She's here again, Drew McCasslin thought as he slammed his
racket against the tennis ball. For the third time that
week she was sitting at the same table, the one nearest
the ledge overlooking the tennis courts. The table's
brightly striped umbrella partially shaded her face.
She hadn't been there when he and Gary started playing,
but he'd known the moment she walked out onto the patio,
which was an extension of the club's outdoor snack and
cocktail bar. He had missed a ball when he let his
attention wander to the graceful way she smoothed her
skirt beneath her hips and thighs as she sat down.
"Better every day," Gary said to him as they met at the
net to catch their breath, take a swig of Gatorade and
towel mop rivers of sweat that saturated sweatbands
couldn't absorb.
"Not good enough," Drew replied before taking a long pull
at the bottle of lemon drink. Over the bottle's length, he
eyed the woman sitting on the patio above them. Ever since
the first day he had seen her there, she had inspired his
curiosity.
She was bent over the table tapping a pencil against a
tablet in a manner that he now associated with her. What
the devil was she always writing down?
Slowly, he lowered the bottle from his mouth, and his blue
eyes narrowed with suspicion. Could she be another
bloodsucking reporter? God forbid. But it wouldn't be
unlike an enterprising tabloid publication to send bait
like that to trap him into an interview.
"Drew? Did you hear me?"
"Huh?" He swung his eyes back to his tennis opponent. A
friendly opponent for once. "I'm sorry. What did you say?"
"I said your stamina has improved since last week. You're
running my ass all over the court, and you're barely
winded."
Drew's eyes crinkled at the corners as he smiled,
obscuring the tiny white lines in his bronzed face. It was
a smile reminiscent of the days before he had learned the
definition of tragedy."You're good, but you're not
Gerulaitis or Borg or McEnroe or Tanner. Sorry, chum, but
I have to be a helluva lot better than you before I'm
ready again for the big fellows. And I'm not there by a
long shot. No pun intended." The once-famous grin flashed
again in the Hawaiian sunlight.
"Thanks," Gary said dryly. "I can't wait for the day I'm
stumbling over my tongue and you've still got enough
energy to jump the net when the match is over."
Drew slapped him on the shoulder. "That's the spirit," he
gibed goadingly. He picked up his racket and twirled it
with the absentminded finesse that had come from years of
thinking of it as an extension of his hand.
A cheer and hearty applause erupted from a group of female
spectators. They were clustered on the other side of the
fence surrounding the courts. Their vocal approval
increased as Drew walked back to the baseline.
"Your fans are out in full force today," Gary said with a
taunting inflection.
"Damn groupies," Drew grumbled as he turned around and
glared at the women who clung to the fence like hungry zoo
animals at mealtime. And he was the feast. He scowled at
them angrily, but that only seemed to stir them rather
than to repel them. They called outrageous endearments to
him and flirted shamelessly. One, wearing a brief halter
top, peeled the side back to flaunt a heavy breast with
his name, decorated with flowers and hearts and lovebirds,
tattooed on it. Another had a bandanna, the kind he wore
as a trademark sweatband around his forehead every time he
played, tied high around the top of her thigh. He looked
away in disgust.
He forced himself to concentrate on the ball as he bounced
it idly, planning his serve, plotting to fire the ball
across the net to bounce in the back corner of the serve
box and spin out to the left, Gary's weak backhand side.
One of Drew's "fans" called out a lewd invitation, and he
gritted his teeth. Didn't they know that the last thing he
was interested in was a woman? My God, Ellie had only been
dead...
Dammit, McCasslin, don't think about Ellie, he warned
himself. He couldn't think about Ellie when he tried to
play or his game went straight to hell....
"Mr. McCasslin?"
"You've got him," he had said cheerfully into the
telephone receiver that sunny day in paradise when the
last thing a man would expect was for his wife to die in
the tangle of metal and glass of a car crash.
"Are you alone?"
Drew had pulled the receiver from his ear and looked at it
in puzzled amusement. He laughed out loud. "Yes, I'm alone
except for my son. Is this going to be an obscene phone
call?" He'd meant it as a joke. He'd had no idea how
obscene the call would actually be.
"Mr. McCasslin, I'm Lieutenant Scott with Honolulu P.D.
There's been an accident."
He didn't remember much after that....
Now he took up the ball and bounced it in his hand as
though weighing it. Actually, he was trying to erase his
mind, to wipe it clean of memories that made his insides
churn. His eyes gravitated to the woman still sitting at
the patio table. Her cheek was resting on her palm as she
stared vacantly into space. She seemed impervious to
everything going on around her. Didn't she hear all the
commotion from the women at the fence? Wasn't she the
least bit curious about him?
Apparently not. She hadn't so much as glanced at the
tennis court. Unaccountably, he resented her indifference,
which was irrational, since all he'd wanted for the year
since Ellie's death was to be left alone.
"Hey, Drew," called out a singsong voice from the gathered
fans,"when you're through playing with your balls, you can
play with something of mine."
The double entendre was so blatant and so crudely bold
that Drew's blood boiled, and when his serve sliced
through the air, it was but a blur. For the rest of the
set, he kept up that kind of anger-inspired play. When it
was over, he'd granted Gary only two points.
