Daisy's back in town

Chapter Eighteen

Daisy had lived in the Northwest for fifteen years, but she'd never forgotten how seriously Texans took theftfootball. Be it the Texas Stadium in Dallas, a high school field in Houston, or a small park in Lovett, footballwas considered a second religion and was worshiped accordingly.

Amen.

What Daisy hadn't known was that this particulargame was an annual event. A yearly meeting where grown men gathered to sweat, ram into each other, andcompare battle wounds. There were no yardline markers. No referees. No goalposts. Just two sidelines and endzones marked off with DayGlo orange spray paint, and someone with a stopwatch. Jack's team wore redpractice jerseys, the other team wore blue.

Each team brought grit and spit and a desire to tear each other's heads off all in the name of fun.

This was football in its rawest, purest form, and Nathan Monroe was going to be the only player who wore padsand a helmet. A fact that angered him to no end.

Daisy tried to talk him out of his anger by pointing out that he was fifteen and he was playing against men whowere all a lot older and bigger. He didn't seem to care that he'd get hurt, only that he'd looked like a wuss.

"Nathan, I paid over five thousand dollars for your straight teeth," she'd told him. "You're not going to get themknocked out."

It wasn't until some time later, when Brandy Jo showed up at the park and told him she liked the way he lookedin pads and helmet, that his mood seemed to brighten a bit.

She and Nathan caught a ride with Jack to the park, and as the three of them moved closer to the playing field,Jack took a closer look at her dress. "That doesn't look like your cheerleader outfit," he said when Nathanwalked over to Billy to get his red-mesh jersey.

Daisy had ignored Jack's suggestion that she wear her cheerleader skirt and sweater, and had chosen instead apeach apron dress that crisscrossed down the back. She looked down at the hem of the dress just above herknees. "Too long?"

"And it doesn't have a back."

"I guess I won't be doing any of those toe-touch jumps that you were apparently so fond of in high school."

His gaze scanned the members of his team assembled in the center of the field. "In the dress you got on, you'dprobably hurt your pom-poms. And that would be a true shame."

"You don't need to worry about my pom-poms." She stopped at the red sideline. "They're fine."

"They certainly are," he said over his shoulder as he continued toward his team.

Daisy stared after him and smiled. He wasn't wearing anything beneath his mesh jersey, and his tan skin showedthrough the tiny holes. Her gaze slid down his back to his tight, butt-hugging football pants. Jack Parrish wasmighty fine himself. His pants encased his legs to just below his knees, and he wore black football socks andcleats. He moved as if he hadn't a care in the world. As if he wasn't about to spend the next hour or so gettingrun over and the stuffing knocked out of him.

Tucker Gooch called her name and waved to her from the middle of the blue team. She waved back to him andnoticed a lot of faces she'd gone to school with. Cal Turner and Marvin Ferrell. Lester Crandall and Leon Kribs.

Eddy Dean Jones and several of the Calhoun boys, Jimmy and Buddy included. She wondered if Buddy knewthat after he'd had sex with Lily, she'd gone crazy and driven her car into Ronnie's front room.

Probably not.

She recognized a lot of other faces too. The people she'd grown up with in Lovett. Penny Kribs and little ShayCalhoun. Marvin's wife, Mary Alice, andGina Brown.

Jealousy knotted Daisy's stomach. She wondered if Gina and Jack had been together in the past month. Theyprobably had. Jealousy moved up from her stomach to twist her heart. She knew the feeling and was familiarwith it. She'd felt it fifteen years ago when just the thought of Jack with someone else used to torment her,sending her emotions bubbling up over the top.

But Jack wasn't hers and she wasn't a kid anymore. She knew what to do with jealousy now. She didn't fight itor pretend it didn't exist. She felt every prickly thorn of it. Then she let it go as best she could.

Her head won this round over her heart, and she sat in a folding chair next to Rhonda and the girls on thesidelines. All three little girls wore red cheerleader outfits and jumped about like their legs were made ofsprings.

"Last year Billy tore a groin muscle," Rhonda told her as she pulled off Tanya's socks so the baby could wiggleher toes. "He whined about it for three weeks."

"Marvin broke his thumb last year," Mary Alice added as the leaned forward in her chair.

Groins and thumbs weren't covered by padding and helmets. Daisy stood, ready to drag Nathan away from theteam huddle, then she sat back down. He would never forgive her if she did that. So she crossed her fingersinstead.

