Sisters of Spirit, Pure Romance Set

by Nancy Radke

  An older man walked up behind him and did a double take. “You look like... Are you.. Josh Logan? Green Bay?”

  “Yes.”

  “Wow! Imagine meeting you. I’m James.”

  “Hello, James.”

  The man’s eyes went glassy. “Can I have your autograph?” He searched through his pockets for something for Logan to write on. “I can’t believe I’m actually meeting you. I figured you would have gone out with the team.”

  “A few of us stayed a couple of days to see the Seafair celebrations.”

  “There are others here?”

  James looked around, searching for players until Logan said, “No. Not here.”

  “Seattle really creamed you guys, Friday.” He sounded apologetic.

  “Practice game.” Which meant the starters didn’t stay in the game very long. He had been very happy when the coach had pulled him out and put in the backup quarterback.

  “Why did you leave Tampa? You were doing great there last year.”

  “They wanted someone younger.”

  “That rookie?” James asked.

  “He looked good to them.”

  “Dallas has a rookie this year, too. What do you think of him?”

  Logan hadn’t seen him play, so said, “Wait and see. That’s what you do with rookies.”

  James kept checking his pockets as the line moved forward, finally pulling out a grocery list. “Here,” he thrust it at Logan, who took the wrinkled piece of paper, flipped it over and found a blank spot.

  “I’ve got a fantasy team this year and have you in as quarterback.”

  Logan grinned at him. “Guess I’ll have to play well, then.”

  “I had you last year and you won for me.”

  “So I’m playing for two teams now?”

  “You’re playing for lots of teams, man. I bet over half the fantasy teams have you as their quarterback.” The man found a pencil and Logan dutifully signed his name.

  “There you are.” He handed the man back his pencil and the slip of paper. James folded it carefully and tucked it in his wallet.

  A small group was gathering around them. “Is that right? Are you Josh Logan with Green Bay?” one of them asked excitedly.

  “Yes.” The security check-in point was quickly coming up. He could get away then.

  “I have you as one of my two quarterbacks. So do several of my friends.”

  It sounded funny when they said it that way. As if they owned a team. But fantasy football was the thing to do now.

  “Why are you still here? We don’t want you in Seattle.” The voice was thick with animosity.

  Logan looked at the last man who had spoken, taken aback by the intensity of the young man’s stare as he shoved his way into the line ahead of the small group. “Well, you’re in luck,” he told him. “I’m leaving.” Jerk.

  The young man shoved James aside to bring himself face to face with Logan. “What do you want his autograph for?” he said to the group. “He’s no good. The Minnesota quarterback, Mason Powell, is better.” He thrust his way forward and James retreated, still trying to stay in line.

  Logan stepped aside and motioned James to move on past, putting himself in between the two. He really didn’t want to be next to the unpleasant young man, but also didn’t want the older man to be harmed because of him.

  “What’re you doin’?” the younger man demanded, then tried to push his way past.

  “Stay in line,” Logan said.

  “Well, he went...”

  “He’s my friend. We’re together.”

  “Oh! Well!” The young man scowled at him, his nose crooked as if he had been in a fight and had never gotten it straight again.

  Logan could smell alcohol on him and realized the man was half drunk.

  “Thank you,” James whispered, pulling his suitcase along.

  “Where’s your luggage?” the young man demanded of Logan.

  “Where’s yours?” Logan responded, for the man didn’t even have a backpack. His scraggly hair looked like it hadn’t seen a comb in days.

  “I’m not going anywhere,” the man said. “I don’t need a suitcase.”

  They were at the security checkpoints and Logan showed his information to the guard, nodded to his words of greeting and hurried on through.

  The younger man continued to lurch behind Logan, and started to argue with the security personnel when they stopped him.

  Happy to be free, Logan put his shoes back on and sprinted towards the gate. He was cutting it close.

  “Logan, Logan.” He glanced over at two men running beside him. They had been part of the group shoved aside by the man. “Autograph,” they yelled, waving some paper.

  He shook his head. “No time.”

  He could see the disbelief on their features as they slowed and let him run on. If he stopped every time someone asked for an autograph, he would never get anywhere, but they acted like he was a jerk to tell them, “No.”

  He ran up the concourse. His plane should be pulling out about now, but he continued to run, just in case.

  There, the gate, and there, Jake, talking to the airline ticket agent. Jake pointed him out to the agent as Logan ran up, handed her his ticket and followed Jake down the ramp.

  He was breathing hard but not out of breath. Jake handed him his jacket and small traveling case. Logan was doubly glad he’d made the plane, otherwise he would’ve been without even a toothbrush in Seattle.

  “What happened?” Jake asked as they entered the plane.

  Everyone else was already seated. They moved into the first class section as the door to the plane was closed. “Lots of things. Traffic mainly. I thought I had more time. Didn’t expect to travel the freeway at 5 miles an hour. Thanks for holding the plane.”

  “I almost didn’t, you know.”

  Logan smiled, remembering how he’d doctored up Jake’s things.” You found my present?” he asked as he opened the overhead bin.

