“So I thought about you and Coopersville. I know we didn’t end things on good terms, but I knew you’d be a nice guy, even if you were still angry with me. I took a chance, and Luis hired me and rented me one of the places you own, which is really nice place, by the way. I could not have afforded a place like that in Austin. It felt serendipitous.”
Cooper didn’t speak. He hadn’t expected an apology.
“Are you planning to fire me?” she asked, finally looking up at him.
He sat for a minute, quietly considering her. “No. Not as long as you do your job,” he said.
“Thank you, and I will. I knew I could count on you. I won’t disappoint you this time. I will do my job to the best of my abilities,” she said.
He sat silently watching as she got to her feet.
“Thank you again,” she said.
“Sure,” he said. He leaned back into his chair after she was gone, considering their conversation. He realized two things, two conclusions he’d been working his way toward since seeing her for the first time this morning. For one thing, he had meant what he said to her. He would not be firing her. Yes, he could, and it would be a perfect revenge for the way she’d left him. But revenge would mean he was still invested, and he wasn’t. He’d been caught off guard when he saw her here this morning, yes, but as the day progressed, those feelings had moved off.
Honestly, he was glad that he’d escaped, which brought him to his second realization. She wasn’t the one for him. He’d come to that fact years ago, after the initial hurt of her choices had passed. He wasn’t interested in her anymore, not even a little bit. So if she wanted to work here and live across the street from him, that was fine, just so long as she left him alone.
#
A little before dusk, Cooper arrived at the golf course. Celeste’s return mixed with the arrival of Houston the ex-boyfriend had put a damper on his anticipation for a night of golf followed by some more adult time with the professor. The parking lot was empty save for the professor’s SUV.
He parked his truck, and shot a quick glance over at the driving range. It sat empty and dark, and she was not where she said she’d be.
He scanned the practice area, also empty. She wasn’t in the clubhouse either. Grabbing his clubs from the back of his truck, he walked over the maintenance shed to get the gator. He wasn’t sure what hole he’d find her on or if he’d find her at all. He hoped so, in spite of his reservations.
She was on hole twelve, which was at the back end of the course, the farthest one from the clubhouse. He sat for a while, watching her. She was dressed in shorts—black, knee-length, and tailored—a perfect fit for her body’s curves, and a pink polo shirt was tucked into them. Legs bare except for those snowy-white golf shoes again, hair pulled back into another ponytail.
He drove over to meet her. She’d just finished tapping her ball into the hole when she looked up at the sound of the gator’s approach. She smiled.
“You’re not where you said you’d be,” Cooper said, pulling out his sexy I’m-happy-to-see-you smile. He’d pulled alongside her golf cart and waited until she walked over to him.
“I decided to hit the course instead. I didn’t get to play as long as I wanted to yesterday, so I came out earlier. I hoped you’d look for me when you noticed I wasn’t at the driving range.”
“I thought you might have changed your mind,” he said.
“Nope,” she said, smiling, looking him over too—dressed in shorts like yesterday; a plain T-shirt this time, The Coopersville Brewpub, not tucked; and those old, beat-up golf shoes on his feet.
“You want to play another hole?” she asked. She was standing beside the gator now.
“I was thinking about it.”
“If not golf, what else would you want to do?” she asked, her desire for him on display in her eyes.
He smiled and stuck out his left hand, snagged her wrist, and pulled her closer. He put his hands on her waist and lifted her off her feet, setting her down in between his legs in the gator, and kissed her. No convincing was needed apparently, as she opened her mouth and moved her tongue in to play with his.
“There were four guys here earlier, playing in front of me, and when they left, they told me that I should be careful playing out here in the dark. I was on my way in after this hole,” she said in a break between their kisses.
“Good thing I caught you,” he said, and went back to kissing her. He pulled her into his lap, legs on the outside of his, straddling his hips. She felt good, and he pulled her hips closer to touch him, where it did him the most good, sucking his breath in at the contact.
“I’m glad too. I bet it gets really dark out here,” she said, looking around now, a little nervous.
“It does,” he said, bringing her face back to his to be kissed, his hand moving up to her breasts now, caressing them through her shirt before it moved lower, first to pull her shirt free of her shorts, and then under her shirt and up and under her bra. He squeezed one of her breasts in each hand—nice, soft, and the perfect size—before he tugged their tips softly. She moaned into his mouth. He would stop and ask his questions about Myra in a second, right after this kiss.
“Here?” she asked, pulling away, her mouth inches from his.
“Why not?” he said, and kissed her again.
“Oh,” she said after a moment, gazing into his eyes.
“You’re not afraid of the dark, are you?” he asked, his mouth at her neck now.
“No, I guess not. Aren’t you worried someone might see us?” she asked. His mouth felt nice moving along her chin.
“No. It’ll be totally dark here in a minute, and no one else is here. Yours was the only car in the parking lot when I arrived,” he said, and hit the latch on the seat. It rolled back a few inches, giving him more legroom.
“If you’re sure,” she said.
