Samantha screamed, “Yeah!” so loudly she nearly pierced Holly’s eardrum, and then jumped up and down, holding onto her hat with one hand and the hem of her skirt with her other. “That’s the way, baby! That’s the way! Go, go, go!”

The second baseman missed his catch, and Wade rounded the base, heading for third.

“Yes!” Sam screamed. “Ohmigod yes!”

Wade stopped at third, safe, and Sam sank back down to her seat and chewed on her thumbnail, her eyes locked on Wade waiting lithely on third for the next batter.

“So,” Holly said, lightly amused, “you’re a quiet fan.”

“We need a big hit now!” Sam yelled at Mason, who was at bat. “Bring him home, Mas. Bring him home!”

Mason singled, and Samantha leapt back to her feet when Wade headed for home just as the shortstop nabbed the ball and threw.

“Oh God.” Samantha slapped her hands over her eyes, then peeked through her fingers as both the ball and Wade raced for the plate. “I can’t look, I can’t look!”

“But you are looking,” Holly pointed out.

“Tell me what’s happening!”

“Safe,” Holly told her, watching as Wade slid into home a fraction of a second before the catcher snatched the ball out of the air and dove onto Wade. “He’s . . . buried, but safe.”

Samantha dropped her hands from her eyes to her mouth as she stared at the tangle of limbs over home plate, not moving a single muscle until Wade pushed clear, adding an extra adrenaline-fueled shove for good measure as he got to his feet, dirty but safe.

Samantha fell back into her seat, blew a strand of hair from her eyes, and let out a long breath. “Jesus. This is exhausting.”

“Yes.” Holly put her tongue firmly in her cheek. “Does it hurt, too?”

“What?”

“That horribly painful-looking crush you have going for the Heat’s sexy catcher.”

“Shh!” Samantha whipped her head right and then left. “Do you want everyone to hear?”

“I hate to break it to you, but you were the one yelling your head off for him.”

She looked horrified. “Was I that loud?”

“I don’t know. The people in China might not quite have heard you.”

“Oh my God, I know! It’s ridiculous.” She covered her face. “I’m ridiculous.”

“Why? You’re smart, funny, beautiful. He’s smart, funny, beautiful. Why is it ridiculous?”

“Oh no. You’re not going to interview me. No way. I’m not my publicity whore brother. I set up the interviews and that’s it.” Sam folded her hands in her lap and returned to the formerly prim, in-charge professional Holly had first sat with. “What were we talking about?”

Holly smiled. “You mean before you revealed you wanted to jump the catcher’s bones?”

At Samantha’s growl, Holly laughed. “Come on. It’s true. Off the record, I promise.”

“It’s complicated.” Sam let out a gusty sigh. “We . . . sort of have a past.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Samantha looked away, the tips of her ears sending out enough heat to light North America. “I don’t want to discuss it.”

“Okay.” Holly could understand that all too well. “Well, we were talking about you possibly helping me get that interview with—”

“We got stuck on an elevator for two hours once,” Sam burst out.

Holly blinked. “That sounds . . . traumatic. Anyway, I was wondering—”

“We’d just flown into Atlanta. We had those little bottles of Scotch. I definitely blame the Scotch, but let’s just say we made damn good use of the downtime and leave it at that.”

Holly looked at the misery on Sam’s face. Misery, and remembered lust. “Huh.”

“We had wild drunken monkey sex!” Sam clapped her hand over her mouth. “I really don’t want to talk about it.”

“Yeah,” Holly said with amusement. “I can see that.”

“Oh my God. Sorry. Clearly, I’ve been holding onto that for too long.” She shook her head. “We’ve been pretending it didn’t happen. And I really need to shut up now. What were we talking about?”

“Nothing as good as this.”

Sam closed her eyes when Holly laughed. “You are lucky, Holly, so damn lucky, that you get to pop in and out of people’s lives without getting involved.”

Holly paused. Is that what she did?

“You get to keep yourself distanced, disengaged. I really need to get the knack of doing that, let me tell you.”

Once upon a time Holly would have taken great pride in that most accurate assessment of her character. But this past week or so, surrounded by the people she was beginning to think of as friends, watching those people live their lives to the fullest in a way she’d never managed, she suddenly realized how much she was missing.

Chapter 10

I’m convinced that every boy, in his heart, would rather steal second base than an automobile.

—Tom Clark

After the win, Pace poured out of the dugout with the others, telling himself things were good. That they were going to stay good. That the unnamable ball of uneasiness sitting on his chest was ignorable.

The guys with family in the stands were rushed and hugged and congratulated, and with that odd ache still in place, Pace turned away.