Second Thoughts: A Hot Baseball Romance by Mindy Klasky

Nick had left her, sure. But she had a diploma from the University of Raleigh. She had a loving family. She had skills—she could write well, and she was better with a camera than anyone she’d ever personally met. She’d be okay. Lonely, yeah. And sad. But she’d be fine. She’d survive.
    And then she’d realized she was pregnant.
    It was her own damn fault. She was the one who’d come down with bronchitis. She was the one who’d forgotten all those warnings on her monthly packets of birth control pills, the ones that said that antibiotics made them substantially less effective. She was the one who’d celebrated her first day of real recovery by seducing Nick, by welcoming him back into her bed.
    The funny thing was, all the books said she should slip right back into those five stages once she discovered the pregnancy. She should plummet straight back into the emotional chaos. But she’d never been tempted to go back there again, not even for a heartbeat. It was like she’d lived through a forest fire, and her fingers were immune to the flicker of a single match.
    In the end, she had Olivia and none of the rest of it mattered.
    “Jamie?” Nick said, and she heard the dark challenge in his voice, the fire beneath his words that matched the gleaming copper of his hair.
    She shook her head. “No. You don’t have the right. You don’t have any rights at all. You’re the one who walked away.”
    He closed his eyes like she’d slapped him, and he kept them closed as he said, “This is different.”
    “How?” There. She did still have some anger to draw on. It scorched that single word like wildfire. She let a little more of her rage bleed into her voice as she said, “Is it different because there’s an innocent child you can walk away from now? I don’t trust you, Nick. I’ll never let you hurt Olivia the way you hurt me.”
    She watched him swallow, heard the sound above the thunder of her own heartbeat. It was so hard to stand here with him. How many times had she seen light glinting off the stubble of his day-end beard? How many times had she seen his mouth twitch as he searched for a specific word? How many times had she watched those ridiculously long eyelashes, waited for them to rise, to reveal the green eyes beneath?
    The green eyes that matched her daughter’s.
    The green eyes that looked at her now with the same grim determination she’d last seen seven years before, in an overheated dorm room, when he’d cut the bonds between them forever.
    “I could have done something,” he said, and his voice was soft enough that she actually took a step closer to him. “I could have helped you.”
    “I didn’t want your help,” she said.
    “I could have sent money.”
    “I didn’t need your money.”
    “Dammit, Twelve, I should have been there for you!”
    She didn’t bother answering. There wasn’t anything to say. The old nickname gave the lie to the rest of his statement—he should have been there, but he’d given up that right. He’d forfeited it the day he’d chosen to walk out. Nevertheless, she wasn’t surprised to hear his next question, the one she’d been dreading from the moment she’d seen him in the dugout.
    “Can I see her? Will you let me talk to her?”
    “Nick…” She surprised herself by not knowing the answer to his questions. For years, she’d told herself she had to protect him, had to keep him from feeling responsible for Olivia. She had to protect Olivia too, had to keep her safe from a man who could walk away without a backward glance. But he was asking for involvement now. His eyes were open, and she had no excuse.
    “You can be there,” he said. “I just want to meet her.”
    “Let me think about it.” She saw the defiance settle in, tracing the lines of his lips, of his rugged jaw. He’d fight her on this. With phone messages and texts, with hand-written letters in her mailbox. With lawyers and judges and juries, if she didn’t give in.
    She