Lady Be Good

by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

  Emma needed a hell of a lot more instruction than that! Kenny strode toward her. “Since Francesca missed, you don’t have to get it in the cup on your first putt, but you have to get it close. Aim right for the cup. And hold the club a little lower. Keep your head still. Just do everything Ted said.”

  He’d meant to reassure her, but her knuckles grew pale again as she resumed her death grip on his putter.

  Ted shot him an annoyed look, but Kenny had too much at stake to stand idly back and allow her to screw this up for him. “Move your arms, but keep everything else completely still. The motion comes from your shoulders, do you understand? Take the club back and then move it right through the ball in one smooth motion. Got it?”

  Instead of listening to him, her grip grew even tighter as she moved behind the ball. He realized he’d been thrust into his worst nightmare. He’d been forced to hand control of his life over to someone else. And not just anyone, but a domineering woman who professed to love him. It was his childhood all over again.

  His eyes felt gritty as she drew back the club and tapped the ball. It barely rolled four feet before it came to a stop.

  “The cup’s up there!” he exclaimed. “You’re not even close!”

  “I didn’t want to hit it too hard like Francesca.”

  He ground his teeth. “Francesca had a downhill putt. Yours is uphill. You need to hit an uphill harder.”

  “Well, you might have told me that first instead of bombarding me with all that other twaddle.”

  Twaddle!

  He realized Dallie was staring at him, and his gaze was even more censorious than before. “Francie, you’re away. This time it’s uphill. Just try to get it close, okay?”

  “Of course, darling.”

  She lined up all crooked again, and Kenny shot Skeet a lethal look, daring him to intercede. Unfortunately, he’d picked the wrong person to intimidate because it was his own turncoat caddy who betrayed him.

  “Move your right foot back, Mom, or you’re going to hit it way to the left.”

  Francesca did as he suggested, then stopped to push a lock of hair back from her face. “If I’d known I was going to play, I’d have brought barrettes. You don’t happen to have a barrette, do you, Emma?”

  “I don’t think so. Let me check my purse.”

  These women were going to kill him! “Emma doesn’t have a barrette!” Kenny snagged Emma’s arm as she started to head back to the cart. “I took her last one this morning.”

  Francesca gave him a snooty look, held back her hair with one hand, grasped the putter with the other, and sent the ball flying up the green.

  Kenny caught his breath. She’d hit it way too hard, but by some miracle her line was straight. If the ball caught the back of the cup, it was going to drop. It was going to . . .

  The ball clipped the right edge of the cup, and Kenny’s heart stopped as he waited for it to fall.

  It wobbled, held the edge, then rolled past.

  Francesca let out a whoop. “I almost made it! Did you see that? Did you see it, Dallie?”

  “I sure did!” Dallie beamed at her. “What do you think, Kenny? About the best putt this woman ever hit. A little strong, but she had the right idea.”

  Kenny felt sick. Francesca’s ball had stopped barely ten inches above the cup. Even she could tap it in from there. If Emma didn’t put the ball close on her next putt, she wouldn’t have a chance at a tie. And he no longer believed she had it in her to put it close. Her behavior had grown too erratic. He had to do something.

  His heart raced. He moved toward Dallie. “I’ve got an idea for a new contest, Dallie. Francesca and me. I only get one putt, she gets two. What do you say, Francie? You’re not even a foot away, and I’m over twenty-five feet. If I don’t make my putt, you win.”

  Francesca shaped her lips into a little girl’s pout that was at complete odds with her barracuda brain. “Absolutely not! Emma and I are having fun, aren’t we, Emma?”

  Emma’s complexion had turned green beneath her sunglasses, and he knew she’d figured out that more was at stake here than a simple game of golf. “As a matter of fact, it might be a good idea if Kenny—”

  “Oh, no, you don’t!” Francesca settled a hand on her slim hip. “Kenny’s one of the best putters on the tour. Even from that far away, he’ll probably put it in, and then I’ll lose. At least I have a chance with you.” She pointed one manicured fingernail toward Kenny’s ball. “Hit it, Emma.”