  “Yes. Limburger cheese in my suitcase. My grandfather happens to like it, so I put it in a package and had it mailed to him. After I resealed it of course.”

  Logan smiled, wishing it had been harder for Jake to clean up. “What do you think of the new crop of players we have?”

  Jake put his case in beside Logan’s and shut the door. “I sure hope they cut Marcello. Do you notice how he always tries to take the easy route and tackle the smaller people?”

  “Yes. I bet the coaches noticed, too.”

  Logan pulled out his cell phone, checked to make sure it was charged up and put it in a pocket he could easily reach. Just in case she called.

  “So, who is she?” Jake asked as they took their seats.

  Logan grinned and punched Jake lightly in the arm. “What makes you think it was a woman?”

  “I can’t think of anything else that’d make you late. You’re Mr. Punctuality. An hour early is late for you. Tell me about her.”

  Logan didn’t particularly want to. Jake was as avid as Logan in pulling practical jokes and he didn’t want Jake doing anything, however harmless, to affect his meeting Alison again.

  But he didn’t have much choice. The two shared a rental house in Green Bay. Jake would find out sooner or later. And the longer Logan held him off, the more Jake might feel he had reason to cause mischief. It would be better to tell him now.

  “Her name is Alison. She’s an interpreter for the deaf.”

  “And?”

  “She lives in Seattle.”

  “Go on.”

  “I really didn’t learn much about her.”

  “Come on!” Jake snorted in disbelief. “You had all day.”

  “No, not really. I met her on the way here.”

  Stretching his long legs out in front of him, Jake settled in for the trip. “That’s not like you man, you’re slipping.”

  “You’re telling me,” Logan agreed. “I think it was my face. Take a good look. Would that inspire confidence in you if you were a young woman?
”

  As directed, Jake took a good look at the eye that had darkened overnight and grinned widely. “What’d she do? Scream and run?”

  “Almost.”

  “I assume you explained.”

  “Not well enough.”

  “Not even when you told her you were Josh Logan?”

  “I didn’t tell her that,” Logan stated flatly.

  “Why not? You’d have had her in your pocket—”

  “Because I really want to get to know her better. Without football in the way.”

  Logan could see Jake was considering the idea, silently debating the wisdom of such an action. “You could be making a mistake. It smooths a lot of paths, bro.”

  “Not yours.”

  Jake nodded. His broken marriage had threatened to derail his career before it had any momentum. “No. Mandy loved the perks the game brought us, but not the downside. The first time I was released from a team, she took my money and split. I’m just glad we didn’t have kids.”

  “Alison has a brother who was paralyzed playing college ball.” He went on to fill Jake in as much as possible. He wanted him to help, not throw roadblocks in the way.

  Things went as expected until they landed in Green Bay and Logan tried to get his suitcase.

  Jake had put it on a flight to Anchorage.

  3

  It was late when the two men arrived home. Logan checked his cell phone one more time, hoping Alison would prove him wrong and call.

  She hadn’t.

  He paced the floor, mentally running through everything he had to do in the next few months. There was no big break he could remember. Just in case, he opened his smart phone and scrolled through his calendar. Almost booked solid, except for Tuesdays and the bye week.

  He would write her a letter.

  He sat down at his oak roll-top desk, gathered plenty of paper, and started, putting the date at the top, then trying out different salutations. Confident and bold, he was also meticulous, and as each draft hit the wastebasket, he grew more and more frustrated. It was worse than writing term papers for Professor Sterling at the University of Tennessee. Anyway, he wasn’t much of a letter writer.

  Frustrated, he realized he couldn’t get past the first sentence. Everything he wrote sounded false and stilted.

  He’d have to go see Alison face to face. Once she got to know him, she might like him enough to go out with him.

  As soon as his schedule allowed, he would fly to Seattle and see her. The timing was going to be tight, but anyone could do anything if they wanted to badly enough.

  He would be able to get away on Tuesdays, once the season started...provided he survived the game each Sunday. They always got the second day off to recover. He could leave Monday after the meetings, fly to Seattle and spend the night there. Or fly to Seattle Tuesday morning. That would be best. He always slept better in his own bed and she probably wouldn’t be off work until afternoon.

  The trouble was, he wouldn’t be able to stay long, three or four hours at the most, for his Tuesday night meetings with the juvenile court judge were at ten p.m.

  The time of that meeting couldn’t be changed. It was the only time he and Judge Walters were able to get together to work on their project, helping young offenders. His fame as a sports star made him a powerful influence on some of them.

  Some were unreachable, but he and the judge had enough success stories that they’d roped Jake and several other players into the program.

  It couldn’t be neglected. It was just something he’d have to work around.

  After a session at the computer, Logan discovered he’d also have to work around the airline schedules—unless he flew his own plane. Well, that was one of the reasons he’d leased it. A small corporate jet, it would do the flight in five to six hours. It allowed him to go see his family at a moment’s notice. It would now help him see Alison when other flights weren’t suitable.

  Logan strolled across to the large picture window in his spacious living room and stared out at the quiet waters of Green Bay, not seeing the vista before him.

