Play Date (Play Makers Book 3) (24 page)

“He adores you almost as much as I do. I don’t think I could make it through this if I didn’t have these lunches to look forward to.”

“I look forward to them too,” Rachel admitted. “You’re an amazing person, you know. I know Sean appreciates you, but there’s so much drama. For me, it’s simple. You’re awesome. Don’t ever forget that.”

“‘Awesome’?” Kerrie grinned. “You’re spending too much time with laid-back surfer dudes, dude.”

Rachel smiled, imagining what her friend would say if she knew it was a laid-back
NFL
dude. She might actually approve, she realized suddenly. Everyone else—her dad, Beth, Sean—would be horrified, but not Kerrie. She was emotional but never really judgmental.

And flawed relationships?

She was the poster blonde for them.

So they talked about Sean for two hours and, when it was time to go shopping, Rachel convinced her to stay and have coffee and cheesecake instead so they could talk some more. The conversation drifted to Kerrie and Coz, the early years, and the revelations were almost romantic.

Kerrie hadn’t actually stolen her twin’s fiancé, at least not knowingly. She had flown into San Francisco the week before the wedding to meet Coz and his family for the first time. Feelings were already raw, since Melody had chosen other friends for her maid of honor and bridesmaids, excluding Kerrie from the wedding party and prompting tongue-wagging about the identical twins. Weren’t they supposed to be super close? From womb to tomb? Finish each other’s sentences? Have ESP?

It felt like a slap to Kerrie, and so, before she notified her family she had checked into the hotel, she went down to the bar, where a lean, handsome flirt offered to buy her a drink, then lavished her with compliments.

His name was Doug, and since Kerrie had only heard Melody’s boyfriend referred to as Coz, she hadn’t suspected a thing, even though the printed invitations had in fact said “Douglas Cosner.” Of course, Coz had known who
she
was, and instead of coming clean, had used his knowledge as a pickup line. “You’re a lot like my ex-fiancée—a real babe—but she’s my ex because she’s not a very nice person. Now here you are, just as beautiful, and ten times sweeter.”

She had fallen hard, and apparently so had Coz. After a wild night of dancing and making love, they decided to elope. Kerrie admitted she had been excited about beating her twin to the altar. Now the tongues could
really
wag.

By the time they had the ceremony, she was too euphoric—not to mention too drunk—to notice his last name on the marriage license was Cosner. At some point he confessed that Melody was his ex, praising Kerrie for being everything she wasn’t.

And to her drunken shame, she had decided karma was a bitch.

“I was glad I didn’t know earlier. Didn’t give Mom and Mel a chance to shame me into giving him up. We were so much in love,” she told Rachel, her eyes glowing with remembered passion. “Not just that night, but for years after that. It was magic for so long. His career took off, he showered me with love and attention and worldly goods, and I never second-guessed myself. He didn’t love
her.
He loved me. And I loved him.”

“It’s romantic,” Rachel admitted. “When you implied you stole your sister’s fiancé, well . . . that’s not really true at all.”

“It’s what everyone thinks. Even Coz. He rewrites history so
he’s
the injured party.”

Rachel took the opportunity to sing Sean’s song. “You need to divorce him. Find a lawyer tomorrow morning and just do it. Get a fair property division, because you earned that. Then hide away someplace. Sean will visit you and so will I. And in a few months . . .”

“How
many
months? How long will Sean make me wait? That’s the question. He wants to date, but I’m too old for that. He’s only twenty-seven, you know. But I’m thirty. Ready to be married.”

“Lots of people date in their thirties and forties,” Rachel corrected her. “I’ll be doing it myself. It’s better than a loveless marriage, isn’t it?”

“What if we miss all the sneaking around? What if
that’s
what he likes about it?”

Rachel winced. Was that even a possibility? Trysts in motel rooms? There was a certain thrill to that sort of thing, wasn’t there?

Her friend was waiting for a response, so she gave her the only one she could think of. “We both know the answer, Kerrie. Divorce Coz for the right reasons—you don’t love him, he doesn’t love you, he makes you miserable. Then spend some time being single. Don’t communicate with Sean, but lean on me as much as you want. When the divorce is final, start socializing again. In NFL circles. Run into him. Go out for coffee. It will happen or it won’t. But no one will ever say he broke up his coach’s marriage. Because if you do it right, that won’t be true.”

