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CHAPTER ONE

ONLY ONCE BEFORE could Deuce Monroe remember being speechless. When he’d met Yaz. He’d shaken the great man’s hand and tried to utter a word, but he’d been rendered mute in the presence of his hero, Carl Yastrzemski.

But standing in the warm April sunshine on the main drag in Rockingham, Massachusetts, staring at a building that had once been as familiar to him as his home field pitcher’s mound, he was damn near dumbstruck.

Where was Monroe’s?

He peered at the sign over the door. Well, it said Monroe’s. With no capital M and a sketch of a laptop computer and a coffee mug next to it. But the whole place just seemed like Monroe’s on steroids. In addition to taking up way more space than he remembered, the clapboard had been replaced by a layer of exposed brick covered in ivy, and three bay windows now jutted into the sidewalk.

At least the old mahogany door hadn’t changed. He gripped the familiar brass handle, yanked it toward him and stepped inside.

Where he froze and swallowed a curse. Instead of the familiar comfort of a neighborhood bar, there was a wide-open area full of sofas and sunlight and…computers?

Where the hell was Monroe’s?

The real Monroe’s—not this…this cyber salon.

He scanned the space, aching for something familiar, some memory, some scent that would embrace him like his long-lost best friend.

But all he could smell was…coffee.

They didn’t serve coffee at his parents’ bar. Ice-cold Bud on tap, sure. Plenty of whiskey, rum and even tequila, but not coffee. Not here, where the locals gathered after the Rock High games to replay every one of Deuce’s unpredictable but deadly knuckleballs. Not here, where all available wall space was filled with action shots from big games, framed team jerseys and newspaper clippings touting his accomplishments and talent. Not here, where—

“Can I help you, sir?”

Deuce blinked, still adjusting to the streaming sunlight where there shouldn’t be any, and focused on a young woman standing in front of him.

“Would you like a computer station?” she asked.

What he’d like is a Stoli on the rocks. He glanced at the bar. At least that was still there. But the only person sitting at it was drinking something out of a cup. With a saucer.

“Is Seamus Monroe here?” Not that he expected his father to be anywhere near the bar on a Tuesday morning, but he’d already tried the house and it was empty. Deserted-looking, actually. A little wave of guilt threatened, but he shook it off.

“Mr. Monroe isn’t here today,” the young lady beamed at him. “Are you the new software vendor?”

As if.

He sneaked a glimpse at the wall where Mom had hung his first autographed Nevada Snake Eyes jersey at the end of his rookie season. Instead of the familiar red number two, a black and white photograph of a snow-covered mountain hung in a silver frame.

“Do you have a phone number where I can reach him?”

She shook her head. “I couldn’t give you that, I’m sorry. Our manager is in the back. Would you like me to get her?”

Her? Dad had hired a female manager?

Then a little of the tension he’d felt for the past few weeks subsided. This was the right thing to do. It took a career-ending injury caused by monumental stupidity, but coming home to take over the bar was definitely the right thing to do.

Obviously, someone had already exploited his father’s loss of interest in the place and made one too many changes. Deuce would set it all straight in no time.

“Yeah, I’ll talk to her,” he agreed.

She indicated the near-empty bar with a sweep of her hand. “Feel free to have a cup of coffee while I get Ms. Locke.”

Locke?

That was the first familiar sound since he’d arrived in Rockingham. He knew every Locke who had ever lived in this town.

In fact, Deuce had just had an email from Jackson Locke, his old high-school buddy. A typical what-a-jerk-you-are missive laced with just enough sympathy to know Jack felt Deuce’s pain for ending a stellar baseball career at only thirty-three years old. Jack’s parents had moved to Florida years ago…so that left Jack’s sister, Kendra.

Deuce swallowed hard. The last time he’d seen Kendra was the week he’d come home for his mother’s funeral, about nine years ago. Jack’s baby sister had been…well, she’d been no baby then.

And Deuce had been a total chicken scumbag and never called her, not once, afterwards. Even though he’d wanted to. Really wanted to.

But it couldn’t be Kendra, he decided as the hostess scooted away. Back then Kendra was weeks away from starting her junior year at Harvard. Surely the Hahvahd girl with a titanium-trap brain and a slightly smartass mouth hadn’t ended up managing Monroe’s. She’d been on fire with ambition.

