They finished in eighth place at Torrey Pines with five under par.
Out of 128 golfers.
Not too shabby. Especially when Josephine did the math on 50 percent of those winnings, got overwhelmed by the six figures of it all, and immediately attempted to give it all back while they packed their suitcases to return to Florida.
“It’s too much, Wells. I can’t accept it,” she called through their open adjoining doors.
His chuckle drifted into her room. “You can.”
“No, thank you.”
“You have two options, belle. Take the money you earned. Or leave it with me and watch in horror as I spend it on you in the most frivolous ways.”
Josephine paused in the act of sliding her toothbrush into her toiletries case. “Such as?”
“A skywriter comes to mind. Just think, you could see ‘Wells’s Belle’ written in the clouds over your apartment building every day for a month. That’s one option.” He wasn’t finished. “Maybe instead of buying every kind of bubble bath they sell at Bath and Body Works, I’ll just buy you a whole franchise. Maybe a private concert from the Beach Boys—a cover band, at the very least. You want to hear more possibilities?”
“No, that’s quite enough to prove you’re financially reckless.”
“See? Taking the money is the responsible thing to do. I can’t be trusted.”
Her phone signaled an incoming text and she picked it up off the bed, swiping to find a text from Jim. There were no words, just a picture of her father in front of the construction taking place at the Golden Tee, giving a thumbs-up—and Josephine’s stomach dropped to her knees when she saw how much progress they’d made in just five days.
Drywall had been installed, shelves were in place. There was a crate in the background and she could see it contained the freestanding fireplace—decorative only, because hello, this was Florida. The windows were new, stickers still on the glass. Boxes containing the new display stands and furniture she’d ordered stood waiting to be opened. By her.
The shop was going to be done sooner than expected.
If Josephine was in Palm Beach right now, she would be putting together furniture, directing traffic, ordering stock from their supplier. Getting ready to open the doors. But she wasn’t there—she was in California. And she’d agreed to fly into Miami and spend the week leading up to the Masters with Wells.
While the sweat cooled on their bodies in the dark last night, he’d kissed her neck and talked about all the places he wanted to show her in Miami. Restaurants, golf courses, the beach. His bathtub. When she’d hedged, preparing to tell him no, that she needed to get back to Palm Beach to check on the progress of the Golden Tee, he’d hit her with the knockout blow.
They could watch golf highlights in his home theater.
Her boyfriend had a home theater. With leather recliners and soundproof walls.
Josephine’s life was no longer familiar and she couldn’t discount the sense that reality, the one she’d built, was slipping through her fingers.
Another picture text buzzed its arrival on her phone.
The outdoor putting green was almost completed, too. Fencing had been installed.
Even the water feature was up and running.
At this rate, she could probably have the Golden Tee open for business in a week. Maybe even less, if she declined to let Wells whisk her to Miami.
Once she went back to Palm Beach, however, and got sucked into the reopening of the Golden Tee, she wasn’t going to leave again. Josephine knew that fact like she knew the layout of Rolling Greens. Her heart was being torn in two directions, because as much as it beat for her family’s business, it was beating for Wells Whitaker now, too.
And he needed her.
How many times today had she been called a good luck charm by the press? Not to mention all the idioms they’d assigned to her during television broadcasts. The one who turned it all around for Whitaker! The secret ingredient! Nate pretended to bow down to her every time they’d crossed paths during the tournament and at first, she’d laughed. Now she wondered if she had the strength to abandon this team.
Or if Wells would—or could—continue at this trajectory to the top without her.
Her thumb swiped slowly across the screen of her phone, a lump rising in her throat over the pride in her father’s expression as he gestured to the new Golden Tee sign. Her roots were in Palm Beach. Were the ones she’d put down with Wells too new to be tested?
“Our ride to the airport should be here soon,” Wells said, entering her room through the adjoining door—and Josephine quickly closed her texts and darkened the screen of her phone, the pit opening in her stomach. “What was that?”
“Nothing, just looking at pictures from Tallulah’s visit,” she lied, hating the acidic taste that sharpened on her tongue. “Trying to decide which one to frame.”
Wells hummed knowingly and kissed her shoulder. “Not too long until she’s settled in Boston. You’ll see her again soon.”
