AFTER A QUICK scan of the hallway, Trevor dragged his sister into his room. “What the hell are you doing here? Sorry.” He raked a hand through his hair. “Are they feeding you? You look so skinny.”
She laughed. “Trevor, I’m twenty-one years old. No one’s feeding me, that’s my job now.”
“Right, right.” He ran his hands up and down her arms. “Are you okay? Did someone find you? What are you doing here?”
Her lower lip quivered. “Don’t I get a hug from my big brother?”
“Oh God. Of course you do.” He snatched her into his arms, his gut churning with emotion. Topmost among them, fear. He dragged her over to edge of the bed and sat her down. Scanning her from head to toe, he noticed heavy bags under her eyes, strain on her achingly lovely face. His sister had always been pretty, even as a twelve-year-old. The twenty-one-year-old version was no tomboy leaping over broken glass. Eyes the shade of melted caramel, cropped blond hair, strong winged eyebrows like punctuation marks, all added to her fairylike appearance.
If the Detroit guys got ahold of her . . . the thought made him literally sick, bile seeping into his throat.
“Why’d you come here?”
“I told you I wanted to come to one of your games.”
“I said I’d think about it.”
“Well, I thought about it, and I decided one of your away games would be much safer. You’re here to play the Chihuahuas.” She giggled at the name.
“Don’t laugh, the Chihuahuas are a tough team.”
“I’m not surprised. Chihuahuas are much tougher than you might think. You try clipping their toenails and see what happens.”
Trevor had a sudden vision of clipping the El Paso Chihuahuas’ toenails and let out a bark of laughter. “So you’re still working at the dog groomers?”
“Yes. I got a promotion and a raise. And a few days off. So I checked the Catfish schedule online and I saw that you were playing here in El Paso. It’s only a few hours away from Tucson.”
“How did you get here? Did you take a bus?”
She tilted her head back. “You’re looming. Do you have to loom?”
He realized he had his arms crossed over his chest as if he were a bouncer. “Sorry.” He dropped his arms but couldn’t bring himself to sit still. “Did anyone see you?”
“Yes, but it’s okay because I used that cool memory deactivator from Men in Black.”
“This isn’t funny, Nina. It’s life or death. I’m not going to allow anything to happen to you.”
She dropped her head, staring at the backs of her hands. “I know that,” she said in a small voice. “That’s the problem.”
“What?” He didn’t like the sound of that one bit. He resumed looming over her. If he had to use his size to prod some common sense into her, he would.
“It doesn’t feel right making you suffer for the rest of your life. It was one thing when I was twelve and couldn’t make my own decisions. But I’m grown up now.”
“You’re barely twenty-one. And you’re . . . my little sister.”
At that, she swung her head up, eyes flaring. “You were only fifteen when you went to juvie. You had to grow up in a hurry.”
A big hurry, but he didn’t want to talk about the past. “Yeah, and . . . it’s done. I did my time, and I don’t regret a second. End of story.”
“But it isn’t the end of my story. What do you think it’s like for me, knowing how much it cost you?” Face twisted with passion, she surged to her feet. “I can’t live with this, Trevor. We’re both living in fear all the time. It’s like those guys are in our head, controlling everything we do. You have a different name, we hardly ever see each other. They destroyed our lives once, but now we’re doing it to ourselves! And I hate it.”
“Nina, Nina . . .” He caught her against him, making shushing noises. She was overwrought, that was all. If he could just get her through this crisis, everything would go back to normal. Or what passed for normal since that one brutal night.
“I know what you’re doing,” Nina murmured against his shirt. “You’re trying to pacify me. It’s not going to work. We deserve better, Trevor. We deserve to have regular lives. Get married, have families. None of this is our fault.”
Her words found their way to a part of him he’d tried to kill off. The part that believed there was more to him than the baseball intimidator or the off-hours lady-killer. He couldn’t go there, couldn’t let that wound get ripped open again. But he also didn’t want to get her more upset.
