Dropped Third Strike (Portland Pioneers #1)

by Micah K. Chaplin

  He glanced at the woman in his bed and sighed. After he’d learned of his release, Reid had sought solace in the only two things he could count on – alcohol and women. He turned to the two more often than most people liked, but they were always available and willing to take his mind off his worries. He was several drinks in when Megen showed up at his place. She had knowingly planned for his level of inebriation and wore minimal clothing that was easy to remove. He divested her of it pretty quickly, and then she turned her attentions on him while he continued to down vodka like it was water. Before long, his mind was numb and his body was alive. And that was just what he needed. He was grateful for his two vices. They’d both gotten him in some trouble, but he could quit either one when they were done serving their purpose.

  With a dull ache in his head, Reid wandered into the living room of his condo and called his usual airline. He was able to book a ticket on a noon flight. That gave him two hours to get Meg out of his place, nurse his hangover, and get to the airport. He took a deep breath and padded back to the bedroom to take care of the first of those tasks. It wasn’t actually that difficult of a feat. Meg knew how their arrangement worked, although she did talk him into a quickie before he hit the shower. When he emerged clean and shaven, she was gone, but she’d left him a plate of eggs and toast along with aspirin and big bottle of water. He ate in his towel and made a mental checklist of what he needed to pack. He didn’t really know how long he’d be gone, but he figured he should prepare for a few days. Easy. As he rode in a cab to the airport in a suit with just a carry-on in tow, he realized of all the things he’d learned in his time as a ballplayer, packing for a road trip was certainly a contender as the most valuable.

  Settled in his seat on the plane, it occurred to Reid that he’d never interviewed for a job before. He knew he should be nervous, but he’d detected a bit of desperation in Kate’s voice that morning so that took some edge off. Plus, he knew how to charm her. There was little need for him to be nervous. He held all the power in this situation, and as soon as the aspirin kicked in, he would be able to walk into Kate Marks’ office full of confidence.

  Kate’s stomach was a bundle of nerves as the clock approached two-thirty and her appointment with Reid grew closer. She’d been on the phone when he called back with his flight information, but he left a message. With the time difference between New York and Oregon, he would arrive around two and head straight to her office. A few hours didn’t seem like enough time to prepare for this meeting. Then again, she wasn’t sure any amount of time would be sufficient in preparing to see Reid again.

  She had listened to his message multiple times, and Kate tried telling herself it was only to double-check (OK, quadruple-check) the details. But she couldn’t even fool herself. It was about hearing his voice – especially the part where he said her name. It still sounded so familiar on his lips even though he’d made it clear he didn’t remember her at all. She was still bothered by that fact … and annoyed that it bothered her. How could he have forgotten her? Despite her best efforts, she’d failed at erasing her memories of him. There were just too many, and most of them still qualified as significant moments in her life. Those were the kind of memories that never went away. Apparently they were not as significant to him. She shook her head before her thoughts could go down that road. She was sure it would catch up with her later, but for now, she needed to focus.

  Reid didn’t have an actual résumé, so Kate had spent the morning researching his playing career and calling the coaches at the college where he’d reportedly tutored players on their hitting. The staff members at North Carolina practically fell all over themselves to praise Reid. As soon as she finished telling them who she was and why she was calling, the positive words about Reid came pouring through the phone. She had a hard time getting the men off the phone. The head coach was the most fervent in his support for Reid.

  “Look, ma’am, I know Benjamin’s got a reputation, and his own offensive numbers don’t show it, but he knows how to hit,” the coach said. “He’s helped a lot of my boys, not just on the field, but in the classroom. I’m not sayin’ he tutored them himself, but he got ’em to care about their grades and work a little harder. He’s a good guy, and he can relate to players who have ego as well as those who don’t quite believe in themselves. I hope you’ll give ’im a chance.”

  This did not help support Kate’s belief – or hope – that Reid was underqualified for the job.

