“Yes,” he said, surprised. He moved to his front window and looked out, frowning at the movement at the end of the driveway. Probably deer again, eating the wildflowers. He’d always wanted a big, dopey, happy mutt to chase them away, but he was gone too much for a dog. “I’ll be fine.”

“Of course you will. Just do what you have to and get back in the game. You don’t want anyone calling you a pansy-ass for taking a break midseason.”

Pace let out a low laugh. Okay, so he wasn’t calling to offer sympathy. “Yeah. Thanks for the call.”

“I’m your emergency contact, I assume. So I’ll hear if anything goes wrong.”

Actually, Wade and Red were his emergency contacts. “I’ll make sure you hear. Bye, Dad.”

But his father was already gone. “Pansy-ass,” Pace muttered, and frowned at another movement on the driveway, and a flash of blue. Okay, that wasn’t a deer. He headed outside, but when he got out there, he saw nothing.

Tia?

Since he had bigger worries, he shrugged it off and headed to the park. The grass hadn’t been mowed. Another fence had fallen down. And once again the bases were gone.

There was no playground equipment or lights here either, just a group of good-at-heart, ragtag kids making the most of what they had, and at the sight of them waiting for him, some of his tension drained. All of them were here today—Chipper, River, Danny, and . . .

Holly.

She stood next to where home plate should have been, holding the bat with Chipper directing her. She wore a pair of shorts and a T-shirt with a Heat hat—his—low over her eyes. He had no idea how the hell she could see anything, but there was River, preparing to pitch to her. Jesus, she was either brave or stupid, and he had a feeling, given the way something in his chest expanded just looking at her, it was the former. He dropped the new bag of gear he’d brought and ran. “Wait!”

No one listened to him. River pitched, and Pace stopped short as Holly swung. It was a god-awful swing, too, so low she might as well have been golfing. She missed, and Chipper also missed the catch, which had the ball bouncing and rolling, landing at Pace’s feet.

He scooped it up as everyone turned to look at him. “What are you doing here?” he asked Holly.

“We’re teaching her how to play.” Chipper grinned. “She’s great at hitting.”

Pace raised a brow as Holly flashed him a smile void of her usual wattage. He wondered what was going on inside her head. He knew what was going on in his head, which was a running motion picture of how she’d looked when he’d last seen her, gloriously naked and panting his name.