by Jen Talty
“I know how she feels,” Jack said. “I’ve done my best to keep her at arm’s length.”
“Thank you. I do appreciate it.”
“Does she really have a picture of me that you took in the last couple of years?” Jack asked.
“I just wanted to know you were okay, that’s all. You disappeared off the face of the earth after the… Well, my father and I were worried.”
Much to her surprise he palmed her cheek. “Thank you,” he whispered. “It’s nice to know you actually thought about me.”
“You’re not mad?”
“I didn’t say that.” He smiled, and his eyes softened. “I feel slightly invaded, but I also feel like you never stopped caring.”
Courtney didn’t know what to think or how to feel right now. “My father doesn’t know I found out where you were last year, and I don’t want him to know.”
“Yes, I do, did.” Rudy waltzed into the room with Bri in his arms.
“Here.” Bri shoved the picture of a bearded, long-haired, red-headed hippy in Jack’s face. “I like you better now.” Bri touched his face. “When you kiss me good night, it’s soft. I bet that thing would be all scratchy.”
Jack chuckled.
Courtney stood there, stunned, unable to react to anything. “You knew?” she asked her father.
“I hired the same P.I.”
“What?” Jack asked.
“Bri, go play with your dollhouse for a little while. Looks like you get to stay up a bit later tonight,” Grandpa said.
“Okay!” Bri skipped off to her room as if she hadn’t a care in the world.
Courtney rubbed her temples. A wave of dizziness washed over her. “We paid for that info twice?”
“No.” Rudy laughed. “I went to hire him right before he gave you those pictures. I saw them before you.” Rudy turned to Jack. “I prayed you’d come home.” Rudy pulled Jack close, giving him a big bear hug. “I’ve been waiting for your return.”
Pangs of jealousy flowed through Courtney’s veins. The son her father never had but always adored. When Jack’s father died, Rudy took him in and gave most of his attention to the All-American boy, Jackson Albert Hollister. She swore her son would never be named that.
Not that it mattered. A relationship with Jack back then had been a fantasy. A relationship with Jack today, impossible. It didn’t matter that she’d probably always love him. And where were these thoughts coming from? She was mad, hurt, confused. Hell, she didn’t know what she was.
“I can’t believe you both went looking for me.”
“We were worried. You’re family to us.” Rudy placed a fatherly hand on Jack’s shoulder.
“I need to go give Bri a bath,” Courtney said, in no mood to deal with the emotions swirling around in her mind and heart. “We’ve got a busy day tomorrow.”
Her father curled his fingers around her biceps. “I love you.”
“I love you, too, Dad.” She glanced at Jack who continued to stare at the picture of himself while he scratched at the sides of his face. “Good night, Jack.”
“Sleep well, Courtney.”
Sleep wouldn’t come easily, and when it did, it would be filled with dreams of Jack.
7
Jack sat on the edge of his bed holding the image Bri had given him. It had been taken maybe a little over a year ago. He’d been off the cocaine for a few months. He’d been working on a fishing charter boat while learning how to build things out of wood. The picture was taken in front of the trailer park he lived in while he sat at the entrance selling one of his latest masterpieces.
In a few short years, he’d gone from having millions in the bank to wondering why he even bothered having a checking account.
“Hey,” Courtney said softly. She stood in the doorway of his bedroom wearing a long T-shirt and a pair of boxers. “Are you okay?”
“I’m still in shock.”
“Imagine what it was like for me when I saw you with all that hair.” She waved her fingers at the top of her shoulders. “You have great hair, but it looks much better shorter and damn, that beard. That was a bit much. If I had seen you in the street, I’m not sure I would have recognized you.”
“That was kind of the point.” He set the image on the nightstand, snagging his beer. “I know I shouldn’t be having this, but I needed to take the edge off.”
She reached for it, lifting it to her lips. “I don’t blame you. It’s been a strange turn of events lately.”
“You can say that again.” He took the bottle back and finished the last swig. He fluffed his pillow and stretched out on the bed, crossing his ankles. Tears stung at his eyes. When he’d returned, he knew they could easily reject him. Hell, he expected both Rudy and Courtney to tell him to take a hike. Jack figured he’d have to spend days, maybe even a week convincing them to work with him. If Rudy said no after that, Jack would have to decide if he had the balls to go it alone.
But he never expected either one of them would go looking for him.
Talk about being humbled.
“Have a seat.” He patted the mattress.
“Can I ask you a question?” She made herself comfortable next to him, pulling one of the throw pillows across her lap.
“Of course.” He could feel the warmth from her body float off her skin and land on his like a blanket of hot soapy water.
“Actually, it’s a series of questions.”
“I’ll do my best to answer honestly.”
She nodded. “You stormed off the golf course after hitting Tom and the press found you—”
“That’s so very well documented. You really want to know the sordid details?”
“Well, you left the course and went on a bender. You were arrested. You spent a few days in jail. You went to court. You were found guilty and were sentenced to community service.”
“Ah.” He laced his fingers through hers and stared at their intertwined hands. “You want to know how I disappeared.”