  Kate thanked the coach for his time and hung up with a sigh. Looking for another out, she called a few contacts she had in the Mets organization. They offered their support of Reid as well. Many of them were dismayed by their GM’s decision to let him go. They still believed Reid would turn a corner and become the All-Star so many had projected. They echoed the UNC coach’s sentiments that Reid knew more about hitting than his stats conveyed.

  By the time Kate’s assistant buzzed her to announce Reid’s arrival, Kate already had a strong sense about the outcome of this interview. This was probably a blessing, since his presence was likely to wreak havoc on her ability to think clearly. She told Sara to send Reid in and took a deep breath before the door opened. Silently, she began to prepare herself for the sight of him. She felt calm and collected as she stood and crossed toward the door. But then he walked in and any illusion she had of feeling of calm and collected walked out.

  Reid wore a simple but well-tailored charcoal grey suit with a black shirt. He had skipped the tie and left the top few buttons of his shirt undone. It might have been a bit casual for a typical job interview, but on him, it worked. Then again, Reid looked good in everything. He also looked good in nothing, but Kate quickly squelched that recollection. Her gaze drifted up from his attire to his face, where his lips were curved into a slight smile and his hazel eyes were full of amusement and recognition.

  He closed the door behind him, and Kate only hoped her intelligence wasn’t on the other side of it.

  “Kate,” he said, holding out his right hand.

  “Reid,” she responded, shaking his hand and praying he couldn’t feel the slight tremors running through her.

  “It’s been awhile,” he said.

  “Yes, it has,” Kate said. “I wasn’t sure you remembered me.”

  “Of course I do,” Reid said. “I’d ask how you’ve been, but I don’t think I have to.”

  He gestured to their surroundings and Kate nodded, grateful for the excuse to avert her eyes from him and look around her office instead. Yet even the carefully-chosen artwork and fine furnishings tastefully done in the team’s colors – brick red and grey – could not distract her from the fact that Reid was standing so near. His scent had invaded her personal space, and Reid had always had a presence about him that was hard to ignore.

  “You could say I’m doing well, I guess,” Kate said, hoping her breath sounded steadier than she felt.

  “I’m not surprised you landed here, in the front office,” Reid said. “You always did know your baseball.”

  Kate smiled politely at the compliment and took a seat behind her desk, glad to give her shaky knees a break and put something of a barrier between herself and Reid. He sat down opposite her, folding his six-foot-four frame into the plush grey suede chair. He had filled out more since high school, unsurprisingly, but otherwise, Reid still looked like the same boy Kate had noticed on their high school diamond. And he appeared every bit as calm as she wished she felt.

  “Thanks for coming out on such short notice,” Kate said.

  “Not a problem. I’m technically unemployed, so I suddenly have a lot of free time on my hands.”

  He said it lightly, but Kate didn’t miss the underlying hint of rejection and disappointment. The sympathy she’d tried to eliminate earlier in the day snuck up on her again. She did her best to keep it out of her face though. In her mind, he still didn’t deserve it.

  “I’m sure you won’t stay jobless for long, which is why I insisted on bringing you here today,” Kate
said. “As you know, I’m interested in seeing how you might fit in as hitting coach for our organization. Have you given much thought to the idea of coaching?”

  “Sure, but I thought those days were a few years down the road,” he said. “I’ll be honest and tell you I’d rather be playing. But since that doesn’t seem to be an option right now, I guess I’ll be happy if I can just stay involved with the game. Baseball is all I know.”

  “You have a degree in business though,” Kate said. “At least you have that to fall back on.”

  Kate had been impressed that Reid held a degree. He’d had a chance to enter the draft midway through college, but he’d waited. By the time he graduated, he’d also raised his draft stock. Not many pro athletes put their education first, and it made her respect him more, despite her reservations.

  “True, but I don’t want to fall back,” Reid said. “I want to move forward.”

