First Position (13 page)

She twirled her hair feverishly.  “No on
e
ne
w
.” 

“Not good enough.  Tell your old man, or I will just drag it out of Wesley.” 

She thought her father was joking -- he probably was -- but she knew Wesley would be more than happy to gossip about her love life.  She couldn’t take that chance.  After a deep breath, she whispered, “Daniel Mason.”  Emory braced for her father to yell -- like she had heard him so many times at referees for bad calls.  But he didn’t say anything.  He kept quiet, snapping a piece of chalk on his desk, and shoving the empty pizza box on the floor.  He squeezed a few napkins for good measure. 

“Daddy?” 

“Yes, I’m here.” 

“Well?”

“I’m reserving judgment for a later date.”

With that, they talked briefly about her work and his off-season preparations.  When she hung up, she heard her phone dinging frantically in the den.  She hurried to her phone, seeing multiple texts and missed calls from Mason.

* * *

Mason had lost his appetite.  He sat at the dining room table in his hotel suite, staring at his steak, baked potato, and chocolate chip cookie on a side dish.  He kept his phone close, on the placemat, running his finger across it.
 
Ring, you bastard
!
   And it finally did.
 
Holy shit
!
  He immediately hit speaker.  “Em!”

“Yep, it’s me.”  Emory sat on the floor of her bedroom, with one hand on her phone and another massaging her left foot.

“Jesus, where have you been?”

“I just saw all your messages,” she said.  “It’s been a long day.”

“Bad?”

“I didn’t say that.  I got caught up in the studio, and then I had to make a lot of phone calls telling everyone about the break-up.  Sorry you were worried.”

“I was -- all day.”  Mason cut into his steak, his appetite returning.

“I’m sorry.  How was your day?

“Tests, exams, and pouring rain.  Sucked.”

Emory didn’t want to give Mason a chance to bring up Eric.  “I called my dad.  Told him about you.”

“Really?”  Mason coughed several times, nearly choking on his bite, then took a sip of water.  “How is John?  Does he still want to kill me?”

“I’m not sure.”  She switched to massaging her right foot.  “I think his exact words were he was reserving judgment.”

“Damn, what does that mean?”  Mason recalled the way her father looked at him at graduation, after they’d broken up.  It was a look as ferocious as he’d ever seen from a blitzing linebacker.
 
Fucking crazy eyes!

“Just keep me happy, and he’ll be happy.  When are you coming back?”  She hadn’t lost sight of the fact that he could be moving to Seattle.

“I should be back day after tomorrow, Wednesday, late afternoon.  I’ll come by straight from the airport.”

Emory breathed a sigh of relief.  “I’m glad you’re coming back to Charlotte.” 

“I’m going to be wherever you are,” he said, adding some pepper to his baked potato and took a bite.

“Oh, really?  Do I have any say in that?”

“No!”  Mason joked.  “Why didn’t you answer any of my calls or texts today?”

“I told you I was busy.  And I forgot my phone this morning, and when I got home, the battery was dead.  Crazy day.”

“Any craziness at Eric’s place?”

Crap, he hadn’t forgotten about that
.
  “It was fine.”

“You didn’t answer my question,” Mason said sharply, carving into his steak with a purpose.  “How did things go?”

“I said things went fine.”

“This is like pulling teeth.  The more you resist, the worse I imagine.  You don’t know the terrible thoughts I’ve been having.”  He gnawed the steak on his fork.  “This fucking rain isn’t helping my mood either.” 

Emory sighed.  “OK, he was there.”

“Shit! I knew he’d be waiting for you.”

“It wasn’t exactly like that.  He was with the wedding planner.”  

“Was he staging some kind of an intervention?”

“Not quite.”  Emory giggled.  “He was in the shower with her.”  She bit her tongue to avoid giggling some more, not wanting to provoke Mason further.

“What the fuck!”  Mason put down his fork and grabbed the knife.  “So you saw him naked?” 

“That’s what you’re concerned about?”

Mason calmed himself, putting the knife down.  “Sorry.  Had that been going on long?” 

“I don’t think so.  I think he knew I was coming and wanted to make me jealous.  That’s all.”

“Interesting tactic.  Did it work?”

“I thought it was pathetic.”  Emory heard Mason exhale through the phone and felt bad for giggling.  It certainly wasn’t funny while she was in Eric’s house, and she should’ve known Mason wouldn’t find it funny across the country.

“So how did Eric handle your interruption?”

She hesitated, increasing Mason’s blood pressure.  He stood up from his chair.  “Did that fucker put his hands on you?”  She hesitated again, and Mason took her silence as an admission, kicking over a dining room chair.  

Emory heard a loud crash.  “Mason!”  He grabbed the baked potato from his plate and fired it towards the garbage can near the entrance of the room, striking it hard, the potato exploding like a bomb, shattering into tiny white bits spraying across the floor.

“Fuck this, I’m coming back.”  He breathed heavily.  “I’ll be on the first flight back, and then I’m going to . . . .”

“Mason!  Stop!”  Emory yelled, rising to her feet.

Her tone startled him, jolting a small amount of sanity into his mind.  He paced the room trying to gather himself.  “Please tell me exactly what he did.” 

“Only if you promise to stay in Seattle and finish your contract meetings.”

“I won’t promise that.  If there is one mark on you, I swear to God -- I’ll take a football and spike it up his medical ass!”  Mason kicked the garbage can across the room.

“Mason, you are making it very hard for me to tell you.”  Emory had forgotten how protective Mason could be.  “Please sit down, and try to calm down.  Then I’ll tell you every detail, if you really want to know.” 

