Retrograde

CHAPTER ONE

2009

Cassie’s eyes followed the arc of the ball as it cracked off the bat and sailed deep into left field, dropping a foot from the fence. The man on third streaked for home plate and made it easily. The runner who’d been on first had to slide in. LSU was up by two in the bottom of the ninth. When the batter was called out trying for third, the game ended. The stands erupted.

Amid the jostling and high-fiving of fans oblivious to everything except the victory, Cassie managed to get to her feet and make her way to the bleacher steps. She wasn’t really a baseball fan—or a sports fan, period. She’d only come tonight because her best friend Megan won two tickets in a trivia contest and wanted company.

No, that wasn’t exactly true. She wanted to see Dean. Not badly enough that she’d have spent the money for a ticket, but enough to fight the crowds and guarantee herself a very late night. She had a final exam in the morning, and she couldn’t afford not to do well. On scholarship, GPA mattered.

She and Megan finally made their way to the field, and she spotted Dean talking to a reporter, pausing every few seconds to acknowledge someone’s congratulations. Nancy Rice, his girlfriend, was plastered to his side, her iPhone held high as she snapped selfie after selfie. A twinge of jealousy hit Cassie, and she thought that Nancy must have availed herself of every cosmetic enhancement her father’s money could buy. Nobody’s natural breasts stood that high and firm without a bra.

She realized she was being petty and was ashamed of it. If her family had that kind of money, she might have done the same.

Cassie and Dean had grown up in the same Marrero neighborhood. They’d been playmates through elementary school and confidants through junior high. By his sophomore year, his athletic ability had opened new doors for him, doors Cassie couldn’t walk through. Now there he was, the star of the team—MLB bound. Redshirted in his first year, Dean was in his fifth year at LSU, supposedly working on a master’s of some sort. Cassie doubted he put much time into classwork.

She was a senior, her undergraduate work almost finished, but two more years loomed ahead of her if the university accepted her into the Master of Accountancy program. Which they wouldn’t if she failed her exam. She declined Megan’s offer of drinks or coffee and hurried back to her dorm.

Over the reporter’s head, Dean saw her walking out. Cassie Rae Landry. Was she an LSU student?

The reporter nudged him. “Dean?”

“I’m sorry. What did you ask?”

“How high do you think you’ll go in the draft?”

“I don’t know. I don’t care, either. All I want is a chance to play. I need to see somebody. Excuse me.”

He made his way through the crowd, Nancy following as fast as she could in her four-inch heels, but by the time he reached the exit, Cassie was nowhere to be seen.

“What’s so important that you had to be rude while we were on TV?” Nancy asked when she finally caught up.

Being on TV was very important to her. Dean sometimes thought that if he weren’t regularly in the news, if he were just an average student from Marrero, Nancy wouldn’t have looked at him twice.

“I don’t think I was rude. I thought I saw a good friend from school. Someone I hadn’t seen in years. No big deal.”

“Oh. Where’s the after-party tonight?”

“At Jace O’Connell’s. I gotta get to the clubhouse.”

“I’ll meet you at the car.”

Freshly showered, Dean walked out of the clubhouse twenty minutes later. In the parking lot he found Nancy and two of her friends taking turns posing provocatively beside his Mustang—five years old when he’d bought it with four summers of construction money, and he’d kept it running great and looking sharp ever since.

“Hi, Dean.” The brunette leaning against the door gave him a sexy smile, earning herself a nasty look from Nancy.

“If you’re ready, let’s go.” He waited for the brunette to move, then opened the door and slid behind the wheel. While Nancy said goodnight to her girlfriends, Dean leaned back against the seat and sighed. Nancy wasn’t going to be happy, but he wasn’t going to Jace’s. Jace’s parties always got out of hand. The last time he’d been to one, the cops showed up, and they were lucky they hadn’t all been arrested. Besides, he’d had enough of the all-night binges. For a while, anyway. Might as well get it over with.

“Nancy, I’m not going to the party. If you want to go, I’ll drive you over, but I’m not staying. I’m tired.”

She pouted. “I bought this dress just for this party, and now no one will see it!”

“The world will see it. You’ve been posting pictures all night.” When she raised the phone again, he covered the lens with his hand. “Can you put that away? Not everything has to be public.”

For a second something flickered across her face that wasn’t pouting. “If I don’t post it, it’s like it didn’t happen,” she said, quiet enough that he almost missed it. “Nobody remembers me for anything else.”

Moments like that were one of the reasons they were still together. Despite having money, status and beauty, she sometimes seemed as insecure as an unwanted child. He often felt more like a father than a lover, and he could never tell if she truly felt that way or if she was fishing for reassurance.

She’d been spoiled by her wealthy family, and she was vain—but she had reason to be; she was beautiful, with wavy ash-blond hair framing a gorgeous face and a figure that stopped men in their tracks. She could be pouty and whiny, but she could also be unexpectedly generous, as the Rolex on his wrist proved. She could be a lot of fun when she didn’t push it too far.