  Kenny squeezed his eyes shut. Francesca was going to sink her putt. But could Emma put hers in in two? Not a chance if she didn’t get it close. “Hit it smooth.” His jaw was so tightly clenched it ached. “All you have to do is put it up there.”

  She lined up properly, but the club head wobbled as she took it back. He closed his eyes . . . heard Ted groan . . . opened his eyes . . .

  She’d left it short by two and a half feet.

  His ball now rested nearly three feet below the cup, while Dallie’s was less than a foot above. If both women sank their putts, it would be a tie. But Emma’s putt was farther.

  “My turn!” Francesca said.

  His ball was away, and it wasn’t her turn. He waited for someone to correct her, and, when nobody did, started to say something himself only to hold back at the last second. If he said anything, they’d all stare at him as if he’d twisted the head off a kitten. His blood boiled, and he could feel himself beginning to lose what remained of his self-control.

  Francesca stepped up. “Do you think I should putt with my sunglasses on or off?” she asked her husband.

  Of all the idiotic questions! His entire future was at stake, and Francesca was worried about her sunglasses!

  Dallie, however, acted as if her question was perfectly reasonable. “I guess that’s up to you. However you feel comfortable.”

  “Are you going to keep your sunglasses on?” Francesca called across the green to Emma.

  Emma turned to him and Kenny felt himself losing it.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “What should I do, Kenny?”

  “Don’t worry about the fucking sunglasses!”

  Francesca frowned at his explosion. “Little pitchers,” she said with a pointed look at Ted.

  Ted sighed.

  Dallie grinned.

  Kenny felt as if the top of his head had blown off.

  Francesca moved into position. “This is so exciting. I’ve never won before, and even I can make this. You won’t be upset if I win, will you, Emma? I’m not actually very good, but—Oops.”

  Yes! Kenny could barely contain a whoop of victory as Francesca’s putt caught the lip of the cup and rolled past six inches.

  “Bloody stupid game!”

  Oh, yes! Yes! Now that the pressure was off, even Emma could do this. She had two chances to win this thing for him and only a two-and-a-half-foot putt. His sexy, determined, Emma!

  He slipped in front of her, turning his back to the rest of them so no one else could hear. Every one of his senses was fully alert as he willed her to concentrate. “Now listen to me, sweetheart. Pay attention to every word I’m saying. You’ve only got a two-and-a-half-foot putt, and you have two chances to get it in. You can do this. I want you to line up nice and straight and take that club head back smooth, not like you did last time. I don’t want to see any wobble. And hold yourself completely still. Nothing moves except your arms, you understand? Take the putter straight back, then bring it through the ball right toward the hole. Now do you have any questions? Any questions at all?”

  She bit her lip and peered up at him from beneath the brim of her straw hat. “Do you love me even a little bit?”

  Oh, God Not now! Not this! Shit! Wasn’t this just like a woman! He bit back a stream of expletives and tried to speak reasonably. “We’ll talk about it after we’re done, all right?”

  She shook her head. The cherries bobbed. “I need to talk about it now.”

  “No, Emma. It doesn’t have to be now.” His own eyes
stared back at him from the reflection in the lenses of her sunglasses, and they looked wild.

  She lifted her chin an inch. “Yes. It does.”

  Blood churned like acid through his veins. “Don’t do this to me. Why? Why does it have to be now?”

  “I don’t know. I only know that it does.” Her chin trembled, she slipped off her sunglasses, and he saw that her eyes were dark with pain. His unruly stomach cramped as he watched her try to pull herself together. “Never mind. I’m being foolish. Besides, I already know the answer.” She slid her sunglasses into her pocket. “What a goose I’ve been about all this. I’m in way over my head with you. Of course, you’ve known that all along. Well, it has to stop.” She managed a brisk little smile. “I’ll do my best to hit your putt, Kenny. And then I’m getting out of your life.”

  His stomach . . . it wasn’t ever going to be the same. “You’re talking stupid. I don’t want to hear this.”