Lying to Wells was bad enough. Using her best friend to escape an uncomfortable conversation was even worse, and the guilt propelled Josephine into motion. She slipped free of Wells’s potential embrace, desperately searching for any remaining item to stuff into her suitcase. “I’ll, um . . . be ready in a sec.”
After a couple beats of silence, she glanced up to find Wells watching her with his brows drawn, as if trying to read her thoughts. “Everything okay, Josephine?”
“Yeah, why?”
He regarded her closely, before shaking his head. “No reason.”
Her phone buzzed audibly in her pocket and she had no choice but to ignore it, leading to a pregnant pause. “Ready when you are,” she said, hurrying to zip her suitcase.
Wells took both pieces of their luggage and wheeled them out through her door. His clubs had already been shipped back to Miami and weirdly, she kind of missed the weight of them on her shoulder. Especially when they reached the valet—and were showered with applause waiting for their driver to pull around. At that point, she actually wished she was holding Wells’s sticks as a prop. Just for something to do with her hands, because now she was alternating between awkward waving and tucking stray hair into her ponytail.
Had people actually been camped out, waiting for them to leave?
A security guard approached her with a bottle of champagne on behalf of someone in the crowd and Josephine smiled her thanks. Wells posed for pictures with a family in a rare moment of wholesomeness.
In the midst of the commotion, Josephine traded a glance with Wells and . . . he just looked so happy. Even his frown lines were less prominent than before. Compared to the golfer who’d quit mid-tournament over a month ago, he was a different man. Content. He laughed all the time. As a golfer, he was almost back to where he’d been at his peak, only now he had that relaxed aura of experience and maturity thrown in. He’d grown. With her.
They’d grown together.
She’d let someone else in to share in the ups and downs of her condition and she’d never, ever expected to do that. But Wells made it right.
They were a formidable team.
And she couldn’t leave without knowing how far they could go.
* * *
Wells sat up in bed and looked down at Josephine, tracing the line of her bare shoulder with his gaze before standing reluctantly and heading for the kitchen. He poured himself a glass of water, set it down, then braced both hands on the counter without drinking a sip.
Something was off with his Josephine—around 10 percent of the time.
The other 90 percent of the days they’d spent together in Miami, she was her usual incredible self. Smiling, challenging him, melting him with her touch, stunning him with incredible insights as they watched old Masters footage in the dark, cuddled up on one recliner and wrapped in a fleece blanket. Quite frankly, Wells would have been more than happy to sit in that home theater listening to Josephine murmur observations in the dark, her hair still half-damp from a bath, for the rest of his time on this earth.
He was so fucking happy, he almost couldn’t withstand the pressure in his chest. It built and it built and it built every time he looked at Josephine.
That 10 percent, though. It ate at him. Big-time.
Every so often, when she didn’t realize Wells was watching, he caught her staring into space. Or lying awake in the dark, tense, when she should have been sleeping. Then there was the fact that she wouldn’t swipe open her phone in his presence. He caught only the tail end of her phone calls to Jim, but she’d hang up before Wells could get the gist of the conversation.
Three times now he’d asked if something was wrong and she’d visibly declined to be honest with him—and that wasn’t like Josephine at all. She was the most honest person he’d ever met in his life. It was one of a billion reasons he’d fallen in love with her.
Maybe she wasn’t in love with him . . . back.
Totally possible. Totally understandable.
Wells couldn’t even fault her for that. He’d probably join an order of monks, take a vow of silence, and go live on a remote goddamn mountaintop if that was the case, but he’d get it.
Or maybe he was just distracting himself with that horrible possibility.
Because deep down, he knew what her 10 percent withdrawal was really about and he needed to stop avoiding it. Or where confronting it would lead.
Wells hung his head and let the dread wash into his stomach.
Then he retrieved his phone from where it was charging in the living room. He stepped out onto his balcony into the balmy Miami breeze, hesitating only a second before calling Jim. It was late, just after eleven, so Josephine’s father sounded concerned when he answered the phone. “Wells? Is everything okay?”
“Yes. Everything is fine. Josephine is fine. She’s sleeping.”
An exhale came down the line. “Good. Okay. What’s up?”
Wells looked out over the Miami skyline, to the ocean beyond, but he wasn’t really seeing any of it. He could see only the beautiful woman asleep in his sheets. His one.
