his assumption, but that would be lying. And it would seem as if she was ashamed of being Shaw’s daughter and she wasn’t. She believed in her father, she always had. She was proud to be his daughter, proud of what the man had accomplished. His being banned from baseball didn’t change that. Just made her that much more protective of him.
More than anything in the world, she wanted to get her father inducted into the hall of fame. He’d earned the honor. He deserved it.
This sportswriter still waited for an answer. “I make it my business to,” she told him.
She saw interest flare in Mike Marlowe’s deep blue eyes.
Miranda didn’t often act on impulse. Something told her that she’d made a mistake coming here.
Chapter Three
“Do you know SOS personally?”
As he asked the question, Mike could feel his pulse accelerating. He tried to talk himself down. It was too much to hope for, stumbling across a private in with Shaw.
He caught himself hoping anyway. In all ways but one—maintaining lasting relationships—Mike thought of himself as an optimistic guy. And this whimsical meeting might just be the opportunity of his young career.
He glanced at the woman on the bar stool next to his and waited for an answer. He was more than a little convinced that she would affirm his hunch.
Miranda blew out a breath. No doubt about it, this was a mistake. She should have never agreed to this meeting, never mind that she had been the one to suggest it in the heat of the moment. It was a mistake, pure and simple.
Served her right for letting her emotions get the better of her. In that respect, she’d taken after her mother, not her father. Being stoic, like SOS, was simply not in her nature.
Although, God knew she tried. But any good intentions had died the second she’d read Marlowe’s column. Someone had to speak up for her father. And look where that had gotten her. Tap dancing madly around words in a sports bar, edging away from an overly eager, overly handsome sportswriter.
Time to retreat.
Miranda slid off the bar stool and slipped her purse strap onto her shoulder. “I have to go,” she told him with finality.
Mike read between the lines. Her evasive action told him what he wanted to know. God, but he was glad he’d answered her e-mail. “You do know him personally, don’t you?”
She hated lying, but she also understood the kind of floodgates that could be opened if she admitted knowing SOS, much less that the former pitcher was her father. She’d been through this more than once.
Still, the word No refused to form on her lips this time.
“And if I do?” Miranda hedged.
The excitement built within him. “Then I’d fall to my knees right here and start to beg.”
That wasn’t what she was expecting him to say. Amused, she asked, “That might be interesting, but why would you go to such lengths?”
He felt not unlike Aladdin holding the magic lamp in his hands, about to come in contact with the genie for the first time. “For you to use your influence with SOS so that I could land an interview with him.”
She knew without having to ask that no way in hell would her father go along with an interview. It had taken her a long time to get the man to communicate with her beyond a few precise words at a time. He wasn’t the kind of man to talk to strangers, much less bare his soul to a journalist. Her father was, at bottom, a very private, very shy man. He always had been. She couldn’t remember his ever having given an interview. Certainly not since Ariel’s death.
And with each devastating incident that occurred in his life—Ariel’s death, his divorce, her mother’s passing, the scandal and finally, the car accident—her father had just grown more reticent and distant. Even in the best of times, he wasn’t someone who liked listening to the sound of his own voice. He preferred doing to talking.
Looking at Mike, she shook her head. “I’m afraid you’re out of luck there—”
“On my own, yes,” he agreed, talking quickly, “but I’ve never met anyone who actually had access to the man before.”
Miranda had learned how to bob and weave with the best of them. “I didn’t say I did,” she reminded him.
“You didn’t say you didn’t.”
Fair enough, she thought. He had her there. But she could remedy that. It meant a small white lie about knowing her father. “Okay, I don’t know him.”
Mike smiled broadly. “Too late, Miranda. I don’t believe you.”
Her stomach tightened when he said her name, and she didn’t like it. She really needed to get going.
Miranda shook her head. “That has no bearing on the situation.”
As she began to leave, Mike stunned her by doing exactly as he’d proposed. He fell to his knees right in front of her, impeding her exit. He caught hold of her wrist—preventing her from just walking around him to the front door.
“Please.” The entreaty seemed to vibrate from every pore of his body.
She was acutely aware that people were watching them. Her father’s daughter when it came to drawing undue attention, she felt uncomfortable as the center attraction.
“Get up,” she blurted, trying unsuccessfully to disengage herself. “People are going to think you’re proposing.”
He’d rattled her, Mike thought. Good. Maybe he’d get her to see things his way after all. “If that’s what it takes to get an interview with SOS…” Mike’s voice trailed off.
Her eyes widened. Just her luck to champion her father’s cause with a man who was mentally deranged. “You’re crazy. You realize that, don’t you?”
Mike rose to his feet, still holding on to her wrist. “Look, I’ve tried to get an interview with SOS half a dozen times—if not more—and he won’t return any of my calls.”
She could well believe that. Not wanting confrontations or to get into a discussion as to why he wouldn’t do an interview, her father would simply just ignore the call altogether.
“He likes to keep to himself,” she told him.
“But he’s obviously opened up to you.” And where Shaw could do it once, Mike was positive the pitcher could do it again.
“I wouldn’t call it that.” And technically, she was telling the truth. Getting information out of her father— any kind of information—took a great deal of time, as well as patience.
Again, Mike saw it for what it was. He prided himself on being able to read people, a combination of body language and attitude. “Look, I get it. You’re trying to protect the man. That’s really commendable of you. But you also feel that Shaw’s gotten a raw deal—”
“He has,” she interjected.