“Do you want me to take you to Jace’s?”

“No.” She turned away and looked out the window. “Just take me home.” The pouting continued all the way to her upscale townhouse. She got out without saying goodnight, and he didn’t offer to walk her inside. He sighed, watching her go. He wanted out, but every time he tried to end it, she became either semi-hysterical or seductive, and he’d back off. One day soon.

He drove back to campus; he had a nice room in the athletic dorm, but he didn’t sleep in it that often. As he passed the coach’s office, he noticed a light inside and, on impulse, went in. He found one of the assistant coaches busy at his computer.

“Hey, Coach. Would you mind looking up a name in the student directory?”

“Sure.” The coach turned back to his computer. “What’s the name?”

“Cassie Landry. Cassandra Landry. All I want to know is if she’s a student here.”

“Yep. She is.”

“Do you have any way to look up her phone number?”

“Ah…no, it’s not listed, but she lives in the honors dorm. You going for the brainy type these days?”

Dean shook his head. “It’s not like that. Once she was my best friend. Sometimes my only friend.”

“Dude, she’s a senior. Been here for three and a half years. You didn’t keep up too well.”

“No. I guess I didn’t. Thanks, Coach.”

Dean checked the time on his phone. Not that late. He strode across the campus to the honors dorm. Two guys playing Halo in the lobby looked at him as though he might have been an escapee from the zoo, but they gave him Cassie’s room number.

Deep into corporate financial reporting, Cassie barely heard the knock. When it came the second time, she got up to answer, hoping it wasn’t some drunken freshman looking for help with an assignment.

“Hey, Cassie Rae. Long time.”

“Dean…yeah, it’s been a while. Come in. Sit down.”

“I saw you tonight at the game. I tried to catch up, but you were too fast for me. I can’t believe we’ve been on the same campus for almost four years, and I never saw you until tonight. You should have let me know you were here. Last I heard, you were headed for Tulane.”

“I tried to see you a couple of times right after I got here. Security turned me away at the dorm door. I didn’t have your phone number.”

He knew exactly what had happened. Security turned away a lot of girls trying to get into the athletic dorms. He could also see how humiliating that must have been for someone as proud as Cassie. No wonder she didn’t try again.

“I wasn’t shocked to find you in the honors dorm. Cassie Rae Landry, Girl Genius. Kind of always how it was. What’s your major?”

“Accounting. Minor in banking and finance. I figure if I want to make money, I should be where the money is.”

“Won’t you need a master’s for the big bucks? CPA, CFO?”

She nodded. “Yep. I’ll be at Ourso for two more years. I assume you majored in coaching and sports administration?” She sat back in her chair with a grin and folded her arms across her chest in the same posture he remembered from elementary school.

“You’re selling me short. No, I majored in English. I mean, you never know when you might blow out a knee and end your career. I thought if that happened to me, I’d go on to law school.”

“Wow. I’m impressed! Well, you were always a reader. Now what about this master’s you’re working on?”

He rolled his eyes. “Coaching and sports administration.”

While they laughed, she thought back to her junior year of high school when suddenly she’d seen him as more than a friend. He was already beyond her reach, hanging out with the popular kids, but oh, how she’d wished for something different. Looking at the confident, savvy young man he was now, she realized that she’d never had a chance. He’d always been out of her league.

Dean thought back to the days when the two of them ran wild through the Oak Cove neighborhood. How it felt to have someone who liked him when he had no idea he could pitch, when he didn’t have a dollar for soda. These days, he couldn’t be sure who liked him and who liked the ballplayer who was going to be rich.

They reminisced for an hour until he realized she was trying to study for an exam, and he knew Cassie didn’t fool around when it came to grades. She’d always been like that.

“Thanks for letting me in at this hour of the night,” he said as he rose to leave.

“I can’t imagine a day when I wouldn’t let you in. I’ll see you on TV in a few years when your team wins the World Series.”

“I can only hope. I’ll probably be seeing you for a bank loan one day.”

On impulse he held out his arms. The embrace was fierce.

Though she looked for him, Cassie didn’t see Dean again on campus. LSU made the playoffs, and the team was traveling. She finished her coursework and was elated to find she’d been selected as Dr. Bollinger’s research assistant. He was her favorite professor, and the assignment came with a tuition waiver. Her student debt load would be much lighter.

She graduated summa cum laude. LSU won its sixth national baseball title.

Cassie was back in Marrero, in her parents’ dirty, rundown kitchen, frying bologna for a sandwich when she heard the announcement on the local news.

“The Las Vegas Silver surprised no one today when they selected LSU phenom Dean Ryder with their first-round pick in the MLB draft. Some scouts have hinted that Ryder could bypass the minors.”

A video clip of Dean showed him celebrating with his family and Nancy, who was taking selfies despite being filmed for TV. Cassie smiled and shook her head. She’d be seeing Dean on the news for years, in his new world, surrounded by new people.

“Good-bye, old friend.”