Suddenly a Bride / A Bride After All: Suddenly a Bride. Кейси Майклс

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СКАЧАТЬ both up, then to get them to throw on shorts and tops and tie their sneakers—after they’d found their sneakers. Danny’s left one had been in the freezer and, no, she didn’t ask who had done that, because she already knew. They couldn’t decide what they wanted to eat, they needed to brush their teeth—as if either of them ever did that without first being threatened.

      Elizabeth got out of the car and opened the rear side door, motioning to the boys to hurry up. “Today, people. Anyone would think you two don’t want to play baseball.”

      “We don’t,” Danny said, grinning at her, his smile minus his top two front teeth. “But Richard said we should humor you.”

      “Oh, he did, did he? Do either of you know what that means? That you should humor me?”

      Mikey at last undid his seat belt and slid down off the safety booster seat, Elizabeth holding on to his arm as he jumped to the ground. “Not me. I only know that Richard said it’s easier to humor women than it is to fight them. Unless you wanted us to eat spinach or something.”

      Elizabeth’s annoyance melted like spring snow under the warm, gap-toothed smiles of her sons. Boys could get away with murder, just with their smiles. Including boys who were well into their forties. It was simply impossible to stay angry with any of them.

      She made shooing motions with her hands, aiming both boys toward the grassy incline that led down to the small ball field … ball court … whatever.

      As she followed them, Elizabeth quickly realized she had already made at least two mistakes, and the boys weren’t even officially signed up yet. One, they were the only children wearing shorts, and two, they were the only children not carrying gloves. No, mitts. She remembered that word from Jamie. They were called baseball mitts.

      Danny and Mikey stopped a good distance from the other children and turned to look at her, their identical big blue eyes that were so much like their father’s gazing at her in mute appeal.

      “Okay, okay, I’m coming,” she said, stepping between them and taking their hands. “Let’s look for Mr. Hollingswood, all right? Chessie told him we’d be here.”

      She walked closer, careful to stay to the left of the long white chalk line that seemed to mark the beginning of the playing area, heading toward a low wooden bench and three men who were watching as the children threw balls at each other. Elizabeth would have thought that they were playing catch, except it didn’t seem that anyone was actually catching anything. There was just a lot of throwing and then chasing after the ball going on, except for the trio of boys who were huddled together, examining a worm one of them was holding.

      Chessie had said her cousin was a hunk; that was how she’d described him. Elizabeth thought that wouldn’t be much of a help until she got closer to the three men. Then it got very easy to pick him out.

      He was taller than the other two men wearing matching bright blue T-shirts with the word Eagles stitched on the back at shoulder level. He had none of the softness around the gut the others had. He was wearing classy tan Bermuda shorts as opposed to their baggy jeans, and he had his baseball cap on backward, the coal-black hair beneath it looking mussed in the way only great hair can.

      Besides, as he raised the reflective, wraparound sunglasses he was wearing, giving her a glimpse of a pair of emerald-green eyes, and started walking toward her, he said, “Elizabeth Carstairs? Hi, I’m Will Hollingswood, Chessie’s cousin. These your boys?”

      That pretty much cinched it.

      “Yes, I’m Elizabeth. And,” she said, raising one hand first, and then the other, “this is Danny, and this is Mikey. Boys, say hello to Mr. Hollingswood.”

      “Coach,” Will corrected quickly. “It’s shorter. Hi, boys. You like baseball?”

      “No,” Mikey said, and Elizabeth gave his hand a warning squeeze, so that her son quickly added, “Thank you?”

      “Close, Mikey, but not quite the answer I was hoping for,” Elizabeth said quietly. “Tell Coach you want to learn how to play baseball.”

      “But I don’t,” Mikey, always honest, told her not quite as quietly.

      “But we need the fresh air,” Danny piped up, always helpful. “And Mom needs the break. That’s what Richard says.”

      Elizabeth looked at Will, who had now pushed his sunglasses up on his head as he gazed at her, his smile wide and white and pretty much something out of a toothpaste ad, if GQ even allowed toothpaste ads.

      “They really don’t know much about sports. I’m sorry.”

      “Well, this should be fun,” he said, and Elizabeth felt hot color running into her cheeks. “Do they have mitts?”

      “Uh—no, they don’t. But we’ll get them in time for the next practice. Is there anything else they need?”

      Danny was giving Will his full attention—sucking up, Elizabeth knew was the term for it—but Mikey had pulled an action figure from his shorts pocket and was busily turning it into a truck or something. Neither boy was paying the least bit of attention to what was going on beyond that white chalk line.

      “We’ve got a list here somewhere,” Will told her, heading over to a large three-ring binder on the bench. “Did Chessie tell you to bring their birth certificates along and proof of health insurance?”

      Elizabeth pulled the relevant papers from her purse. “Yes, I’ve got all of that right here. Oh, and a check for seventy dollars. Is that right?”

      Will took everything from her, looking up at her as he scanned the check but then quickly sliding it into a pocket of the binder without comment. Richard had written the check, and his name was printed on it. She’d argued with him that it wasn’t necessary, but he’d insisted. Not that she was going to tell Chessie’s cousin that … or that she suspected Richard would have just as happily written a check for two months of sleepaway camp for both boys. He liked the twins. He just didn’t have the knack for interacting with them, that’s all. He’d rather buy them something; it was how Richard showed affection.

      She watched as Will assembled a few papers and handed them back to her along with the birth certificates and her insurance card. “We’re a new team, what they call an in-house team, so we only play five other teams. Practices go on just about every morning at nine until our first game, which is also at nine. All the games are played on this field. The schedule and the rules are all on those papers. Six outs a side, no sliding, no stealing, no taking leads and no keeping score so we don’t bruise their little egos.”

      He leaned down to be on eye-level with the twins. “And I don’t like this any more than you two do, so let’s just try to get through it together with the least amount of trauma, all right?”

      He put out both hands, palms up, and the boys surprised her by grinning as they completed the low fives.

      “Okay, Danny? Danny, right? Which one of you two peas in a pod is Danny?”

      Danny raised his hand. “Me. I’m the good twin. I got all Excellents in Deported.”

      “Deportment,” Elizabeth correctly quietly, rubbing Danny’s blond curls. She really should get the boys haircuts, but she loved their curls. Besides, they had so many years to be grown-up. “And try not СКАЧАТЬ