Page 2 of Chasing Headlines

“I mean it, Olivia Aster Milline.” Dad's face turned an unhealthy, reddish-purple color. “They’re the perfect spectacle on that game field, but they’re rarely even good employees. They’re like animals who can only fathom their own needs. Overgrown toddlers who still believe the world and everyone in it revolves around them and what they want.”

I huffed out a breath. “Generalize and stereotype much?”

“They use people. Especially women. They get what they want when they want. So even the ones with the best of intentions can’t help themselves. So they cheat?—”

“And they lie and ruin families and ruin their families’ lives.”

Turns out, that wasn’t a particularly good day to test my dad. If a man’s eyes could blaze fire, his did right then.

“It doesn’t matter if you believe me, Olivia.” His lips curled in cold, calculated fury. “All you have to know is the day you bring home a professional athlete of any sort. The day you mistakenly think: but not him, he’s special and he loves me, Dad will understand. That day? That’ll be the last time you walk through the door of my house. The last check with my name on it that you cash. The last time you drive any car that I own, or say the words, ‘Furston Milline is my father.’ Do you hear me?”

Apparently, Mom left him for a pro tennis player—who then cheated on her. And there’s some story about Aunt Christiane that no one in the family has ever dared to spill, at least not within my earshot. The TLDR of it all amounts to: I'm not allowed to date any professional athlete. Ever.

I guess Dad forgot that his son was one? I'm sure Curt was a celibate monk the entire time he played. Yeah, I won’t think about . . .Bleh!

My third love began and may as well have ended the time I snuck into baseball camp—the summer before my senior year. I just wanted to see the best of the best in person. The top high school players in the nation were invited every year. And Curt was going. He had nothing better to do than help out the scouting crew while he was recuperating from surgery.

If anyone ever bothered to ask me, I shouldn't have had to sneak in. A good brother would have invited his sister and hugely fanatical lover of all things baseball to tag along. After all, he’d invited me to stay with him for most of the summer. I mayhave promised to play quasi- nursemaid since he was down the use of his dominant hand.

Surely that should have come with a front row ticket to any baseball-related activities he was going to, right?

Wrong. The jerk. And that stupid rule!

Instead, he was a complete jack wagon who forced me to leave, and barred me from attendinganybaseball-related activities during the entire two week camp!

It was too late, though. I'd already fallen in love a third time.

He was beautiful. The way he moved. The confidence, the focus. I could have watched him play third base forever. At one point, he dove at a line drive toward left field, knocking it down to the dirt. From one knee, he drilled it across the infield to first base.

I could have kissed him. I wanted to. I cheered too loudly and was found out. In a desperate attempt to not have the rather sour-faced security guard call my dad, I told them I was interning for Curt.

Big brother vouched for me and then physically removed me himself. I was sent home in a rideshare. And then there were the brotherly versions of Dad’s lectures . . . which were a special level of horrible—filled with gross boy stories that no woman should have to endure.

Much less from her brother.

“Dad may be overboard in some regards, but, Liv, most of these guys are swine.” Curt leaned back on his couch and pulled a pillow over his lap. He laid his red-and-black mechanical brace on top with a grunt.

“That word. Right there: most.” I pointed at him and then snagged another pillow to help elevate his arm. “I'll grab an ice pack, and I'm timing you. No cheating.” I moved aroundthe sofa into the kitchen. “Mostis notall. That means there are some?—”

“There’s not a single one of my teammates that I’d leave in a room alone with you, Livvie,” he said over the schtuck of Velcro pulling apart. “Even in broad daylight. Unsupervised.”

I gently placed the icepack on his bare elbow. “Oh, so even at seventeen I need, what, constant supervision?” I huffed and crossed my arms.

“No.Theydo. They’re fine teammates and even friends. But they turn into morons around pretty girls.” He leaned his head back, on top of the couch cushions. His eyes slid shut. Post-surgery Curt needed a nap every day.

“In case you missed it, my little sister had the nerve to turn into a beautiful young woman.”

Damn him and his flattery. “The nerve, huh?”

He yawned. “Makes my job as overprotective big brother that much harder.”

So, yeah, forget asking the guy's name. And how was it that baseball caps could be so frustratingly magical at obscuring faces? Of all the rotten luck.

After my forceful removal, if I even hinted I was thinking about baseball camp. Yeah, no. Another round of snarling erupted from my grumpy-faced brother. Usually included a few swear words sprinkled in amongst the grousing about “Irresponsible, boy-crazy stupidity.”Jerk.

I finally had enough and told him I'd only gone because I wanted to be a scout—like him.Ha. Take that.I put my game face on. I knew the stats—and the game I was playing. But I could change this “no baseball” rule, at least in my brother’s eyes. He wasn’t a dinosaur like my dad. He’d even taught me to pitch.

Curt stared at me. “There's not a lot of women scouts.”

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