And on fire with a few other things, too. His whole body tightened at the memory, oddly vivid for having taken place a long time and a lot of women ago.

This Locke must be a cousin, or a coincidence.

He leaned against the hostess stand—another unwelcome addition to Monroe’s—and studied the semi-circle of computers residing precisely where the pool table used to be.

Someone had sure as hell messed with this place.

“Excuse me, I understand you need to speak with me?”

Turning, the first thing he saw was a pair of almond-shaped eyes exactly the color of his favorite Levi’s, and just as inviting.

“Deuce?” The eyes flashed with shock and recognition.

He had to make an effort to keep from registering the same reaction.

Was it possible he’d slept with this gorgeous woman, kissed that sexy mouth that now opened into a perfect O and raked his fingers through that cornsilk-blond hair—and then left without ever calling her again?

Idiot took on a whole new meaning.

“Kendra.” He had absolutely no willpower over his gaze, which took a long, slow trip over alabaster skin, straight down to the scoop neck of a tight white T-shirt and the rolling letters of Monroe’s across her chest. All lower-case.

The letters, that was. The chest was definitely upper-case.

A rosy tone deepened her pale complexion. Her chin tilted upward, and those blue eyes turned icy with distrust. “What are you doing here?”

“I came home,” he said. The words must have sounded unbelievable to her, too, based on the slanted eyebrow of incredulity he got in response. He took another quick trip over the logo, and this time let his gaze continue down to a tiny waist and skin-tight jeans hugging some seriously sweet hips.

He gave her his most dazzling smile. Maybe she’d forgiven him for not calling. Maybe she’d stay on and work for him after he took over the bar. Maybe she’d…

But, first things first. “I’m looking for my dad.”

She tucked a strand of sunny blond hair behind her ear. “Why don’t you try Diana Lynn’s house?”

Diana Lynn’s house? What the hell was that? Had he gone to assisted living or something? “Is she taking care of Dad?”

That earned him a caustic laugh. “I’ll say. Diana Lynn Turner is your father’s fiancée.”

“His what?” Men who’d had pacemakers put in a year ago didn’t have fiancées. Widowed men with pacemakers, especially.

“His fiancée. It’s French for bride-to-be, Deuce.” She put a hand on her hip like a little punctuation mark to underscore her sarcasm. “Your dad spends most of his days—and all of his nights—at her house. But they’re leaving tomorrow morning for a trip, so if you want to see him, you better hustle over there.”

Deuce had been scarce for a lot of years, no doubt about it. But would his father really get engaged and not tell him?

Of course he would. He’d think Deuce would hate the idea of Seamus Monroe remarrying. And he’d be right.

“So, where does this Diana Lynn live?”

She waved her hand to the left. “At the old Swain mansion.”

He frowned. “That run-down dump on the beach?”

“Not so run-down since Diana Lynn worked her magic.” She reached into the hostess stand and pulled out some plastic menus, tapping them on the wood to line them up. “She has a way of livening everything up.”

Oh, so that’s what was going down; some kind of gold digger had got her teeth into the old man. Deuce hadn’t gotten home a moment too soon.

“Don’t tell me,” he said with a quick glance toward the pit of computers to his right. “She’s the mastermind behind the extreme makeover of the bar.”

“The bar?” Kendra slid the menus back into their slot and looked in the opposite direction—toward the bar that lined one whole wall. “Well, we haven’t been able to close long enough to rip the bar out yet.”

He didn’t know what word to seize. We or rip or yet.

“Why would you do that?”

She shrugged and appeared to study the bank of cherry-wood that had been in Deuce’s life as long as he’d lived. He’d bet any amount of money that the notches that marked his height as a toddler were still carved into the wood under the keg station. “The bar’s not really a money-maker for us.”

Us, was it? “That’s funny,” he said, purposely giving her the stare he saved for scared rookies at the plate. “Most times the bar is the most profitable part of a bar.”

His intimidating glare didn’t seem to work. In fact, he could have sworn he saw that spark of true grit he’d come to recognize right before some jerk slammed his curve ball into another county.

