“Relax, Carly,” he says, pulling me back into his grasp. “We are here to enjoy each other. I won’t take anything from you that you won’t already want to give me.” He smiles reassuringly, his boyish charm setting my mind at ease.
He shakes my arm until I let out a smile. “Come on. It’s on like Donkey Kong, little lady,” he says, pulling me through the entrance.
We stop at the front counter and Royce dings the bell to alert the attendant of our arrival. We have to wait for someone to rent our clubs from, but no one answers. I step out onto the course to look around for someone, but the course is pretty deserted. Only a small group of college-aged girls on the far end. Royce gets severely impatient, bouncing his hand continuously on the bell.
I elbow him in the ribs and he bends over and groans pretending as though he’s critically injured. “Oh, stop it. You’re fine,” I laugh as I nudge him.
“Hello? Anyone here?” I shout into the back employee area.
We are met with strangled moans and grunts, sounds of papers and boxes falling onto the ground, and then the unmistakable shrill of a woman enjoying herself.
“Oh, my God, people are doing it back there,” I whisper, pointing to the back area of the building.
Royce perks up, all fake injuries magically healed, and rushes to the employee door where I’m standing.
He bursts into laughter. “Maybe that’s part of the employee benefits package,” he jokes.
“What do we do?” I ask, walking back around to the front of the counter. “Should we leave?”
Royce grabs score cards, golf balls, and clubs from behind the counter, and throws a twenty on the register. “Hell, no. We came here to golf. I’m pretty sure they could care less if we just helped ourselves. I think they would prefer this to us interrupting whatever they have going on back there,” he adds with a smirk.
A loud strangled noise of a couple climaxing spills out from the doorway and I want nothing more than to get away from this uncomfortable situation. “I’ll meet you out there,” I say over my shoulder as I walk out of the clubhouse and onto the course. I can’t get out of there fast enough, and Royce just chuckles at my discomfort with our predicament.
Just as I reach the first putting obstacle, my embarrassment level spikes to an all-time high. My eyes widen and I search for anything to look at other than what is in front of me, but I fail miserably. Walking out of the backdoor and onto the course are our sexcapade culprits. The middle-aged man is extremely large and looks as though he just got out of the shower. However, I know it’s sweat and not water rolling down his cheeks and neck. He’s tucking his collared shirt into his sweatpants and wiping his face off when he notices me.
I turn away from him as quickly as I can and act casual, hoping Royce will join me and we can start our game like we didn’t just see, or rather hear, the most unprofessional and inappropriate thing ever.
Nope, Royce walks through the main entrance arm in arm with our woman of the hour. Her hair and makeup look as though they have been recently corrected and smoothed out. She has the tell-tale post-coital glow and she looks as though she couldn’t care less that we just heard her scream out Mr. Putt-Putt’s name.
I admit to myself that I’m slightly jealous of seeing her cougar paws all over Royce. He’s not mine, but there is a voice in my head screaming, Warning, back off woman. I claim that man for myself. At the very least, I want her to unhand him and reattach herself to Captain Sweatpants.
“Look who I found,” Royce drawls with a crooked smile. “Wanda here said we were more than welcome to grab whatever equipment we needed and go ahead and start our game.”
She rubs her hand up and down his bicep and giggles. Actually giggles like an immature school girl. “Sorry I was indisposed when you all came in. I am just so embarrassed. Welcome to our little establishment. I sure hope you two enjoy yourselves.”
Lies, lies I tell you. She’s not sorry, nor is she embarrassed. She is feeling rather good and satisfied. My eyes zero in on her exploring hand and I quietly hate her. In fact, I want to hit her with my golf club. Royce notices my squinted eyes and grimaced expression and shoots a befuddled look back to me. When I attempt to correct my expression, he smiles at my dismay.
“Thank you for your help. I think we’ll get started with our game,” Royce tells her while politely taking her hand off his arm.
“Absolutely. Just holler if you need anything. Bob and I will be around,” she offers before leaving to join him at the side entrance. I watch her as she walks to him and explains her meeting with us. They both then wave to us, which only makes the entire exchange even more uncomfortable. I quickly throw my hand up and down in a stiff pathetic-looking wave and turn back around to face Royce.
His arms are folded across his chest and his smile is plastered from ear to ear.
“Well, that was awkward,” I immediately tell him.
“Mmm hmm,” he enunciates slowly, unmoving.
“What? That was seriously ridiculous. I can’t even believe we are going to stay.” I move past him, ignoring his suspicious grin.
“You were jealous,” he finally announces.
“I certainly was not!” I defend, snatching a club and ball away from him and preparing for the first obstacle. He may have a slight point. There were a few pangs of jealousy coursing through me when I saw sex-crazed Wanda fawning over him, but those feelings don’t matter. I’m in the middle of a divorce and I’m trying to hold my life together. The last thing I need is a romantic distraction, especially one like Royce. He’s the lead singer of a band, not exactly father material.
“Okay, whatever you say,” he chuckles following behind me.
Taking a deep breath, I grip the rubber on the top of the golf club and focus on the little white ball on the green. I size up the hole at the end of the course on the other side of the windmill obstacle, my eyes bouncing back and forth from the ball to the hole.
Royce’s arms snake around me and his tattooed hands cover mine. I feel his chest press against my back and his head dip into my neck. I’m startled and I freeze, unsure what to do.
“If by chance you were jealous, all you have to say is yes, Carly. I would never let you regret that decision,” he whispers.
My heart feels like it’s going to pound out of my chest, my breath catches, and I’m left completely speechless. My head is telling me to push him away and set boundaries, but my body rejects the notion.
He lightly kisses my cheek and then moves away as quickly as he appeared. I hear him open the bag of candy he brought with us and unwrap some Starbursts as I take my first swing. I watch as the little ball rolls down the course and stops nowhere near the hole. It smacks against the front of the windmill and bounces back down the course.
“You want a do-over?” he asks, struggling with a mouth full of Starbursts.
I spin around to him. “No. It’s your turn; it’s only fair.”
He gives me a nod and digs into the candy bag, pulling out a few squares of goodness and places the bag on the ground. I move out of his way so he can take his stance at the start of the course, but he grabs my hand and places a pink wrapped candy in my palm.
“Dessert,” he says with a smile before moving away from me.
He stretches his body in an over exaggerated fashion, reaching the club above his head and twisting his midsection back and forth. He carries on with this for several minutes until I finally can’t help but laugh.
“Oh my goodness, shoot already,” I giggle.
He bounces back and forth on the balls of his feet while stretching his neck. “You can’t rush genius; I’m preparing my body for battle,” he explains in jest.