Authors: Mindy Klasky
Tags: #Romance, #Adult, #office, #wedding, #baseball, #workplace, #rich, #wealthy, #sport
Oh, she was good. She’d found out about Spring Valley when no one else had, not any of the reporters that flocked around the game like starving pigeons, crapping out stories day after day after day.
She was good. But she was also desperate. She’d needed his money, enough that she’d terrified herself into asking for it. And something about her vulnerability, about her silent cry for help touched a tender spot deep inside him.
And here he was again, acting before he thought out what he was doing. He put her book bag on the ground beside them and slipped his hands over her arms, closing the distance between them. He lowered his mouth to hers, raising one hand to tangle in her hair, to ease her head to a better angle so he could deepen the kiss.
For just a heartbeat, she stiffened. He felt the wires tighten inside her; he sensed her instinct to run away. He started to let go of her hair, started to make himself step back, even though that was the last thing on earth he wanted to do.
But then, she leaned into him. Her mouth opened, and he could taste mint, just a breath of it like she’d been chewing on LifeSavers before he’d dragged her off to the bar. Her arms closed around him, pulling him closer. Her hips shifted, steadying her as she leaned into him, and the heat of her tongue chased his.
“Get a room!” The cry came from the street, kids in a rusty Ford, windows down, engine already roaring as it tore away into the night. Amanda jumped back, hissing like a scalded cat. He reached for her automatically, but dropped his hand back to his side when he heard her nervous laugh, when she ran her fingers through her hair.
God, he ached to have those fingers somewhere else. But that wasn’t going to happen. Not tonight. Not if the look of panic on Amanda’s face told him anything.
So he reached down and retrieved the canvas straps of her book bag. He held it out for her, trying not to notice that she avoided his hand completely, that she didn’t even let her fingers brush against his. He watched her swallow hard, and he resisted the urge to run his fingertips down her throat, to feel the rise and fall as she swallowed again.
“Good night, Amanda,” he said, shoving his hands into his pockets.
“Good night, Kyle.” She matched his tone, almost succeeding in making her words into a joke.
He couldn’t step away. Not yet.
She turned toward the door, but she stopped just before she edged inside. “Hey,” she said. “When’s the next day game?”
“Next Saturday,” he said. “We have the national broadcast tomorrow night, so no Sunday day game this week.”
She nodded, like she couldn’t think of any words to say out loud.
“I’ll get a list of them to you,” he said. “And tickets.” And then there wasn’t anything else to say, so he settled for “Thank you.”
It might have been his imagination, but it seemed like she clutched her purse closer to her side. He wondered if she’d already deposited his checks. He wanted to ask her why she needed them. He wanted to know what made her so afraid.
Instead, he watched as she passed beyond the glass door. But he stood out on the sidewalk, looking in, until she disappeared into the elevator, heading up to Apartment 314.
Amanda went to next Saturday’s game. And the Sunday game following. Both times, there was a box waiting for her on the seat, with her sunglasses neatly wrapped in tissue paper. Both times, she stepped to the railing and waited for Kyle to toss her a ball. Both times, she delivered her lines perfectly, like an actress born to the stage. And both times, Kyle continued his hitting streak in the game.
Amanda didn’t have time to waste at the ballpark. She needed to be back at the office drafting new letters to Dr. Phillips, trying to get the scientist to commit to specific dates when she could take his testimony in a deposition, get his expert opinion on the record even if he couldn’t make it back from Africa for the actual trial. She was supposed to be writing briefs, arguing legal points, fighting for UPA every single step of the way. With less than two months to go, she didn’t have a spare moment to waste. Her client’s continued existence depended on it.
But the days were gorgeous—clear blue skies and almost no humidity, even in the middle of a North Carolina summer. She couldn’t pull herself away from the Sunday game, especially when it became clear that the Rockets were going to win.
At the top of the ninth inning, an usher made his way to her seat. “Ms. Carter?” he asked. When Amanda nodded, he said, “I’m supposed to deliver this message to you.” He handed over a slip of paper.
Amanda opened it cautiously. “Dinner tomorrow.” The words were written in the same broad scrawl she recognized from the checks. “Artie’s. 7:00.”
Her first thought was to refuse. She’d just spent half the weekend at the ballpark. She couldn’t give up more time to this crazy game, to whatever match she was playing with Kyle Norton.
Her second thought was to panic. She should get the hell out of Rockets Field, leave Raleigh altogether. If she showed up at the restaurant, Kyle could have police there, ready to arrest her. He could have copies of the checks he’d written, statements showing that she’d cashed them. She could be carted off in handcuffs.
Her third thought was to realize Kyle could have done that long ago. If he wanted to turn her in, he’d had almost two weeks to do so. There was no reason to drag her out to a steakhouse to get his revenge. And even if she’d blown off the better part of two uninterrupted days of weekend work, she’d still have to eat
some
time on Monday. Why not enjoy a real restaurant? It wasn’t like Artie’s fit into her meager budget.