Kerrie’s amber eyes swam with tears. “I know you’re right. But I’m not strong like you.”

“I’m not strong,” Rachel told her quietly. “But I know one thing. You’re afraid to be single, but it’s not the worst thing in the world. And sometimes it’s amazing.” She gave her a playful smile. “We’ll put on our sluttiest outfits and let Rafa drive us to every club in town. Doesn’t that sound like fun?”

“Who
are
you?” Kerrie demanded. Then her smile softened. “I know what you’re saying. There are other guys out there. But there’s only one for me. Someday you’ll meet your own Sean and you’ll understand.”

Rachel smiled at the idea. She definitely wanted to find her own Sean Decker someday.

But not too soon. Because having her own Bam Bannerman was working pretty well for the moment.

• • •

Thanks to her new philosophy, she really did treat every day as a gift, starting with her students. They had grown so close, not just with her but with each other, so she decided to use that to teach them about the importance of communities. It took all of Sunday night to draw a map on poster board of the twenty-block area around the school that would encompass all of their homes, including Rachel’s. She wouldn’t identify them by name, partly to protect private information, but also because she wanted it to be even
more
personal than that. So she topped some pushpins with lumps of clay, and then on Tuesday had the children decorate them with marker pens, creating their own unique designs.

She expected Kyle to adopt a cat as his emblem, but he made her laugh by drawing a spaceship and explaining he wanted to go to Mars. So much for trying to pigeonhole him. Tommy chose to duplicate the tiger that had earned him his Tiger Boy nickname, and a surprising number of children followed suit. Alicia’s pin sported a flip-flop. Jenny’s had a huge number five. And so on.

Of the twenty-one pushpins, ten were Bannerman-inspired. Rachel almost drew a shiny sheriff’s badge on hers, but it seemed risqué, so she asked the class for ideas and went with the majority vote.

A book.

Not too exciting, but if that was how they would remember her, she took it as a compliment.

When all the pins were in place, she barely had to speak to make her point. The children supplied the narrative, surprised that they all lived so close to each other, and that their class virtually dominated the neighborhood. They loved finding out that Rachel lived there too. Loved locating familiar landmarks like the park where they played football with the “baby ball.” Kyle showed her where his Uncle Alex lived. Mary—alias Purse Girl—was sure she could identify the ice cream shop her family walked to every Sunday night.

And not surprisingly, they asked where Mr. “Brannerman” lived. Rachel playfully topped a pushpin with a football-shaped lump of brown clay and stuck it in the upper corner of the wall, ten feet from the poster board. Then she fell in love with the awed looks on their faces and dragged out an atlas to show that yes, it was a long distance, but he lived alongside the same ocean. In the same country. Along the same freeway.

By the end of the week there were three maps on the corkboard. Their community. Their country, with pushpins for important places like Disneyland and important persons like the president and Bannerman. And their world, where Rachel indulged herself with a blue pin to mark where her father lived.

• • •

When Bannerman showed up on Friday, he barely had time to tease her by whispering, “I didn’t slip up, teach,” before the children dragged him to the maps to identify their individual pushpins. He liked having his own and seemed especially pleased that so many of them had chosen their nicknames as inspiration for their designs.

She invited him to stay through story time, but he claimed he had an errand to run. Suspecting it was the setup for a joke, she told him to take his time, since she would be later than usual because a parent had requested a conference.

“No rush,” he told her. “I’m just gonna take that tree out.”

“Pardon?”

“It bugs me. So it’s coming out.”

She pictured him wielding a chain saw or axe, his naked muscles glistening with perspiration, and decided she couldn’t miss it. “Wait for me, please? I want to watch.”

His blue eyes twinkled. “Have some self-respect, would ya?”

She turned to the class. “Can you say good-bye to Mr. Bannerman?”

They did an adorable job of it, and he started to leave, then gave her a curious look. “What kind of parent? Mom or dad?”

“It’s one of the fathers.”

“Nice parenting,” he drawled. “Using his kid to hit on you?”