“It’s not our fault, but it got dumped on us and we have to deal with it. We can’t just pretend it’s not real.”
“I’m not! I know it’s real, I can’t ever forget it.” Those words seemed to rip right of her heart. “And every time I pick up the phone to call you and my heart races because I know it’s a risk, I remember all over again. Every time I see a baseball game on TV, or even a baseball cap, I think about you and how I should be there for you, rooting you on. It’s not right, Trevor. It’s not right and I hate it.”
“Shhh, shhh. You have to calm yourself, sweetheart.” He soothed slow circles across her back. “Whatever we do, we have to do it carefully. We can’t be reckless. You understand?”
Slowly, she nodded. “I’m sorry for rocking the boat, Trevor. But it’s been eating at me. It’s like I can’t move on with anything until I make this right.”
“Honey, you did nothing wrong. Now let’s talk about something else. We have a lot to catch up on. Are you hungry?”
At her eager nod, he remembered that he had a “date” with Paige. Picking up his phone, he saw that it was already after seven. Crap. Standing up Paige Taylor was the last thing he wanted to do. “Let me just text someone quickly.”
“I’m interrupting something.”
“No . . . I mean, I had plans, but nothing that can’t be changed.”
He was composing a text to Paige when a knock on the door made him startle. Nina’s eyes went huge. “I wasn’t followed, I swear,” she whispered.
Trevor’s mind raced. It could be Dwight, Duke, any of the guys . . . it didn’t have to be something menacing. “Go in the bathroom while I see who it is,” he said tensely.
“Be careful,” she hissed, and scampered into the bathroom. He had a flash of ten-year-old Nina and how she used to play hopscotch on the front walk, hopping between irregular boxes drawn in blue chalk. Despite his fear, it was good to have her with him. It meant he didn’t have to worry about what was happening in her life. She was a few feet away, and that made something inside him relax.
The hotel door had no peephole, so he called through it, “Who’s there?”
“Your seven o’clock date, reporting for duty,” came the answer.
Paige.
Shit, what should he do about Paige? He didn’t want to blow her off; what if she took it personally and never spoke to him again? “I . . . uh . . .” He coughed. “Think I’m coming down with something. Can I take a rain check?”
A short silence. “Sure, Stark. We can reschedule for some time when you don’t have a baseball groupie in your hotel room.”
A what? “That’s not it, I promise.” He coughed again, making a bigger production out of it, adding a gasp for air at the end.
“That is the fakest cough I ever heard.” Paige called. “You sound like Jerome with a hair ball.” She made a god-awful sound in her throat, sounding just like a cat hacking up a dust bunny. “You don’t need to lie to cancel a date, you know. And believe me, I know when a man is lying. I’ve had on-the-job training.”
Trevor cringed, leaning his forehead against the door. He hated deceiving Paige. But he couldn’t tell her the full truth either. “I don’t have a groupie in here. I wouldn’t do that to you.”
“You do whatever you want, Trevor. See you at the shoot tomorrow.”
He heard soft footfalls receding down the hallway carpet. He swore under his breath. She’d probably never want anything to do with him again.
“Move,” said Nina from behind him, shoving him out of the way. “I’m not going to be responsible for messing up your love life too.” She flung open the door.
“Nina,” he hissed, but it was too late, she was already flying down the hallway.
“Paige?” Paige turned to see a pretty blond girl running down the hall toward her. “Please come back. Trevor handled that very badly, but he really does want to have dinner with you. I can stay in the hotel room while you guys are gone, that’s fine with me.”
Paige blinked a few times. Baseball groupies were apparently very open-minded, despite being so young and innocent-looking. “I don’t want to get in the way,” she said stiffly.
“As if!” The girl smiled and took her by the wrist to guide her back to Trevor’s room. “I can tell by the way Trevor was talking to you that he really likes you.”
Paige glanced up the hallway. Trevor was planted in front of his room, a stormy expression on his face. “Good to know,” she said dryly.