“You and Wendy had already separated. Her father had dropped you.”
There were so many moments Jack wished he could change. One would have been the night that Courtney told him that she loved him. One of the others would have been when he found out the truth about Wendy’s pregnancy. Had he known that, he might not have ended up having to watch Tom marry and have a child with the one woman that made Jack feel alive. “I took what I had left and begged the judge to let me serve out my sentence anywhere but here. He sent me to Galveston. I continued to act like an asshole for a while, meaning I continued to do drugs and try to kill myself slowly with them. Then, and I really don’t know what changed, but I got tired of being tired all the time. I quit the drugs, took up woodworking, got a job, and turned things around. Eventually, I picked up a golf club and started practicing, and then I ended up back here.”
“What happened between you and Wendy?”
He laughed. “What didn’t happen with us? We were a match made in hell, that’s for damn fucking sure.”
“You and I stopped being close the night you told me to go home to daddy. I’m curious as to why you left her when you told me she was your soul mate.”
“First off, I lied about that,” he admitted, but he wasn’t sure he was ready to tell her the entire truth, in part, because he wasn’t sure she would be willing to tell him everything about Tom. Not that he needed tit for tat, but they each used their spouses to hurt the other. That he knew to be the truth. “The only thing she ever was to me was a direct path to an ulcer.”
Courtney laughed. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be. I know I made a mistake by marrying her. I only wish it had been my idea to get a divorce.”
“You didn’t leave her?”
He shook his head. God, how he hated to admit this to Courtney. All it did was show how weak and driven by greed, fame, and shame he was. From the second he’d gone to bed with Wendy, he’d started a downward spiral that he wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to stop. At one point, he could
n’t even look himself in the eye, much less Rudy and his beautiful daughter. “I stopped towing the line, and she gave me an ultimatum.”
“You don’t do those well,” Courtney said. “I’ll be honest. I told my dad that all these rules he’s been putting on you would backfire.”
Jack shifted to his side and let his gaze soak in the sexy woman sprawled out next to him. She’d been a spitfire of a teenager. Smart, energetic, and she always had a way of making him feel as though he could do and be anything. That used to scare the crap out of him. A teenager shouldn’t make a grown man feel that way. And the older she got, the more he noticed her and more he pushed her and her father away.
It was more than his growing attachment to Courtney that had Jack driving down the wrong road. He’d become impatient with Rudy’s plan for his career. Jack didn’t want to wait. He wanted it all, and he wanted it all right now.
“I’ve broken out in hives at least a dozen times in the last couple of weeks since moving into this house, and I have a to-go bag packed and ready to sneak out in the middle of the night.”
“That’s really not funny, but I understand. My dad can be intense.”
“You don’t have to tell me that. When I first went pro, I thought I’d never be able to live up to his standards.”
“Back then, I’m not sure either of us could live up to what he thought we should be doing. He’s changed a lot since then. I think he’s really trying not to pile on the pressure, but at the same time, he doesn’t want to be soft on you either.”
“I know I’ve let him down.”
“I can’t believe I’m going to say this, but he let you down too.”
Jack snapped his gaze from their intertwined fingers to her sweet blue orbs. “I don’t see how you could say that. He’s been nothing but wonderful to me my entire life, and all I did was shit on him and the memory of my parents.”
She cupped his cheek. “Not entirely true.”
He chuckled. “But you’re not denying it completely.”
“Of course not. We were both brats,” she said. “But, for me, my father had had certain expectations that I struggled to live up to, and one of them was being second to you.”
Jack arched a brow. “What the hell does that mean?”
“You were the son he never had, and he wanted you to be number one.”
“He had big dreams for you too.” Jack understood the kind of pressure Rudy put on all the golfers he worked with. He’d seen it firsthand while still in high school on the varsity team and watching Rudy work with some of the best golfers in the world.
Jack had helped destroy Rudy’s reputation and while Rudy still had a lucrative pro shop, he no longer worked with golfers on tour. That was in part Jack’s fault.
“Of course, he did, but his focus was on you.”
“Were you jealous?” he asked.
She patted the side of his face before dropping her hand to her side. “Never of you, but sometimes I would feel a little envious of how proud my dad was of you and he’d boast about your future.”
“Until I started fucking it up, which wasn’t too far after it started.”
She laughed. “You were getting a chip on your shoulder long before you started dating Wendy.”
Oh boy, had he ever. Money and fame had gone to his head in ways he hadn’t ever expected. He had no idea the price of admission would be his self-confidence. The higher up on the money list he got, the more friends showed up at his doorstep. Only they weren’t friends.
They were people who wanted a piece of him, and they all took what they wanted until Jack had nothing left to give.
If he ever had anything to begin with.
He remembered the very first time he tried cocaine. It had been with, of all people, Tom and Wendy. He’d been twenty-three, and the realization of how good he had it hit him hard. The pressure of always being at the top of his game weighed heavy on his shoulders. So heavy, he needed something to take the edge off, and a little booze and a romp in the sack with a good-looking lady wasn’t cutting it anymore.
