Tony Vitale’s door, he braced himself for what he’d find inside—a pale kid, maybe bald, his eyes haunted. Mack had seen it too many times not to expect the worst. It never failed to make his chest tighten and his throat close up. Forcing himself not to react visibly had been one of the hardest lessons he’d ever had to learn.
“You okay?” Beth asked, regarding him worriedly. “You’re not going to walk in there and pass out on me, are you?”
Mack gave her a disbelieving look. “Hardly.”
“You wouldn’t be the first man who couldn’t take seeing a kid this sick,” she said.
“I’ve been here before.”
She gave him a look filled with understanding and commiseration. “It’s always hardest the first time. After that, it gets easier.”
“I doubt that,” Mack said.
Her gaze stayed on his face. “You ready?” she asked finally, as if she’d seen some minute change in his demeanor that had satisfied her.
“Let’s do it.”
Beth pushed open the door, a seemingly genuine smile on her face. “Hey, Tony,” she called out cheerfully. “Have I got a surprise for you!”
“Ice cream?” a weak voice called back hopefully.
“Better than that,” she said, then stood aside to allow Mack to enter.
Admiring her performance and determined not to let her or the boy down, Mack gave her a thumbs-up and strode into the room.
The boy lying amid a pile of pillows and stuffed animals was wearing a too-large football jersey with Mack’s old number on it. He clutched a football against his scrawny chest. When he spotted Mack, he struggled to sit up, and for just an instant there was a glimmer of childish delight in his dull eyes before he fell back against the pillows, obviously too weak to sit upright.
“Mighty Mack!” he whispered incredulously, his gaze avidly following Mack’s progress across the room. “You really came.”
“Hey, when I get a call from a pretty doctor telling me that my biggest fan is in the hospital, I always show up,” Mack said, swallowing the familiar tide of dismay that washed over him. The men who walked onto a football field every Sunday and allowed equally brawny men to tackle them and pound them into the dirt didn’t know half as much about real bravery as this kid.
Tony nodded enthusiastically. “I’m your biggest fan, all right. I’ve got tapes of every game you ever played.”
“That can’t be that many. I had a short career.”
“But you were awesome, the best ever.”
Mack chuckled. “Better than Johnny Unitas in Baltimore? Better than Denver’s John Elway? Better than Dan Marino in Miami?”
“Way better,” Tony said loyally.
Mack turned to the lady doc. “The kid knows his sports legends.”
She gave him a wry look. “Obviously, the two of you agree you’re in a class by yourself.”
“He is, Dr. Beth,” Tony asserted. “Ask anyone.”
“Why ask anyone else, when I can get it straight from the horse’s—” she deliberately hesitated, her gaze on Mack steady before she finally added “—mouth?”
Mack had the distinct impression she would have preferred to mention the opposite end of the horse. He had definitely not won her over. Not yet, anyway. That was a challenge for another time, though, one he was surprisingly eager to pursue. For now, his focus had to be on Tony.
“How about I sign your football for you?” he suggested to Tony.
The boy’s eyes lit up. “That’d be great! Wait till my mom comes tonight. She’ll be so excited. She’s watched all those tapes with me a million times. I’ll bet she’s the only mom around who knows all your stats.”
Mack read between the lines, but managed to keep his expression neutral at the hint that there was no father in this boy’s life. He reached in his pocket and pulled out a valuable football card from his rookie year that he’d brought along. “Want me to sign this for your mom or for you?”
“Oh, wow! I saw that card on the Internet. It was selling for way more than I could pay,” Tony said, obviously struggling to do the right thing. “Sign it for my mom, I guess. She can show it to all her friends at work. She’ll probably want to put it in a frame on her desk.”
Mack grinned at him. “Good choice. I’ll bring you your own on my next visit. I think I can come up with one from my MVP year that’s even more valuable, especially when it’s signed.”
“You’ll come back?” Tony asked, his eyes wide with disbelief. “Really? And we can talk about all the guys you drafted for this season? We really need that defensive lineman you got.”
“Tell me about it,” Mack said.
“Has he signed yet?”
Mack grinned at his enthusiasm and his up-to-date knowledge. “Not yet. We’re still bargaining.”
“He’ll sign,” Tony said confidently. “Who wouldn’t want to play for your team? What I don’t get is why you didn’t go after that punter at Ohio State.”
Mack laughed. “Maybe I’ll explain budgets and salary caps to you the next time I come.”
“I can’t believe you’ll really come back,” Tony said.
“I’ll be back so often you’ll get sick of me,” Mack promised. “Nothing I like more than talking to someone who remembers all my great plays.”
“And I do,” Tony said. “Every one of them. That game against the Eagles, when you threw for a team record was the best ever, but I liked the way you scrambled for a winning touchdown against the Packers, when everybody said you ought to be off the field because of a shoulder injury.”
Mack laughed. “That was a great one,” he agreed. “I still get a twinge in that shoulder every time I think about it. I had to scramble, because I couldn’t have thrown the ball if my life had depended on it.”
“I knew it!” Tony said, obviously delighted to have his impression confirmed. “I told my mom before you ran that there was no way you were going to try a pass. How come the Packers’ defense didn’t get that?”
“Pure, dumb luck,” Mack admitted. “And just so you know, I shouldn’t have stayed on the field. I could have cost us the game.”
“But you didn’t. You won it,” Tony said.
“That doesn’t mean it was the smartest play. It means I was showing off.”
“I don’t care. It was a great play,” Tony insisted.
Mack laughed at the kid’s stubborn defense. “Too bad you weren’t around to talk to the coach. He almost benched me for the next game because of that play.”
Tony’s eyes widened in disbelief. “Really? But that’s so unfair.”
Mack studied the boy’s face and thought he looked even paler than he had when Mack had first arrived, despite his obvious excitement. Mack glanced at Beth and saw the lines of worry creasing her forehead. He was pretty good at reading cues and he definitely got this one. It was time to go.
“Listen, Tony, I’ve got to head to a meeting. You get some rest. Maybe next time we can go down to the cafeteria for some hot chocolate. I hear it’s pretty decent.”
“Really?” Tony asked, his voice fading as if he were falling asleep but struggling to fight it.
“If the doc okays it,” Mack said, giving her a questioning look.
“No problem,” Beth said, but she