Dropped Third Strike (Portland Pioneers #1) (11 page)

“You know what was harsh? Having to march him out there every few days when the rest of the bullpen was gassed. He was a last resort, but I still used him way more than I wanted to,” Don ranted.

“I know, and I’m sorry,” she said. “I made it up to you the next season when I brought Jace Brigham over though, right?”

The mention of the young phenom she’d spirited away from the Giants brought a smile to Carroll’s wrinkled face.

“That’s what I thought,” Kate said, smirking. “See, I’ve gotten better at my job.”

“Well, I’m anxious to see what Benjamin can do for our boys,” Don said. “I’ve always liked him as a player, but I know he’s had some struggles. Hopefully those are behind him. Especially the off-field stuff. We don’t need any of that.”

“I wouldn’t have hired him if I thought that would be a problem,” she said.

She saw a hint of doubt on Don’s face, and she felt an urge to set his worry at ease.

“Listen, I’ve known Reid for a very long time. I know what he’s made of and what kind of person he really is,” Kate said. “Reid Benjamin will give you the best he’s got. And, trust me – that’s really something special.”

“Another compliment? This must be my lucky day.”

Until she heard his voice, Kate didn’t realize Reid had come up behind her while she was talking to Don. She wondered how long he’d been standing there. Obviously long enough to hear her last comment.

“Don’t get too used to it,” she said to him.

“No kidding. She doesn’t throw out compliments too often,” Don chimed in. “She’s a tough boss, Benjamin. I hope you’re ready for her.”

“Oh, Kate and I go way back,” Reid said, smirking at Kate. “I’m more than ready for what she throws at me.”

Kate wanted to slap that smirk off his face. And she certainly didn’t appreciate the suggestive nature of his tone. Beyond the irritation of being reminded once again of their history, she didn’t want the manager or anyone else in the organization to think she hired Reid for any reason other than his baseball skills. She’d worked hard to disprove the rampant theories that women were too emotional to make logic-based decisions. If her history with Reid ever came out, many would assume she’d hired him for other skills, and she was quite certain that all of her efforts would be for naught. Her reputation was on the line. If Reid screwed that up for her, the sliver of compassion she had for him would completely disappear. She would never be able to forgive him.

While she silently fumed, the two men next to her were sharing a good laugh. They’d shifted the conversation from her, thankfully, to baseball stories and ballplayers with whom they’d both worked. She hoped Don had missed Reid’s insinuation or chalked it up as typical male banter. She finished her glass of wine and decided she definitely needed another. The cocktail hour still had plenty of hour left. She would need some liquid help to get through it.

When she turned back with her new glass of wine, Don was no longer at the table, but Reid was still there. Waiting for her, apparently.

“Feeling a little calmer now?” he asked. “I thought smoke might come out of your ears a few minutes ago.”

“Reid, we need to be really careful with what we say about our past,” she said, keeping her voice low. “I don’t want people to think that’s why I hired you. And I hope you don’t either.”

“People hire old friends all the time. It’s not that big of a deal,” he said.

She gave him a look of disbelief. “Our history is a little more complex than that, unless you’ve forgotten.”

It took a lot of effort for Reid to keep a straight face. He hadn’t forgotten, but it amused him that she seemed to think he had. It was even more entertaining to see how much that irritated her.

“Whatever,” Kate said, clearly buying his act. “It was a long time ago, and I really want it to stay there. My job is on the line here, Reid, and so is yours.”

“Alright, alright,” Reid said, chuckling and giving her that winning smile. “I’ll keep it quiet. I know how to behave when I have to.”

“I’ll believe that when I see it,” Kate said.

Reid just grinned as she walked off to talk to some of the Pioneers players. She made it clear she did not want him to follow, so he stayed put. He didn’t want to annoy Kate, but he had a feeling he wouldn’t be able to avoid that. He’d never been good with his words – particularly where she was involved – but it seemed he was going to have to take extra care when he was speaking to her. He hadn’t yet started his job, but he wanted to keep it. He wanted to succeed at something. Something besides upsetting Kate. But that was going to be a challenge. Everything he said seemed to fire her up. And sadly, not in a good way.

He’d much rather see the good fire in Kate. Reid had vivid memories of how passionate she could be. He hadn’t thought about those occasions in quite a while, but now they flashed through his mind like a highlight reel, and he watched her across the room, comparing her to the girl in his head. It was a pretty sharp contrast – hot and sexy in his mind, cool and all business in person. Part of him wanted to know if the woman in his mind still existed. She didn’t show any signs of it at the moment. Then again, she had always been fairly guarded, but when she let that guard down – hang on. Kate had let him see her true self a few times, and those were the memories flowing through his mind right now. They were incredible and so was she, in ways no one else in this room knew. But Reid did. He knew it very well. He wouldn’t mind knowing it again, but there was no way Kate would let him in again. Not with the apparent anger she harbored toward him.

He tried to imagine what he’d done to earn such ire, but his mind couldn’t quite get there. He preferred to focus on the good times. Plus, the last time he’d seen her had been right before he hit a rough time in his life – and the bottle. That might be playing a factor in his recall. He didn’t like remembering those days, so maybe he’d also managed to erase a few memories of Kate and whatever he’d done to hurt her. He didn’t know if she’d ever tell him what he did, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to know either. He had enough failures to try and fix at the moment without adding another.

Ten days later, Reid was officially a Portland resident. He’d wasted no time selecting one of the Scott Properties to call home, and it only took him a few days to settle things in New York. He decided to hold onto his condo, although he let his former Mets teammates know it was available for sublease if they knew anyone who was interested. Packing didn’t take him long either. The only things he needed were clothes and a few personal items he had kept with him even through all his minor league moves.