The game kicked off at seven-thirty. It was ninety degrees in the shade and sweat poured off the players. Jackwas the quarterback for the red team, and Daisy had forgotten how much she liked to watch him play. Everytime he drew his arm back to drill that ball down the field, his jersey pulled up and Daisy was treated to a viewof his flat stomach and navel just above the waistband of his pants. When he got knocked flat, she got a glimpseof his chest.

Horizon View Park was soon filled with the shouts of men calling out to each other, cleats pounding down thefield and muscle hitting muscle. Of bodies hitting the ground with an audible thud followed by a whoosh, andthe cheers and jeers of spectators on the sides.

In the first quarter, Jack threw a short pass to Nathan, who caught it and ran with it for about ten yards before hegot tackled. Daisy held her breath until her son got back up and brushed a chunk of grass from his helmet. In thesecond quarter, Jimmy Calhoun made a touchdown for the red team. Unfortunately he was tackled in the endzone and went down hard. When he was finally able to get back up, he limped to the car and Shay took him tothe hospital. Everyone predicted a knee injury. Buddy hoped it wasn't something more permanent.

"Shay's got her heart set on a big family," he said as he watched his brother being whisked away. "Hope hedidn't rupture any thang vital."

During half-time, Daisy helped Rhonda and Gina pass bottles of water out to both teams. Each man lookedsomewhat worse for the wear, and they had half the game left. On the blue team, Leon Krib's left eye wasswelling, and Marvin Ferrell had a busted lip. While Tucker Gooch wrapped his ankle, he asked for her phonenumber.

She didn't give it to him.

She excused herself and talked to Nathan to make sure he was all right. Billy grabbed him around the neck andrubbed his knuckles in Nathan's hair. Instead of getting angry like Daisy half expected,,Nathan laughed and socked Billy in the gut.

"Billy really wants a little boy," Rhonda told her... "But he's going to have to settle for playing with Nathan."

Billy only had about three weeks before she and Nathan were returning to Seattle. Daisy wondered how Nathanfelt about leaving. If he was still excited to get back home.

Was she? Her little tug of anxiety turned into a hard yank at the thought, and she was very much afraid theanswer was no. Just yesterday she and Nathan had been driving through the small downtown area of Lovett andshe'd noticed a vacant space right next to Donna's Gifts on Fifth. Before she even realized what she was doing,she'd visualized herself there. A sign hanging beneath the striped awning. DAISY MONROE PHOTOGRAPHYpainted on it. Or maybe she'd name her business Buttercup or...

Her heart and head were at war, and she'd better figure things out quick before she signed a lease in Seattle.

She handed water to Eddy Dean who had bloody knuckles and to Cal Turner who was already limping. But thelimp didn't keep Cal from asking her to meet him at Slim's later that night. She glanced at Jack, standing a fewfeet away, deep in conversation with Gina. He stood with his hands on his hips, a white towel hanging off oneshoulder. Gina gestured to the left, but Jack's gaze was on Daisy as she approached him.

"I'll talk to you later," Gina said and moved to the sidelines.

"Okay, thanks." Jack grabbed two bottles of water and twisted the cap off one. He had a bloody raspberry on hisleft elbow and his white pants were covered in green. He drank half of one bottle and poured the rest over hishead.

"Are you going to go out tonight with Cal?" he asked as he wiped his face with the towel.

She'd wondered if he'd heard Cal. "Would that bother you?"

He looked at her over the top of the white cotton, then hung the towel around his neck. "Would it matter to youif it does?"

She turned her attention to the sidelines and Gina.

"Yes."

Jack placed his fingers on her cheek and brought her gaze back to his. "Yes, it would bother me. Don't go outwith Cal or flea or anyone else."

"I'm not going out with Cal or anyone else." She looked down at her feet then raised her gaze back up the lacingof his football pants, his red jersey, then into his green eyes. "Are you still going out with Gina?"

He moved to stand so close they almost touched, and he tucked her hair behind one ear. "I haven't been withanyone," he said just above a whisper. "Not since I put you on the Custom Lancer."

She wondered if he was talking about the car. Knowing Jack, she doubted it. "Really?"

"Yeah." His fingertips slipped to the side of her neck. "How about you?"

She smiled because she couldn't help it. "Of course not."

He smiled too. "That's good." He pressed a quick kiss to her mouth then walked around her toward the rest ofhis team. As kisses went, it shouldn't have counted. It was hardly a kiss at all, but it had been just wet enough toleave the taste of him on her lips... Just warm enough to slide inside and light a fire next to her heart.