  “Nevertheless, it has to be said. And you of all people should understand. Don’t you remember, Kenny?” Once again that heartbreak of a smile, full of strong intent, but wobbly at the corners. The saddest thing he’d ever seen. “Love that has to be earned on the golf course, or anyplace else, for that matter, isn’t worth it. Love has to be a free gift or it doesn’t have any value at all.”

  Just like that, she pulled the world out from under his feet.

  She stepped around him to line up, and as she gripped the putter, he remembered his father, and Petie, and the Diaper Derby, and the way Emma’d looked when she’d jumped on that Gray Line tour bus. He shivered. All morning he’d been sweating, but now he was chilled right down to his bones. And somehow he knew that, if he let her hit this putt, he would have lost her forever.

  The knowledge came to him from someplace deep inside, a small, constricted place where he’d kept so many feelings locked away. Now that place spilled open and he saw that he loved this woman with every breath in his body.

  She’d already drawn back the putter, her line was perfect, and his heart shot right up into his throat.

  “Emma!”

  The putter wobbled. Stalled. She looked up.

  He smiled at her. Or at least he tried. His vision blurred as his life settled into place around him. “The game’s over, sweetheart,” he said huskily. “We’re going home now.”

  “What?” Dallie shot forward, his eyes glittering. “You can’t do that! You heard what I told you. If you walk away, you know exactly what you’ll be giving up.”

  Kenny nodded. “I know. But this is upsetting Emma, and I’m not going to have it.” He snatched the putter from her hand and shoved it at Dallie. “I forfeit the match. It’s all yours, and you can damn well do whatever you want with it.”

  Then he wrapped his arm around Emma’s shoulders and began to lead her off the green.

  “But your putt . . .” she said. “I told you I’d make your putt.”

  “Shhh . . . it’s all right. You don’t have to earn my love on any damn golf course, Lady E. It’s yours for the asking.”

  She stopped walking and stared up at him.

  He’d just thrown his career out the window, but as he gazed down into that heart-stopper of a face, he knew this woman was worth a thousand careers. And with that knowledge, he finally understood everything that had eluded him for so long. He understood that, each time he’d played eighteen holes, he’d been trying to justify his life, and that he wasn’t going to do it anymore. He saw that he was more than a man who knew how to swing a club, that he had a brain, ambition, and some dreams for the future he hadn’t even known existed. As he stood there next to the eighteenth green, he finally understood what had been eluding him—that there were a lot of things more important in his life than golf, and the way he loved this woman was at the top of his list.

  He ducked beneath the brim of her hat and brushed her lips with a kiss.

  Dallie’s soft chuckle drifted his way across the green. “Congratulations, champ. I knew you’d get the idea sooner or later. And welcome back to the pro tour.”

  Kenny barely heard. He was too worried about the fact that Emma wasn’t kissing him back.

  Chapter 24

  As Kenny saw the stricken expression on her face, he realized he was going to have to do some fast taking, but he couldn’t do it here, not with the Beaudine family right on his heels. They were too unpredictable, and he had no idea who they’d side with. Besides, the self-satisfied expression on Francesca’s face was distracting him. It made him wonder if she was quite as bad with that putter as she’d seemed to be.

  “We’re getting out of here.” He began half pulling, half dragging Emma toward the clubhouse, gripped by a sense of urgency he didn’t even try to understand. Normally, he would have gone to the locker room to shower and change. But not today. Today she was going to have to take him sweat and all because he wasn’t letting her out of his sight, not until she understood that he loved her, and that they were married for now and forever. Not until she figured out they had a life together that included filling up their ranch house with a whole passel of kids.

  The thought of Emma pregnant with his babies was so sweet his damn eyes started filling up with tears. He had to get her out of here right now before he embarrassed himself in front of everybody. Except . . . he’d left his car keys in his locker.

  “Listen here, Emma. You stand right there—right by those golf carts, while I get my keys. Don’t you move! You understand me?”

  She regarded him stonily. “I haven’t understood you since the day we met.”

