Aim For Love (27 page)

Martin Erickson was waiting for Kaz when he reached the hotel lobby.

“I texted you,” Martin said as he strode over.

Kaz nodded.

“Join me for a drink?”

“I’m in training.”

“I’m not. I’ll buy you a lemonade.”

“Not in the mood, Martin.”

“You might be when you hear what I have to say.”

The outdoor patio off the lobby was crowded with tourists and fans. “Let’s sit at the bar,” Martin said, leading the way.

Kaz had been wrong about Martin—he hadn’t been involved with the drug gang. But the knowledge didn’t make him like the guy.

“I spoke with your father,” Martin said as he took a long draw from his beer. “He wants
you
to make decisions about the farm.” He took another swig. “But you know that.”

He didn’t. The brief conversations he’d had with his father had centered on a fix for the irrigation system and ordering a part for their old tractor.

Martin pushed back from the bar and crossed his arms.

“I want to help you start a marketing program,” Martin said, “a subscription service of sorts for your peaches. A CSA, the local grange guy called it. Your peaches are perfect for a specialty business like that.”

“Why do you care?” It wasn’t a gentleman’s response, but the twitch in Martin’s jaw told Kaz that Martin had come to talk about more than CSAs and marketing. With guys like Martin, there was always a hidden agenda. An agenda Kaz was pretty sure would flow only one way.

Martin shifted on his bar stool and faced Kaz square on. “Look, I know you don’t like me. And I haven’t helped matters any. I’m still learning the ways of the Valley, the pace and the people. But since I’ve moved to Valley Cross, I realize I like it. I like the way people work for a future that isn’t all boxed up and pre-packaged. I like that it’s a place people care about, a place where people have roots.”

Kaz wasn’t sure which shocked him more—Martin’s confession or the fact that he believed him.

“I want to start an eco-resort on my property. Reserve some of the land as wild, like your family did. But I need water for a project like that.”

Martin crossed him arms. If their discussion had been a sumo match, Martin would have just lost. The defensive gesture had surrender written all over it. But sometimes surrender was the path forward. And maybe the wily Martin knew that.

“Your family has water rights,” Martin went on, not stopping for breath. “If we join forces, I can develop my resort and help you in the process.” He did pause then, and locked Kaz in a determined stare.

“I can pay up front to put in a state-of-the-art water-conserving irrigation system that will rival any in the state,” he added. “You’d use less water—half the amount, if my engineer’s calculations are right—and I’d have enough to get the permits through for my project.” Martin tapped the side of his beer glass. “And your organic orchards and the CSA would give the place cachet.
Slow peaches
.” He smiled. “I like the sound of it.”

Few people surprised Kaz, but Martin had managed to shock him. After such a poor performance on the mound, having a backup plan for the farm would be a good proposition.

“What’s to keep you from turning your place into another Newport Shores?”

“You have little reason to trust me, but I’d like you to be on the board. I’m going to do the whole thing as a non-profit. You know—education, kids, demonstration gardens.” Martin took another sip of his beer. “I don’t want to get to the end of my life and have just a garage full of toys.” He set the glass down. “Your parents liked the idea.”

His parents would like any idea that promised to save the farm.

“I need to think about it,” Kaz said as he downed the last of his lemonade, wishing it were a very cold, very tall martini. “I have an appointment. I’ll get back to you. Send the plans down, and I’ll think it over.”

“The plans are waiting at the front desk.” Martin stood. “There’s one more thing you should know. I’m marrying Stacy Kingston. Next month.” He offered his hand. “I’ll be forever in your debt for saving her life.”

“Congratulations,” Kaz said, and found himself meaning it. How he’d gotten tangled in a debt of honor with Martin, he’d have to track back in his thoughts later. That Stacy had a future with a guy who had his head on and who clearly loved her was a good thing. A very good thing. “Like I said, I’ll think about your offer.”

Kaz raced out to the front of the hotel.

Alex and Scotty Donavan were waiting for him.

“Go get your glove,” Alex said.

“My glove?”

“We’re about to deal with your pitching problem.”

No one else was around as Kaz, Alex and Scotty set up in one of the empty batting cages at the end of the Indian School practice field. Kaz had practiced there the year before, during his last stint on the Triple-A team. The irony that he was back on the field he’d played on in the minors—after trying so hard to get away from anything to do with the minor league—but with two All-Stars to coach him struck him hard.

Remembering his mistake handling the ball in the second inning hit him harder. He wasn’t used to relying on other people. At the farm, yes, but in the minors? Not even close. In the minors guys came and went and everybody was trying to get somewhere they weren’t. The unsettled nature of the system didn’t promote team cohesiveness.

Baseball was a game of paradoxes. Individual performance was measured within decimal points of accuracy, but once you got to the Major Leagues, the performance of the team as a whole took precedence, something he would do well to remember. The great teams had something special—Scotty and Alex and the guys on the Giants, they were better as a team than any one of them individually.

As he watched the friendly banter between Alex and Scotty as they set up, he knew that following the old ways, the community and teamwork that his own culture cherished, was the way forward. If he made the majors, his teammates would have his back and he’d have theirs.

If he got his act together.

