Diamond in the Rough

by Marie Ferrarella

“You missed your calling, you know,” Mike told his stepmother as his brother went into the dining room with the plates. “Instead of a child psychologist, you should have become part of the diplomatic corps. They could have used someone like you.”

  “Smoothing out the waves in this family is all the challenge I need or want,” Kate assured her husband’s firstborn with a warm smile. She couldn’t have loved him and his brothers any more if they’d been hers from the moment they’d drawn breath.

  Shutting down his computer, Mike snapped the laptop lid closed and rose from the counter. “I’ll go help Travis so he’ll stop griping.”

  She flashed another smile. “Knew I could count on you.”

  Miranda made her way across the neatly trimmed grass, doing her best to place most of her weight on her toes. Her heels insisted on sinking into the soft soil if she paused. The terrain was not high-heel friendly, but she hadn’t had the time to go home to change.

  She’d come here straight from work, surprising Tilda because ordinarily she stayed one or two hours after quitting time if she got involved in what she was doing—which was most of the time. She loved her work, loved the idea of being involved in something that could help people, possibly cure them or at least alleviate their pains.

  The only thing she loved more was her father.

  “Leaving on time twice in one week,” Tilda had said as she gathered together her own things. “People are going to start saying you actually have a life away from here.”

  Miranda made sure that her machine shut down. Lately, it had a tendency to go into sleep mode instead.

  “Today’s my dad’s first day as coach for that Little League team.” It was the end of January, but things began earlier these days. Seasons that once began in March now started in January, allowing more practice games. In this case that was a good thing. She wanted her father busy and involved in something other than the pain of the past.

  “And you want to make sure he shows up.”

  Miranda hated to admit it, but her friend was right. However, she had shrugged evasively. “Something like that.”

  She’d driven all the way here from the lab, praying she and the kids who turned up tonight wouldn’t be disappointed.

  When she’d parked in the lot of Greenwood Elementary School, Miranda scanned the area for her father’s big black van. He insisted on driving himself around rather than allowing his assistant, a former linebacker named Walter, to chauffeur him around. Driving afforded him a certain kind of independence he refused to surrender. The van had been customized to accommodate his special needs. More than that, it gave him back a portion of his dignity. She knew the way her father thought. A man who could drive himself around was in charge of his own destiny, at least to some extent. A man who was driven around was not.

  The fateful car accident had initially robbed him not just of his mobility, but of all feeling from the neck on down. Slowly, miraculously, several operations gave him back some of that feeling and mobility, returning it by inches. But even before the operations had begun, she had insisted that Steven Orin Shaw was more than the sum of his parts, repeating it over and over again like an ancient mantra. By the time he had finally been discharged from the rehab facility, she’d managed to burrow through the wall he’d built up around himself and awaken his pride, which in turn caused his iron resolve to kick in again.

  Without that, he would have been a goner before the first month was out. Instead, he began not only to function but also to thrive—in his own way.

  This was the best thing for him, she thought, coming up to the fenced-off area where a small group of nine-and ten-year-old boys and girls sat restlessly, their stored-up energy all but bursting. As was the custom, the children wore uniforms. At the beginning of a new season, each group of children got to adopt an actual major league team. Part of the process meant dressing like that team for the duration of the season.

  Her father’s coaching career began with the Cubs. He’d never been that crazy about the actual Cubs, having been initially passed over by their minor league counterparts at the very beginning of his career. But it was a start, she thought, mentally crossing her fingers as she approached him.

  “Hi, how’s it going?” she called out.

  Putting down his roster, Steve Shaw frowned in response. He turned the wheelchair around to face her directly. For two cents, he’d aim his chair at the parking lot and just keep going.

  “It’s not. I don’t know anything about coaching kids,” he grumbled, barely lowering his voice to keep it from carrying to the kids assembled behind him. He gazed up into his daughter’s eyes. He knew she meant well, but the road to hell was paved with good intentions and this would have qualified as one of them. “This was a bad idea, Randy.”

  At least he was using the nickname he’d given her instead of her formal name. She took heart in that. “It’s a good idea, Dad,” she countered, undaunted. “Remember, the whole idea behind this is for all of you to have fun, nothing more.”

  That was far too P.C. for him. He’d never been one of those people for whom winning was everything, however, it was a large part of who he was—or at least who he had once been. “And to win,” he added.

  “That’s part of the fun,” she told him, flashing a large, sunny smile she hoped was contagious. She patted her father’s shoulder, aware that at least fifteen sets of eyes observed every movement. She lowered her voice and leaned in. “You can do this, Dad. You’re a natural.”

  “And you’re a con artist, Randy.”

  Miranda spread her hands. “I’m whatever I have to be.” Her answer reminded her of the promise she’d made to Marlowe. She’d said almost the same thing to the sportswriter when he’d asked if she was SOS’s assistant. Her timing was probably off, but she needed to do it now, before her courage failed her. “Dad?”

  Steven raised his eyes to his daughter’s face. “Yeah?”

  “There’s this sportswriter—” Her father’s expression instantly became almost dour. Only dogged determination made her continue. When she was younger, that look would have had her lapsing into silence or even backing out of the room. But she wasn’t a little girl anymore. “He’d like to interview you.”