  In his vision was the tantalizing picture of a slender young woman who walked with the grace of a doe. She occupied all his waking thoughts. What was she really like?

  Green eyes— a smoky gray-green—were locked in his memory. She had looked on him with humor and interest, even liking, for a while. Then the shutters came down.

  But she hadn’t had that frozen look people acquired whenever they met a celebrity—like the older man at the airport—so she probably hadn’t guessed who he was.

  He’d never get to know Alison, really know her, if that happened, for it became impossible to talk comfortably. The image of a super-star surrounded him with a glittering shield that often destroyed honesty and created an insurmountable barrier to the free flow of conversation.

  Logan believed in going after what he wanted. He wouldn’t have made it to the pros if he’d been a man who gave up easily. Anything worth having was worth the effort to get it.

  Somehow he was going to have to see her, persuade her to like him, without telling her who he was. He realized that it could take weeks to accomplish. He also realized it might be impossible. Even if he wrote the letter, he couldn’t send it. He didn’t know her address.

  Tuesday morning Alison drove directly to the high school where she was interpreting the last few days of the summer classes. The student she worked with was trying to learn calculus, and Alison spent a large part of her time fingerspelling words that weren’t included in the normal sign-language vocabulary.

  For some reason this was the day that the self-appointed school romeo decided to make another play for her. He was a conceited man, his handsomeness offset by the arrogant expression on his face. Seeing her enter the copy room alone when the few scattered classes were over, he followed her in, offering to help her use the machine.

  Seething inside, she grabbed her papers, sidestepped his groping hands and left the room.

  He hurried to follow her, so she paused until he reached the half-opened door, then slammed it shut on him.

  She marched straight to the office and lodged a complaint. “Tell him to stay away from me. There are only a few more days, he should be able to do that.”

  That evening, on the 5 o’clock news, it was reported that the police had found the body of a missing girl, who had last been seen jogging near Lyons Lake.

  Alison had been planning to run, but decided to go buy a can of Mace before she went out. She wouldn’t give up her daily run, but she would take added precautions.

  The dead girl had been running at dusk, so Alison decided she would always quit before it got that late, even if it meant cutting her distance. Once it got into the fall and winter shorter daylight hours, she might give up running altogether. Or get a tazer.

  Her summer job was almost finished. She had agreed to do a few days at a hospital, helping a deaf patient through a surgical recovery period. That job would not last long, so she had applied to the schools again. Although it didn’t always pay as well as private interpreting, she liked being able to have a fixed schedule. She got into a high school this time, helping a young girl who was partially blind as well as deaf. She’d start that after Labor Day.

  After buying the Mace, Alison returned home and went out jogging. Nothing happened, but it was a small can, fitting easily into her hand, and she set it beside her running gear to make sure she always carried it with her. The thought of the dead girl made her doubly careful.

  Thoughts of Logan made her doubly agitated. Ryan’s remarks had prompted her to save the paper bag, and it sat on the counter, a constant reminder to call the man.

  She dithered about it until Thursday, when she picked up the paper bag and drove over to see Chantal. Her best friend was pretty level-headed, and Alison didn’t mind getting advice from her.

  “Do you think I should call?” she asked as she dropped spaghetti into some boiling water.

  Chantal thumped down a hea
d of lettuce, breaking out the center. “Not unless you really want to, but from your account, I’d say you are being too sensitive. All men aren’t the same.”

  “The ones I’ve run into are.”

  “You do seem to have your share of bad luck.”

  “I felt like I couldn’t believe anything he said. Even the name of his city didn’t ring true. I mean...would you hesitate before you say the name of your hometown?”

  “Maybe. Maybe not. He could have just moved there recently, which would explain his southern accent.”

  Alison nodded. Chantal was a tall woman with a quirky sense of humor that she usually aimed at herself. She also thought logically...and in this case was emotionally distant from the problem. “You’re right.”

  Chantal pushed her curly black hair away from her face and regarded Alison with eyes of deep brown. “I’ll tell you what. Go ahead and call him; just don’t give him your phone number. That way you stay in control.”

  “Well...”

  “Use my phone. He won’t be able to get your number then.”

  “If it were you, would you call?”

  “I wouldn’t have met him in the first place. Men see me and run.”

  “No, they don’t.”

  “They don’t stay around long enough to leave their phone numbers. You’re different. They try, then you send them away. Call him.”

  Alison crinkled the bag, biting her lower lip. Maybe she shouldn’t have asked Chantal for advice after all. She still wasn’t sure if we wanted to call him. “What would I say?”

  “Hello.” Chantal abandoned her salad making, wiped her hands and picked up her phone. “You say, ‘Hello.’ Go ahead. You’ll regret it if you don’t, always wondering what might have been.”

  “All right. I’ll do it.” Encouraged, Alison dialed the number. It rang, rang again.

  She hung up, relieved. He hadn’t answered. Good.

  “What did you do that for?” Chantal asked.

  Sheer panic. “I don’t know what to say without sounding like I’m chasing him.”

  “Then I guess you’d better just forget it, because it’s the only way you’re going to get to know this guy.”