Scotty showed him a couple of moves for getting him more freedom on his pull-down, a way to get more power from his release. Though neither Scotty nor Alex said as much, the practice session was probably meant to run the team lesson home as much as to teach him anything about his pitching.

They took a break and grabbed some water from the cooler at the end of the cage.

“Now that you’ve got some focus back, maybe you’d better deal with my sister,” Alex said.

“Sister?”

“Yeah, sister.”

Alex slugged back the water. Even late in the evening, the desert heat blew in on the barely perceptible breeze.

“Your game’s not the problem.” Alex gestured to Scotty and back to himself. “We’ve been through this, so we know the drill. Love will kick your ass if you ignore it.”

Love
.

Hearing the word from his tough-playing teammate sent a shock of recognition through Kaz’s veins. He’d heard the stories of Alex’s and Scotty’s roads to love. It had taken life-threatening emergencies before either of them got the love thing right. If the drama of the past two weeks was any indication, Kaz was right on target. But he sure as hell didn’t feel like he was.

And having Sabrina’s All-Star brother helping him get in touch with her floored him.

He shook his head. “Sabrina’s not taking my calls. Hasn’t for a couple weeks.” He might as well be honest.

Alex pulled his cellphone from his back pocket. “Use my phone.”

Kaz swallowed his embarrassment, walked away a few feet for privacy, and punched in Sabrina’s number. When the call went to voicemail, he didn’t leave a message.

He returned the phone to Alex.

Alex shrugged. “Guess she’s not taking my calls either. I warned you that she’s got the Tavonesi stubborn gene. I think she got most of it.” He grinned as he shoved the phone into his pocket, and then he picked up the bat. “Let’s see your fastball a couple more times. I need the practice.”

Stubborn
.

It wasn’t a word Kaz would use for Sabrina. He had a whole roster of words that clustered in his thoughts about her, but
stubborn
hadn’t been one of them. She’d walked out of his life with a grace he admired. Nothing like a clean break, head held high, to send a damn clear message.

The irony was,
he
hadn’t been clear. He’d told her he wasn’t available, knowing he was being vague. He should’ve told her the truth that night they’d made love, told her about his vow and his determination to honor his word. He should’ve been clearer and not made her make the first move away. And in addition to his desire to honor his vow—hidden under that, where he had to be mercilessly honest to even discover it—it bothered him more than he wanted to admit that he couldn’t provide her the lifestyle she was accustomed to. It didn’t matter that she could provide such a life for herself. If he couldn’t, he’d at least want to meet her on near equal ground.

But he wasn’t from her well-heeled, moneyed world. Hell, who was he kidding? He didn’t fit into her world in any way. It was one thing, a great thing, really, for Alex to mentor him, to help him, even to be okay with the fact that that he loved Sabrina. But equal ground? That was a level he’d never reach.

He whizzed a fastball past Alex. Scotty nearly hit the dirt trying to corral it.

“Hey, give him something he can at least get a piece of,” Scotty said as he fired the ball back to Kaz with a comical huff. “We have to ride back to the hotel with him. Maybe you haven’t been in a vehicle with Tavonesi after he’s struck out.”

Kaz threw another fastball, and Alex clocked it into the net. Scotty took a turn batting. For a pitcher, the guy had a damned solid swing.

“Sabrina said you can use a sword to slice a BB fired at you from seventy feet,” Alex said as they gathered up the bats and headed to his car.

That Sabrina remembered and repeated the story gave Kaz a fuzzy feeling that it shouldn’t have.

“That story gets some mileage.” He tossed his glove in the back and hopped into Alex’s car. “But you won’t be seeing any performance—the sheriff impounded my sword as evidence. Those days are over.”

Alex shook his head. But then a smile crawled across his face. Kaz had seen that smile from Sabrina. It was one smile he’d never learned to read.

Five days later Kaz had a good outing on the mound. He used the pointers Scotty had shown him and ramped up his fastball to ninety-eight miles an hour. That something as simple as relaxing into his pull-down could make such a difference didn’t surprise him. What surprised him was that he hadn’t noticed the need for the move himself.

But more than tuning up his pitching mechanics, he sank into playing as a member of a team. He let a line drive go by him that afternoon—a ball that he’d normally have moved heaven and earth to field—but he trusted that the second baseman would field it. And he did. After the play, Alex tipped his finger to his cap in silent recognition.

He was fitting in.

All day those sorts of incidents happened, as if some force were at work, cracking him open to the power of the whole, a power he’d once been in harmony with but had lost touch with in the last few hectic years.

He knew before his agent called him the next day that he’d made the team. The contract the club offered wasn’t as much as they’d hoped for, but it would do. With the added income from his new contract—
and
if he took Martin up on his offer—Tokugawa heirloom peaches would have the future they deserved. The future his grandfather had intended so many years before.

He should’ve been able to sink into the joy of achieving his goals, of realizing his dream. But something was missing. And that something wasn’t a thing at all.

He wanted Sabrina to share in his success. He wanted her reaction, her delight, in his accomplishments. But she wasn’t there to celebrate with him. And her absence turned sweet success bittersweet.

Sabrina Tavonesi had stolen his heart, and there wasn’t a damned thing he could do about getting it back.

Chapter Twenty-five