Chapter 7
Ihoisted the bag of clubs over my shoulder and headed down the green to the next hole.
Mark waited for me, leaning against the golf cart and radiating smug asshole.
Forcing myself to leave my computer long enough to play eighteen holes was already a challenge.
There was no way I could ride around in a tiny car while I did it.
Walking gave me a chance to corral my thoughts and make sense of things.
It also kept the claustrophobic feelings at bay.
I’d started playing golf almost as soon as I’d started my business.
Sitting through meetings was torture, but I could talk through problems with clients on the course, and if I kept moving while we did it, I came up with solutions that kept them coming back.
It was the closest thing I’d done to networking and marketing and one I mostly did for fun now.
I had more business than I had time, but I still enjoyed playing, and Mark enjoyed gloating.
Both at my antiquated method of getting from hole to hole and at the four-stroke advantage he had over me.
Enjoying the game hadn’t equated with being good at it. Not for me anyway.
“Nice of you to show up,” Mark said as I set my bag of clubs next to the cart.
“In ten years, one of us is going to have a bourbon paunch and the other one is still going to be loved by the ladies.” I studied the green in front of me and reached for my driver.
“The ladies love a little extra meat. That’s why they call them love handles.”
“If you say so.” I tipped my head and slanted my gaze at him.
“I know so.” He reached for his own driver and motioned with his club for me to tee off. “Julianna loves my meat.” He waggled his eyebrows suggestively.
“Asshole,” I muttered under my breath as I squared my shoulders over the tee.
I raised the club over my head and swung, feeling the head connect with the ball in a satisfying thwack.
The drive went straight down the fairway, with the ball landing two-thirds of the way down.
“It’s probably pity on her part anyway.”
Mark swung and connected with his ball, sending it down the fairway to come to rest on the edge of the green.
“Now who’s the asshole? It’s a rhetorical question,” he said when I opened my mouth to answer. “And pity is what I’m going to take on you. Look at how far your ball is from the hole. I’ll spot you two strokes so you can get it up on the green with mine.”
He jumped in the golf cart and took off down the edge of the fairway, leaving me to follow on foot.
By the time I reached my ball, he’d played through and was retrieving his ball from the cup.
It took me the two extra strokes and one additional one to sink my own ball.
It was a good thing my ego wasn’t tied to my golf game.
“How’s work?” My friend relaxed against the cart, looking like a man who hadn’t been hauling a bag of clubs all over the course. “We haven’t talked since you finished that protein modeling thing.”
“The company was happy. So am I.” It had been incredibly satisfying to watch the pieces slide into place, and the pharmaceutical company had been more than satisfied with the results.
I’d gotten an additional contract for 3D modeling, with the possibility of much more once the bioengineers had a chance to begin development of the therapeutics.
It was going to be challenging to fit everything in over the next month, which made me think about the thing Elena asked me to do.
“What do you know about the Essex Corporation?”
“The development company? They build high-end hotels and vacation properties. Why? You’re not thinking of investing or something, are you? I can’t imagine they need computer systems as advanced as the ones you design.”
“They don’t.” Their reservation system was simpler than anything I’d worked on since undergrad. Any coding they needed was straightforward to the point of being mundane. But Elena asked me to talk to them, so I would.
Doing something to help her had real appeal. It felt a little like taking care of her, which was something I’d learned I enjoyed very much from our last encounter. Computer work for Essex might be well outside of the scope of my normal jobs, but I could do it for her.
“A friend asked me to take a look at their computer systems.”
“A friend?” Mark hit me with a look that telegraphed disbelief at my explanation. “Is this friend a woman?”
“Elena is doing some work for the developer. The owner mentioned the trouble they’d been having with their system, and she asked me to take a look at it.
” As I explained it to Mark, I realized that wasn’t exactly the way it had worked.
I’d told Elena to give my information to Essex.
Their people were the ones who’d contacted me, but helping Elena was the only reason I’d considered doing the job.
“She’s your friends-with-benefits hookup, right? I didn’t realize you guys talked about that kind of thing. Or has your relationship changed?”
It hadn’t—not exactly—although something definitely shifted the last time we got together.
There was something unbelievably seductive about having her trust me like that with her body.
It went beyond just sex. And holding her after, while she snuggled on my lap, had been something else entirely.
I didn’t want to explain any of that to my friend, but I didn’t want him labeling her as my hookup either.
“She asked me to help her with a problem; I’m helping.” It wasn’t the explanation he wanted, but it was the only one he was getting.
“Whatever you say, man.” He shrugged his shoulders, content for the moment to let things go. “It’s a good thing you’re better with a computer than a golf club.”
Mark climbed into his cart and headed for the next hole. I followed, grateful the course was walkable. Water bordered several of the holes, making a natural hazard. A few bald cypress trees stood beyond the rough around the edge of the fairway. The knees stuck up like fingers in the marshy water.
As I watched, a white ibis picked its way between the knobby projections, freezing with its pink leg bent when it spotted something.
I froze, too, waiting until it thrust its long, curved bill into the water, emerging with a crawfish.
I left the ibis to his breakfast and picked up my pace to the next tee box.
“I was thinking while I waited for you to finally join me.” Mark rolled his eyes, but there was no way I’d give up my walk and the unexpected things I got to see to ride in his motorized buggy.
“Since you seem amenable to doing favors for friends.” He gave the last words extra emphasis, and I braced myself for something I was sure I wouldn’t like.
“I was thinking you could help me set up my door cameras and smart home app thing so the refrigerator can talk to the dishwasher.”
“I can’t believe they actually let you operate on people. You know that’s not how it works, don’t you?” I set my bag next to the golf cart and dug around for my club.
“I don’t have to know how it works. I just have to get someone to set it up for me.
I choose you,” he said, reaching for his own club.
“Besides, it will give Julianna a chance to work on you about the Hope and Help benefit. She’s trying to fill a table.
” He swung, sending his ball down the fairway to land on the green.
I shuddered at the idea of being at the mercy of Mark’s persuasive wife. “I’m not an IT guy.”
“That’s not what I hear.”
Ignoring him, I set my ball on the tee, pulled back, and swung. My ball hooked hard to the right, and I watched it clear the edge of the fairway to land with a splash in the water. A handful of startled birds took flight, and I hoped hard this wasn’t a precursor to the rest of my day.