“I’m sure that’s true in other business models,” she said slowly, a bemused frown somehow just making her prettier. “But the fact is, the bar’s not the most profitable part of an Internet café.”

He choked a laugh of disbelief. “Since when is Monroe’s an Internet café?”

“Since I bought it.”

He could practically hear the ball zing straight over the left-field fence, followed by a way-too familiar sinking sensation in his gut.

“SINCE YOU what?”

He didn’t know. Kendra realized by the genuine shock in those espresso-colored eyes that Deuce had no idea that she and his father shared a two-year-old business arrangement. She’d never had the nerve to ask Seamus if he’d told his son. In fact, she and Seamus Senior had politely danced around the subject of Seamus Junior for a long, long time.

But it looked like the dance was about to end.

“I bought Monroe’s a while ago. Well, half of it. And I run it, although your dad still owns fifty percent.” All right, fifty-one. Did Deuce need to know that little detail?

“Really,” he said, thoughtfully rubbing a cheek that hadn’t seen a razor in, oh, maybe twenty-nine hours. Giving him the ideal amount of Hollywood stubble on his chiseled, handsome features. It even formed the most alluring little shadow in the cleft on his chin.

She’d dipped her tongue into that shadow. Once.

“Yes, really.” She pulled the menus out again just to keep her hands busy. Otherwise, they might betray her and reach out for a quick feel of that nice Hollywood stubble.

“And you turned it into—” He sent a disdainful glare toward the main floor “—the Twilight Zone.”

She couldn’t help laughing. He’d always made her laugh. Even when she was eleven and he’d teased her. He’d made her giggle, and then she’d run upstairs and throw herself on her bed and cry for the sheer love of him. “We call it the twenty-first century, Deuce, and you’re welcome to log on anytime.”

“No, thanks.” He took a step backward, sweeping her with one of those appraising looks that made her feel as if she’d just licked her finger and stuck it in the nearest electrical outlet.

When his gaze finally meandered back up to her face, she forced herself to look into his dark-brown eyes. They were still surrounded by long, black lashes and topped with those seriously brash eyebrows. The cynicism, the daring, the I-don’t-give-a-rat’s-ass-what-anyone-thinks look still burned in his eyes. It was that look, along with a well-known penchant for fun and games, and the occasional out-of-control pitch, that had earned him the most memorable yearbook caption in Rockingham High School history: Deuce Is Wild. And her brother was on the page to the left with his own epigram: Jacks Are Better.

Their gaze stayed locked a little too long and she felt a wave of heat singe her cheeks. How much did he remember? That she’d admitted a lifelong crush on her big brother’s best friend and biggest rival?

Did he remember that she’d never once used the word no during their passionate night together? That she’d whispered “I love you” when her body had melted into his and a childhood of fantasizing about one boy finally came true?

Sophie hustled toward the hostess stand, holding out a manila envelope, and blessedly breaking the silence.

“The kid from Kinko’s dropped this off,” she said, giving Deuce a quick glance as though to apologize for the interruption. Or to steal another look.

Kendra took the envelope. “Are you sure they sent over everything, Soph?”

The young woman nodded. “And the disk is in there, too. For backup.”

Kendra gripped the package a little tighter. This was it. Seamus and Diana Lynn were on their way to Boston, New York and San Francisco to nail down the financing that would allow her to finish the transformation of Monroe’s into the premier Internet café and artists’ space in all of Cape Cod. Two years of research and planning—and what seemed like a lifetime of agonizingly slow higher education—all came down to this presentation.

“Seamus just called,” Sophie added. “He’s anxious to see it today, so he has time to go over any fine points with you before they leave.”

She glanced at Deuce, who managed to take up too much space and breathe too much air just by being there. He’d always be larger than life in her wretched, idolizing eyes, regardless of the fact that he was responsible for putting an end to all of her dreams.

Then a sickening thought seized her. Everyone knew that Deuce’s baseball career was over. Was he back for good? If so, then he had the ability to wreck her plans once again. Not because she would fall into his bed like a lovesick schoolgirl—she’d never make that mistake again—but because he had the power to change his father’s mind.

If he wanted Monroe’s, Seamus would give it to him. If Deuce wanted the moon and stars and a couple of meteors for good measure, Seamus would surely book a seat on the next rocket launch to go get them.

