LITMIR.BIZ

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him out. But not for financial reasons. Lane hadn’t wanted his money. She’d donated most of the settlement Samantha had won her to various different charities.

      No, it was a lesson the Baker girls had wanted to enforce so Danny and anyone else in the game of baseball got the message.

       You hurt us, we hurt you.

      Scout remembered asking Lane what form of revenge she wanted them to inflict on Roy, but Lane hadn’t wanted to even hear his name mentioned. It was as if the betrayal from him was somehow too big to deal with.

      Bigger than her divorce from Danny.

      Her sister’s reaction always made Scout wonder about Lane and her feelings for Roy. And that speculation made her feel slightly less guilty about not telling her who Duff’s favor was for. At the end of the day, it didn’t really matter. Scout needed Lane to pressure Duff to get his health checked.

      Lane was probably right. He was getting older and slowing down. Scout could accept that. Hell, it’s not like she was going anywhere. She was here for him. Slow or not. She just needed some assurance there wasn’t something else, something more serious with far greater reaching consequences, going on.

      It was fair to say, Scout didn’t like change. Very fair considering she’d lost the only man she ever loved because she wouldn’t change.

      That nervous niggle in her stomach reared its ugly head. The one she could forget about for hours until suddenly it was there again making her nauseous. She couldn’t say why, but it sure felt like a whole lot of change was coming.

      No, Scout definitely did not like change.

      * * *

      LANE PULLED UP to the stadium and thought about what it would feel like to walk through those doors. It had been five years since she’d done it. No matter how many times she had come home to visit, no matter how many times Duff had asked her to check out a game with him, she hadn’t once set foot in this place. The home of the Minotaurs.

      For that matter, she hadn’t entered any other ballpark. Heck, she felt uncomfortable walking by a diamond in a park. She hadn’t watched a single game on TV. She hadn’t paid attention to any playoff runs or World Series.

      She didn’t even know if her ex-husband was still on a team. Still playing. Still doing well. She didn’t care.

      Her love for baseball had died that night. No, it had been murdered, by her. She’d purposefully ejected it from her life. Went so far as to stop treating all professional athletes because she hadn’t wanted to be remotely reminded of the lifestyle. She’d turned down a professional golfer’s offer of ten thousand dollars for one hour of therapy without blinking.

      She’d even stopped eating hot dogs.

      She missed hot dogs.

      It wasn’t lost on Lane that after the failure of her marriage she’d turned her back on everything she loved except her immediate family. Her first major failure at her job, and she’d done the same thing to work.

       Quitter.

      The word sat ridiculously heavy on her shoulders. Was that what she was? Was that what she did? Did she quit when things got hard?

      No, she told herself stubbornly. She made rational decisions to protect her mental well-being. It was not the same thing at all.

      Besides she was here now, standing outside the stadium, wasn’t she? Scout needed her and Lane wasn’t going to let an old grudge get in the way of doing the right thing by her father. She would grant Duff’s favor and he would, in turn, do her a favor by making appointment with a doctor. Just a normal checkup. Something any daughter might prod her aging father into doing.

      She left her car, swallowed the crazy nervous thing that was in her throat and walked through the stadium doors like it was no big deal. It was early March and snow was still on the ground in upstate New York, although it was melting. Today the sun was out and there was a hint of spring in the air. Enough to give a person a sense of hope that warmer weather was coming. It was just a matter of time.

      Spring used to be her favorite season. The start of everything new. New flowers, new grass, new life and, most importantly, a new baseball season. She thought about the date, and realized opening day for the minors was three weeks away.

      There might be players around the ballpark. Those making a run for The Show would be down in spring training. But the cast of players who knew they would start in Triple-A would already be warming up. Hoping to prove themselves enough for some scout to see them and give them a chance.

      Lane headed toward Duff’s office, stopping just outside. She was supposed to meet the player Duff wanted her to work with. Like Scout, he’d played it off as no big deal. Just a pitcher who they wanted to gradually work up to full speed.

      She figured he was someone coming off an injury.

      A patient, she thought. That’s how she would deal with him. Not a player, not an athlete, just a patient. If she could maintain that distance, then it wouldn’t be like being involved in baseball at all.

      Taking a deep breath, she knocked and opened the door. The outer office was empty and she could hear voices behind the inner door. Marching forward, she entered the office, ready to compartmentalize her task. She was here to assess her father’s health. The other task was simply the means to an end.

      “Hey, Duff,” Lane said, seeing her father leaning back in his chair behind the desk. The player in question was sitting on the opposite side of the desk, his back to her. “Well, you got me back here. And I guess you’re going to be my patient for the next few—”

      The player stood and turned to face her.

      “Roy Walker. Wow,” she whispered. Because she really had nothing else to say.

      Scout did this. Duff did this. They both did this to her. Yet another horrible betrayal by people she trusted. How could they force her to confront the one man she never wanted to see again?

      The man who had ruined her marriage. Who had turned her into a failure.

       It wasn’t his fault. It was yours...

      “Lanie,” he whispered as if he, too, was not ready for the confrontation even though he’d at least had a heads-up it was coming. “You look...good. I mean, it’s good to see you.”

      Lane shook her head. Roy was talking to her. Speaking actual words to her. She was in the same room as him. Unthinkable.

      “I don’t know what I’m supposed to say now.”

      “Lanie,” Duff huffed. “Now, come on, girl. It’s been five years. The man did you a favor and opened your eyes. He gave you your life back. Stop holding on to history and get over it. I need you to work with him.”

      “Oh, I can promise you that is not going to— Wait.” Her gaze flew to Roy’s face and she could actually see him brace himself for what came next. “What are you doing here?”

      He swallowed a few times and she followed the movement of his Adam’s apple. She started to take in things about him now that the shock of seeing him was fading. The gray mixed in with the dark hair at his temples. His body still looked strong, fit. Wide shoulders and long arms, which gave him extra zip when throwing a ball. She knew he was thirty-seven, but the person Duff had asked her to work with was a minor-league player.

      Roy didn’t play baseball anymore. He certainly didn’t play minor-league ball.

      “I needed a job. Duff helped me out.”

      “You needed a job? Yeah, right. You’re a multimillionaire. What happened to your grand plan? You said you were done with baseball. You said you wanted to leave on top and not hang around like all the other old-timers who didn’t know when to walk away. You talked about it constantly. Almost bragging about how smart you were to leave while the leaving was good. Now, five years later, you want to pitch again?” She shook her head.

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