Me. Harsh. So very harsh.
Taryn: Not as harsh as the differences between our scorecards tonight.
Me: Since when did you learn to trash talk?
Taryn: Since the football team discovered the Coffee Kiosk.
She followed that up with a winky-face emoji, and my good mood at seeing her words on my screen evaporated. Wildcats were frequenting her coffee shop? What the hell did that mean? I’d been dropping by for the past month, and I hadn’t seen a single teammate in the place. Granted, I usually stopped right before closing, but...
The fuck? Were my teammates hitting on my girl? How the hell did they even know about her? While Taryn was never far from my thoughts, I hadn’t talked about her with any of the guys. After the disaster with Derek Watson in high school that had put me and her in the friend zone for the past five years, I’d learned my lesson. No way would I give in to a teammate—or anyone—over her ever again. Taryn Hamilton was my girl. End of story.
Practice lacked some of its usual fun as I scanned the faces of my teammates, wondering which ones were hanging out at the Coffee Kiosk while I was working at Touchstone. Afterward, I showered in record time and hit a drive-thru for a burger. I did not want to be late for my date with Taryn.
When she rolled up beside me in her compact car, the lights over the mini-golf course were coming on. Laughter from a couple of families taking advantage of the course on this warm August evening wafted through my open window. I rolled it up and stepped out of my car.
While I’d been away putting up with monotony broken up by a short stay overseas, my forever gorgeous Taryn had become effortlessly sexy. She stood in front of her car with a hand on her hip, a teasing smile ghosting across her features. She’d pulled her thick, dark hair into a ponytail, but stray tendrils escaped to caress her long, graceful neck the way my fingers itched to do. Her red V-neck T-shirt hinted at her pretty cleavage and clung to her curves in a way that made my mouth water. She’d tucked the shirt into a pair of white shorts that hit at mid-thigh and showed off her tan. How she managed a tan with all the hours she put in at the coffee shop was a mystery.
“Ready to celebrate your football prowess with a beatdown on the golf course?” she sassed.
“Taryn, Taryn, Taryn. Exactly how many times have you won at mini-golf? Once? Twice?” I stepped up close enough to catch a whiff of her spicy perfume accented with a faint scent of coffee. Delicious.
“While you were off saving the world, I was here, practicing my putting.” Spinning on her heel, she headed in the direction of the pro shop. “This is now my home turf,” she tossed over her shoulder with a smirk.
Caught up in the sexy sway of her hips as she walked ahead of me, it took me a second to form a sentence. Stepping next to her at the window, I said, “That’s some tough talk.”
“Don’t you worry your fine self. I can back it up,” she said as she handed her debit card to the attendant who charged it and handed her a scorecard and a pair of putters.
By the fourth hole, she was winning by a stroke and gloating rather obnoxiously. It was adorable. Except I couldn’t stop thinking about that comment about Wildcats players hanging out where she worked.
“So which Wildcats have you been practicing your trash talk with?” I asked as I lined up a shot.
“Fitz and Tarvi.”
I pulled my shot to the right and bounced the ball off the front of the windmill, missing the hole by a foot in a two-square-foot space.
“Seriously? What are those two doing hanging out at the coffee shop?”
She lined up her shot and kissed the ball off the left side of the hole, but she was better poised to sink it on the next turn than I was. “Fitz is along for the ride—or maybe the entertainment. Tarvi and Hailey are working on a thing—or maybe just honing their flirting skills. I’m not exactly sure.”
As soon as she said her coworker’s name, I relaxed and bounced my ball through the front door of the windmill and off the ramp in the back. Taryn glared at me, which made the shot even more fun.
“Hailey wants to go to the football party they’re hosting after your first game. Tarvi wants both of us to go, but those kinds of parties aren’t my scene.” Her shot sailed cleanly through the windmill to land beside mine in the back, so our score difference remained the same as we stepped over to the next hole.
Her casual comment didn’t require explanation. No amount of apology would ever fix my fuckup. But in my heart of hearts I had to admit I wasn’t sad she didn’t want to go to a football party. Her lack of interest gave me an out not to attend those parties either yet still save face with my teammates for skipping them. Because my girlfriend didn’t like them.
With only the two of us in our “group,” it wasn’t long before we’d caught up to one of the families playing ahead of us. Two busy little girls with messy pigtails and a running commentary on their skills as they raced around inside the loop-de-loop hole held up our game. From what I could gather, they’d be going pro anytime now. Taryn hid a grin behind her hand, but I didn’t bother hiding mine. Those kids were hilarious.
Stepping next to her, I casually slipped my arm around her waist and worked my ass off not to stuff my nose into her neck to draw in a lungful of her spicy perfume. She went utterly stiff when my body made contact with hers. Turning her head, she shot me a confused look, which I returned with a smile. Since my first day home after my discharge, I’d been subtly working toward moving us out of the friend zone. Based on her response to my move, I’d been too subtle.
Before she could balk or move away, the little girls’ dad noticed us waiting and nodded to the next hole. “We’re probably going to be a while. Maybe you want to play ahead and come back to this one?”
Taryn shrugged, and I said, “Sure.”
Reluctantly, I dropped my arm from its new favorite place wrapped around T’s waist, and we walked over to the water hazard. The two of us glanced at this hole then back to where the toddlers were playing and exchanged a smirk. Bet the frilly dresses those two had on would be drenched before they finished with the water hazard.
“You said you work most Saturdays.”
As she set up her shot, she nodded. “The perks of being promoted to assistant manager.”
