“Son, you’d do well to remember your sister isn’t the candidate here. I am.”
The discord between father and son—candidate and campaign manager—stunned her. As far as she knew, Daddy always let Pete run the campaign. Her gaze ping-ponged between them. Which one would emerge victorious?
“And her actions, as usual, reflect poorly on the family. Why can’t she just behave?”
“Dammit, Peter. Cut your sister some slack.” Her father slammed both hands down on the desktop. Contact split the air like a gunshot.
“But Father, she…she—” The color leached from Pete’s face as he stammered.
“So she got drunk and had too much fun once…five years ago. You’ve never let her forget it, even though she’s made amends a thousand times over.”
“I have?”
Her father gave her a gentle smile. “Yes, darling, you have. You’re doing a beautiful job of raising Tara.”
Peter grunted. “When you two are done with the love fest, let’s get back to the issue of Joe Boxer’s effect on your campaign. That guy makes Mel look like the Virgin Mary.”
A fierce need to protect Dave the way he’d stood up for her gripped Mel. “Dave is the most decent, caring man I’ve ever met.” She realized how that sounded and flashed her dimples. “Except for you, Daddy.”
“Of course.” Her father smiled back.
Pete retched. “Spare me. Both of you. He’s a menace. Parties…booze…drugs…rehab.”
“He’s made mistakes. Haven’t we all?” Mel still didn’t like to think too hard about a habit bad enough to involve rehab, but took comfort in Dave showing no signs of substance abuse now. “They’re in the past. The future is what counts.”
Even now, her brother was relentless. “Then tell him his future depends on dragging his sorry ass to a virtual press conference Monday morning. Eight o’clock sharp.”
Because she didn’t like his tone, she flashed Peter a fake-sweet smile. “I’ll see if he’s busy.”
“He’d better not be.”
****
“Hey, Reynolds, a bunch of us are hitting the Strip after tonight’s game. We booked the high-roller penthouse at the Riviera. You in?”
Dave eyed his teammate, Greg Bartlesby. A rookie first baseman, Greg had yet to figure out road trips weren’t nonstop parties. Kinda reminded him of himself a few years ago, before his mom’s health nosedived and he discovered he had a daughter.
Neither the booze nor the strippers likely to be involved in the evening’s festivities appealed to him. “Sorry, man. I have to be up first thing in the morning.”
“What’s more important than a par-tay?”
Dave grabbed his uniform shirt from the locker. It was Sunday afternoon. He’d promised Mel he’d be available for some virtual town hall thing in the morning. Answering a bunch of nosy questions from the fair citizens of Brannen, Texas, appealed as much as a prostate check. But it was still better than killing time and brain cells partying with a bunch of kids too young to know any better. “Nothing you’d understand.”
“Come on, old man. You haven’t been out with us guys in months.”
He shook his head firmly. “Not this time. Maybe next week.”
“Fine by me.” Greg shrugged. “You’re the one who’ll miss out on a killer time.”
“I can live with that.” His nights of indiscriminate partying were in the past—where he wanted them to stay.
Because the Vegas Vanguard was leading their division, the game went about as well as he’d expected. The Condors were down by two at the seventh inning stretch when Matt pulled him to the side.
His face was grim. “We’ve got big trouble, Dave.”
“We can make up two runs.”
Matt grimaced and shook his head. “Not the game, Sherlock. I’m talking about Greg’s party afterward. I hear he’s ordered up coke to go with the strippers.”
“How’d you hear that?” And why hadn’t he gotten wind of it? He used to be the first to hear about that kind of thing.
“I have my finger on the pulse of the Condors, my friend.”
“So do I!”
“Not so much these days. You’re always off with your family.” He held up his hand to stop Dave’s protest. “As it should be. But dude, Bartlesby’s too good to get caught up in the shit that dragged you down.”
Ouch. “You saying he’s better than me?”
“You couldn’t play first base to save your daughter’s life.” Matt slugged his arm. “Tell me it wouldn’t feel good to save some young, dumb kid from making the same mistakes you made.”
