Lady Be Good (Wynette, Texas #2)(105)

Dallie shot Skeet an annoyed look that didn’t bother Skeet one bit. Kenny gestured toward the tee. “Be my guest. I believe in showing respect for the elderly and the infirm.”

Dallie just smiled. Then he walked over to the tee, swung a couple of times to loosen up, and striped a beautiful drive down the center of the fairway. It was the kind of golf shot Dallie’d cut his teeth on.

Kenny tried to quiet his nerves as he approached the tee, but that film of sweat on his chest wasn’t drying up. He told himself there was no reason to get all agitated about today’s round. Not only did he know every nuance of Dallie’s game, but the residual effects of the older man’s shoulder injury were going to give Kenny a distinct advantage. Even so, his jitters wouldn’t go away because today’s match was about something bigger than a round of golf, and both of them knew it.

Kenny stepped up to the tee, adjusted his stance, and hit a nasty duck hook into the left trees.

Dallie shook his head. “I thought we fixed that when you were eighteen.”

Kenny couldn’t remember the last time he’d hit a shot like that. A fluke, he told himself as they walked off the tee and down the fairway, with their caddies following.

“I hear from Francie that you got married,” Dallie said.

Kenny nodded.

“Simplest thing for you to do, I s’pose.” Dallie chewed the words as if they had a bad taste to them. “Hard for the press to get too riled up about a man defending his bride. Easiest way out.”

Kenny had to struggle to keep his voice even. “Only a person who doesn’t know Emma could say something like that.”

Ted piped up from behind Kenny’s shoulder, “That’s what I tried to tell him, but he wouldn’t listen.” He stepped between them. “The thing is, Dad, Lady Emma’s a lot like Mom once she gets an idea in her head.”

“I doubt that. Your mother refused to marry me until I got my life straightened out. Seems Lady Emma’s not that particular.”

Kenny didn’t like the implied criticism of Emma, and he was getting ready to say so when Ted stumbled over nothing and bumped him hard with his bag. “Sorry. Hey, Dad, how’s your shoulder feeling?”

“The shoulder’s fine. It’s my game that’s rusty.”

Not all that rusty. Kenny ignored the sight of Dallie’s ball lying in the middle of the fairway and concentrated on his slight of Emma. “Maybe I should give you a couple of strokes,” he said. “Doesn’t seem fair taking advantage of a handicapped senior citizen.”

Dallie pointed off to the stand of trees on the left where Kenny’s ball rested. “I figure your handicap’s going to even out mine.”

“What handicap are you talking about?”

“The fact that you’re scared shitless.”

A chill slithered right down Kenny’s spine. He should have known better than to bait a master strategist like Dallie. Still, he couldn’t let Dallie intimidate him, and he started to respond only to have Ted bump him with the bag again.

“Will you watch where you’re going?”

“Sorry.”

And sorry was the word for the way Kenny played for the next nine holes. He missed half the greens and left himself miles from the pin on the ones he hit. Fortunately, Dallie’s driving distance and long iron play weren’t back to normal, so after nine holes, Kenny was only down by two.

Just as they made the turn for the back nine, a golf cart came clattering up. “Kenny, darling!”

The British accent was less noticeable than the one he’d recently grown used to, but just as familiar. He turned and began to smile, then saw that Francesca Serritella Day Beaudine wasn’t alone.

Next to the gorgeous television star sat his very own wife. She was wearing his favorite hat, the straw one with cherries on the brim. They bobbed as the golf cart hit a bump. Both women wore sunglasses. Emma’s were her no-nonsense pair with the tortoiseshell frames, while Francesca’s were trendy oval wire-rims.

She waved with one hand, while she drove the golf cart with the other. Francesca was one of his favorite people—not only beautiful, but smart, funny, and kind, in her own peculiar fashion. Still, he wished she were anywhere but here. “Emma and I decided to ride along and give the two of you moral support.”

As the cart drew closer, he saw that Francesca was wearing some kind of pricey designer outfit, but it was Emma’s simple, flower-strewn T-shirt that caught his attention. As he observed the gentle rise and fall of her breasts beneath the bright yellow cotton, he remembered that he hadn’t been able to curl his hands around those breasts last night because his new wife insisted on sleeping alone.

He frowned. The last thing he needed while he was struggling through one of the most stressful rounds of golf he’d ever played was to be distracted by Emma’s breasts. And he couldn’t give Dallie an even bigger psychological advantage by letting him see that the women’s appearance had unsettled him, so he forced a smile as he approached their cart.

“Hey, Francie.”

“My darling Kenny!” He was enveloped in a cloud of chestnut hair and expensive perfume. “You eloped, you naughty boy. I’ll never forgive you.” She beamed at him, and then her green cat’s eyes flew to her son. “Teddy, you’re not wearing a visor. Did you put your sunblock on?”