Mason stepped over the dining room chair and sat in front of his tray, though only the steak and cookie remained.  “OK, I’m sitting down now.”  Emory told him about Eric and Molly and the unwanted kiss, staying calm to make sure Mason did, too.  She again apologized for her dead phone battery and not calling sooner.  “Thanks for telling me.  I just hate that another guy had his hands on you.”

“How do you think I feel about Alexis?”

Mason gnashed his teeth.  “Point taken.  But Alexis is the only other woman I’ve been with, and not even in the same league as you.” 

“Really?  No one else?”
 
He must be the only NFL player who can say that.

“No.  I was married and kept my vows to her.”

“So, two women in your whole life?” 

“Yes, I’m not particularly proud of that.”

She laughed.  “I think a low number is good.”

“So, what’s yours?”  Mason braced himself.

“Wow!  That’s direct,” she said, embarrassed by the question.  “Can we talk about something else?”

“No.”

“Mason, this is very personal.  Please don’t make me tell you.”

Jesus, how high could it be?  Teens?  Twenties
?
  Mason grabbed his phone and cookie, moved over to the sofa, and stretched out his long body.
 
Maybe I should just drop this, and we can talk about the rain
!
  “My question and your answer are personal for me, too.”  He munched his cookie.  “I plan on having you in my bed as soon as you’ll allow it, so I think I have a right to know.”  Mason nodded, pleased with his own logic.
 
Steven isn’t the only smart guy in the family.

Emory closed her eyes.
 
Damn, he has a good point
.
  “Just one,” she whispered.

Mason dropped his cookie on the floor and sat up on the sofa.  “Can you repeat that?  I don’t think I heard you right.”

“There’s only ever been you,” she said, blushing.

“But it’s been six years!  And you were engaged!  And traveled Europe for two years!”

“What does Europe have to do with it?”  Emory laughed.

“Lots of clubs and kinky sex over there.  At least that’s what I heard.”

“Right, tons.  That’s all they do over there.  And you think I’m into that?”

“Well, remember that one time when we. . . .”

“Shut up.  I was so busy studying in Europe that I had no time for anything else.”

“What about Eric?”

“It had nothing to do with Eric,” she said, her voice cracking.  “It had to do with you.”  Emory explained that her time with Mason was special, and that no one else could compare, and that she’d suffered a lot of grief when their relationship ended.  So she guarded her heart carefully, to the point that Eric had to beg her for weeks to go out, and told him she wouldn’t make love again until marriage.  That was why Eric pushed so hard for a wedding date, which brought an end to their engagement. 

Mason couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
 
Dude was OK with that?  Will this rule apply to us
?
“I’m sorry all that happened, Em, but I’m here now, and I’m not leaving again.”

“But if Alexis hadn’t left you, would you be with me again?  Or are you only with me by default?” 

“God, is that what you think?  Nothing could be further from the truth.  I married her by default.”

“But. . . .”

“Em,” Mason stopped her, “if I had known I had a chance to be with you again, I would have left her.  But you wouldn’t see me.  I figured I lost you forever.  I fell apart without you.”

CHAPTER TEN

The Seahawks, like the past several years, had fallen short of their goals and missed the playoffs.  A lack of depth at the quarterback position was a central issue.  The starting quarterback had sustained a concussion in the third game and was sidelined for the next six weeks.  The Seahawks turned to their rookie quarterback -- a late-round draft choice from a small college, with supposedly big upside, who’d shown some promise in pre-draft workouts and threw the ball fairly well in a few pre-season appearances.  But nothing can prepare a rookie for the speed and ferocity of an NFL regular season game.  Management’s belief that he could serve as an adequate back-up turned out to be a huge mistake.  The rookie was unprepared and overwhelmed, and so began the demise of another regular season.

The General Manager couldn’t afford to have this happen again.  His job was on the line.  He needed a proven quarterback who could enter a game in a pinch and keep the team afloat if the starter went down.  This type of player -- the journeyman quarterback with proven ability and some fuel left in the tank -- was always in short supply.  Quarterbacks in the NFL typically were either very good -- the starters and franchise players -- or not very good at all -- untrustworthy rookies, draft busts, or over-the-hill veterans.  The journeyman quarterback was in a category all his own.

When the season ended, the General Manager targeted Mason as a possible back-up.  He compiled binders on Mason’s career, his five-year stint in the NFL marked by occasional highs and lows.  He started some games and played well, then played poorly in others.  In other games, he came off the bench to rally the team to victory, but sometimes he entered a bad game and made it even worse.  There seemed to be no rhyme or reason why Mason played well at times and poorly other times.  But he was experienced and had the potential to carry a team for a few games, seemingly what the Seahawks needed.  His arm was a concern, though.  The General Manager didn’t want to substitute an unproven rookie with an uncertain arm.  It’s why he insisted on a thorough medical examination, including an MRI. 

Steven and Mason sat across a large conference room table from the General Manager and Head Coach.  The General Manager held the medical assessment in his hand.  It was full of uncertainty, the doctors not knowing whether the joint was healing properly and whether Mason’s arm strength would ever return.  It was not the news the General Manager had hoped for, but Mason perhaps could still fit in his plans, though at a reduced price. 

The General Manager got straight to the point.  “We have real concerns about Mason’s arm.”  He held up the paperwork and slid it across the table to Steven, who reviewed them, then whispered something to Mason, signaling he had things under control.

“We don’t,” Steven replied firmly, looking the General Manager straight in the eye.

“Of course you’re going to say that.  All agents say that.”

Steven smiled and leaned forward.  “So what are we doing here?”  Mason looked out the window, raining again.

“Well, we are interested in Mason, but concerned.”