“Good point.” He wouldn’t wish a stint in rehab on anyone. It sucked to hit rock bottom and have to pull yourself back up, inch by excruciating inch.
“Don’t forget the brownie points you could earn in the organization if you save one of the team’s rising stars from ruin.” His buddy’s lips curled into a sardonic grin.
If the team’s new owners would think better of him for it, that was an even stronger argument for sticking his neck out. They were still gunning for his job—and with Mel and Tara in his life, he had more reason than ever not to wind up unemployed. “I’ll do it.”
After the game, which the Condors lost by one, Dave had no trouble getting Greg to reissue his invitation to the party.
“Glad you changed your mind, man. The more, the merrier.” Greg slapped his back. “See you in the penthouse. ASAP.”
About fifteen minutes later, after a cab ride to the Strip and an elevator ride to the Riviera’s twenty-third floor, he stood in front of the closed door to the penthouse. It vibrated with bass line from some dance remix. He dreaded going inside, where most of his teammates were likely to be drunk or high—or both.
“Why’d I let Matt talk me into playing knight in shining armor? That’s his deal, not mine.”
But here he was, about to try to save Greg from himself.
You’re in it for yourself, too.
So what if guiding the rookie down a different path took him up a notch in the owners’ eyes? He deserved the chance to shine, dammit. For his family as well as himself.
He took a deep breath and pushed open the door, stepping into the din. Just what he’d expected: free-flowing alcohol and baseball bunnies hanging all over his teammates.
The second he came through the door, a redhead with her tits half out of her top sidled up to him and shoved a red Solo cup into his hand. Not wanting to break up the party before he knew whether Matt’s worries were legit, he flashed a smile. “Thanks, sweetheart.”
After sniffing its contents, he tipped the cup to her and took a sip. But when she tried to plaster her breasts to his arm, he pulled away. The busty redhead couldn’t compare to the bombshell waiting for him in Texas.
“Not tonight.” He shook her off and waded deeper into the crowded suite.
Matt must have been wrong, he thought as he scanned the room and found no signs of drug use. Looks like the usual post-game shindig to—
He broke off when he spotted half a dozen lines of coke set up on a mirror on the coffee table. Greg’s dark blond head was bent over the spread, ready to take a hit.
“Shit.”
His pulse kicked up. It wasn’t that he anticipated the rush Greg was about to experience and wanted one of his own. Rather, it was a rush of anger because Matt was right—again—and now he had to fix it. How in hell could he keep Bartlesby from making the same mistakes he had?
He didn’t have time to consider the question. He strode to the coffee table and tapped Greg’s shoulder.
The kid looked up. His dilated pupils and twitchy cheek told Dave all he needed to know. Greg was already flying high.
“Welcome to the party, man.” With a jerky wave, he indicated the spread on the table. “Take a hit.”
Dave kneaded his fist into his thigh. Even after two and a half years of sobriety, he wasn’t completely immune to the siren call of a quick high, which made his attempt to try to save Greg—and his
reputation—foolhardy at best, and a stupid bid for self-destruction at worst.
One of the first things they’d drilled into his head in rehab was that everyone had to save himself. So what in hell had possessed him to come to this party now, when he had so much more to lose?
Could it be he subconsciously wanted to screw things up with Mel and Tara?
No way. Earning brownie points with the Condors’ owners wasn’t worth jeopardizing a future with his girls. They were his family now.
Dave turned down Greg’s offer with a shake of his head and backed toward the door. But before he reached the hallway, the door burst open and a half-dozen uniformed officers streamed into the suite. High-pitched shrieks split the air and the music’s beat ground to a halt.
“Police! Nobody move.”
Well, hell. Dave’s heart sank. He shoved his hands in the air and froze.
So much for “What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.”
Chapter Thirteen
“Joe Boxer was supposed to be dialed into the teleconference by now,” Mel’s brother hissed.