The girl lowered her voice. “He’s going to be mad that I told you this, but I’m Trevor’s sister, Nina. He’s very sorry he faked the hair ball, but he was doing it to protect me. Will you come back?”
Trevor’s sister? Oh now, that wasn’t fair. Not only did she feel like an idiot, she felt like a clichéd idiot. Now that she looked more closely, the girl’s resemblance to Trevor was hard to miss. Same hair color, same cheekbones, same angelic good looks. Of course, Trevor’s were in the form of a hard-bodied ballplayer, so they were hardly identical.
“I didn’t know Trevor had a sister,” she said. “Nice to meet you, Nina. I’m Paige.”
Nina took her hand and tugged. “Please come back, pretty please. I surprised Trevor by showing up out of the blue, but I don’t want to mess up his social life.”
“No no, it’s not like that,” Paige protested. Nina ignored her, dragging her back to the living storm cloud that was Trevor Stark. When they reached the door, Nina skipped past him, but Paige stopped short, unwilling to go inside. While she was relieved that Trevor hadn’t been stashing a groupie in his room, he’d still lied to her. He’d faked a cough so she wouldn’t meet his sister.
Levelly, she met his eyes, glittering chips of Caribbean ice, a contradiction if ever there was one. “Well?”
He held her gaze for a long moment, then, as if he couldn’t help himself, gave her a quick head-to-toe assessment. She’d dressed for her “date” with him. Could anyone blame a girl for wanting to look her best for Baseball’s Hottest Outfield? She’d dug up a Pucci dress she picked up at a flea market in Naples. It clung happily to her body in psychedelic swirls of green and hot pink. It ended halfway down her thighs, with lots of leg exposed between the hem and her favorite cowboy boots.
“Damn,” he breathed. “You really know how to make a guy regret a coughing fit.”
The heat in his eyes scrambled her brain. “Yeah, well . . .” was all she could manage. Electric energy pulsed between them.
“I’m sorry,” he finally said. “I didn’t know Nina was coming. I . . . was rattled.”
“Big Bad Trevor Stark, rattled? Don’t tell the other teams, they might try to hire her.”
He didn’t seem to think that was funny, since he scowled. His hand tightened on the edge of the door. “Well, Paige Taylor . . . are you finally going to take me up on my invitation to my hotel room? I’ve been waiting since that first night we met.”
“Poor baby. All sad and lonely, no doubt.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Yes, as a matter of fact.”
Well . . . now she was rattled. Trevor Stark, lonely? She walked in, telling herself not to make a big deal out of it. According to the rumors, girls frequently shared his hotel rooms. Was he saying that wasn’t true?
Inside the room, Nina was crouched in front of the minifridge. “There’s nothing in here except a bottle of water.”
“I have some protein bars in my overnight bag,” Trevor told her. “If I’d known you were coming, I’d have packed some animal crackers.”
She straightened up, her entire face beaming as if it had been replaced by the sun. “You remembered.”
“Of course I remembered.” Voice gruff, Trevor shoved his hands in his front pockets. “We don’t see each other very often,” he explained to Paige in a mutter.
“Last time we lived together was when I was twelve and he was fifteen. I just turned twenty-one.” Nina uncapped the bottle of water and drank about half of it in one long swallow.
“Nina,” Trevor warned in a low voice. Clearly, there was a story here, a story Trevor didn’t want to tell. Paige was torn between wanting to grill Nina for every bit of information she could and respecting Trevor’s privacy. She decided on the latter.
“I only have half brothers and sisters. One of each. I don’t see them much either.”
Trevor shot her a grateful look, but Nina paid no attention to their attempt at shifting the subject. “I came to see Trevor so he can take me to one of his baseball games. Can you believe I’ve never seen one in a real ballpark? You probably have, right?”
Paige laughed. “You could say that. My father was a baseball player. A pitcher. His name is Crush Taylor.”
Nina plopped down on the bed and stared at her. “Oh my gosh. You’re Crush Taylor’s daughter? The owner of the team?”
