The night Isabella taunted Chaser by trashing two of Jen’s concession stands was the night he’d taken out a restraining order. The model wasn’t allowed near him, Jen, or the stadium.
“Your track record with women—”
“Sucks,” he finished for her.
“The ladies fall in love faster than you care to commit.”
“I’m thirty-three and enjoy playing the field.”
“No baseball, no woman…Mercury must be in retrograde.”
Chaser grinned. Jen followed astrology. She read her horoscope, charted the planets. She now blamed Mercury for his suspension and lack of sex. His grin widened.
“Want a snow cone?” When times were tough, Jen believed snow cones made life bearable.
Squeezing her waist, he slowly released her. “Make mine lemon.”
Turning toward the shelf, she grabbed two paper cones, then headed for the freezer. She scooped shaved ice, returned, and added syrup. Lemon for him. Blueberry for her.
He planted his hands on the concession stand countertop, pushed up. “The Bat Pack gets to practice and travel with the team,” he said as he accepted his snow cone, inhaling its tart scent.
Jen stood between his splayed legs. “It won’t be the same as playing and you know it.”
He knew it, all right. Eleven years, and he hadn’t missed a game. Sitting on the bench would kill him. “Guy Powers could have gone easier—”
“No, he couldn’t have,” she said, and he blinked. “Outside the park, the Bat Pack runs wild. Powers has overlooked your reputations and indiscretions. Today you fought your own teammates. Inexcusable, my friend.”
He took a bite of his snow cone, let the ice and lemon dissolve on his tongue. The taste was as bitter as his suspension. “Thought you’d take my side.”
“Not when you’re wrong.”
That’s what he loved about her. She kept things real. Forced him to face his faults and fix them.
He ran a palm down his blue-jeaned thigh. Blew out a breath. “Powers acquired a bunch of assholes in the off-season overhaul. No one gets along. No unity—”
“No love of the game.”
Chaser cut her a look. “I love baseball.”
“Not the way you used to.” She eased back a step, beckoned with her finger. “Follow me, big guy.”
Snow cone in hand, he hopped off the counter and trailed behind her. He loved to watch her move. A woman of sleek beauty and Ivory soap skin. Ballet posture and a lightness to her step. A floating grace left over from the stage.
They were the only two on the mezzanine level. Yet the walls pulsed with the expectancy and excitement of Opening Day. On Sunday afternoon, the heart of the park would beat baseball.
Stealing Home, another of Jen’s concession stands, came into view. This one sold soda, cotton candy, Cracker-Jacks, and shelled peanuts. Pennants, baseball cards, bobble-heads, and enormous foam fingers flashed behind the grilled gates at Strike Zone, the third of her concessions, which was located right before the tunnel.
At the tunnel’s entrance, she took his hand. “We were seven years old, Chaser. We’d only watched baseball on television. It was Thursday noon, and Big John called us in sick at school so we could attend the game. A day that gave meaning and purpose to your life.”
Chaser studied her face, her expression soft and dreamy as her memories returned him to his youth. Tugging him along, she led him through the tunnel’s shadows and into the electrifying sunshine.
Even though the stadium was his second home, its sheer size hit him hard. He’d spent countless hours crouched behind home plate, in the dugout and the locker room, but not once since he’d contracted with the Rogues had he climbed into the stands and viewed the game as a fan.
He dropped onto a seat and motioned Jen to join him. A low chuckle escaped him. “I remember Big John holding us to the promise that we wouldn’t move from the seats he’d found vacant. Yet throughout the game, we snuck closer and closer to home plate.”
“You were a fan of Lou Wood. The best catcher of his time. He made the final out against the Yankees that took the Rogues to the 1981 World Series.”
Chaser focused on home plate. “Ninth inning, one out, Yankees were down by two with a man on second. Top of the order, and the Yankee left fielder broke his bat on a pop-up. A mile-high pop-up. Woods made an over-the-shoulder catch, then fired the ball to second. The runner had taken off for third and was tagged out. An amazing double play.”
Jen patted his thigh. “You’re better than Woods.”
“Woods never got suspended for fighting.”
They sat in silence, eating their snow cones, comfortable in each other’s company. Finishing up, Chaser slipped off his sunglasses and stared at the field. He took in the white brilliance of the baseline and bases, the newly designed on-deck circle, the diagonally mowed outfield. The ivy that covered the outfield wall. The eighty thousand seats soon to be filled with screaming fans.
Emotion welled in his chest. The game was his, and he’d lost it in a brawl. He pressed his palms to his eyes. Kicked his own ass hard.
“Stop feeling sorry for yourself.” Jen knew him well.
“I have nothing better to do.”
There was a moment’s hesitation before she said, “Tell me about Dane Maxin.”
He cut her a glance. “Beyond the fact the man punched me?” Maxin had thrown an unsportsmanlike punch, hitting Chaser from the side and not face-on.
“Just curious.” She dipped her head, pink tinting her cheeks. “He asked me out.”
Chaser ran his hand through his short, spiked hair. “He’s not your type.”
She punched his arm. “I think he’s nice. The battery in my El Camino died yesterday, and he gave me a jump.”
If Dane had done a good deed, he wanted to jump more than her car; he wanted to jump her bones. Of that Chaser was certain. “Your father gave you his El Camino when he traded up fifteen years ago. Big John didn’t expect you to keep it forever.”
“The car holds his memory.”
“You could have called me,” he said. “I carry jumper cables. I would have helped you out.”
“You’d already left the park. I didn’t want to call you back.” Finished with her snow cone, she tore the paper into thin strips. “Aside from giving you a black eye Dane’s not a bad guy.”