Draping a towel around his neck, Gary wheezed, "If I'd
known that all it took to get you to play championship
tennis was a dirty suggestion from one of your groupies,
I'd have rented them by the hour weeks ago."
Drew had already gathered up his tennis bag, zipped his
racket into its holder and was heading toward the stairs
that led to the patio overlooking the courts."Most of them
could be rented by the hour, I'm sure."
"Don't be too hard on them. They're your fans."
"I could do with more fans who are sports writers or
commentators. Among them, I don't have one. All they do is
tell the world that I'm washed up. Finished. Drunk all the
time."
"You were drunk all the time."
Drew stopped on the step above Gary and whipped around to
confront him angrily. His friend's face was guileless,
open and damnably honest. What he'd said was true. Drew's
anger dissolved in the face of such forthright
friendship. "I was, wasn't I?" he asked on an embarrassed
sigh.
"But not anymore. Today you were the old Drew. Blistering
serves. Damn! Every time one came near me, I saw my life
flash before my eyes." Drew laughed. "Well-thought-out
maneuvers, strategy to take advantage of my weak left
side."
A grin split Drew's mobile mouth. "I didn't think you'd
notice."
"Like hell."
They were laughing companionably as they took the last few
stairs up to the patio. Drew saw at once that she was
still there, a sheaf of papers strewn over the tabletop, a
glass of mineral water at her right hand. She was
scribbling furiously on a yellow legal pad. He was going
to walk past her table. It was on his way to the lockers,
and he would only call attention to himself if he avoided
passing where she was sitting.
They were almost beside her when she glanced up at them.
The glance was a reflex action, as though they had
disturbed her train of thought and she was looking up
involuntarily to determine the source of that
interruption. But she looked directly at Drew, directly
into his eyes, and the impact of her gaze made his eyes
narrow on her and his ears close to Gary's chatter.
Her eyes dropped immediately back to her paper, but not
before Drew had seen that they were incredibly green and
surrounded by dark, bristly lashes.
That was when he made up his mind. He'd make a wager with
himself. If she was still there when he came out of the
locker room, he'd speak to her. If not, well, nothing was
lost. He wasn't really interested in meeting a woman, any
woman. It was just that this one intrigued him. If he was
honest with himself, he'd have to admit that the main
reason she piqued his curiosity was because she was so
uncurious about him.
Yes, he'd leave it to chance. If she was still there when
he came out of the locker room, he'd at least say hello.
No harm in that.
One other thing, he reminded himself. Don't linger in the
shower.
Arden's heart was booming like a kettledrum.
It had been a full five minutes since he'd walked within
touching distance, since she'd seen his face up close and
in the flesh for the first time, and still her heart
hadn't quieted.
She blotted her palms with the damp napkin knotted in her
fists. Ice rattled in her glass when she took a sip of her
lime-refreshed mineral water.
He had looked straight at her. Their eyes had met.
Briefly, briefly. Yet it had been like lightning striking
her to see Drew McCasslin for the first time, knowing the
bond that linked them together. Total strangers to each
other, yet with a common secret they would share
throughout their lives.
She looked down at the court where he had just played with
such brilliance. A few months before, she'd known little
about tennis, especially professional tennis. Now she was
almost expert in her wealth of knowledge on the subject.
Certainly she had a vast amount of knowledge on the career
of Drew McCasslin.
A group of four ladies came onto the court, looking
ridiculous in their designer tennis clothes and
extravagant gold and diamond jewelry. She smiled at them
indulgently, remembering Ronald's urging that she join the
tennis league at their club in Los Angeles.
"That's not me, Ron. I'm not athletic. I'm not a
participator, a joiner."
"You'd rather sit in the house all day writing those
little verses that you lock away and don't let anyone see.
For God's sake, Arden, you don't have to play well. I
don't care if you can play tennis or not. It's just good
for my professional image, not to mention the valuable
contacts you could make if you're an active member of the
club. Socialize with the other doctors' wives."
He'd settled for bridge. She never was a master of the
game, but she played well enough to be invited to all the
tournaments sponsored by the country club, and that
satisfied Ronald's demands that she mix and mingle with
what he considered suitable friends for a prominent
doctor's wife.
Then Joey had come along and provided her with a viable
excuse for curtailing her social activities. Joey had
provided her with excuses for many things. Some, she
wished she could forget. Would her son, her adorable,
painfully sweet, innocent son, have understood that one
life-altering decision? Would he have forgiven what she
couldn't forgive herself?
She'd asked his forgiveness the day the pitifully small
casket was lowered into the short grave. She'd asked God's
forgiveness, too, for the bitterness she felt at watching
an intelligent, beautiful child waste away in a hospital
bed while other robust children played and ran and got
into mischief.
Shaking herself out of her emotional reverie, she took
another sip of water and mentally toasted herself for
playing it just right with Drew McCasslin. It was public
knowledge that since he'd retreated to his carefully
guarded estate on this island, he'd avoided interviews and
shunned publicity of any kind.
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