The usher hadn’t waited around to carry back a response.
She could look up Kyle’s phone number—it had to be there, in the collection of documents she’d pulled when she did the research that led her to Spring Valley. But she hadn’t called him before, and it felt slimy to use her ill-gotten documentation to accept a dinner invitation.
Slimier than blackmailing him? Yeah. She wasn’t going to answer that one.
In the end, she waited until the Rockets got the third out at the top of the ninth. The ball was a high fly to the dead-man’s land between center and right. Kyle darted over, backing up the center fielder, but the other guy, Ryan Green, ended up making the catch. As the crowd roared its approval, the two ballplayers high-fived each other. Green headed toward the celebration that was boiling over onto the pitcher’s mound, but Kyle took a moment to turn around, to look at the stands.
To look at Amanda.
He took off the sunglasses—
her
glasses—and pointed them toward the stands in right field. She felt his gaze like a laser across the wide sweep of perfectly groomed grass. She realized she was standing, that her fingers had folded around the railing, as if she were actually considering jumping down and joining him on the field.
That was ridiculous, of course. So she took a step back. And she nodded once, tight, sharp, sending a single focused message. His smile was clear across the diamond, and it melted something inside her, sanding off one of the stony corners of her heart. He returned the sunglasses to his face and headed off to join his colleagues in their midfield congratulations.
Amanda joined the happy fans climbing to the top of the stands and the exit to the park. As soon as her back was to the field, she glanced at her watch. 4:15. Plenty of time to go into the office. Plenty of time to settle down and get some real work done.
She told herself she wasn’t allowed to look back at the playing field. She wasn’t allowed to watch the joyful celebration behind her. She had other things to accomplish.
~~~
On Monday morning, Amanda’s usual routine was knocked back a couple of hours. She woke up at five, of course, and she completed her usual punishing rounds of calisthenics. She showered and pulled on her office uniform—white blouse, tailored suit, practical pumps. She slipped on her plain eyeglass frames, squaring her shoulders at the feeling of competence they brought her.
Then it was down to the medical library at the University of Raleigh. She had some hardcore research to complete, tracking down a few complicated details about the pharmacokinetic properties of the drugs at issue in her case. The law firm had skilled librarians, but sometimes Amanda found it better to do her own research, rolling up her figurative sleeves and studying the numbers, the graphs, the threads of information that spun out, one after another, completing a beautiful complicated whole.
Science had always been that way for her—an elegant and complicated structure built on the steady, soothing constants of mathematics. She loved the simplicity at its very core, the balance as everything did what it was expected to do. There was power in the predictability, in the absolute
truth
of her work.
By the time she’d spun out her research web and tracked down all the articles she needed, it was nearly noon. She hurried into the office, already planning the legal document she would draft that afternoon. She’d have to include half a dozen graphs, rely on the color printer to make the data on suppressed bioavailability absolutely, perfectly, one-hundred-percent clear.
She was just calculating the best way to display four complicated variables when she turned the corner into her office. The lights were on—that should have been her first clue that someone had invaded while she was out. The second warning was the pile of sunglasses on her desk.
There had to be three dozen pairs, tangled together on the old-fashioned leather blotter like some bizarre sea creature. They were all designed for kids—Disney characters and cartoon creatures and so much sparkly pink and lavender that she thought she might be sick all over the collection. Someone had written a note in huge bubble letters: I Love Baseball. But, of course, “Love” was written as a giant heart.
“Very funny, guys!” she called over her shoulder, and she was rewarded by a cascade of giggles. The office crew had had their fun with her. It must have taken them half the morning to assemble the plastic collection. She swept every last frame into an empty drawer in her desk, the one she saved for comfortable shoes and a change of clothes in the winter.
The glasses
were
funny. The entire situation was laughable—or it would have been, if she didn’t feel compelled to continue with the charade. At least the Rockets played in Florida tomorrow night, the beginning of a road trip that would last almost two weeks. That gave her two vital weekends to get her own work done, concentrated days and nights that couldn’t come at a better time, given her inflexible trial deadline.
She snapped open the locks on her briefcase and dug out the stack of articles she’d copied at the medical library. She was just spreading them out on her desk when Harvey poked his head in the door. “Wow,” he said. “Are you sure you can work in here? Isn’t the light blinding?”
She made herself smile as she pushed her librarian glasses higher on her nose, purposely trying to send a subliminal message that she was studious and competent. “Let me guess,” she said. “The Miss Piggy glasses were your contribution?”
“Nope.” He shook his head. “My daughter sacrificed her very own pair of Hello Kitty frames. Nothing but the best for you.”
“Give her my thanks,” Amanda said dryly.
Harvey flashed a grin before he became a little more sober. “I just wanted to stop by and make sure you received your invitation to the partners’ retreat.”
