Page 32 of The Dating Game

“Oh, okay.” Brooke nods. I catch a brief flash of annoyance, but she quickly schools her features back to a neutral expression. I step back and let her take her shot. She makes good contact with the ball, but it fades left down the fairway.

“Your clubface wasn’t square to the ball,” I tell her. “That’s why the ball went left.”

Brooke looks down the fairway, then back at me. “I guess so.” She marches back to the cart, shoulders tense.

“You just gotta watch that wrist,” I say as I hop back into the cart next to her.

I continue my montage of advice as we play through the next few holes. By the seventh hole I’ve commented on her stance, her swing speed, and her green reading capabilities. Brooke’s answering comments are getting more and more brisk and her smiles are turning into grimaces.

Pretty sure I’ve sucked all the fun right out of this golf date.

Basically I’m nailing Operation Daring Game. I’ll be shocked if she doesn’t break up with me after today. Which will be a huge relief, since then I can put this whole ridiculous thing behind me.

And putting Brooke behind me is exactly what I need to do. Make her part of my past since she doesn’t actually want to be part of my present.

Or my future.

I’ve had enough experience with women who don’t want to be part of my future, thank you very much.

We’re in the middle of the fairway on the eighth hole, and it’s Brooke’s shot. She grabs her 7-iron and heads for her ball. She stopped taking practice swings at the last hole—presumably to try and cut down on my critiques—so I have to be proactive. I hurry over to her as she sets her feet.

“Just remember to watch that back leg,” I tell her. “And your hip rotation.” Without giving it much thought I step up behind her, place my hands on her waist and promptly lose my train of thought.

This woman smells amazing. Like someone bottled up a strawberry field on a summer’s day then sprinkled it all over her. Heat flares tumultuously through my body as my hands register the curve of her hips beneath my splayed fingers. My heart pounds in my chest as my gaze hitches on the spot where her collared shirt hits her skin; the thought of being allowed to trace kisses along her delicate neck until I find that perfect hollow where it meets her shoulder makes my pulse even more frenzied.

I step back quickly, dragging in oxygen like I’m a drowning victim who finally found his way to the surface of the water.

Brooke swings around to look at me, and I’m unsettled to see her cheeks have turned pink and her amber eyes are popped wide like she too was affected by my touch.

But that doesn’t make sense. She’s not attracted to me. If she were, she wouldn’t only be dating me as bet, right?

If she’s attracted to me and I’m attracted to her—what’s to stop this from turning into a real relationship?

Suddenly Operation Dating Game feels more like a dangerous mission. One where my heart is at stake.

So I do the only thing I can think of to reset the status quo between us, announcing loudly, “I gotta take a leak.”

Chapter 11

Brooke

IwatchWillhurryoff toward a grove of trees lining the fairway, my mouth open in shock. What just happened?

He touched me. That’s what. He touched me and suddenly all of my annoyance over his nagging and nitpicking of my swing drifted away to be replaced by a monster named desire. I wanted him to slide his hands further around my waist, maybe even for him to tug me around until I was facing him. I wanted Will to kiss me!

This is unacceptable for multiple reasons.

One: I threw up on this man. I’m sorry, but surely that voids any future romantic prospects between us. I can’t be in a real relationship with a guy while simultaneously worrying that every time he looks at me he’s remembering what it was like to wash my vomit off his tennis shoes.

And speaking of being in a real relationship, that’s an excellent segue into reason number two.

Two: this is not supposed to be a real relationship. Not for me, anyway. Which means wanting to kiss him has no place in it. I cannot be mixing business with pleasure. Sure Sydney thinks something real is going to develop between us, and maybe, just maybe a teeny-tiny part of me—the part that keeps trying to forget about the puke thing—at one point thought she could be right…but these last two dates with him have shown me that Sydney clearly has the matchmaking skills of a drunk Cupid.

Meaning she totally misfired her arrow.

Will is annoying. I hate to say it, but it’s true. He’s arrogant and impatient and kind of inconsiderate. A total 180 from the guy I met on the plane and talked to in the parking lot of the bar.

Furthermore he’s currently relieving himself in a tree! I know this is a thing that lots, if not the majority, of men do on golf courses. My dad certainly did it enough—gotta go check those bushes for my ball, he’d joke. But this is our second date. It would be nice if he cared a little about impressing me with his ability to hold it until we get to the restrooms at the turnaround.

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