The only delays in his move had come in the form of people calling to congratulate him on his new job. College coaches and teammates, Mets colleagues, and younger players he’d helped – everyone was eager to share their excitement over his new position. It was touching and encouraging that so many people believed he could do it, and although he was fairly sure of his skills, the votes of confidence certainly helped.

The encouragement from friends almost made up for the silence from his parents. He’d called them when he left Portland but got their answering machine. Oddly enough, the Benjamins still had one of those, but Reid wasn’t sure they checked it very often. If they did, they didn’t return his calls. He didn’t really blame them though. His parents had slowly been distancing themselves from him over the past few years, and his on-field failures had nothing to do with it. He simply wasn’t the man they’d raised him to be. Thanks to the New York media, his drunken escapades and constant carousel of female companions were well-documented. The final straw, as far as he could tell, had been the night he assaulted a photographer. Reid had been leaving a night club, where he’d gone to soothe his broken ego following a particularly terrible game in which he’d struck out four times and committed two fielding errors. After a few drinks and wordless conversations with a few beautiful women, he was feeling a lot better. The photographer was waiting outside to get a shot and wasn’t leaving without a good one. Reid should have ignored the photographer’s rude and snide comments, but the alcohol had robbed him of that capability. Instead of a great snapshot of the Mets’ big signing failure, the photographer left with a broken nose and grounds for a lawsuit that would net him more cash than the photo would have. Reid settled out of court, but the publicity kept him in the media for weeks.

Reid had done more than disappoint his parents; he’d embarrassed them. Thus, he hadn’t seen Sam or Kathy in more than a year. He was so ashamed, he hadn’t even returned to Arizona for the holidays, opting to mail gifts instead. But he still tried to check in with them every few weeks. Even if they weren’t claiming him at the moment, they would always be his family, and he hoped someday he’d be able to make them proud again. Maybe this new job would be a step in that direction.

The cross-country drive gave him plenty of time to think about his new responsibilities. Transitioning from player to coach wouldn’t be terribly difficult given his time volunteering at UNC. Working with professional athletes would present different challenges than working with college athletes, but he was up for it. He also used the driving time and the Bluetooth in his Mercedes GL-Class to call each Pioneers player with whom he would be working. He’d met several of them in whirlwind fashion during Fan Fest and the cocktail party, but he wanted to make sure he introduced himself to each player and got a sense of their goals for the season. He let them all know the hours he planned to be at the ballpark in the coming week so they could stop by and start working with him before the start of spring training.

Nearly every player took him up on his offer of extra work. He thought he’d only spend a few hours a day at the ballpark, but he quickly realized he needed to be there nearly all day, and he didn’t mind one bit. His work ranked higher in priority and interest than unpacking and setting up his new house. That could wait. The batting cages felt more like home anyway, and he didn’t mind spending almost all of his waking hours there. It seemed more important to get settled in the ballpark than in his new condo. He developed a quick appreciation and knowledge of the players who came in to work with him. Their work ethic was impressive, and he was excited about the potential in all the young men.

He shouldn’t have been so surprised at the collection of talent. Kate had been the one to bring them all here. She was smart. She didn’t make major mistakes – at least not in baseball. He’d followed her career casually over the years, and he’d done a little nightly research on her since he’d joined the organization. She’d had a few signings flop, but every GM did. To her credit, Kate’s miscues hadn’t been too expensive and none had hurt the team long-term. She was doing a great job in her role, and he was confident her success would translate to the field sooner rather than later.

He hadn’t seen her since his return to Portland. Every day when he went to the ballpark, he resisted the urge to stop into her office. He only hesitated because he remembered the way they left off at the cocktail party, and he was not keen on upsetting her further. His goal was to win her over again. He’d done it more than once in the past without much effort, but clearly it would be a more formidable task this time around. He needed to start by earning back her trust, and he figured the best way to do that was to avoid bringing up the past – which he seemed to want to do every time he saw her – and just get to work. So that’s what he did.

Kate may not have laid eyes on him yet, but she was well aware of Reid’s return. His vehicle was unmistakable in the employee garage – a black Mercedes SUV with vanity plates that read “REID 17” could only belong to one person. The manager and players were eager to inform her of his presence as well, and she was glad to hear their excitement. It seemed Reid was already hard at work. She shouldn’t have expected anything else, but it pleased her nonetheless. It was good to know that although many things about Reid had changed over the years, his baseball drive and work ethic had remained the same.

She was hard at work too, filling roster holes as efficiently and effectively as she could. The calendars now said February, which meant pitchers and catchers would report to spring training in less than two weeks.

She’d finally found a free agent catcher to campaign for their back-up role. Carson Slater was a late-round draft pick straight out of high school. He only played two seasons in the Mets’ minor league system before enlisting in the Navy. After two years of active duty, he was now in the inactive reserves and eager to take another swing at a baseball career. Kate had sent a scout to see Carson in his hometown a few weeks earlier and the report was encouraging enough to sign him to a low-risk contract. During a brief phone call in which Kate welcomed him to the organization, the young catcher revealed he had worked out a few times with Reid Benjamin when they were both Mets prospects.

“He was already a big deal, and no one even knew who I was, but he was willing to talk to me about my swing,” Carson said. “One day, he stayed with me at the field until way past dark. I’m sure he had better places to be, but he never complained and he didn’t leave until he felt like I really got it.”

“I’m sure he’ll be glad to see you again in Arizona,” Kate said. “And if you make it to Portland sooner, he’s been holding batting cage hours pretty regularly.”

“Yes ma’am. I’ve already told my wife I’m heading out tomorrow,” Carson said. “Second chances like this don’t come along too often. I don’t plan to take it lightly.”