The first and final woman he’d ever love.
“Have you talked to Josephine lately?” Wells asked, deep down already knowing the answer. If he was being honest with himself, he’d been blind to this moment, even though they’d been heading there since day one.
“Sure, I have,” Jim responded, brightly. “Been keeping her in the loop on the construction. Although, I’m not sure you can even call it construction anymore, since the last day and a half has been all about finishing touches. Touchups and whatnot.” Josephine’s father paused, his tone losing some of its enthusiasm. “The place is good and ready for her.”
Wells’s heart dropped into his stomach.
Good and ready.
“Josephine knows that?” Dumb question. Of course, she knew. But he asked it anyway. Maybe to punish himself, because Jesus. The Golden Tee being rebuilt in the shape of Josephine’s dream? It was the thing she was most excited about in this world. And she’d felt the need to keep the news from him. She hadn’t shared her excitement with him. She’d hid it.
“Never mind. Obviously, she knows.” Wells cleared the rust from his throat. “That’s amazing, Jim.”
“Sure is.”
Silence filled the line.
“Thing is, Wells . . .” Jim hesitated, mattress springs creaking in the background, as if he’d risen from bed. “Damn the timing on this.”
Wells swallowed hard. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, Rolling Greens has made their repairs and is up and running now, back to being operational. They need the Golden Tee to open their doors pronto, so we can start processing customers. Right now, they’re renting equipment out of a tent in the parking lot and well . . . it’s not what club members expect.” A beat passed. “Basically, they’re giving us until next week.”
Next week.
Those two words landed on his shoulders like ten-pound sacks.
The Masters was next week.
“If Josephine is coming back, she’ll have a lot of work to do before then . . .”
Wells’s brows snapped together. “If she’s coming back?”
He could sense Jim’s discomfort without even seeing the older man. “Haven’t you talked to Josephine about this?”
No.
No, he’d been too busy trying to pretend they weren’t living on a deadline.
Not knowing how to answer Jim’s question without sounding like a selfish asshole—and that’s exactly what he was—Wells dodged. “Did she . . .” He shook his head. “I mean, obviously she’s going back to Rolling Greens, right? It’s her place. It’s her . . . heart.”
God help him, he sounded pathetic, and he didn’t care one bit.
“I’m not so sure, Wells . . .” Jim trailed off. “I mean, it’s the Masters, right? You need her.”
The numbness crept into every corner of Wells’s body as the crux of the matter washed over him like a ten-story wave. “She doesn’t think I can do it without her.” His legs wouldn’t hold him anymore and he dropped into one of the chairs. “And why would she think any different when everyone has been telling her for weeks that she’s responsible for my comeback. I reinforced that. Didn’t I? I leaned on her too much and now . . . she’s going to give up the Golden Tee to caddie for me. Is that what’s happening here?”
Wells was going to be sick. You selfish piece of garbage.
Jim broke into his shame spiral. “She’s trying to get an extension from the course—”
“An extension won’t matter. It’s only temporary. After the Masters, it’ll be another tournament. Another one after that.” It hurt to breathe. “She’s too loyal to leave me.”
Just like she’d always been.
Standing on the sidelines, his stubborn fangirl to the bitter end, no matter how badly he played. Holding up her sign. Wearing his discontinued merchandise. Rain or shine. Of course she wasn’t going back to Palm Beach to leave him to compete in the Masters alone, especially after his continual bad behavior when she missed two measly days in California. How had he not seen this? How had he not recognized the pressure bearing down on Josephine?
No. He couldn’t let this happen.
He wouldn’t let the woman he loved give up her dream out of loyalty to him.
Otherwise, he was never worthy of that loyalty in the first place.
“I’ll make sure she’s home,” Wells said, raggedly, ending the call.
And then he spent the night planning the hardest conversation of his life.
* * *
Wells wasn’t in bed when Josephine woke up.
She frowned into the pillow, rolled over to stretch her sore muscles. If they continued having sex at this rate, she was canceling her gym membership.