“I am. But first I need to ask you a few questions. I’ll start by formally introducing myself,” he said, his mouth back on hers, his tongue playing with hers, his hands at the waist of her shorts. He glided his fingers over her hips and moved them smoothly downward to cup her ass, pulling her hips in close to the front of his body, rubbing against her. She moaned.
“My name is Cooper. Barnabus Lee Cooper. The man you think is stealing from your aunt Myra,” he said, his eyes on her, watching her, looking for her reaction. “I don’t steal,” he added. He hadn’t removed his hand from her ass, and he continued to hold her against him, waiting to see how she’d respond.
#
“But you said your name was LC. And what’s this about my aunt?” she said, eyes closed in pleasure, her lips still at his neck. He was one smooth kisser.
“LC stands for Lee Cooper, a nickname from my childhood,” he said.
“You’re the same Cooper who owns the pub?” she asked, pulling back slightly so that she could gaze into eyes that were the same crazy heated as yesterday, completely at odds with tone.
“I don’t own it. It’s a co-op. I’m just the manager. But you knew that already, didn’t you? I think you knew who I was long before you arrived into town.”
“How would I have known that? And how do you know me?” she asked, still staring into his eyes. What was up with all this talking? It was so not what she came here to do.
“Of course you knew, and your aunt told me…us…warned us about you, and asked us to help her find out what you were up to,” he said.
“What I’m up to? What does that even mean? And who is ‘us’?” she said, sitting back. He had her full attention now, although straddling his lap wasn’t the best position of strength from which to discuss anything.
“By us, I mean a few of her closest friends, those who have her back. Your aunt told us about your planned visit here for the summer. She hadn’t seen you in a very long time, and given her relationship with your mother, she was worried that you might be up to something nefarious,” he said, staring at her, his expression a little hardened.
“‘
Nefarious’?” she asked. He nodded. She didn’t know how to respond other than to get to her feet. She pulled herself away, straightened her bra, pulled her shirt down, and tucked it back into her shorts.
“Okay, this is starting to feel strange. What exactly are you accusing me of?” she asked.
“I think you’re here to get your hands on your aunt’s money, a scheme that you and your mother concocted to stop your aunt from spending her money in the way she sees fit. You’re here to make sure she leaves money for you and your sister. Or maybe it’s to try to take it from her now. Maybe that’s your goal. Do you hope to find her incompetent, so you and your mother can swoop in to take what’s left? That old getting-something-for-nothing plan that your mother is famous for, or are both of you famous for it? Apples don’t fall far from the tree usually,” he said, his face becoming more hardened as he spoke.
“So I’m thief? You are accusing me a being a thief?” she said, starting to get angry.
“More a gold digger than a thief,” he said, all nonchalant, like this was normal, everyday conversation. “You follow the money. I’m willing to bet that you know who I am, and that you knew well before yesterday, well before you made your trip here. I’m willing to bet you know all there is to know about me. I’ve heard it’s what you do. I believe you are in town for money, mine or your aunt’s or maybe both—hell, who knows? I’ve met women like you before,” he said.
“You don’t know me.”
“I think I do,” he said.
She stared at him for a minute, not sure what to think, except for feeling more than a bit blindsided. It sounded like he didn’t really like her, and how that could be after what had happened last night, after what had happened a few minutes ago?
“So I drove down to a small-assed town like Coopersville, Texas, famous for its intolerance for anything brown, and I also somehow engineered to meet you at the gas station and followed you here? Is that what you believe?” she asked, pointing her finger toward him, having found her anger. Her eyes were almost sparking with righteous indignation.
“I’m here to snag you for your money. Oh, and while I’m at it, I might as well steal from my aunt and get into her good graces so she’ll leave me all of her money. You do know that her money comes to me anyway. Her will requires it. Is this really what you think of me?” she asked.
“You wouldn’t be the first,” he said, stepping out of the cart now, stretching his arms above his head.
She walked closer to him until she stood in front, her finger pointing at him. She inhaled, taking in a huge gulp of air, and he knew another barrage of words was on its way.
#
He watched her inhale, anger spilling out of her eyes even as she squared her shoulders. He smiled to himself, losing his irritation, ’cause she was the picture of an angry woman done wrong, and she was preparing to let him have it from both barrels, and so not in the way that he would have preferred. Still, it was a sexy picture.
“I’m a thief,” she said.
“And a gold digger, don’t forget that part,” he added—and was that humor she heard in his voice? Was she some big joke to him?
She looked away, the air leaving her body. She shook her head, dumbfounded and hurt by his accusations, and here she was once again, having to explain herself to someone; this path was so familiar and so very old, all that like mother, like daughter bullshit. She laughed and shook her head again.
“What was this?” she asked, pointing to the gator. “What was this and in the trailer yesterday?”
“A good time for me. For you. Who knows?” he said, and shrugged. “A test drive, a tease, a setup—any and all of the above would work,” he said, and watched her flinch.
