From the Heart

profile. “Your mother took you? I would have thought baseball a father-son sort of thing.”
    “My father wasn’t around. He wasn’t much on kids and responsibilities.”
    “I’m sorry.” She turned her head to look at him. “I didn’t mean to pry.”
    “It’s no secret.” He shrugged. “I wasn’t traumatized. My mother was a terrific lady.”
    Liv looked out to the field again. Strange, she mused, she hadn’t thought of Thorpe as ever being a child, with a family, growing up. She tried to picture it. Her vision of him had been limited to a tough, hard-line reporter with a gift for biting exposés. Thinking of him with a childhood, perhaps a difficult one, altered the view. There were entirely too many facets of him. She had to remind herself she didn’t want to explore them.
    But—what had he been like as a boy? How much had the early years influenced the way he was today?
    There was sensitivity in him. The rose—the damn rose.Liv thought of it with a sigh. It made it difficult to remember that distance was necessary. And his sexuality. He knew how to arouse a woman, even a reluctant one. Arrogance, yes, but he was so blatantly at ease with it, the trait was somehow admirable. And his skill in his profession couldn’t be faulted. She couldn’t term him power or money hungry—not when he had casually refused a position most reporters would slit throats for.
    I’d better be careful, she decided. I’m dangerously close to liking him.
    Thorpe watched her profile, observing the play of emotions over her face. When she forgot her guards, he reflected, she was clear as glass. “What are you thinking?” he murmured, and cupped the back of her neck with his hand.
    “No comment,” Liv returned, but couldn’t bring herself to discourage the familiarity. She couldn’t find the will to push it away. “Look, they’re ready to start again.”
    “The count’s still three and one,” Thorpe explained. “The runner on second’s charged to the first pitcher. If he scores, it goes against him, not the relief.”
    “That seems fair,” Liv commented as the batter knocked a foul tip straight at her. In automatic reflex, she reached up to protect her face and snagged the ball. As she looked down at it, stunned, the impact stung her palms.
    “Nice catch,” Thorpe congratulated, grinning at her astonished face.
    “I caught it,” she said in sudden realization, then gripped the ball tighter. “Do I have to give it back?”
    “It’s all yours, Carmichael.”
    She turned it over, rather pleased with herself. “How about that,” she murmured, then suddenly giggled.
    It was the first time he had heard the young, carefree sound from her. It made her seem seventeen. He had to check the urge to pull her against him and just hold her. She had never appealed to him more than she did at that moment, with the sun full on her face and a baseball clutched in her hands. Love for her was abruptly and unexpectedly painful.
    He lost track of the game. It was Liv whose head shot up at the hard crack of ball on bat. Her eyes grew wide as shejumped from her seat with the rest of the stadium. She grabbed Thorpe’s arm, dragging him with her.
    “Oh, look! It’s going all the way over the fence! That’s a home run, isn’t it? A home run, Thorpe!”
    “Yeah.” He watched the ball drop over the green barricade. “Home run. First one of the year.”
    “Oh, it was beautiful.” She was caught in the loud blast of celebration music, the cheers of the crowd. Liv turned, giving Thorpe a quick, spontaneous kiss. It was over before she could be surprised by her own action, but he pulled her back for a deeper, lingering one. The shouts went on around her, lost in the fast, rocketing beat of her heart. She gave him pressure for pressure, taste for taste.
    “Could be,” Thorpe murmured as he drew his lips an inch from hers, “there’ll be a whole volley of long balls.”
    Breathless, Liv eased out of his arms. In them, she lost everything but need. “I think one’s enough,” she managed. Because her legs weren’t as steady as they might have been, she sat back down. She was closer to the edge than she had realized. It was time to take a few steps back. “Are you going to buy me another hot dog?” she demanded, and smiled at him. She ignored the tingling that still brushed along her skin. “I’m starving.”
    The rest of the game was a shrewd defensive battle. Liv had difficulty keeping her attention focused.