“You don’t have a gym membership,” she yawned to herself, sitting up. Wanting to sneak one more look at the pictures her father had sent of the Golden Tee under construction, Josephine picked her phone up off the nightstand and scrolled through her camera roll, her stomach a combination of dread and excitement. More than anything, she wanted to show these pictures to Wells. He would be happy for her. He’d be interested and he’d probably have great suggestions, too, but . . . she was avoiding the conversation.
Not only with Wells.
She was avoiding it with herself.
She’d written an email to the owner of Rolling Greens asking for an extension on opening the doors of the new and improved Golden Tee, but although the owner had been following her journey with Wells on television, he’d apologetically declined. In fact, he’d seemed even more eager for Josephine to return to Palm Beach, now that she had some notoriety behind her, hoping it would earn him some clout with club members.
What was she going to do?
She didn’t know. Every day, she woke up thinking the answer would have made itself clear, but she quickly became absorbed by Wells, by the magic they made.
By love.
Their relationship wasn’t some temporary flight of fancy. It was built on rock. And she became more and more positive of that every minute they spent together. They’d seen each other at their worst and best, and they supported each other unconditionally. This man was the one great love of her life and she wanted to stay with him a little longer. She just needed to make sure Wells was solid and wouldn’t self-destruct at the first sign of adversity.
Then she would go.
Yeah right.
She looked at the completed construction pictures on her phone one last time, no choice but to acknowledge the wistfulness in her chest, before setting it back on the side table, facedown. Quickly, she finger-combed her hair and pulled on Wells’s discarded T-shirt, detouring to the en suite bathroom to brush her teeth before venturing out to the living room.
She stopped short when she found Wells sitting on the couch. Shirtless in sweatpants.
The television wasn’t on. He wasn’t reading or looking at his phone.
He was just . . . sitting there.
A finger of alarm traced down her spine, but she shook it off.
Maybe he was visualizing the course at Augusta. That wouldn’t be unusual.
“Morning.” She circled the couch and sat down beside him. “I’m usually the one who wakes up first. Everything okay?”
He didn’t answer right away. “I don’t know.”
Nerves crept into her throat, but she laughed through them. “Why does it feel like I just walked into a breakup?”
Wells flinched. Just the slightest gathering of his shoulder muscles—
And the air evaporated from Josephine’s lungs.
“Oh my God,” she managed, pushing off the couch onto legs that were suddenly nothing more than cooked spaghetti noodles. “A-are you breaking up with me?”
Wells shot to his feet as well, looking pissed. “Are you serious, Josephine? I am not breaking up with you,” he gritted out. “Don’t even say those words out loud.”
The roiling in her stomach settled. Slightly. “Then what’s wrong?”
“What’s wrong?” He shoved five fingers through his hair and took a deep breath, visibly calming himself down. “You’ve been hiding the screen of your phone, staring off into space when you think I’m not paying attention. And I think part of me knew what was going on, especially after days passed and you hadn’t said one word about the Golden Tee. So I . . . called Jim last night.” He took a step toward Josephine, where she’d frozen in place by the glass door that led to the balcony. “When were you going to tell me that the Golden Tee has to open its doors by next week, Josephine?”
It was all real now.
More than just words on her phone and a problem for tomorrow.
It was big and messy and she had to deal with it out loud. Right now.
“I’m going to call the owner of the course today and try to make him see reason.” Her voice was veering toward high-pitched, apprehensive, but she couldn’t seem to control it. “I can’t miss the Masters, Wells.”
“Josephine,” he said calmly, though his eyes were anything but. “You should be in Palm Beach, getting the shop ready. I would have gone with you. I would have helped.”
“I know,” she whispered.
“Then why stay quiet about it?”
“I don’t know.”
“Yes, you do. We both know.”
Josephine shook her head. She even had the impulse to run. Just run straight out the door and not have to hear anymore.
“Yes, we do,” Wells continued in a gentler tone, closing the distance between them and cradling her face in his hands. “You’re afraid to tell me you’re not going to be caddying for me anymore. Let’s just get it on the table, belle. We don’t hide from each other.”
With those meaningful words in her ears and his familiar, beloved hands holding her cheeks, coupled with his nearness and the scent of him, Josephine was about to have a moment of weakness. A really, really big one. Someday she would look back and excuse herself for being a woman so in love, she was willing to give up everything to maintain the feeling. Keep the connection burning bright. To continue living the fairy tale no matter what it cost. To do what was best for this person she cared about, adored, needed.
