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Tess doesn’t disagree with me about being stupid and scared, and I don’t blame her. This is why I keep her as my friend, because she will never lie to me or bullshit me. Holding the bag of cookies out to her, she takes one and starts munching on it.
“I just want to enjoy my last night with him and not worry about tomorrow,” I admit as Tess bends down and grabs a few boxes of balls, helping me finish stocking the shelves while we share the bag of cookies. “I want to be a happy, smiling, supportive girlfriend, who doesn’t unload all of her bullshit onto his lap right before he gets his one shot to show the world he’s still an amazing golfer who deserves to be back on the pro tour immediately.”
Who has made plenty of money in his career to not need to go to this tournament or any other fucking tournament probably for a long-ass time if he didn’t want to, but this is his job, and who am I to tell him how to live his life? No matter how badly I want to, I can’t ask him to stay and pick me over what he was born to do and what he so clearly wants to continue doing.
He won’t ask me to go, and I can’t ask him to stay.
“Sip and Bitch tomorrow after he leaves?” Tess asks, making tears start pooling in my eyes all over again when she says it out loud, figuring I might as well get it over with as well.
“Yeah, sure. Sip and Bitch tomorrow after he leaves.”
Fuck my life.CHAPTER 23Birdie
“Quit puttering around.”Palmer pulls his mouth away from mine when the sound of the ferry horn signifying there’s ten minutes left before it leaves interrupts our goodbye kiss on the dock.
Not goodbye. Just see you in a couple days… hopefully.
His hands are still holding my face in them, my arms are still wrapped around his waist with my wrists locked together behind his back, and we just stand here staring at each other, neither one of us wanting to pull away first.
God, just ask me to come with you.
“You’re not going to cry like a baby again like you did last night, are you?” I ask him, trying to take a little heaviness off this moment and off my heart.
“You gave me a blowjob while I was watching Caddyshack.” He scoffs. “What man in their right mind would be able to hold it together after something like that?”
I shake my head at him as he chuckles, rubbing his thumbs against my cheeks as he dips his head, pressing his lips gently to mine for a few beats and then pulling back before I’m ready.
“It’s only for a few days, and then I’ll be back,” he reassures me. “You do want me to come back, right?”
He laughs softly again, but there’s a flash of something in his eyes that almost looks like my own stupid insecurities. It’s gone before I can even process it, and he’s giving me a big, dimpled smile as he drops his hands from my cheeks, and I let go of my hold on him so he can bend down, grab his duffle bag, and sling it over his shoulder. Bodhi already loaded both of their suitcases and Palmer’s clubs when we got to the dock a little bit ago, saying his goodbye to Tess back at her place so she could get to work.
“Don’t worry about me or what’s going on back here,” I tell him, wrapping my arms around myself, because it’s suddenly cold as hell without being pressed up against him, putting the fakest smile on my face I can manage. “Just go win that thing and get back on the tour. I’ll be cheering you on watching on the TV in the bar tomorrow at work.”
Or, you could ask me to come with you, and I could cheer you on behind the spectator rope fifty feet from you. We could have sex when we get to the hotel tonight, and I can give you some good luck sex before you go off to work tomorrow morning like a good girlfriend does.
Goddammit, why won’t you just ask me to go with you?
“Right… back on the tour.” He nods, smiling right along with me, making it harder and harder for me to breathe when I’m just standing here like an idiot, not saying what I should be saying.
“I’ll keep my bed warm for you,” I tell him, trying my best to give him a sultry smile, but it probably comes out more like a tilted grimace and not at all sexy.
Palmer steps back up to me, holding the strap of his bag on one shoulder, reaching up between us to brush a piece of hair out of my eyes that came loose from my messy bun, and tucking it behind my ear. Just the brush of his fingertips across my forehead makes me miss him and wish he was back already and he hasn’t even left yet, when the ferry horn signals the five-minute warning.