Peter’s angry red face did nothing to ease the herd of centipedes tap-dancing in Mel’s stomach as they waited backstage with her father. She tipped a bottle to her lips and took a healthy swig. Maybe cool water would drown the suckers. “He’s not answering his phone.”
All twenty of the calls she’d made to Dave’s cell phone in the last forty-five minutes had gone straight to voicemail. She hoped he hadn’t lost the thing again, because she didn’t want to face Brannen High’s packed auditorium without backup. She peered through the curtain at a sea of curious faces and another wave of nausea crept into her throat.
Pete sneered. “Dependable as ever, is he?”
“It’s not his fault he wasn’t around.”
On her other side, her father started coughing uncontrollably. Mel shoved her water bottle into his hand and thumped his back.
He shook her off. “I’m fine, dear—but I can’t say the same for your young man.”
“What’d he do now?” Pete grabbed the paper their father had been reading, skimmed it and let loose a string of expletives that made Mel blush.
Her brother waved the newspaper in her face. “Dumbass got himself picked up in a drug bust on the Strip last night.”
With one hand, Mel steadied the paper and her stomach lurched. Oh God. There it was in black and white, in that damn “Baseball Beat” column. She tugged the sheet from Pete’s hand. Dave and several teammates had been at a party the cops raided at the Riviera.
Her brother smirked again. “Thought you said that was in his past.”
“I thought it was.” Mel hated how small her voice sounded. She hated even more that she’d put her trust in someone so irresponsible…that she’d bought his tired “I’m not the man I used to be” line. If he was still in party mode, she didn’t want him anywhere near their daughter.
“Don’t be too hasty, sugar.” Daddy squeezed her arm and pointed to the end of the article. “Says there he was questioned but not charged.”
She checked the story again. Her father was right. But she hated he’d been there at all. “That doesn’t make me feel better.”
“It shouldn’t.” Pete grunted and stepped toward the curtain. “I’ll send everyone home.”
Her father clamped his hand around her brother’s wrist. “You’ll do nothing of the kind, Peter. I’ll answer their questions so they don’t feel I’ve wasted their time.”
Pete blinked. “If you want.”
“Yes, I want.”
With that, her father went to face the crowd and Mel stepped outside to escape her brother’s accusing glare. She took deep gulps of fresh air. Maybe it would cleanse away her feelings of worthlessness.
No such luck. She was still berating herself when her phone rang. She checked the display.
“You’re late.”
His breath was like a jet engine in her ear. “I know, and I’m sorry. Couldn’t be helped.”
“Kind of hard to make a call from jail, I suppose.”
Silence stretched so long she wondered if the call had gotten disconnected. But then he sighed. “Ted’s been writing about me again?”
“Yep.” She wished she didn’t sound so bitchy, but she couldn’t help it. He’d betrayed both her and their daughter. “What happened, Dave? I trusted you.”
“Will it do me any good to tell you that wasn’t what it looked like?”
“I’ve heard that before.” She recalled her father’s advice to reserve judgment and tapped the toe of her pricey stiletto on the cement step. “This had better be good.”
“Not sure how good it is, but it’s the God’s honest truth. I went to that party to try to keep one of my teammates from doing something he’d regret for the rest of his life.”
Mel could think of only one situation a man would regret until the end of time. And it broke her heart that Dave thought of it the same way. “Did he pick up some blonde bimbo at a bar?”
“What? No!” he spluttered. “It was drugs, Mel. I wanted to keep him from getting hooked on coke, okay?”
“You can’t save someone else.”
“I know, I know. That’s one of the first tenets of rehab.” He sighed again. “But I hoped keeping an up-and-coming rookie from self-destructing would make me look good in front of the bosses. My rep isn’t the best in the business.”
How well she knew that. “Peter reminds me of it at least fifty times a day.”
“Sorry about that.”
She shrugged. “The past is the past.”
“Yeah, and the future is now—and I just screwed it up, big time.”
“Sure did.” But his explanation made enough sense that she no longer wanted to see him run up a flagpole by his BarelyTheres.