  Blunt. To the point. Typical Reid.

  “Do you think being a hitting coach would qualify as moving forward?” she asked.

  Reid paused for a moment, clearly considering her question. Kate waited as he appeared to weigh the option in his mind. This gave her more time to study him, which wasn’t necessarily a good thing, although it wasn’t wholly unpleasant. His dishwater blonde hair looked the same as it had in high school – buzzed on the sides and slightly longer on top. The ends were blonder than the roots, and Kate couldn’t decide whether it was obtained from a salon or the sun. His seemingly permanent tan complemented his eyes, which were a color that could only be described a hazel, though Kate thought that label failed to do them justice. Indeed, they did look hazel from a distance, but anyone fortunate enough to get close enough to him would see they were actually golden brown rings with the faintest flecks of green. She remembered the first time she had looked into those eyes up close. She was pretty sure she’d melted on the spot. And he had seemed completely unaware. That was a long time ago, but the youthful sparkle still seemed to be there as she looked at him now, and that surprised her. Knowing what he’d been through over the years – to say nothing of the professional setback that brought him to her office today – she would have expected that sparkle to be missing. She wondered how he kept it around.

  “I don’t know,” he said, abruptly ending her study of him. “It’s not necessarily a step back. The position would be an honorable one, but playing again is going to be my ultimate goal.”

  “If you don’t mind me asking, do you have reason to believe another team might pick you up right now?”

  He shrugged. “I haven’t heard anything from my agent, if that’s what you’re after. In fact, when I told him about your call, he told me I should give it serious consideration. He thinks this would be a great move for me.”

  “I believe it would be too,” Kate said. “But I also need to know why you would be a great move for this team and, specifically, our offense.”

  “I’m glad you asked that,” Reid said. “I pulled last season’s batting stats and studied them on the flight. We both know stats don’t tell the whole story, but they can at least give an outline. I’m also familiar with your former hitting coach and his style. That fills in a few more gaps for me. He seemed to focus on a lot of power and big home runs. Your players embraced that, but they also struck out a lot. I would like to see if we can get them to take more walks and be more selective about the pitches they go after. Obviously, I say this without watching any film of the team, and it’s been two years since I’ve seen the Pioneers in interleague play, but I think it’s a good start.”

  Kate nodded. Reid’s insights weren’t earth-shattering, but he had hit some very key points, which showed he had done his homework. Also, it wasn’t so much what he said, but how he said it. He had a confidence in his words and yet didn’t claim to know all the answers without further investigation. Kate knew from experience that Reid would take his research on the offense seriously. He hadn’t necessarily been at the top of his class in academics, but when it came to baseball, he was a top scholar.

  The interview lasted a full hour, and Kate learned more about Reid’s work with the college players as well as the different methods he tried in attempt to repair his own batting woes. She could tell the latter was a tough subject for him and clearly something he thought about often. Maybe too often. Perhaps that was his problem, but Kate knew no one could tell a baseball player he was thinking too much; he had to figure it out and loosen up on his own.

  Throughout the interview, Kate felt her calm returning, and she was all business. Discussing baseball had corralled her nerves and kept her thoughts from drifting to her history with Reid. Then again, baseball had always been a safe subject for them. As long as they both stuck to that, they’d be fine. Kate shook his hand to close the interview, and as they walked to the door, she told him she expected to make a decision quickly.

  “Great,” Reid said. “And since I’m in town for the night, maybe we could get dinner.”

  “Excuse me?” Kate said, caught off-guard by his suggestion.

  “I know there’s a possibility that you’ll be my boss soon, but what would be the harm in two old friends having dinner?” he asked.

  Talk about a loaded question.

  The interview was one thing – but dinner for two was a completely different story. They were so much more than simply “old friends” and he knew it. She wasn’t sure she could keep her serene façade in check in a social setting, and she definitely didn’t want to unlock an emotional flood – a very real risk where he was concerned.