Partners’ retreat. The words expanded in her head like a balloon filling with helium. For seven years, she’d put in her time at Link Oster, doing the work assigned by others, playing by their rules. Every year, she’d watched the partners traipse off to a secluded resort for their annual retreat. She’d listened to the office gossip, to the tantalizing hints of what they’d be discussing away from prying eyes, from straining ears. She’d waited, breathless, to find out what decisions had been made, how the firm had shaped policies for the coming year—what offices they intended to open, whether they’d distribute raises, who would receive bonuses.
And this year, she’d be in on the talks. This year, for the first time, she was a partner. That’s what she’d bought with her blood money, with the checks Kyle had given her.
“I haven’t seen the invitation yet,” she said.
He nodded toward her inbox, to the neat stack of inter-office envelopes she hadn’t had a chance to open yet. “It’ll be in there. We’re thrilled to have you join us.”
Amanda smiled as she looked at her boss. “Thanks, Harvey. I can’t wait.” Before she could express more of her gratitude her phone rang.
“I’ll let you get that,” Harvey said, ducking out the door.
“Carter,” Amanda announced as she picked up the phone.
“Mandy!” Only two people in the world called her Mandy—her mother and her brother. And Alex sounded like he was about to have a nervous breakdown as he shouted her name.
“What’s up?” she asked, cautiously easing herself into the ergonomic chair behind her desk.
“I’m so glad I caught you at the office,” he said.
“What’s wrong, Alex?”
“You know I wouldn’t bother you at work if it wasn’t really important.”
She swallowed her frustration, even as her palms grew slick with sweat. “I know,” she said. “What’s going on?”
“It’s Hunter.”
Her nephew. “Oh my God! What happened?”
“Nothing. I mean, not like you’re thinking. God, I just found out myself, and my head is spinning. I called you because I couldn’t figure out what else to do.”
Amanda forced herself to take a deep breath. She realized her fingers had tightened into a fist, and she spread her palms out flat on the desk in front of her, cradling the phone with her shoulder. She hadn’t heard Alex babble like this in years—not since she’d taught him how to ratchet down his emotions, to keep from provoking their father, to avoid sharing too much with friends, teachers, strangers who didn’t give a damn.
He took a deep breath before he said, “We just got back from the doctor. She says the early intervention is really working. It’s not like the autism is going away or anything, but this is such an important time, before he starts school, while his brain is still completely elastic.”
“What do you need, Alex?”
“Two more aides. His doctor wants to put him in this special, intensive program. There are half a dozen types of therapy; he’ll work with specialists every day. The doctor says she’s seen such incredible improvements in kids just like Hunter. But…”
Amanda shoved down her glasses and rubbed at the bridge of her nose. “How much?”
“Twenty-five thousand dollars.” She heard the emotion in her brother’s voice—hope and fear and shame all wrapped up in a shroud of exhaustion. She knew exactly how he felt. “Insurance won’t cover it, not this year anyway. I might be able to change policies next year. And I wouldn’t ask, I wouldn’t call you at all, but the doctor says timing is really important…”
She knew all that. She’d read the studies, monograph after monograph, from the second her nephew had been diagnosed. She kept abreast of new developments, of pioneering treatment options. But where the hell was she going to get twenty-five thousand dollars? “Let me see what I can do, Alex.” She tried to keep fatigue from her voice.
“Mandy, you know I wouldn’t ask you if I had anywhere else to turn.”
She knew that. Of course she did. But she also knew she was tapped out. There was no way she was scraping twenty-five grand out of her bank accounts. “Let me talk to some people,” she said. “I’ll call you back when I’ve got things worked out.”
“Thank you.” She heard the gratitude in Alex’s voice, crystal clear behind the tears that clogged his throat. All of a sudden, she pictured him when they’d been kids. He’d always trusted her, always known she could solve any problem, whether it was a Matchbox car that wouldn’t roll or a father who was furious that his horse hadn’t come in at the track. Amanda could fix anything. She was a superhero, at least in her little brother’s eyes.
Well, now that she was an adult, capes were in short supply. But as she hung up the phone, she knew she had to do something. After all, it was her fault Warren had screwed up the family finances. She was the one who was good with numbers. She should have realized he was emptying their accounts, trashing their credit history, long before he’d finished the job. She should have done something to stop him before they all fell over the cliff.
Before it was too late.
She couldn’t let her brother down now. She couldn’t give up on Hunter’s potential. Not without a fight. No matter what it cost.
~~~
Kyle watched Amanda over the top of his menu, realizing he hadn’t been certain she would actually show up at Artie’s. He’d known she wouldn’t trust him enough to let him pick her up. He hadn’t even considered pressing the issue.
Instead, he’d gotten to the restaurant early and made sure he could get the small table in the curtained alcove. The last thing he wanted was a bunch of the guys horning in on their conversation, giving him shit about his sunglasses girl. They’d dished out enough crap in the locker room for a lifetime. But no one was arguing with the fact that he’d broken out of his slump.
Now, Amanda clutched her Stoli, her hands tight enough on the tumbler that he thought she might shatter it. She eyed his glass of tonic water, her eyes narrowed behind those sexy glasses. “You don’t drink,” she said. It wasn’t a question.