The prodigal son had returned, and the surrogate daughter might just be left out in the cold.

Kendra squared her shoulders and studied the face she’d once loved so much it hurt her heart just to look at him. Deuce Monroe could not waltz back into Rockingham and wreck her life…again.

But she’d never give him the satisfaction of knowing he had any power—then or now.

“You can follow me over there,” she said with such believable indifference that she had to mentally pat herself on the back.

“You can ride with me,” he replied.

“No thanks.” How far could she push indifference? Didn’t he remember what had happened the last time they’d been in a car together?

“You can trust me.” He winked at her. “I’ve only been banned from race tracks, not the street.”

Of course, he was referring to his well-publicized car crash, not their past.

“I just meant that I saw your father yesterday. You haven’t seen him in years. No doubt you’ll want to stay longer than I do.”

“Depends on how I’m received.” He turned toward the door, but shot her a cocky grin. “It’s been a while.”

“No kidding.”

The grin widened as he added another one of those endless full-body eye exams that tested her ability to stand without sinking into the knees that had turned to water. “Is that your way of saying you missed me, Kendra?”

If any cells in her body had remained at rest, they woke up now and went to work making her flush and ache and tingle.

She managed to clear her throat. “I’m sure this is impossible for you to comprehend, Deuce, but somehow, some way, without formal therapy or controlled substances, every single resident in the town of Rockingham, Massachusetts, has managed to survive your long absence. Every. Single. One.”

He just laughed softly and gave her a non-verbal touché with those delicious brown eyes. “Come on, Ken-doll. I’ll drive. Do you have everything you need?”

No. She needed blinders to keep from staring at him, and a box of tissue to wipe the drool. Throw in some steel armor for her heart and a fail-safe chastity belt, and then she’d be good to go.

But he didn’t need to know that. Any more than he needed to know why she’d dropped out of Harvard in the middle of her junior year.

“I have everything I need.” She held the envelope in front of her chest and gave him her brightest smile. “This is all that matters.”

She couldn’t forget that.

“SO WHAT THE HELL happened to this place?” Deuce threw a glance to his right, ostensibly at the cutesy antique stores and art galleries that lined High Castle Boulevard, but he couldn’t resist a quick glimpse at the passenger in his rented Mustang.

Because she looked a lot better than the changes in his hometown. Her jeans-clad legs were crossed and she leaned her elbow out the open window, her head casually tipped against her knuckles as the spring breeze lifted strands of her shoulder-length blond hair.

“What happened? Diana Lynn Turner happened,” she answered.

The famous Diana Lynn again. “Don’t tell me she erected the long pink walls and endless acres of housing developments I saw on the way into town. Everything’s got a name. Rocky Shores. Point Place. Shoreline Estates. Since when did we have estates in Rockingham?”

“Since Diana Lynn arrived,” she said, with a note of impatience at the fact that he didn’t quite get the Power Of Diana thing.

“What is she? A one-man construction company?”

Kendra laughed softly, a sound so damn girly that it caused an unexpected twist in his gut. “She didn’t build the walls or houses, but she brought in the builders, convinced the Board of Selectmen to influence the Planning Commission, then started her own real estate company and marketed the daylights out of Rockingham, Mass.”

“Why?”

“For a number of reasons.” She held up her index finger. “One, because Cape Cod is booming as a Hamptons-type destination and we want Rockingham to get a piece of the action instead of just being a stop en route to more interesting places.” She raised a second finger. “Two, because the town coffers were almost empty and the schools were using outdated books and the stoplights needed to be computerized and the one policeman in town was about to retire and we had no money to attract a new force.” Before point number three, he closed his fist around her fingers and gently pushed her hand down.

“I get the idea. Progress.” He reluctantly let go of her silky-smooth skin. “So Diana Lynn isn’t a gold digger.”

She let out a quick laugh. “She’s a gold digger all right. She’s dug the gold right out of Rockingham and put it back in those empty coffers.”

He was silent for a minute as he turned onto Beachline Road and caught the reflection of April sunshine on the deep, blue waters of Nantucket Sound. Instead of the unbroken vista he remembered, the waterfront now featured an enclave of shops, which had to be brand-new even though they sported that salt-weathered look of New England. Fake salt-weathered, he realized. Like when they banged nicks into perfectly good furniture and called it “distressed.”