  “No harm,” Kate said, even though it felt like a lie. “But I have a lot to do. I need to go over my notes from our interview, make a few calls, and finalize some details for Fan Fest. I’m not sure I’ll get off work in time for dinner.”

  Work was her standby out, always there to help her in uncomfortable situations. And this most certainly qualified as uncomfortable.

  “I understand,” he said with a shrug. “With the time change and the travel, I’m pretty beat. I plan to catch a nap, so I probably won’t eat until around eight. If you change your mind, give me a call.”

  “Sure thing,” Kate said, opening the door to let him out.

  “It was good seeing you, Katie,” Reid said, offering his killer smile.

  Kate did her best not to show how the familiar nickname shook her as she merely nodded in response. He waved to her assistant and continued on down the hall. Just before stepping into the elevator, he turned and smiled back at her. Kate struggled to make a quick retreat into her office without blushing or scurrying away like a scared mouse. Behind her closed door, she fanned her face, but the heat wasn’t due to his smile or even the warmth of his hand enveloping hers in greeting and departure.

  He’d called her “Katie.”

  There it was.

  Katie.

  No one called her that.

  Except Reid.

  What’s more, the familiar nickname rolled off his tongue with such ease, you’d never know he hadn’t used it in years. She sat down at her desk and stared down at his stat sheets and the notes she’d taken during phone conversations with his references, the closest thing to a résumé she had. With great effort, she tried to re-focus on why Reid had just been in her office. The Pioneers needed a hitting coach, and despite her personal issues with him, Reid would be a very good fit. With a sigh, she began drafting a formal offer to e-mail to Reid and his agent. The one-year contract was decent but the salary was nowhere near what Reid was used to making. It also included a clause about his alcohol use. The contract could be voided if he was intoxicated in public or behaved in a way that would embarrass the organization. The team’s legal counsel flinched a little when she added it but assured her it wasn’t illegal. As badly as they needed a hitting coach, she also wanted to protect the team’s investment. She hoped Reid wouldn’t balk at the stipulation.

  James Scott was thrilled when he called to check in on Kate and learned of her progress. He had expec
ted her to drag her feet on even contacting Reid, so he was surprised she was acting so fast. He had done a bit of his own research on Reid, and he believed the signing would be huge for the organization. Not only would Reid satisfy the hitting coach role, but he would also bring some publicity to the team, something James was always trying to generate. He didn’t even try to mask his excitement about the new hitting coach, and he kept Kate on the phone for even longer than usual. It was one of the more pleasant conversations they’d had recently though, so she didn’t mind one bit. She soaked in his praise, letting it make up for all the pressure he’d been putting on her in recent months.

  By the time Kate finally hung up with the owner, Reid’s agent had responded. He was happy with the contract and had already conveyed his opinion to Reid. Now, Kate just had to wait for a call from the man, himself. This certainly wasn’t the first time she’d been in this position.

  Not by a long shot.

  Chapter Two

  Reid Benjamin had caught Katie Marks’ eye with the ease of tracking down a routine fly ball. It just took a bit longer – and a bold move on her part – for him to notice her. A senior in high school with scholarships on the line, he was too busy working on his bat speed and keeping his grades above water to pay much attention to the quiet brunette who sat in the front row next to the dugout at every home game.

  Even if he had noticed her sooner, Reid probably would have written her off as another jersey chaser. Sure, he’d enjoyed the attentions from a number of those girls, but he never let any of them get too close. He found them to be a distraction. Reid, and others, noticed that his batting average took a bit of a dip whenever he was involved with a female. Even in high school, he couldn’t afford that. His athletic talents would earn him the opportunity to be the first member of his family to go to college. Several college coaches had watched him and visited him over the last few years. A few pro scouts had come and gone as well. They all agreed he had talent, but the consensus was that a season or two of college ball would best benefit him, an opinion that pleased his parents.