  It wasn’t the most encouraging response, but he risked brushing another kiss over those stiff lips. “Yes, you have, sweetheart. You understand me better than anybody I’ve ever known.” He began backing toward the door. “Please, just stay right there.”

  He whipped around, rushed into the pro shop without bothering to knock the dirt off his shoes, and raced for the locker room, moving faster than anybody at Windmill Creek, or the entire town of Wynette for that matter, had ever seen him move.

  His hands were shaking, and he had trouble with the lock on his locker, but even so he didn’t leave her alone more than two minutes. By the time he got back, however, she’d disappeared.

  There was only one explanation. The Beaudines had her. Those rotten, perverse Beaudines! The same Beaudines who were coming toward the clubhouse right now from the eighteenth green, with Ted driving the cart, and Dallie and Francesca strolling behind, their arms around each other.

  “What did you do with her!” he shouted, even as he realized that she wasn’t with them, so they couldn’t have done anything with her.

  Dallie looked amused, Francesca distressed. “Oh, Kenny, you can’t have lost her already.”

  He spun around and ran toward the parking lot. Emma didn’t have a car, and she was in a snit, so she’d decided to walk, that was all. She’d be right out there on the highway, marching along the white line like a drill sergeant, probably picking up litter on the way and God help anybody who spit out the window of his pickup.

  He raced down a row of cars toward the entrance, his worry mounting because she was too mad at him to pay one bit of attention where she was going. And he didn’t even know why she was mad. Except he did know. He’d been so slippery with her right from the beginning that she didn’t trust his feelings for her.

  He stopped running when he reached the entrance to the parking lot and looked up and down the highway, but he didn’t see anything except an old blue Dodge heading in one direction and a Park Avenue heading the other. Maybe he was wrong, maybe she hadn’t come this direction at all. Maybe she’d gone inside the clubhouse and headed for the Wagon Wheel Room to get something cold to drink.

  He spun on his heel and ran back across the parking lot, past the Beaudines, and into the club house. But she wasn’t in the Wagon Wheel Room. She wasn’t anywhere.

  Emma leaned against the fence and stared at Torie’s emus pecking away at the ground. She was no longer furious; s
he was simply numb. Once again, Kenny had used her emotions against her. But this would be the last time.

  She had no idea what had motivated his display on the eighteenth green; she only knew that she had once again been manipulated. Somehow Kenny had decided to use her as a pawn in his get-even scheme against Dallie Beaudine. Well, she’d finally had enough. She couldn’t bear having her emotions spun about in the whirlwind that made up Kenny Traveler’s life any longer.

  What an idiot she’d been! Like every other woman in history who’d fallen in love with the wrong man, she’d imagined that she could change him, but that wasn’t going to happen. And today, with his false declaration of love, he’d finally and forever broken her heart.

  One of the larger emus lifted his head to study her. Nothing had ever been more welcome to her than the sight of Shelby and Torie rounding the corner of the clubhouse just as Kenny had disappeared inside. They’d taken one look at her face, thrust her into Torie’s BMW, and brought her here.

  On the way, they’d picked and prodded at her in their typically American way, demanding that she give up her secrets and tell them everything. She’d evaded them, but when they’d gotten to the Traveler house, they’d started questioning her all over again.

  She knew their probing was well-intentioned. In their minds, they couldn’t help her if they didn’t know what was wrong, but she couldn’t tell them. The truth made her seem too pitiful—the dotty, dear thing who’d unwisely fallen in love with a gorgeous, violet-eyed rogue who couldn’t commit.

  Besides, she understood something about them that Kenny couldn’t seem to comprehend. Despite all their protests that they’d never speak to him again because he’d upset her, he was theirs, and they’d do anything for him.

  It was Torie who finally seemed to realize how much she needed to be alone, and she’d suggested Emma wander down to the emu pen to see her “critters.” Now, as Emma propped her hands on the wooden fence post and gazed at the ungainly birds, she knew it was time to do what she should have done on Sunday. It was time to get on a plane and go home.