“It’s nothing like that. And anyway, he’s married.”

“Even sleazier,” the halfback noted with disgust. “I’ll stick around just in case.”

She laughed fondly. “That kind of thing never happens, Vince. So just go. But don’t start without me.”

He chuckled. “I thought we weren’t supposed to talk dirty around here.”

“Go!” She maintained a stern look until he turned away and ambled down the hall. Then she melted as she watched the show, knowing he’d be using those sinfully decadent muscles on the tree—and then on
her—
soon enough.

• • •

As it turned out, the dad at the conference actually
did
hit on her, which was unprecedented for her as a teacher. And in his defense, Tommy’s father—an investment broker who usually behaved himself—was apparently floundering in an unexpected role as single parent. Apparently his wife had left with some new guy, leaving the dad with a bewildering set of new responsibilities. And since Tommy already loved Rachel, it seemed logical to at least try dating her.

Especially since the father insisted he had always felt “a vibe” between himself and the teacher, even before his wife’s departure.

Rachel assured him it was his imagination. Then she gave him an armload of great books on single parenting and showed him the door. To his credit, he didn’t push further. He would step up. Take care of his son. And he was basically a nice guy, so hopefully he’d find the right woman soon.

But his child’s kindergarten teacher? Was he
that
clueless? Were men in general so clueless?

On a normal day, it would have upset her, or at least made her page through other self-help books for tips on how to avoid those situations in the future. But the prospect of Bam Bannerman, shirtless in her back yard, kept things in focus.

She expected him to want sex before felling the tree, especially since he hadn’t “slipped up” during the week, but when she arrived home, there was a pickup truck parked in her driveway, facing the front, and he was dressed in jeans, work boots, gloves and a lightweight, long-sleeved shirt, shirttails out, half open down his chest.

Apparently he meant business. Then there was the pile of equipment near the tree. An axe and chainsaw, some shovels, and a wheelbarrow. She recognized most of it from her garage, since the widow who sold her the house had left all her husband’s old tools and yard utensils for her. But the wheelbarrow was bigger and sturdier than hers, so apparently that had been the errand he had to run.

He looked good. Huge as usual, but still, outmatched by the large-trunked tree and its wide spread of dead branches. It actually reminded her of the contrast between Bannerman himself versus Kyle or Tommy during one of their playful scrimmages. David versus Goliath.

“You don’t have to do this, you know,” she murmured.

“It’s already done.”

She laughed at the stubborn pronouncement. “Okay, so? How can I help?”

“You can’t. Just put on something sexy and sit on the stoop.”

“Flash some skin, right?”

“Huh?”

“So you don’t charge me for the work.”

He glared.
“That’s
what set you off? It was a compliment, Rachel. Man,” he added under his breath, “there’s no pleasing you sometimes.”

“Should I show some skin or not?”

“Yeah, the more the better.” He grabbed her with his gloved hands. “But I’m still gonna charge you.”

She slipped her hands behind his neck. “Good.”

He kissed her, his mouth hot, his tongue restless, and she molded against him greedily.

“I’ve been imagining this moment all week,” she told him, trying for a light tone but sounding throaty instead. “Forget about the tree, sheriff. Come to bed with me.”

“You’re hung up on that sheriff stuff,” he said with a grin. “But this tree’s coming out.”

“Do it tomorrow.” She stroked his face. “I missed you.”

“Yeah, I missed you too.” He kissed her again, then pulled free, a determined look on his face. “We’ve only got four hours of light. So let me get this done, okay?”

“Okay.” She glanced at the pile of tools, then back at him—the gloves, the stubborn jaw, the broad chest. Reminding him breathlessly to “Wait for me,” she sprinted into the house.

This time, she noticed the roses—pink and absolutely gorgeous—and a thrill went through her. Apparently they were part of her future, at least as long as his lab results held up. She was tempted to change into a bikini and lure him into the house, but watching him fell the tree would be so hot, it might be worth the delay.

So she dressed quickly in shorts and a loose T-shirt—no bra—and within minutes was sitting on her beach blanket in the middle of the lawn with a pitcher of lemonade and two plastic cups. He ignored her completely, still sizing up his opponent. Then he picked up a shovel and started digging near the base.