Page 70 of Putting Out
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“Stand in front of the camera.” Odie tugged on Reilly’s arm to move her where he wanted her.
“This is ridiculous.”
“It is not ridic-culous. It is tech-nah-logy. While Pierce is working your core, I’m going to ref- fine your swing.”
Reilly grumbled. “My swing is flawless.”
“Your swing is… not bad. I know I’m the one who gave it to you. Now we’re going to make it better.”
They were in the backyard of Luke’s plantation home. Pierce and Odie had arrived a few days ago. Together, the group had formed some ground rules.
Not wanting to risk any extra attention, Luke had temporarily dismissed the cleaning crew, which left house chores up to the lot of them. Pierce took cooking and laundry. Reilly opted for shopping and cooking cleanup. Luke had vacuuming and trash, and Kenny drew the short straw with bathrooms.
Odie had stated as an old-fashioned throwback he was useless with chores, but agreed to buy his own beer and keep his room moderately clean. Since it was the most they were going to get from him, they agreed.
Kenny and Luke had taken charge of the setup of the equipment that had been transferred from the barn in Nebraska.
In order to work in all weather conditions, Luke had rented a large, white tent often used for outdoor weddings, to protect the equipment from the elements.
A soft rain fell beyond the perimeter of the tent, but the temperature was mild enough not to warrant more than a long-sleeved shirt. Reilly flexed her arms a few times, swinging her driver backward and forward until Odie started to move her around like a Barbie doll to get her in the correct position.
The camera sat on a tripod and was attached to a USB cable that Kenny had secured to the laptop on the table behind her. Odie lined her up so that her full body was displayed on the monitor.
“What we’re going to do is anal-lyze your swing. We can record you swinging at full speed and then slow it down to pinpoint where your body goes off-line. The comp-puter can then break down your movements isol-lating any weak points. Once we’ve identified those, we’ll use an ap-para-tus I’ve built with markers to make sure your hips, arms, and head are in line.”
“Hey, Reilly, this is pretty cool.” Kenny was busy studying the computer’s monitor. “Take a swing.”
Reilly addressed the ball and gripped her driver securely in her hands. She swung at the tee with no golf ball on it because Odie still wouldn’t let her actually hit a ball, and followed through with her natural swinging motion.
“Wow! Check this out. Your hips are off by like a fraction of an inch. According to this readout, you just sliced the ball.”
Quickly, Reilly checked the area around the tent for Luke. The last thing she wanted to encourage was his nickname. Then she recalled he’d already left early that morning for his next commentating gig.
He hadn’t been looking forward to it. Since the brief interview he gave on air after her announcement, he’d been besieged by requests to do interviews regarding her decision. Without a doubt, his co-anchor, Jim, was going to bring up the “Reilly” question again. Luke grumbled the night before that he was quickly running out of material.
In jest he told her he was going to have to create scandalous dirt on her or run the risk of becoming boring. No one wanted golf to be more boring, he insisted.
Reilly wasn’t afraid. As weird as things had gotten between them since his aborted seduction attempt - Luke was being unfailingly nice, which was completely out of the norm - she doubted he would exact on-air revenge.
Not that he had any reason to want revenge. If anyone should have revenge it should be her. She was the wounded party. She was the one who’d been jilted after a particularly heated round of sex, then nearly seduced only to be dropped again like a hot coal. Just because she called him on it, and he got snippy wasn’t any reason for him to claim the role of victim. No doubt he knew that, which was why he was being so nice. It was guilt over what he’d done. Or guilt over the other woman.
“Reilly!”
She came to attention at her brother’s bark.
“Are you deaf? I said swing again.”
Reilly did as instructed but this time focused more as if she were standing on an actual tee box. The game was golf and it was where one hundred percent of her focus needed to be. If she didn’t keep that in mind, if she didn’t have her mental game working alongside her physical game, then all of this hard work was going to be for nothing.
“Sweet,” Odie muttered as he held the camera steady. He glanced over his shoulder at Kenny. “What does it say?”
“Straight down the middle. Given the projected club-head speed, about two hundred and seventy-six yards. Shit,” Kenny whistled. “Can this thing really tell that?”
“You betcha. It’s all about physics and angles. Ultimately, we can’t make Reilly a man.”
“Some of us are more grateful for that than others,” Reilly quipped.
