Page 1 of The Perfect Catch

Prologue

Calvin Ramsey hadexperienced some surreal moments in his career as a professional baseball player.

Getting drafted in the first round and snagging a signing bonus that a wise investor could live off for decades.

Playing for half a season with one of his brothers in the minors before reaching the bigs, where he would don the same number his father wore as a pitcher in the major leagues.

Advancing his team in the playoffs with a walk-off homer two years into his career.

He wasn’t an everyday starter, but he’d been a difference maker. A utility player who could fill in at five positions admirably, and provide some pop off the bench with a clutch pinch-hit.

But this afternoon, seated in the sports car he’d rewarded himself with after five years in the majors, Cal wasn’t sure if he’d ever felt anything quite so surreal as this. He stared out over the half-empty players’ parking lot while the guys who’d been his teammates just yesterday were starting to enter the building for another day’s work. They would be facing division rivals again tonight, the second game in a week-long homestand. And they’d be suiting up without him.

After arriving at the stadium, he’d been told to report to the general manager’s office. And every second since then had felt like an out-of-body experience. He hadn’t been sent down to the minors, which considering his slow start and tweaked hamstring would have been understandable.

Nope.

He’d been released. Designated for assignment and put on waivers for any one of twenty-nine other teams to claim. In the weeks to come, he could be picked up by any other team for next to nothing. As of today, he was the special of the week—the player put on the major league clearance rack, so to speak. Though uncertain if another team would pick him up, he was certain that at best his future would be as a journeyman utility guy.

But right now, with his batting average the worst it had been in his entire career, there was a chance he’d be out of baseball for good.

Calvin Ramsey, son of a storied baseball family with a pitching legend for a father, first of his name to lock down a seven-figure signing bonus, had just been given the boot. The kicker was that he hadn’t even been remotely worried about his roster spot. He was only a spot starter, but for a half-decade he was a proven commodity off the bench, a fan favorite for timely pinch-hits, and perhaps most importantly, well liked in the locker room. He was the teammate most likely to dump the Gatorade bucket on that day’s hero after a win, accepting of his role in the dugout, and genuinely supportive of all his teammates, regardless if their struggles meant more playing time for him.

He’d worked his ass off to gain a roster position. He’d won his arbitration case in the off-season and locked down a bigger contract after a career year. But, as his father always said, it wasn’t about what you did last season. A team needed you to perform now. And he hadn’t. In baseball, there was always someone younger, stronger and faster ready to take your spot. Cheaper, too. Some wet-behind-the-ears rookie would get his first major league at-bat tonight, courtesy of Cal’s hitting slump.

If he sat here much longer, he would hear the sounds of batting practice getting underway. The crack of the brand-new Louisville Sluggers as they launched balls into the still-empty outfield seats. The occasional clink of a ball off the batting cage while the hitting coach worked with someone new on going with the pitch. The usual shouts and ribbing of the twenty-four other…make thattwenty-fiveother guys, who were on the field.

Sounds he wasn’t ready to hear.

Tipping back against the headrest, Cal couldn’t even wrap his head around where to go next. After devoting every summer of his life to baseball since he was old enough to run the bases, he seriously considered just walking away from the game. For good. He’d collect his salary this year either way.

At almost thirty years old, he didn’t much feel like jumping through hoops to impress a new team anymore. Maybe he needed to take a summer for himself. Help his grandfather out with the farm that had been in the family for generations—a business doomed to die with the old man since Everett Ramsey’s descendants had gone into baseball instead of farming. How many times had Gramp asked him to take over Rough Hollow Farm and Orchards?

It was too soon to make that call though. Because underneath the sense of surreal floating around him, Cal was seriously rattled. Right now, he was going to drive home and put his house on the market. Pack up his things and put them in storage since his time in Atlanta was done. After that? He was not the kind of guy to sit by the phone and wait for a call that might not come. There was a good chance he’d toss his phone out the window and just keep driving. His agent would track him down one way or another if any offers came through.

Sooner or later though, he needed to return home. Hisrealhome in Last Stand, Texas, where a dose of the Hill Country would remind him of his roots. Because in Last Stand, the Ramseys were first and foremost a farm family, most notable because they traced their local heritage back to 1856 when Virgil Ramsey built a home and barn and called it Rough Hollow Ranch.

Cal needed that brand of reality in a life gone off the rails. He just hadn’t known how much he needed it until today. For now, he shut down his phone because he damn well wasn’t ready to talk to anyone. Or maybe it was to prevent himself from seeing any sports news about his career going down in flames.

Turning over the engine, he cranked the tunes and lit out of the parking lot like his ass was on fire. He had a house to sell. And, in time, a life to resurrect once the wrecking ball finished tearing down the old one.

Chapter One

My oldest son may stop by the house sometime this spring.

Seated on theporch swing at dusk, Josie Vance reread the text message thread that had sent her into panic mode earlier that week. Ever since she’d taken the job as a caretaker for this mammoth old farmhouse in Last Stand, Texas, she liked sitting outside to watch the fireflies come out as a reward for a hard day’s work on the property. At those times, she could almost forget this place didn’t belong to her. Like the fluffy little dog on her lap—Kungfu the Maltipoo—and the two Lab mixes snoozing at her feet, the things around her were borrowed pleasures. But when the world all around her was quiet, she simply enjoyed it and didn’t care that it was temporary. All week she’d been too frazzled by her employer’s messages—the threat of an “oldest son” stopping by—to enjoy the usual twilight ritual.

He has been out of touch, so I can’t be sure. It’s just maternal intuition!

Hailey Decker, the author of the texts and the home resident who’d hired her, was an unusual sort of woman to say the least. She was divorced from a famous ballplayer, apparently, some pitcher that Josie had never heard of. After her divorce, Hailey had moved back into the first home she’d lived in as a married woman, a place next door to her ex-father-in-law, because she still looked out for the older man, Everett Ramsey. That had been Josie’s first indication that Hailey was unique. Because who moved back into a house long owned by a divorced spouse’s family, let alone cared for an ex-in-law? Add to the mix that Hailey was a local beekeeper who thought nothing of dropping everything to lead a church mission to Ecuador for three months or going mushing with a team of sled dogs in Alaska for a winter holiday, and you came up with an intriguing human.

Tucking her bare toes under her on the worn green seat cushion, Josie cupped her mug of tea tighter in response to the cooling breeze that came after the hard spring rain that had driven her indoors late that afternoon. Just now, as she listened to the katydids sing, the crickets chirp, and the swing gently creak, she could almost convince herself that her employer’s texts had been all for naught. Despite Hailey’s “maternal intuition,” Josie hadn’t seen any sign of the sons around the property. Which was just as well since she needed to be anonymous for a while. When she’d agreed to the caretaking gig, she’d signed on for overseeing the house, the dogs, a cottage garden and several beehives.

Strange men showing up at the house had not been mentioned.

If you see Calvin, please mention he is welcome to stay with his ailing grandfather. Thank you!

Josie set the phone down again, hoping she never saw the mysterious Calvin for a variety of reasons, but also because she knew Everett Ramsey was hell-bent on looking out for himself. The cantankerous old farmer next door had been sideswiped by a tourist bus a month ago and was lucky to be alive. When he’d first come home from the hospital, Josie had hardly seen him. But over the last two weeks, she’d spotted him outside using his walker on the pitted dirt road that separated his place from hers. He swore a lot about not being able to do as much as he used to, and when she tried to assist him, he’d sworn even more about the nurses who paraded through his house night and day like he was an invalid.

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