. Putting words to it would bring everything back up again.

  Besides, she’d convinced herself it was better to wait until she’d made her final decision about Emma before she broke the news to her parents.

  Kasha knocked on the door, and a few seconds later the smiling housemother, Molly Banks, opened it.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t call first,” Kasha apologized. “But I was hoping to see Emma.”

  Molly bit her bottom lip, and her gray eyes clouded. “It’s not that I mind you seeing her, but routine is such a comfort to our young women. Unexpected disruptions can cause behavioral issues.”

  “I don’t mean to make trouble, I just …” Kasha felt the car keys bite into her palm. “I needed to see her.”

  Molly said nothing, pressed the tip her tongue to her upper lip as if holding back her opinion.

  “But I’m making this about me, aren’t I? And not what’s best for Emma.” Kasha shook her head, the unshed tears tasting brackish in her mouth. She took a step backward. “I’m sorry. I’ll go. When can I see her again?”

  Molly’s face softened. “We were just about to sit down to dinner. Would you like to join us?”

  Her stomach churned and she didn’t think she could eat, but she needed to see Emma again. Needed a reminder of why she was working for the Gunslingers. “Yes. Please. Thank you.”

  “Come on in.” Molly held the door wide, and moved aside.

  Kasha walked over the threshold, and into the tidy house that smelled like fresh-cut lemons and fabric softener. Molly escorted Kasha into the dining room where the members of the household were grouped around the table, standing behind their chairs, waiting for permission to be seated. Like Emma, the other five young women had Down syndrome.

  The walls were painted sunny yellow. The chairs were plain and sturdy. The table was set with heavy plastic dishes.

  “Ka’cha,” Emma exclaimed, her eyes widened behind the thick lenses of her round glasses, and she raced over to envelop Kasha in a tight bear hug.

  She hugged her sister back, overwhelmed by the rush of love. How was it possible for her to so completely love a young woman she had no idea existed six weeks ago?

  Emma slipped her arm around Kasha’s waist, rested her head against her shoulder, announcing to the room at large, “My titter.”

  The other residents surrounded Kasha, calling her name, begging for her attention.

  Emma scowled, squeezed Kasha’s arm, and announced in a loud, petulant voice, “My titter.”

  Molly smiled tolerantly, but her expression was harried as she shooed the other girls back to the table. “I’ll find an extra chair.”

  Kasha felt guilty for disrupting the meal. She should have called. Why hadn’t she called? Um … because she’d been afraid Molly would tell her not to come. “Anything I can do to help?”

  “Ask Dixie.” Molly disappeared into another room.

  On her previous visits, Kasha had learned that the cook, Dixie, lived in her own apartment at the back of the property. Before Kasha could head to the kitchen to see if Dixie needed help, Molly’s husband, Cliff, came home from his job as a postal worker. That set off another round of stampeding girls as they ran to greet him.

  Over the heads of the six residents hugging him fiercely, Cliff gave Kasha a good-natured smile. “Molly didn’t tell me we were having company for dinner.”

  “She didn’t know,” Kasha said. “I apologize for dropping in unannounced.”

  “We do appreciate advance warning.” His voice was kind, but firm.

  “I’ll make an appointment next time.”

  “But … we’re always happy to have visitors.” He clapped his hands, sending the giggling young women back to their places.

  Molly returned with another chair, and she and Cliff rearranged the table settings so that Kasha could sit next to Emma.

  Dixie came around to put meat loaf on the plates.

  “No meat loaf for me.” Kasha put her hand over her plate when Dixie got to her.

  “My titter only eat vegetable,” Emma explained.

  “Oops,” Dixie said. “I forgot.”

  One of the other girls crinkled her nose. “Eww. I hate veggybles.”

  “Well,” Molly said, picking up a bowl of potatoes that Dixie had deposited on the table at her elbow, and passed it around. “You’re going to eat yours, Haley.”

  Once everyone at the table had food on his or her plate, the makeshift family said grace. Then Molly gave the signal and they started eating. All conversation stopped for a few minutes as everyone dug in with gusto. Dixie retreated to the kitchen. Kasha felt odd and out of place.

  Until Emma reached under the table to pat Kasha’s knee and whispered, “My big titter.”

  Kasha had three adopted sisters she loved dearly, but she had never experienced the instant connection she’d felt with Emma from the moment she first saw the girl’s dark chocolate eyes, the exact same color as her own.

  They both had the same creamy latte skin, and the same thick, black hair inherited from their biological father, who’d been part Native American, part Ethiopian. Immediate recognition—soul recognition—of someone she’d never met before had punched Kasha in the gut, left her wrung out and reeling.

  We belong. She’s part of me.

  By her third visit, Kasha experienced an overwhelming urge to become Emma’s legal guardian, and assume custody of her. Provide her with a permanent home. She’d talked to Howard Johnson and he got her to agree to wait six weeks before moving forward with the process.

  “Give yourself a chance to get to know her,” he said. “To see if this is really the right step for you both.”

  The six weeks had passed, and the urge hadn’t subsided. In fact, it had grown even stronger. She wanted Emma.

  Kasha had taken the job with the Gunslingers because of her sister. But joining the sports team had been a big adjustment, going from the head of the physical therapy department at Stardust General, caring mostly for elderly patients, to a probationary position working with cocky, handsome baseball players in the prime of life.

  Her friends teased her and made “hot body” jokes, and asked her if she could
introduce them to members of the team. But in all honesty, Kasha preferred working with her senior citizens.

  Seniors truly needed the skills she taught them in order to stay in their own homes or to be able to walk again or improve their balance to prevent falls. While the ballplayers were chasing the peak of athletic perfection.

  It was definitely a paradigm shift. Normally, her job entailed motivating people to work harder, but with hard-charging guys like Axel Richmond, she faced the opposite challenge.

  Axel.

  She set herself up for trouble when she’d voiced her opinion and agreed to work with him one-on-one. If she blew this, she’d lose her job. The job she needed to provide well for Emma.

  Once she was off probation, she’d not only be making double her previous salary, she would have the best insurance available. True, Emma had Medicaid, but Kasha was determined her sister would have access to the finest medical care money could buy.

  So why had she spoken her mind today? Was it an unconscious form of self-sabotage?

  Subconsciously, could she be having second thoughts about becoming Emma’s legal guardian? She could always backtrack. Advise Axel to get the surgery, tell him she was wrong, let herself off that hook. All it would take was a phone call.

  Did she want out?

  She glanced over at her half sister and instantly felt the hard tug of love. Emma beamed up at her as if Kasha was the most amazing thing she’d ever seen.

  And Kasha felt her heart melt into a puddle of goo. If the look on her face matched the sweet goopiness in her chest, no one could ever call her Sphinx.

  Looking past those heavy glasses into Emma’s dear, trusting eyes, Kasha felt utterly changed. Tears for all she’d lost, tears she never allowed herself to shed, burned at the back of her throat. All these years Emma had been living in the same town, and Kasha had not known of her existence.

  Sadness for everything she’d missed swept over her, for the terrible tragedy and dark secret that had kept her and Emma apart for twenty-three years.

  Breathe. Just breathe.

  The past couldn’t be changed. The future was nebulous. Tomorrow would always be tomorrow. They lived today. This minute. Now.