  “No.” The tone left no room for argument.

  “Dad, it might not be such a bad thing. He said you were his idol.”

  Shaw snorted dismissively. “They say anything to get to you. Flattery, lies, doesn’t matter. All that matters is getting an interview—and then turning it into whatever they want.”

  She thought of the man she’d talked to in the bar. God help her, she might be wrong, but she added, “I believe him, Dad.”

  Steven waved away the notion. “Then you do the interview.”

  “Dad—”

  Turning his wheelchair abruptly away, he gave her his back. “Case closed, Randy. Now, if you really want me to do this—” he waved his hand at the kids who were watching them “—I need to concentrate.”

  One battle at a time, she told herself. “I really want you to do this,” she assured him, surrendering—for the time being.

  “Then call them over for me and let’s get explaining the rules over with.”

  “You get to have some of the dads as assistant coaches,” she reminded him.

  The reminder brought no joy to him. Steven shook his head. In his experience, too many coaches fouled things up and created more problems. “This just keeps getting better and better,” he murmured.

  “Yes,” she told him, squeezing his hand, “it does.” Crossing back to the fenced-in area, she motioned to the children. “C’mon over here, kids. The coach wants to talk to you.”

  A handful of fathers and mothers had opted to hang around rather than just to drop off their offspring and return for them.

  A tall, lanky man in jeans and a fisherman’s sweater hurriedly crossed over to her.

  “Hi, I’m Jake Marshall, Billy’s father.” He pointed over to the group. “Is that really—” He lowered
his voice. “Steve Shaw? SOS,” he added, just in case she was uninformed.

  “Yes,” she told him, trying to gauge the man’s intentions. To her relief, he beamed like a small boy.

  “Wow. Never thought my kid would be coached by a living legend like SOS.”

  She smiled back. The man’s reaction made up her mind for her. She was going to call Marlowe the moment she got home. Her father needed to give this interview.

  Chapter Five

  That night, after the game was over, Miranda stopped for a while at her father’s house just to celebrate his surviving his first day as a Little League coach. It was hard to tell how he felt about the whole thing because he rarely displayed any sort of emotion, but he seemed ever so slightly pleased with the outcome of the session. It was something to build on.

  When she finally got home, she called Mike. She got his voice mail, so she left a message saying she wanted to talk about doing the interview.

  She assumed that would be enough to get the sportswriter to call the second he checked his messages. But when twenty-four hours had passed, she began to worry that perhaps he’d changed his mind about doing the interview. Granted, it had been his suggestion, but the more she thought about it, the more she warmed up to the idea.

  Not that her father was going to cooperate, at least not right away. Her idea was to have the sportswriter observe her father coaching the kids. She was fairly confident the man would have a good start. If he engaged her father in a conversation, there was no reason for her father to know that Mike was a reporter if he didn’t identify himself. By the time the first coaching session had come to a close, a great many of the players’ fathers had shown up, all drawn to the field in order to see the great Steve Orin Shaw up close and personal. If he played his cards right, Marlowe could just be part of the crowd.

  Her father was a man of few words, but he wasn’t rude if someone spoke to him. Once he did speak, Marlowe would see just what kind of a person her father was: a decent man who didn’t deserve what had happened to him no matter what the rules said.

  Miranda tried calling Mike again.

  And again.

  And again.

  “Damn,” she muttered under her breath, snapping the flip phone closed and terminating her latest attempt to get through. By now it was late Friday afternoon and she’d tried all the numbers Marlowe had scribbled on the napkin. She’d gotten voice mail on his cell phone, on his office extension and the landline number she assumed was his home. Frustration made her antsy.

  The uncustomary glimpse of temper had Tilda looking in her direction. Her best friend didn’t bother to hide her amusement. “You know, for an even-tempered person, you seem pretty agitated these last few days. Other than a full moon, what’s up?”

  “That sportswriter I met with the other day, Mike Marlowe, the one who wanted to interview my father…” she said by way of a reminder in case Tilda had forgotten. “Well, I decided that maybe doing the interview would be a good thing after all.” She looked accusingly at the cell phone in her hand before she returned it to her pocket. “And now I can’t reach him.”

  Tilda seemed mildly interested. “You sure you’re calling the right number?”

  “Oh, I’m sure.” The numbers on the napkin were surprisingly legible. “I keep getting his voice mail.”

  “Don’t you know what this weekend is?” When Miranda eyed her blankly, Tilda laughed. “It’s Super Bowl Sunday—the most holy of holy days for football fanatics…and sportswriters, I imagine. Your sportswriter isn’t snubbing you, he’s probably working.”

  “He’s not my sportswriter,” Miranda corrected. “He’s just a means to an end.”

  “Either way,” Tilda said, returning to her experiment, “you’re just going to have to curb your impatience until Monday.”

  Miranda sighed. Tilda was right. But now that she’d made up her mind, waiting until Monday wasn’t going to be easy.