During the third quarter, the blue team scored a touchdown, but Daisy wasn't paying close attention, to thegame. She had bigger worries on her mind. She was in love with Jack. She could no longer ignore it. She'dcome to Lovett to tell Jack about Nathan. She hadn't meant to fall in love with him again, but it had happened,and now she had to decide what she was going to do about it. Fifteen years ago, she'd run away from the pain ofJack not loving her in return. She wasn't going to run this time. When and if she left, she would know how Jackfelt about her.

Three minutes into the fourth quarter, Jack got creamed by Marvin Ferrell, who had to outweigh Jack by a goodhundred pounds. He went down with a umph, and Daisy's heart dropped a few inches. He lay on his back forseveral long moments until Marvin helped him to his feet. Jack moved his head from side to side as if gettingout the kinks, then he slowly walked back to the huddle. His next pass was a fifty-foot bomb to Nathan, who ranit all the way for a touchdown. Nathan tore off his helmet and spiked it into the ground. He jumped around,giving high-fives, and smashing knuckles with his teammates. Jack hooked his arm around Nathan's shoulders.

Father and son, their heads close as they talked and walked to the sidelines, both of them smiling as if they'djust won the million-dollar lotto.

After the game, Nathan was still so excited he forgot himself and gave Daisy a hug that picked her up off herfeet.

"Did you see that touchdown?" he asked and released her.

"Of course. It was a beauty."

Nathan pulled the shoulder pads over his head as Brandy Jo and a group of teenagers approached. They allseemed quite impressed that a fifteen-year-old had been invited to play football with the men.

"I got to play because Jack and Billy play on the red team," he said.

A boy wearing a Weezer T-shirt asked, "Who're Jack and Billy?"

"Billy's my uncle." Nathan paused and looked over the top of Daisy's head. "And Jack's my dad."

She felt Jack behind her a split second before he squeezed her shoulders. She looked up into his unfathomableeyes and his pleased smile, she then turned her attention back to Nathan. The two men in her life stared at eachother and seemed to reach an unspoken understanding. No weeping or crying or falling on each other's necks.

Just an acknowledgment like the slapping of hands and smashing of knuckles.

Instead of coming home and celebrating his touchdown with her and Jack, Nathan asked if he could go hang outwith his new friends. By the way her son looked at Brandy Jo, Daisy knew she'd just been usurped in her son'slife by a fifteen-year-old girl with long brown hair and a Texas twang. She felt an unexpected pang of jealousy.

Nathan was growing up much too quickly, and she missed the little boy who used to hold her hand and look upat her as if she were the most important thing in his world.

"Are you ready to go now?" Jack lowered his face to the top of her head. "I want to get you out of here beforeCal comes over and hits on you again."

He wasn't really fooling her. She could hear the pain in his voice. "What hurts?"

"My shoulder," he answered as they moved toward the parking lot, "like a son of a bitch."

"I don't understand why you guys don't wear pads." She held up a hand. "Don't say it. I know. Pads are forsissies."

Jack opened the passenger-side door for her. She moved to get inside but looked back across the field one lasttime at Nathan. "He's growing up too fast," she said as she watched him walk in the other direction with BrandyJo on his arm. "He was always so rowdy and independent. I couldn't take him anywhere cause he'd just run off.

So I got one of those leashes you put on little kids so you don't lose 'em. I always felt so much better knowinghe was on the other end of the leash. I'd give a hard tug, and he'd come rolling out from wherever he was hidingfrom me." She grasped the top of the car door that separated her body from Jack's. "I wish I could just give hima tug now and make sure he stays out of trouble."

Jack put his hands on the outside of hers. "He's a good boy, Daisy. He'll be fine."

She looked up into his eyes and he leaned forward and gently pressed his mouth to hers, easing into a kiss soslow and sweet, it just seemed to melt her heart. He smelled of sweat and grass and Jack. His thumbs brushedover the backs of her hands as the tip of his slick tongue touched hers. Jack took his time, and the kiss turnedmore deeply intimate. It touched places deep in her soul that recognized hint. This was more than a mating ofmouths. More than the hot rush of sex that demanded to be satisfied.

When he pulled back, he looked at her the way he used to all those years ago. His guard down. His wants andneeds and desires unmistakably clear in his green eyes.

"Come home with me," he said as his hands moved to cover hers in his warm palms.

She swallowed and the corners of her mouth turned up. She didn't have to ask what he had planned. "I thoughtyour shoulder hurt?"

"Not that bad."

"I could massage it for you."

He shook his head. "You need to save your energy to massage other things."