“I’m so dead,” she moaned.
I pulled her to my chest and kissed her forehead.
“Eva said you’ve been working too hard and needed a good night’s sleep. She and Annabella debated whether to wake you, but she decided to let you get your rest.”
“She must think I’m a terrible role model. I mean, I barely know you, and here I am in your bed. God, I’m stupid,” she moaned.
“I thought it was ‘¡Ay, Dios mio!’ last night.”
“You’re pretty pleased with yourself. You plied me with alcohol and then lured me into your bed with a massage. Finally, you did something sneaky with my feet and got me aroused.”
“¡Ay, Dios mio!” I said sotto voce to mimic her.
She hit me with her pillow.
“You’re a sexy, intelligent, gorgeous woman. I’ve seen you perform, and you have every guy eating out of your hand. You can’t tell me you haven’t heard every possible come-on line. If you didn’t want to be here this morning, you could have shut me down at any point,” I said, and then she nodded. “But I am kind of cute.”
“The male ego! Next, you’ll be wanting me to rate my experience,” she huffed.
“¡Ay, Dios mio!” I reminded her as I batted my eyes.
“Okay, Big Boy. Let’s see if you can duplicate what you did last night,” she challenged.
I clapped my hands, rubbed them together, and did my best evil scientist laugh. I do love a challenge.
◊◊◊
Even though today was supposed to be a day off, Caryn thought it was important to keep up our weekly meetings. She had me call the office where Dad and Megan were in the conference room. Dad kicked the teleconference off with some bad news.
“The Quickie Mart was robbed last night. The owner was hurt, and it’s currently closed. He was beaten when he wouldn’t open the safe. The police told me they only had $75 in change in the safe, and it would have been better for him just to give it up.
“I talked to his wife, and he’ll be okay, but she’s talking about retiring and moving to Florida,” Dad shared.
“Did the video cameras Fritz installed capture who did it?” I asked.
“Yes, and I think you know him. It was Tommy Cox.”
Of all the people I knew, he was in the top three for the biggest ass-hat award. The other two were Bill Rogers, who had tried to kill Tracy, and then there was Mike Herndon. Tommy had first come to my attention when he cyberstalked my family and me. Then he was involved in the steroids scandal that almost cost us the season my sophomore year of football.
“Please tell me they caught him.”
“Not yet, but they’re looking for him. Megan just sent the police the video an hour ago. Let Fritz know that the police were impressed with the quality. There’s no doubt who did it.”
“Any other bad news?” I asked.
“Duke cornered a skunk and was banished to the garage for a night,” Dad shared.
“I have a feeling it’s a good thing I’m in Cuba.”
“You owe me big time,” Dad assured me.
“Is he okay?”
“He wasn’t happy about it. You know how he is. He has the whole house on a schedule. Being stuck in the garage turned his world upside down, and he barked for most of the night. There was talk of sending him to the farm, but your mom finally calmed down.”
“Mom loves him too much. She only sends me to the farm when I’ve been bad,” I said, which made Dad chuckle.
It was good I could joke about it now.
“How is everything going there?” Dad asked.
“I hate the director, but everything else is going well. I’ve found a baseball team to work out with and have taken time to do some exploring. All in all, it’s been good,” I said.
“Do you think you could send Caryn home?” Dad asked.
I looked at Caryn, and it was apparent that she and Dad had already discussed this. I was a little irritated that she hadn’t talked to me before now to give me a heads-up.
“Why, what do you need?” I asked.
“The restaurant has taken off. Granny and Mary are being run to the bone, and they need to hire an additional manager. They also need more staff.”
“And Caryn has helped with all that,” I finished Dad’s thought.
“Plus, it sounds like we need to deal with the Quickie Mart,” Dad added.
Megan updated us on the financials, and then Dad had one last item.
“Your grandmother has a new roommate.”
“Did she find herself a man?” I asked.
I could imagine how Dad and Uncle John would take that.
“No, a woman.”
Caryn laughed; I must have made a face.
“Yuri’s grandmother, Yelena, moved in, and she’s helping run the farm,” Dad explained.
In a strange way, that made a lot of sense. Mrs. Antakov was a tough old bird. She would watch the farm like a hawk. I knew my grandmother hadn’t really wanted to come out of retirement but had done so to help me. That, and she wanted to be closer to family. The two grandmothers had bonded. I was sure they would make a good team.
Once we hung up, I looked at Caryn.
“Sorry, I didn’t get a chance to tell you,” she tried.
“Caryn, don’t bullshit me. There were plenty of chances for you to tell me you needed to go back home. In a lot of ways, I envy you. There’s a lot I miss from there.”
“Like a decent shower, and ketchup?” she asked.
“Isn’t it funny that you miss the strangest stuff? Then there are those things you love here.”
“Like that rocket fuel they try to pass off as coffee,” Caryn suggested.
“That’s almost like mainlining caffeine. It tastes horrible, but I can’t wake up without it now. We’ll have to figure out how to make it once we get back.”
“Is there anything I need to take back with me?” she asked.
“If you would take back some of the cigars I bought, that would help me greatly. You can only take $100 worth through customs. The way it is, I’ll have to get several people to take boxes back for me. I plan on using the cigars as special gifts.”
“You’re sure you’re okay with this? In the big scheme of things, your acting career is much more important than hiring some employees,” she admitted.
“I’m good. If I need someone to help me, I’m sure I can count on Fritz. Plus, you’re just a phone call away.”
We talked about the Quickie Mart. My idea had been to turn it into more of a produce stand and not be open as much. Late nights just invited the sort of incident that happened last night. I trusted my dad and Caryn to figure out anything that might come up. She went to her room to pack.
◊◊◊
I spent the afternoon with Coach Conde, doing batting practice. He had a couple of new pitchers for me to try to hit. He confessed that he was using our time to scout prospects. Coach Conde convinced me to pay him, and he would use the money to get them here for tryouts.
Because it was the weekend, he could have two pitchers come in from the eastern part of Cuba. They were from Guantanamo and Las Tunas.
The kid from Guantanamo was a nervous wreck. He was a skinny kid who had a sneaky fastball. It wasn’t overpowering, but it had a lot of movement. It took me a while to figure him out, but once I discovered his tells, I crushed him.
“What just happened?” Coach Conde asked.
“His glove goes up a fraction of an inch higher when he’s throwing the fastball. It causes his nose to disappear. If I can see his nose, he’s either throwing his changeup or curveball.”
He had me call out the next ten pitches as I peppered hits all over the diamond.
After only three pitches, I could tell the kid from Las Tunas was good. I mean, ‘he should be playing in the major leagues someday’ level of good. He had a monster curveball that just fell off the table. If he had only a little more control of it, he would be unhittable. With a decent strength program, his fastball would be good enough to make a rotation. The kid was a raw talent who was on the verge of becoming special, with the right coaching.