“By the time I remembered Greg was the only one who could save Greg, the cops were busting things up. They hauled me in with everyone else, and let me go after my drug test came back clean. I called you as soon as I got my stuff back.”
“You really didn’t do anything?”
“I had a beer. That’s it.” He took another ragged breath. “Wouldn’t have gotten released if I’d had drugs in my system, Mel. Greg’s still in the holding cell, waiting for arraignment.”
Mel pressed her fingers to throbbing temples. She wanted to believe him. He sure sounded sorry. Plus, he’d been nothing but kind and decent since they’d met again, so he’d given her no reason not to trust him. Right?
Right. She laughed, the sound coming out more nervous and high-pitched than she’d have liked. “Don’t expect a warm welcome from Pete the next time you see him. He worked all weekend setting up your big reveal.”
“He must have forgotten I’ve already revealed about as much as is decent.” Dave’s soft chuckle was comforting.
“Guess so.” This time her giggle sounded natural. After so much tension, it was a relief to share a joke.
His tone shifted from joking to serious. “I don’t care how your brother receives me, sweetheart. The reception I get from you and Tara is the one that counts.”
She closed her eyes and prayed she was doing the right thing. With both her and Tara’s futures on the line, failure was not an option. “We’ll be waiting for you with open arms.”
****
“Don’t go, Daddy,” Tara pleaded. The three of them stood in the airport, and her little girl hung onto Dave’s leg as though it were a lifeline.
In the week and a half since the aborted town hall meeting, Mel and Dave had managed to patch things up with each other—and with Pete, who’d promised to sic one of his law firm’s partners on Dave’s Internet photo issue.
Now, watching Tara cling to the father she was just getting to know, Mel’s heart wrenched. She didn’t want Dave to go, either, but seeing her baby girl begging him to stay brought tears to her eyes.
She held them back. The three of them were making enough of a scene without her bawling like a two-year-old who’d lost her favorite
toy. Thank God it was so early the airport coffee shop wasn’t yet open. Few travelers were around to witness the spectacle.
Dave squatted down and squeezed Tara tight until her sobs quieted. “I wish I didn’t have to, kiddo, but I need to go to work.”
He’d told Mel he was looking into a trade in the off-season, making it easier for her to be content with the too-short visits and long good-byes. But they’d agreed not to tell Tara about the plan. They didn’t want to get her hopes up in case the trade fell through.
Tara hiccupped. “Why do you hafta work?”
“Everybody works.” He brushed away her tear with the pad of his thumb and then tweaked her nose. “I need to make money to support you and your mamma.”
Mel bit her tongue. With her trust fund, design business and supplementary income from her father, they didn’t—but men needed to feel useful. She’d put anything he sent into a special account and use it for Tara’s education…or a graduation trip to Europe…or a car.
Dave checked his watch and gave Tara another squeeze before straightening up. “I need to get going.”
He took Tara by the hand and led her back to Mel’s side, stopping to kiss her goodbye. “I’ll call you when I land.”
With another peck for Mel and a ruffling of Tara’s hair, he was gone. Mel stared at the security checkpoint he’d disappeared through. She missed him already. She shook it off and herded a still-hiccupping Tara to the car. First stop: Starbucks. Once she had some nice, strong coffee in her system, she’d figure out how to get Tara’s mind off Dave’s leaving.
Assuming she got over it herself.
Forty-five minutes later, after dropping Tara off at preschool, Mel entered her office for the first time in nearly a week. Sunlight glared off the pile of papers on her desk, turning them into an accusation: slacker.
You can’t keep taking off every time he comes to town. If she didn’t finish a few jobs and pull in some more, she would need Dave’s financial support.
She was just putting the finishing touches on a presentation for one of her clients when her cell phone rang. Engrossed in the sketch she was polishing, she didn’t bother to check who was calling before she picked it up.
Diva In The Dugout (All Is Fair In Love And Baseball) Page 11