  The ringing noise slowly registered as she got ready for work. It wasn’t exactly the crack of dawn but it wasn’t a normal hour for anyone to be calling her. Still sleepy, her first response was to automatically grab the telephone receiver next to her bed. She found herself mumbling, “Hello? Hello?” to a dial tone. The ringing persisted. It wasn’t coming from the phone.

  The door.

  Someone was at the door.

  Her thoughts instantly flew to her father. Someone was at the door because something had happened to her father. It had to be Walter, the man she’d insisted on hiring to stay with her father to help him with all the small tasks that everyone took for granted until they couldn’t do them.

  She could feel her chest constrict. Trying to brace herself for the worst, Miranda made her way to the door. She turned lights on all the way, to buoy her spirits a little.

  But when she looked through the peephole, she didn’t see the six-foot-five, 245-pound former linebacker on the other side. She saw the sportswriter she’d been trying to reach.

  He was here now?

  What the hell was wrong with him? Didn’t he know normal people left for work at this time?

  And how did he get her address?

  Maybe her eyes were playing tricks on her. “Who is it?”

  His answer eliminated any doubt about her eyesight. “It’s Mike Marlowe,” he said. “I just got in.”

  With a sigh, Miranda flipped back both locks on her front door and then pulled it open. She stood on the doorway, blocking his access. “From where? London?”

  “The east coast. Florida.” He tried not to stare, but her suit framed her body, accentuating the length of her bare legs. And highlighting the body in between. “I just got your message,” he told her, trying not to sound as eager as he felt.

  Miranda let out a long breath. She hadn’t gotten all that that much sleep, having put in a long evening with her father. He was doing poorly again, although he didn’t want to admit it. He hated owning up to feeling any sort of pain, but she knew the signs. He’d been through five operations since the accident in an attempt to continue correcting the damage he’d sustained in the collision that had very nearly ended his life.

  The orthopedic surgeon had warned her from the beginning that her father was going to be faced with at least eight to ten operations before it was all over. Perhaps more. The prospect was emotionally draining. So she was trying to stay optimistic and positive for both their sakes.

  She stepped back, allowing Mike to enter. “And you couldn’t wait until later this morning to call back?”

  “Oh. Sorry.” He flashed her a boyish grin as he came in. If she wasn’t so tired, she would have found it charming. “I’m still on east coast time,” he apologized.

  “How nice for you,” she mumbled. She rubbed the back of her neck. Now that she knew there was no emergency, she’d sunk back into exhaustion again. “Look, can you come back later? When I’m not in a rush to get to work?”

  “Yeah, sure.” He took a step back toward the door, then stopped. “But you are serious?” he couldn’t help asking. “You’re not just trying to jerk me around for some reason?”

  “About seeing you later?” she guessed. “Yes, I’m serious.”

  “No,” he contradicted impatiently, “about what you said in your message. That I can actually interview your father.”

  Okay, she was awake again. She was damn sure she hadn’t said anything about SOS being her father.

  Miranda shut the door and looked at him. “How did you find out Steve Shaw was my father?”

  “I did a little digging,” he told her simply. “I found out that SOS has a second daughter named Miranda.”

  A second daughter. That was the way she’d always felt. The second daughter. The spare that came after Ariel. Banking down her thoughts, Miranda pressed her lips together and shrugged. “That could be just a coincidence.”

  “Could be,” he allowed, his eyes meeting hers, “but it isn’t.”

  “And my address? How did you get that?” She was unlisted,
so he couldn’t have gotten it from the phone-book or any listing online.

  “I called in a few favors,” he admitted. As he spoke, he studied her face to see her reaction. “Even sportswriters have their ways.” He became serious. “Why didn’t you tell me you were Shaw’s daughter?”

  “Maybe because I didn’t want some overeager sportswriter camping out on my doorstep.” The minute the words were out, Miranda felt a twinge of regret. She wasn’t usually snippy like this. “Sorry, I’m not at my best in the morning.”

  “No, it’s all my fault,” Mike said. “I should have waited until later. I’m afraid that I didn’t realize what time it was. I heard your message a minute after I walked into my apartment. I guess I just got too excited about doing the interview to think clearly.”

  “Yes, about that—”

  He heard the hesitation in her voice. “You’ve changed your mind again?” he asked.

  Because if she had, he was going to do his damnedest to talk her back into letting him do the interview. This was the closest he’d come to landing it and he was not about to let the opportunity slip through his fingers without a fight.

  Miranda folded her arms in front of her chest. “No, I haven’t changed my mind. Well, actually, I have—but in your favor,” she was quick to add before he could bury her in rhetoric. “I decided that your doing a piece on my father—the man behind all that negative talk—would probably be a good thing.” Her eyes pinned him for a moment. “As long as you do an honest article. Because if you don’t,” she warned him, still smiling, “I’ll hunt you down and cut your heart out.”

  Looking at her, he would have never guessed her capable of this kind of passion. Just showed that it was true what they said about books and their covers. “You have my word,” he told her solemnly.

  She shook her head. “I don’t know you so your word doesn’t mean anything to me.”

  He never wavered beneath her scrutiny. “It does to me.”

  She was silent for a moment. Okay, maybe she believed him. “Point taken,” she finally said. “But what I was trying to get at is that my father won’t do an interview. Not with you, not with anyone—”