He didn’t like Diana Lynn Turner. Period. “So, just how far into him are her claws?”

“Her claws?” Kendra’s voice rose in an amused question. “She doesn’t have claws, Deuce. And if you’d bothered to come home once in a while to see your father in the past few years, you’d know that.”

He tapped the brakes at a light he could have sworn was not on the road when he was learning to drive. “That didn’t take long.”

“What?”

“The guilt trip.”

She blew out a little breath. “You’ll get no guilt from me, Deuce.”

Not even for not calling after a marathon of unforgettable sex? He didn’t believe her. “No guilt? What would you call that last comment?”

As she shifted in her seat, he noticed her back had straightened and the body language of detachment she was trying so hard to project was rapidly disappearing. “Just a fact, Deuce. You haven’t seen your dad for a long, long—”

“Correction. I haven’t been in Rockingham for a long, long time. Dad came to every game the Snakes played in Boston. And he came out to Vegas a few times, too.”

“And you barely had time to have dinner with him.”

This time he exhaled, long and slow. He didn’t expect her to understand. He didn’t expect anyone to understand. Especially the man he was about to go see. Dinner with Dad was about all the motivational speaking he could stand. The endless coaching, the pushing, the drive. Deuce liked to do things his way. And that was rarely the way his father wanted them done.

Staying away was just easier.

“I talk to your brother Jack every once in a while,” he said, as though that connection to Rockingham showed he wasn’t quite the Missing Person she was making him out to be.

“Really?” She seemed surprised. “He never mentions that.”

“He seems to like his job.” It was the first thing he could think of to prove he really did talk to Jack.

She nodded. “He was born to be in advertising, that’s for sure. He’s married to that company, I swear.”

How could he resist that opening? Besides, he was dying to know. “What about you?” He remembered the hostess calling her Ms. Locke. But these days, that didn’t mean anything. “Got a husband, house and two-point-five kids yet, Ken-doll?”

Her silence was just a beat too long. Did she still hate the nickname he’d bestowed on her when she was a skinny little ten-year-old spying on the big boys in the basement?

“No, I don’t, Seamus.”

He grinned at the comeback. “So why aren’t you in New York or Boston? Don’t tell me that Hahvahd education landed you right back in the old Rockeroo.”

He saw her swallow. “Actually, I never graduated from Harvard.”

He glanced at her, noticing the firm set of her jaw. “No kidding? You were halfway through last time…” He let his voice drift a little. “When my mother passed away.”

A whisper of color darkened her cheeks as she was no doubt wondering what else he recalled about his last visit to Rockingham. Surprisingly, everything. Every little detail remained sharp in his memory.

“I got very involved in business here,” she said curtly.

Something in her voice said “don’t go there” so he sucked in the salty air through the open windows of his rental car, immediately punched with memories.

“Smells like baseball,” he said, almost to himself.

“Excuse me?”

“April in New England. It smells like spring, and spring means baseball.” At least, it had for the past twenty-seven years of his life. Since he’d first picked up a bat and his father had started Rockingham’s Little League just so Deuce could play T-ball, spring had meant “hit the field.”

“You miss it?” she asked, her gentle tone actually more painful than the question.

“Nah,” he said quickly. “I was about to retire anyway.” A total lie. He was thirty-three and threw knuckleballs half the time. His elbow might be aching, but he could still pitch. But his taste for fast cars had lured him to a race track just for fun.

Fun that was most definitely not welcomed by the owners of the Nevada Snake Eyes, or the lawyers who wrote the fine print in his contract. He rubbed his right elbow, a move that he’d made so many times in his life, it was like breathing.

“You had a good year last year,” she noted.

He couldn’t help smiling, thinking of her little speech back at the bar. “You think anybody in Rockingham slowed down from all that surviving long enough to notice?”

Her return smile revealed a hint of dimples against creamy skin. “Yeah. We noticed.”

The Swain mansion was around the corner. Instinctively, he slowed the car, unwilling to face his father, and wanting to extend the encounter with Kendra a little longer.

“I see my great season didn’t stop someone from redecorating the walls of Monroe’s.” With mountains, instead of…memories.