Wendy and Tom opened up a world of adrenaline that Jack thought only existed on the golf course, and from there, Jack went down a path that most never came back from.
“I really have changed, Courtney.”
“I know you have,” she said. “The question is will that change stick when the pressure is poured on when you get back on tour.”
Courtney hated reminding Jack that being out on tour could pull all his demons to the surface, but she wanted him to be as prepared as possible. She hoped he really had put the past where it belonged, and she in turned owed it to herself, and to him, to do the same.
“I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t absolutely terrified about playing in a tournament, especially one where Tom is going to be there.”
“You don’t worry about him at all. He’ll try to get in your head, but don’t let him. Play your game. And play smart. It’s a local tournament, so we’ll be right there supporting you.”
“You’ll go? Walk the lines?”
“Yes. I’ll be there,” she said.
“I really do appreciate that.” He lay on his side with his head cradled in his hand. “My game is all over the place.”
“I know. You’ve got to get out of you head and stop thinking about it. Just pretend you’re playing me.”
“I wish it were that simple. The newspapers and golf channels are already talking about me being at the Randall Classic. They want interviews, and they are speculating why I’m not giving them.”
“I agree with my father on his plan to ease you back into the limelight. Just stick with the script. You’ll be okay.”
“Is that why you came in here? To give me a little pep talk?”
Why had she entered his room? Her heart beat erratically. She couldn’t fill her lungs with enough oxygen. She became painfully aware that she was lying in his bed while they were both in their pajamas.
At least the door was open.
Or was that a good thing?
He tilted her chin with his thumb and forefinger. “What’s going on in that pretty little head of yours?”
“Not much, trust me.”
“Are you thinking about this?” He leaned in and kissed her. His tongue slipped between her lips, probing the inside of her mouth like a missile in search of its target.
A guttural groan built deep in the pit of her stomach. It bubbled from her gut to the back of her throat. Without thinking, she wrapped her arms around his broad shoulders, leaning into his strong chest, deepening the kiss.
His hands roamed her body, squeezing her ass as he smoothed down the back of her leg, lifting it up over his.
She enjoyed the way his tender lips dotted kisses down the side of her neck and under her earlobe.
“Mommy?”
“Oh shit,” Jack whispered, practically jumping off the bed. He tripped on something and tumbled to the floor.
“Are you okay?” Bri raced to his side, dropping to her knees.
“Yup.” Jack sat cross-legged on the floor, leaning against the wall.
“What are you doing out of bed, baby?” Courtney quickly made sure all of her clothing was where it was supposed to be before lifting Bri up and setting her on her lap.
“I wanted some water, and I thought I heard you talking,” Bri said, brushing her unruly locks from her face. “But you were kissing instead.” She giggled.
Wonderful. This was the last thing she needed her daughter to see, much less talk about, and that’s exactly what five-year-old little girls would do. “Why don't we go get that water and tuck you back in.”
“Can Jack do it?” Bri asked.
“I think it’s best if Mommy does it tonight.” Jack stood and kissed Bri’s forehead. “I’ll see you for breakfast.”
“Okay,” Bri said.
Courtney stood, hiking Bri up on her hip. She was getting too big to carry like this. “Say good night to Jack.”
“Night, Jack.” Bri wa
ved.
“Night, kiddo,” Jack said. “Good night, Courtney.”
Courtney nodded. Quietly, she tiptoed down the hallway toward the bathroom. “I know Mommy said secrets were bad, but let’s not tell anyone you saw me kissing Jack, okay?”
“Did you like it?” Bri asked while she fiddled with the water faucet in the bathroom.
Oh, what a loaded question. “I did,” she admitted.
“And you like Jack, right?”
“Of course, I do,” Courtney said.
Bri set her water glass on the counter and turned and stared at Courtney. “Then why don’t you want anyone to know?”
“Grown-ups are complicated, baby. But mostly because Jack has that big tournament coming up, and I don’t want him to have any distractions.”
Bri lifted her hand and nodded as if she totally understood. “Grandpa and his no hanky panky rule before matches.”
Courtney covered her mouth. “Do you know what hanky panky means?”
Bri pursed her lips. “Duh, Mommy. It’s what you and Jack were just doing. I’m five now. I know these things.”
“Being such a big girl then, you understand that kissing is a private thing.”
Bri took her mother’s hand and marched them into her bedroom. She jumped up into her bed and pulled up the covers. “Then next time you might want to close the door. But I won’t say anything.” Bri lowered her chin. “Unless asked, because lying is a bad thing.”
“That’s true, and I wouldn’t expect you to lie, not about that or anything to anyone.” Courtney gave her little girl a big hug and kiss. “I love you, baby.” As quietly as possible, she slipped into her room and closed the door.
Her phone buzzed on the nightstand.
Jack: Hanky panky? You are so in trouble when she’s a teenager.
Courtney: This is why she won’t be allowed to date golfers.
Jack: By the way, I liked it too.
Courtney: Do you always listen in on other people’s conversations?
