Love on the Line (2 page)

An earsplitting ring sounded from the room that doubled as her dining room and living space—she’d forgotten to turn the ringer down. For a moment she considered not answering. No one local would be calling since she’d seen nearly everybody in town during the course of her day. And anyone calling from the world outside Albion Bay just brought trouble to her quiet slice of paradise.

On the tenth ring she remembered she’d also forgotten to turn on the answering machine. Whoever was trying to reach her was damned persistent. She stubbed her toe on a protruding deck board as she ran to answer. She’d better call Adam and see if he could come out to work on her decks this week. They’d had a dry September, but the rains wouldn’t hold off forever, and if Adam didn’t get started before the rains did, the decks would never get done.

“Cara?”

Alston Patterson might be nearing eighty, yet he had the voice of a much younger man. But her attorney’s voice always meant trouble. At least it had lately.

“No, it’s Glinda, the Good Witch of the North.”

“
Just
the person I was looking for. Facing the news I have might require a bit of magic.”

“Alston, I’m bordering on a headache and—”

“The news will be the same whether I tell you today or tomorrow,” he said in a gentle voice.

She’d known Alston all her life. He’d been her grandfather’s attorney, and when she needed wise counsel a few years back, she’d asked him to be hers.

“Might as well tell me now then. After wrangling thirty hyped-up school kids, dodging the latest rock avalanche that the gods of nature have thrown upon us and harvesting the world’s most stubborn earth-hugging carrots, nothing could faze me.”

“Your grandfather’s estate has finally been settled.”

There was a long silence. One of those silences that made time feel unreal, one of those silences that Cara imagined was intended to prepare the listener for the news to follow but never did. She missed her grandfather; Alston knew that. That he was calling her rather than just mailing information told her that what was to follow wouldn’t be welcome news.

“His will sets you up as president of the Barrington Foundation.” He inhaled and exhaled a heavy breath. “Its current assets are just under two billion dollars.”

Two
billion
dollars.

Cara groaned and sank into the stuffed chair, one of only two seats in her tiny living room. For three years she’d lived simply, quietly, anonymously in the little town of Albion Bay. The townspeople had accepted her as one of their own. For the first time in her life people looked at her and saw just Cara, the school bus driver and community member, not Russell Barrington’s daughter, not a woman born into one of the richest families in America.

She’d driven the bus, quilted beside the women of the town when someone had a baby, farmed the Albion Bay community garden, gotten dirty, and laughed and cheered at the middle school baseball games.

She’d fit in. She’d carved out a life that felt right. Felt right to her. She’d learned to live with her family’s protests and lack of understanding. She’d found meaning for her life in Albion Bay, meaning that buoyed her in her darkest moments, meaning that made it possible to face her days without fear.

And she’d managed, with Alston’s help, to hang on to her anonymity; he understood that it was crucial to maintaining her carefully structured new life. For the past three years she’d met with him in the city and found clever ways to disburse the two-hundred-thousand-dollars interest from her personal foundation, granting the funds anonymously each year.

And though she was tempted—she liked providing funding to projects that made a difference in people’s lives, even had a knack for it—stepping up to head a two-billion-dollar foundation would push the game into a new arena. A very public arena. Being responsible for giving away that much money in any fashion—and especially in a prudent and well-thought-out manner—would be more than complicated. It would push her back into the world she’d fled and would destroy her quiet, happy life.

“He’s also bequeathed a matching two billion to you directly. That is,
if
you accept the position as president of the foundation. But you won’t be able to touch that money until you’re twenty-five.”

Four billion dollars.

She could do even more good with four billion dollars.

But the thought had barely materialized when she saw Laci’s face—cold, white and surrounded by the silk blankets that Cara had tucked into her coffin. She would never forget the waxy feel of Laci’s skin and the bruises that showed through the mask-like makeup the undertaker had slathered on her friend’s face. Unlike Cara, Laci hadn’t escaped.

“I won’t do it, Alston. I can’t.
What
was Grandfather thinking? What about Quinn? He can take the helm.”

“Your brother has a bequest and a foundation of his own to run, although his is far smaller than this one. And the legal language is very clear. You have two months to decide, or the foundation will remain under the control of the present board and its current president. As will the funds of your private bequest.”

“Who
is
the current president?”

“Your father appointed Dray Bender to that position, just after your grandfather died.”

Cara knew from Alston’s tone and what he didn’t say that he didn’t like Dray Bender. All she remembered was that the man was one of her father’s golf buddies. Her dad probably owed the guy a favor or something. A big one. Her heart fell at the thought. They’d probably fund golf scholarships for Ivy League preppies.

“I see.” She suppressed her desire to curse. Alston always clucked in disapproval when she cursed. “Can’t we dump him and hire someone else? Someone”—she searched for a positive way to frame her remark—“someone who would honor my grandfather’s legacy?”

“Only if you’re at the helm.”

“This is worse than blackmail.”

“Blackmail’s a harsh term, my dear. I doubt that’s what your grandfather intended.” He paused. “Think about it, Cara. There’s a lot at stake here—lives, possibilities, values. Your grandfather liked your values—he trusted you. I’m sure he wouldn’t have wanted a man like Bender stewarding his legacy.”

Her head was splitting. “Look, can I call you in a few weeks? Can you stall? There must be a way to pry Dray Bender out of there and find someone good to head up the foundation.”

“We already have someone good for that. You.”

“What happened to
no pressure, my dear
?”

“That was before you were willed the control of two billion dollars and a private fortune to match it. Like I said, think about it. And I promise I’ll see how deeply we can bury this for the time being so you can maintain your anonymity, at least for a while. But I warn you, it may not be possible.”