“Okay, then,” she said, shaking her head, a mixture of surprise, anger, and hurt running through her body. “Well, thanks. Glad you were satisfied,” she said, making her way to her golf cart. “I hope you get eaten by a bear or a lion or whatever there is lurking in the woods around here,” she said over her shoulder as she slid into the seat of her cart.
She had to turn around to get back to the clubhouse, and she headed straight for him as she came out of her turn. He jumped off the sidewalk to avoid getting run over. She would have found it funny if she weren’t so pissed.
God, it’s dark out here, was her first thought as she made her way back, fuming. Asshole, jerk, and various other curse words ran through her mind too. She took another deep calming breath and looked around at the darkness all around her. Thankfully the cart had lights.
She pulled out the keys she’d taken from his gator and smiled wickedly. He’d have to walk back, the jackass, and it would take him a while. She hoped it took him all night. Not likely; he and his in-shape ass would probably run the whole way.
He’d just called her a gold digger and a thief. Was that what her aunt thought of her too? And after she’d made such a point of being truthful and up-front. That hurt more than anything LC, Cooper, or whatever his name was had said. What the hell, she thought, and she gave serious consideration to throwing the gator’s keys into some tall grass. Lucky for him, she left them on the steps of the clubhouse instead.
She pulled out of the parking lot, heading for her aunt’s home. What a jerk, and all those silly notions and thoughts about how he might be a nice, small-town guy.
Oh, but she’d thought that about LC, the golf-course maintenance man, not Barnabus Lee Cooper, the rich asshole. What was it about men with money that made them feel they could treat people any old which way? Another Houston who thought the world was his oyster and the women in his life should be happy to be there.
“Fuck it up and your ass is out of here,” she said out loud. That should be the warning that came with men like them. She was turning into the opposite of her mom. She wanted nothing to do with rich men; they were a useless bunch.
#
It wasn’t what he’d expected, but he should have known better, he realized, as he headed back to the gator, which he’d left less than twenty-five minutes ago, parked on hole number twelve. He’d had to leave it behind. Thanks to a little thing like a missing key. He’d hurt Kendall by assuming she was the same as Celeste and the many other women he’d dated. Tonight, it seems, he’d been wrong.
It was pitch black out here. He had one of his golf clubs in one hand, his flashlight in the other. He wasn’t afraid or anything, but a person could never be sure out here; open forest lay past the edges of the course, forest that belonged to the state park, and he had run into a stray something or other out here before.
Kendall had taken the damn key and left it on the steps leading to the trailer, which was nice of her, all things considered, and much nicer than he would have been if their roles had been reversed. No, he didn’t have anything else to do tonight besides walk back and forth between the clubhouse and hole twelve, angry at Kendall for taking his keys, but angrier at himself for his inability to distinguish a good woman from a bad one.
Yes, he’d shocked the professor, and that thought led him to other thoughts of her and what had almost happened between them. He recalled the expression of sincere hurt he’d seen on her face, made more striking by the tears that had started forming in her eyes at the end.
He was going to have to apologize, first thing, and he would. He only hoped that he could do it before Myra found out. Not that he was sorry he’d confronted her. It was his way, direct and to the point, and it was a by-product of his dealings with Celeste and the many who had followed. She was the start, the one most responsible for leading him down this path of distrust. He also knew it had been his decision to remain there.
As Luis had recommended, he should have asked the professor straightaway and not allowed other things like exceptional sex to come before his duty to Myra. He’d gotten sidetracked from the start, by her looks, by her body, and by the challenge she presented with her golfing skills. He’d been thinking about little else at the time, and apparently she’d felt the same way.
He too
k a deep breath of relief when he spotted the gator. He was finally back to where he’d started, almost an hour later. He put the key into the ignition, and of course it started right up. He was tired. It had been a busy day at the pub, and it would only get busier. Monday, Memorial Day, would probably be the most hectic of all.
He ran his hand through his hair. He was also responsible for getting the beer trailer to the park, the pub’s contribution to Coopersville’s Memorial Day festivities, and now he’d have to fit apologizing to Myra’s niece in there.
Why couldn’t life be simple, with everybody doing what they were supposed to do? Whatever happened to being honest? Straightforward. Whatever happened to loving people for themselves, not the amount of Benjamins they could offer or the color of their skin?
Where had that last bit of thought come from? It was the golf course. Being out here at night always brought back old memories of life with his father and that combined with his new interest in Kendall had him a little twisted. He shook his head, moving his mind away from those dark images and back to the professor. Yeah, he’d have to apologize. Big-time.
Seven
Later that night, back in the guest room of her aunt’s home, Kendall reached for her cell phone, hitting the button that would connect her to her sister.
“Hi,” Lark said, her voice a balm to Kendall’s bruised senses.
“I don’t think it was a good idea for me to come here after all,” Kendall said.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. What was I thinking? Not everyone is Butch.”
“What happened? Is it Aunt Myra? Is she like Vivian after all? You sound really weird. Are you crying?”
“I did something that I never do, and now I know why I never do it,” she said.
“Do what?”
“Sleep with someone I just met.”
“Dang, Kendall, you haven’t been there but what? A day. Two days. Girl, who?”
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