Karen Templeton - Playing For Keeps

“Yeah. I loved it.” Although not for the reasons she probably thought. The real motives behind his playing, for his determination to win at that game, too, weren’t any of her business. Or anyone else’s.

Jose and the dog finally returned with the ax. After telling them to come get her in the studio if they had any questions, Joanna called the dog and carefully picked her way back to the house in her bare feet. Dale noticed there were two little dusty butt-cheek impressions on the bottom of the long white sweatshirt, a detail that fueled his imagination. Behind him, Jose chuckled.

“Shut up,” Dale muttered. Jose just laughed harder.

Could Joanna help it that her worktable sat at the perfect angle to see across the yard? Or that the play set really only worked in that spot? And was it her fault that stuffing Santa bodies didn’t exactly require her entire concentration? She would have been looking out the window anyway, right? And it certainly wasn’t her fault that Dale McConnaughy had taken off his shirt.

Or that he liked to wear his jeans slung low on his hips.

She was an artist, after all. Her perusal of Dale Mc-Connaughy’s naked torso was no different than all those life drawing classes she took. Muscles and sinews and shoulders.

Oh, my.

On the floor beside her, stretched out in a patch of dusty sunlight, Chester twitched, dreaming. One of the cats, who was just passing, smacked Chester’s nose on general principles; the dog jerked awake, looked accusingly at Joanna, then crashed his head back on the floor with a beleaguered sigh. Joanna chuckled, then looked out the window again and gave a beleaguered sigh of her own.

Maybe Dale McConnaughy represented everything Joanna didn’t want or need, but he was one fine specimen of human male. And Joanna was one fine specimen of pathetically horny female. That she should feel a twitch in her hoo-hah every time she looked at the guy was hardly a surprise.

What was a surprise was that, for all Dale Mc-Connaughy’s come-to-papa charm—yeah, yeah, she wasn’t totally out of the loop—she’d bet her butt that charm was a cover for something that went far deeper. Oh, she had no doubt he was out for only one thing, but unlike most guys who saw sexual conquests as some sort of Holy Grail, she had the distinct feeling Dale McConnaughy used them because his real Holy Grail was out of his reach.

Which was certainly a presumptuous conclusion for her to have reached after—what?—two five-minute conversations. But she remembered vividly, from her stint as a part-time art teacher before the twins were born, seeing that particular expression in this or that student’s eyes. The look that said, “I’m fine, don’t dig, don’t ask, don’t make me think about things I don’t want to think about.” A look that asserted itself at unguarded moments, when buried or ignored pain dimmed even the brightest smile. After a dozen times of asking the kids’ teachers what was up, and getting answers she didn’t want to hear, she no longer questioned if she was seeing what she thought she was. She knew.

But reaching out, however subtly, to a nine-year-old was far different than reaching out to a grown man who would, in all probability, completely misinterpret her motives. Which, considering the way her nerve endings were shouting, “Hallelujah, I am reborn, sister!” would be a completely understandable misinterpretation on his part.

So she wouldn’t reach out.

At all.

Ever.

“Hey, honey!”

Joanna jumped a foot, then turned to see her best friend, Karleen Almquist, click-clacking her way across the room in a pair of high-heeled ankle boots and designer jeans that could practically fit Dulcy. Karleen was not, and had never been, into the natural look. Karleen, bless her, not only believed comparing her to a Barbie doll was a compliment, but a reputation worthy of keeping intact at all costs…as long as she could pass those costs on to the Spouse of the Week.

They’d been best friends forever, although nobody, including Joanna and Karleen, could quite figure out why. Habit, most likely. And an ability to accept each other for who they were. But they’d been there for each other from the do-you-think-he-likes-me? middle school squealies to the breakups of their respective marriages, although Karleen’s track record in that department was running three to one over Joanna’s. The only good thing to come out of the last marriage—according to Karleen—was that, this time, she got the house. A house less than a half mile from Joanna’s. So Karleen, who had turned an avocation into a career as a personal shopper for dozens of time-crunched professional women in town, popped over nearly every day, even if only for a quick cup of coffee. A nice diversion, frankly, since Joanna’s work kept her more housebound than the kids ever had.

“Ooooh, I like this one,” Karleen now said, running a finger down the front of a Santa in an ivory velvet robe on which Joanna had hand painted an ivy design, stitching on tiny red beads here and there for the berries. Then she looked out the window and gasped.

“Holy crap,” she breathed, as artfully plucked sandy brows disappeared underneath artfully scraggly bangs that had been dark brown and lethally stiff in high school. “Is that real?”

“Couldn’t tell you,” Joanna said, deadpan. “He only has his shirt off.”

“More’s the pity.” Then she smacked Joanna in the arm. “You’ve got all that right out your window and you didn’t even call me? What kind of friend are you?”

“Hey. My eye candy. Go find your own. And don’t drool on the velvet.”

“So who is he?”

“Guy who owns the toy store where we got the play set.”

“Does this toy store owner have a name?”

“Dale McConnaughy.”

“The baseball player?” Karleen squeaked.

“Apparently so. And apparently this means a lot more to you than it does to me.”

“You bet your ass it means something. He made All-Stars five years running, voted MVP the last year he played, pitched at least twenty no-hitters during his career—”

“Since when do you know so much about baseball?”

“Since Jasper.”

Husband Number Two.

“And if I never see another game again,” Karleen said, “it will be too soon. But I do remember not feeling too put out if the Braves were playing and Dale McConnaughy was pitching. The camera used to zoom in for closeups of his face, and those eyes…” She sighed, her own eyes glazing over. “And you know how baseball players grab their crotches?”

“I really don’t want to go there, Kar.”

“Sure you do. I mean…” She leaned on the table, her silicone-enhanced breasts immobile beneath her chenille sweater, and lowered her voice. “Took more than a single tug to rearrange himself, if you know what I mean.”

“Oh, Lord,” Joanna said.

“What?”

“You sound hornier than I am.”

Karleen pouted. “It’s been three months!”

“There are worse things.”

“Name one.”

“Starving to death.”

“Honey, I haven’t eaten a full meal since 1983. Food, I can live without.” She spared another glance outside, then brightened. “Hey—sure looks to me like those boys are thirsty, don’t you think?”

“No, they’re fine. They brought their own water.”

“I cannot believe you’re that dense.”

Joanna threaded a needle, biting off the thread with her teeth. “I’m not—what the hell are you doing?” she yelped as Karleen snatched the needle out of her hand, then dragged Joanna off the stool and out of the studio. Chester roused himself and followed, just in case all this activity had something to do with food.

“Either jump-starting your pathetic love life,” Karleen said, once in the kitchen, “or saving mine from an ignominious death.” She yanked open Joanna’s refrigerator door.