Alston had never criticized her choices. He’d even helped her get through the fingerprinting and paperwork at the county level so she’d been able to take the school bus driving job under her mother’s maiden name. The guy was a wizard with the law and with government forms. She’d known that someday there’d be bumps, tasks she’d have to handle, responsibilities that Alston couldn’t hold at bay. But not this soon. And not at this level.

“I can keep it out of the press, if that’s what you’re worried about,” Alston added. “That’ll buy us some time.”

She had that, at least.

A loud knock at her front door made her jump up.

“There’s someone here, I have to go.” She started to hang up, but stopped. “Thank you, Alston. I know you understand what I’m doing. That’s better than anybody else who knows me.”

“You might be more ready for this than you think,” Alston said.

“
My
side, Alston, remember?” But his words rang through her as she hung up the phone.

The front door banged open before Cara could reach it. Albion Bay had an open-door policy, one Cara was still getting used to. Molly Rivers, Sam’s mom, breezed into the living room carrying a tissue-wrapped bundle.

Molly came up to Cara’s chin. She was beautiful in a delicate sort of way, but the years of being a single mom on the edge had taken their toll. Molly’s husband had died in an oil-rig accident two years before Cara moved to Albion Bay, leaving Molly and Sam just enough to scrape by every month. She had a part-time job at Grady’s feed barn, but even with that income, Molly and Sam relied on the food bank in town.

Molly unwrapped the bundle and held out a beautiful slate-blue sweater, hand knitted.

“I saw that ratty sweater you had on last week, Cara.”

Cara fought down the lump rising in her throat as she took the sweater from Molly’s outstretched arms. People in town had been so kind to her. They were the sorts of people who chipped in and helped—it didn’t matter if they didn’t always see eye to eye on the bigger issues of the world or agree about how to run the town.

“I knew you’d never go out and buy yourself something. Belva had some yarn she’d spun, left over from last year’s shearing, and we dyed it to go with your eyes.”

Cara slipped the sweater over her head.

“It’s perfect,” Molly crooned. “Even if it’s me admiring my own work.”

Cara looked at her reflection in the two foot by two foot mirror she’d hung on the wall next to her door. She hoped the emotion she was unsuccessfully swallowing down didn’t show in her eyes. But it did. Cara wrapped her hands around her elbows.

“It’s lovely, Molly. It’s so soft.”

“And it fits you
perfectly
. Belva said you were bosomy—that’s a funny word, isn’t it?—but I told her that you were slim in the waist. I measured you from behind one day when you were working in the garden. If I’d listened to her, I would’ve had you looking like a sack of rice.”

She stared for a moment, and Cara braced under the scrutiny.

“You
really
should let Mary Brown see to that hair,” Molly said. “Maybe just trim off a couple inches and get it away from your face. You have such a beautiful face, Cara. You shouldn’t be hiding it like you do. How are you ever going to meet a good man if you hide away like that?”

Cara was accustomed to Molly’s occasional mother-henning. But she drew the line at matchmaking. Her first year in town, just to fit in, she’d accepted a blind date Molly had set up. The evening with a mechanic from a nearby town was a disaster she wasn’t going to repeat. But she had to admit there were times when the hunger for a man crept through her defenses and swept loneliness into her soul.

For the moment she was glad that the focus was on her hair and not on the pulse she’d seen racing in her throat when she’d looked in the mirror. Deceiving the good people of Albion Bay was a burden she bore alone.

She talked Molly into taking two big jars of her homemade strawberry jam with her as she left. Only after Molly turned up the lane did Cara break down and cry.

Chapter Two

The crowd in Detroit was rowdy. One thing about playing in center field, Ryan got a taste of the hard-core fans and their energy. He’d stolen a home run from the Tigers’ best hitter in the eighth, so he wasn’t on their happy list.

Ryan crouched and focused on Romaro, their closer, and tuned out the catcalls and obscenities. If Romaro did his job and struck out Hobbs, the final Tigers hitter, the game was theirs. But there was nothing comfortable about a one-run lead. Ryan had played against Renaudo in the minors—the guy had power and, more than that, he could put the ball where he wanted it.

Romaro’s pitch was too sweet. Hobbs connected and shot it through the gap.

Ryan was too far back to scoop it on a hop. He waved off Paxton in right field and dove, rolling, and then sprang to his feet and fired the ball to Alex Tavonesi, poised and ready at first. Ryan’s throw was on the mark, and Alex stayed on the bag, but the umpire called Hobbs safe.

Ryan cursed. Sometimes close calls didn’t go your way. But Hobbs should’ve been called out, ending the game.

When the next Tigers hitter shot a line drive into shortstop Matt Darrington’s glove, the crowd booed. Usually Ryan could translate the negative energy of the opposing team’s fans into what it was—love of the game. But tonight the echoing boos just dragged him into the gloomy, black feelings he hated to give the upper hand.

They’d won—he should at least feel happy about that. But he didn’t.

He was miserable and pissed because he had to jump on a plane, fly to Boston, and sit in a courtroom publicly facing more lies and accusations. Worse, for the first time in his Major League career, he’d miss a game.

He boarded the plane and swore that no matter what happened, he’d never miss another game. There were thousands of guys out there hungry to take his job, a hundred of them lined up, ready and waiting. But more than that, the game was sacred to him. But the law was the law, and this time he hadn’t had a choice.

The next morning Ryan grabbed a coffee from the corner kiosk and headed for the courthouse. Usually he took the time to admire the architecture of the city; he loved Boston. Playing there for four years had been a dream. But he loved San Francisco more. Maybe it was the unconventional, pioneering spirit from the Gold Rush that still bubbled there, or maybe it was just the stunning beauty of the hills, the Bay and the way the western light played on the sea. Whatever it was, when the Red Sox traded him to the Giants, he’d celebrated.