Unexpected Shot (Nashville Players #2)

1. Shelby

SHELBY

Oh fuck him…

Not literally, of course. Absolutely not. Not with someone else’s vagina. And definitely not this early in the morning.

Because it’s early. Five forty-three to be exact.

The sun isn’t even up yet over the Nashville horizon.

The air is too cold and the sky is too dark for anyone to be out at a driving range on a golf course.

Which is why I’m here. I thought I could have peace.

I thought I could get in an hour or so of swings by myself before my swing coach arrived for our daily session.

I thought this time could just be me, my clubs, and the thermal mug of coffee I made.

Zero interruptions or distractions as I hit ball after ball in an attempt to get my new swing feeling as natural as my old one did.

I should’ve known he was going to ruin it.

Beau Devereaux ruins everything.

I don’t say anything as I lift my clubs from the back of my golf cart and set them down as far away from Beau as I possibly can.

“Good morning to you, too,” I hear him mumble.

When I glance over to him, he’s not making eye contact, his full focus on the ball in front of him that he’s about to strike with his fifty-two degree wedge.

“You’re here early.” No sense in pleasantries. I don’t like him. He doesn’t like me. We haven’t since the day it happened.

Frankly, we never really got along. We were frequent playing partners who squabbled like siblings. And for all of five seconds, I was a dumb teenager who thought she wanted to kiss him.

That version of Shelby was a dumb, dumb, girl.

That Shelby was also trying to prove herself every day on the golf course.

Coming from a single-parent home where money was tight and resources to play an expensive game were tighter, I had to claw for everything I wanted.

I worked my butt off. I taught myself everything, because unlike Beau and the other guys I played with, I couldn’t afford coaches or lessons.

It was just me, my hand-me-down clubs, and a dream.

Then there was Beau. My best friend’s older brother.

The one who always looked out for me—even when I didn’t want him too.

Beau with his fancy clubs and his bright, fashionable, golf shirts.

He was a natural on top of the lessons his parents got him.

Was I jealous? Slightly. He was the one who had it all.

And I was the one who had to prove why I belonged at the same table as him.

Things are different now. We’re both professional golfers.

Our clubs are top of the line. The carts we each drove to the driving range are our own personalized ones, not ones we rented from the course.

But what will never change when it comes to my relationship with Beau is that we will always, no matter what, hate each other.

Old habits die hard. And some don’t die at all.

“Joke’s on you. I’m here early every day. Part of the system.”

I roll my eyes as I fish my golf glove out of one of the pockets of my bag. “No you aren’t.”

“How would you know?”

He pauses talking and I hear him connect with another ball. Looks like it was a good shot. You know, from the corner of my eye that I’m barely looking out of.

“I’m here every morning at five thirty, because you don’t mess with routine, Shelby. I’m surprised you don’t hear my golf cart since I have to drive past your house to get here. Or can you not hear it because you sleep in a coffin?”

I’ve hated everything about having to move to Nashville. But the shit icing on the fuck-ass cake was learning that the house I bought, sight unseen, just happens to be next door to the man I hate.

I really want to find out who hired the Etsy witch to curse my life.

“Fuck you,” I say, a growl coming through in my tone as I turn to face him. “Also, quit lying to me. You aren’t here this early every day. There’s no way.”

I’m very confident in that fact despite having no proof, just vibes.

Beau has never struck me as an early-bird-gets-the-worm kind of guy.

More of an attention whore than a creature of habit.

Every time his stupid face winds up on my screen, or featured in some magazine, it’s an image from some lavish party or upscale bar.

If it’s a Saturday and he’s not at a golf tournament, he’s at some sort of concert, sporting event, or any place he can have his picture taken.

That isn’t the kind of golfer who’s hitting balls before the sun comes up.

I don’t know why I’m staring at him, subconsciously daring him to spar with me before six a.m. I’m always in a bad mood after we have one of our verbal sparring sessions, so I don’t know why I’m choosing this course of violence before the coffee has set in.

Skipping my first cup of coffee before coming here was mistake number one.

Mistake number two is happening now as I forget to breathe.

I don’t know what it is about him right now that’s rendering me breathless. The way he sets down his club? The way his eyes burn into mine despite being twenty feet apart? The way he has no business looking so good this early in the morning?