“How do you know about Crush?” Trevor asked her sharply.
“I have Internet, you know. I follow your teams. So far I like the Catfish best. You know who I like? Jim Leiberman. His official team photo is so adorable. Do you think I could get his autograph?”
Her wistful tone made Paige’s heart melt. Despite her love-hate relationship with baseball, she couldn’t imagine never seeing a game, never breathing in the heady scent of a ballpark, witnessing the thrill of a home run or a perfect double play. “What are you doing tomorrow afternoon?” she asked impulsively.
“She’s going to be on a Greyhound bus,” said Trevor. “Nonstop, express.”
Nina bounded across the room and clasped Paige’s hands in hers. “Tomorrow’s the game against the Chihuahuas, right?”
“It is. I have field level seats, since I’m a member of the Catfish organization. If you come with me, you can watch your brother from only a few yards away.”
“Really?” Nina’s ecstatic expression was a shocking contrast to Trevor’s grim one. “Oh, Trevor, can I? Please?”
“No,” he said in a quelling voice. “That’s not a good idea.”
“I don’t see why not.” Paige looked from one to the other, completely confused by the undercurrents passing between them. Nina’s face fell, but she didn’t offer any protest. “Nina, can you give us a minute?”
The girl swiveled her head to check with Trevor. For Pete’s sake, couldn’t she make any decisions on her own? At Trevor’s quick nod, she skipped back into the hallway. “I’m going to find the Coke machine and stock up. Any requests?”
Paige and Trevor both shook their heads. As soon as the door had closed behind her, Paige whirled on Trevor. “Why on earth can’t Nina come to a game?”
“She hasn’t been to one so far, why start now?”
That made absolutely no sense. “Is it a superstition or something?” Most ballplayers were prone to superstitions. Crush used to eat exactly twenty-five sunflower seeds before each start. “You think Nina would bring you bad luck?”
“I don’t believe in luck. I don’t believe in superstition. I just don’t want Nina at the game.”
“But why? Give me one reason that makes any kind of sense.”
He ran his hand across the back of his neck. “Maybe I’ll get distracted.”
“You won’t. I’ve seen you out there. Your focus is phenomenal. But even if you got distracted, so what? One game isn’t going to make or break you.”
“I have a responsibility to the team to play my best.”
“But what if you play even better with your sister in the stands? Did you ever consider that?”
An odd expression flashed across his hard face, and she could just imagine his inner scoffing at the idea of playing “even better.”
“Your sister just came to see you all the way from . . . where does she live?”
Trevor didn’t answer.
“From wherever she lives, and you’re refusing to let her watch you play? That seems pretty cold, Trevor.”
“I’m a cold man.” Since his face resembled a frozen mask, it was hard to argue with that. Except she saw the rapid pulse in his neck, the dilated pupils that turned his eyes dark.
“You’re not.” She shook her head vigorously. “I know you’re not. Something else is going on. And I’m going to find out what it is.”
Quick as lightning, he wrapped his big hands around her upper arms and dragged her against his chest. The sudden contact sent tremors through her. “Damn it, Paige. I’m a prick and everyone knows it. Why can’t you just leave it at that?” He spoke low, fierce and passionate. In his eyes she read hunger, fear, desperation, and blazing, blazing heat. It was like being trapped in the force field of a two-hundred-pound magnet—she couldn’t have looked away if she’d wanted to. It would have been physically impossible to break the connection between them.
His gaze shifted, became more personal, scanning her face, her mouth, consuming her, warming her. Her lips throbbed—literally throbbed—and parted. He lowered his head and a soft gasp escaped her. She could feel the kiss building in the air between them, like a flame before it’s lit. A chemical combustion stirred, ready to burst into life.
A soft tap on the door made Trevor jerk upright. She took a step back, freeing herself from his grip as his hands fell away.
“Oh no, Trevor Stark,” she croaked, her voice hoarse. “You are not cold.”