Page 86 of Playboy Pitcher
Or even on speaking terms at the end.
“Was her death the reason you came back to the States?”
“You know what?” Slapping my palms against my knees, I flash him a brittle smile. “I really don’t want to talk about Brigitte. I want to hear more about your family.”
His silence tells me he knows he’s touched a nerve, but instead of plucking harder, he tucks his arms behind his head and follows the sharp curve of my diversion. “Not much to tell. My dad is a well-known wealth fund manager in the city, and my mom is a preschool teacher.”
“How did they meet?”
He smirks. “She hit my dad’s car. Then she became Hailey’s nanny.”
I raise an eyebrow at his devious grin, mentally tucking that story away for another time. Since I’ve successfully shifted the focus onto him, and he’s not hiding behind a persona or an act anymore, I use it to my advantage.
He opened this can of worms; I’m just dumping them out.
“Ben, the other night at the karaoke bar, you said something about your dad and mine.” The words are barely out of my mouth when Ben’s smile vanishes, as if wiped clean by an eraser.
Fuck, this is bad.
Turning away from his clenched jaw, I rush through the rest. “You said you stayed with the Storm even after all the bad trades and waivers because you respected my father. That might not have been a lie, but it wasn’t the whole truth.” I risk an indignant glance at him out of the corner of my eye. “You can’t make the rules and then bend them when it’s convenient for you.”
He’s quiet for too many heartbeats before exhaling a gruff breath. “My dad and Roger went to high school together.” He tosses out the words, as if he didn’t just launch a grenade while holding the pin.
“What?”
His smile is cold. “Small world, huh? They were friends and teammates. Played on the same baseball team. Only my dad was offered a scholarship to pitch for UCLA after graduation. By then he was already being scouted by MLB teams, but your dad...”
“Wasn’t good enough, so he bought one instead,” I finish for him. I’ve heard this story before. I just never knewthatfriend fathered the man I’m legally tied to. Ben sits up, his hand pressing gently against my back again, but I shrug him off. “It’s fine. It’s not anything I haven’t heard before. Dad always said everything has a price if you want it bad enough.” Tilting my chin, I stare at the space between our naked bodies and frown.
“Willow…”
“So, what happened? With your dad, I mean. Wealth fund managing isn’t exactly the major league.”
He shrugs and collapses back against the headboard. “My grandmother got cancer, so he gave up his scholarship to take care of her. Some say he could have been a hall of famer. Guess the world will never know.”
My heart squeezes at that word.Cancer.That evil bastard that ruins families and steals a little girl’s dreams. “So, you followed in his footsteps?”
Ben’s shoulders stiffen, his teeth grinding as if fighting to suppress words determined to break free. “Not on purpose. Baseball came naturally to me. I suppose it’s in my blood and shit. It became an obsession and then a dream.” My heart skips at his callous laugh. “I didn’t find out until I was already ass-deep into it that it was just a recycled one.”
He’s wrong. I’ve studied the stats. I know the odds.
Crawling onto my knees, I squeeze his arm. “But you got drafted on your own. Ben, only twenty-three players in history went straight from the draft to the majors without spending time in the minors. You were one of them.”
His eyes drop to his arm, then slowly rise. As our gazes meet, a jaded smirk settles across his face. “Yeah, drafted straight to the Storm.Roger’steam. My dad’s high school buddy. A fact that your ex dug up and shoved in my face the other night.”
I rear back. “What are you getting at?”
“Come on, Willow. You said it yourself. Only twenty-three players have ever gone straight from the draft to the majors. Don’t you find it the slightest bit ironic that a twenty-two-year-old kid gets fast tracked from the University of North Carolina to starting pitcher for the Miami Storm, a team owned by his father’s friend?”
“Come on. You can’t think he—”
He arches an eyebrow. “Called in a favor so he could live out his failed dreams vicariously through his son? You’re damn right I do.”
No, I can’t believe this.
“That’s crazy, Ben! You said yourself that my father loved baseball too much to compromise the integrity of the game.”
“Did I fail to mention my father used to manage Roger’s investments?” he shoots back, his anger starting to snowball. “Did I also mention that a few very lucrative stock shuffles by dear old dad tripled Roger’s money, allowing him to secure the capital to buy the Storm? That’s how favors work, Puddles. You scratch my back, and I make your kid a household name.”