Fuck this man. Again, not literally, but how dare he look this good before six a.m.…

The biggest inconvenience I’ve had in my life is that the man I’ve despised for a majority of it is also one of the sexiest men on the planet.

And that’s saying something, because my life hasn’t been sunshine and rainbows by any means.

Maybe that’s the difference. My life has been a series of crashes after finally thinking I’ve cleared the hill.

If I had an autobiography, it would be titled Every Time The Shoe Has Dropped.

And while Beau has been part of some of those crashes—and played a starring role to one of the biggest ones of my life—the most annoying thing about him is that he’s good looking and he knows it.

And so do I.

Why, body? Why can’t I be attracted to a blond nerd who wants to talk to me about the way he organizes his video games or about his favorite spoon?

That would be so much more convenient. But no, when God said, “Who should we make Shelby LeBlanc attracted to?” She then went on to reply, “I know! Beau! The man she’ll have fantasies about killing and also eating her out! ”

I really thought God was a girl’s girl. Apparently not, if this is what she’s done.

I hate, hate, hate, the reaction my body has to Beau.

You’d think I’d be used to it by now considering he started as the cute older brother of my best friend.

The one I first noticed after I realized boys weren’t entirely gross.

Then, he became my first golf course crush when I was twelve—one I never told anyone about because I was still going with the company line that I hated all boys, they were gross, and I just wanted to beat them at golf.

At fourteen, I wanted nothing more than for Beau to be my first kiss—on the eighteenth green, because I might be a golfer, but I’m a girl, and that was my movie moment.

That never happened. And it never will. Because one day twenty years ago Beau Devereaux broke my faith. Looking back, he also broke my heart. Because he became a person I didn’t think he was. A cheater. That was the day I took off the Beau colored sunglasses that no one knew I wore.

From that moment on, the one constant in my life was that I hated Beau Devereaux. And lately I’ve developed a second stupid constant—how my body reacts to him when he’s near.

I fucking hate it.

Like right now. Prime example of my body’s betrayal.

He hasn’t shaved this morning, so his beard is unkempt and a little crazy.

Not the close, manicured length he usually keeps it.

He’s casually dressed, trading in his signature well-fitted and brightly-colored golf polos for a plain, black, long sleeve T-shirt and a pair of joggers.

He’s wearing a hat with one of his sponsor’s logos on it, not because he’s worried about being seen without it, but because he likely didn’t do his hair this morning.

Hair that’s long enough to run your fingers through and hold on to if and when—

“Quit staring, Belle. That is, unless you want to get a closer look? Maybe take a picture. It’ll last longer.”

And there it is. The immediate cold shower Beau always provides every time he opens his damn mouth.

“Fuck you,” I hiss, turning back to my golf bag to pull out the dummy weighted club I use to warm up. “Just go back to whatever you were doing. And next time you leave your house, shave your fucking beard. You can’t pull off the Grizzly Adams look.”

“Aw, do you have a preference for how I wear my beard? So nice of you,” he says.

“I don’t. And I wasn’t staring.”

“Whatever you say, Belle. Whatever you say.”

I take in, and let out, a deep breath. And it does nothing to calm me down. “Quit calling me that.”

“Nah,” he says with a shake of his head. “I’m mad I stopped calling you that.”

“I hate it.”

“Exactly,” he says, tapping a golf ball closer to him. “Would you rather me go back to calling you shrew? Or maybe something new? SheDevil has a ring to it.”

I wish I was the SheDevil. I’d have access to hellfire and a pitchfork right now. Yeah, I can’t help smiling at that option. Even if I have to give him credit for it.

“Call me whatever you want.” I shrug, like his venom has no effect on me at all. “I’ll continue to call you a cheater. Because that’s what you are.”

That gets me my daily Beau eye roll. “For fuck’s sake, Shelby. As I’ve told you every day for the past nineteen—”

“Twenty.”

“Fine. Twenty years. I didn’t cheat. I’ve never cheated at a golf tournament, or while holding a golf club, or while keeping score. Ever.”

“And as I say every day, I know what you did.”

He just shakes his head, exasperation taking over his expression. “Are you ever going to let it go?”

I pretend to think about it. “Absolutely not.”