“I’m sorry I hid it from you. It’s just that . . . I’ve been thinking. Maybe I could hire a manager for the Golden Tee, so I can stay on tour with you.” She forced a laugh, even as tears sprang to her eyes, and staunchly ignored the stab of self-betrayal in her abdomen. “I mean, I would look really cute in that white caddie jumpsuit at Augusta.”
Wells looked . . . frozen.
“Hire a manager?” His hands fell away from her face and hung at his sides. “You must really believe I can’t continue winning without you. If you’re willing to do that. Let someone come in and live your dream. You would hate every second of it.”
“I would get used to it eventually.” Even she could hear the doubt in her tone. “And it’s not that I don’t believe you can win! I just think . . . I just. I can help, right? I help you.”
“Of course, you do, baby,” he said, passion evident in every word. “But I see what’s been going on now. All this pressure that has been piled onto your shoulders.” He shook his head. “Good luck charm this. The woman behind the comeback that. My manager hassling you to come babysit the golfer with the bad temper. Now you feel responsible. You feel obligated. And you are not. You’re not.”
A sound leaked out of her that sounded like air escaping a crushed balloon and that’s exactly what she was. A piece of Mylar that had been filled past maximum capacity. As soon as Wells said the word “pressure” out loud, she recognized how much she’d been carrying around. But she was way too stubborn to let it all go. “I love the Golden Tee. I want to enrich my family’s legacy, but . . . this can be my dream, too.”
“Josephine. Stop.” He took her by the shoulders and shook her a little. “Listen to me. You’re the most constant person I’ve ever met. You show up—relentlessly—for the people you care about. You showed up for me over and over and over, well past the point you should have. Because you are so fucking loyal, you don’t know how to quit.”
“I’m not quitting!”
He dragged in a breath. “Then you’re fired.”
The blow hit her out of nowhere, like a line drive to the stomach. Even as she reeled, however, her heart wouldn’t quite let her believe what she’d heard. “Yeah, right. How many times have you said that? You’re full of it, Wells.”
He appeared winded, like he’d just sprinted the full length of a course. “I mean it this time, Josephine. You’re fired. You’re no longer my caddie. I’m sorry.” Wells reached for her and she flinched backward, numb, only remotely capable of feeling her hip ram into the wall. “I don’t know any other way to do this. I’m doing what’s best for both of us. You need to go run the pro shop of your dreams. And me?” He seemed to be struggling for an admission. “I think I need to know I’m capable of winning without you. No, we both need to know that. Otherwise, I’m always going to be an obligation, not the man you want to spend your life with.”
A massive rupture took place in the middle of her chest. All she could hear was choices being made on her behalf—and she resented all of it. She’d claimed her independence a long time ago and no one took that away from her. No one. “Spend my life with you, Wells? You’re firing me.”
“Christ. I’m not firing you as my fucking girlfriend, Josephine. I’m in love with you.”
Her heart got trapped in her mouth, but it was too broken and bleeding to get any enjoyment from those words. “I can’t believe you’re telling me this now.”
“Yeah, I was hoping it would be a little more romantic, too!” Wells shouted, suddenly looking haggard. He paced away, hands dragging down his face, before wheeling back around. “Don’t you think I want to be selfish? Don’t you think I want to say ‘Yes, great idea, hire a manager’ so I can keep you with me on the tour? Of course, I do. I hate being away from you, Josephine. You know that. This is your fault for teaching me how to be selfless and wise and considerate. I want you to have your dream more than I want mine now.”
Oh God, she could feel herself entering the bargaining phase of grief and she couldn’t do anything to stop herself from going there. The more he spoke, the more she loved him and the more she was determined to stop him from being his own worst enemy. “You threw a reporter’s camera in a pond last week. You’re a beast with the media. We’ve come so far in just two tournaments, Wells. Imagine what we could do with one more? Maybe two.”
There was so much affection in his eyes when he looked at her, she almost had to kneel down to shoulder it all. “You will never leave me, belle. I have to do it for you.”
She shook her head, tears splashing down her cheeks. “No, you don’t.”
He closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them again, a fine sheen had developed. “I had no idea what unconditional love looked like until you, Josephine. You taught me how to be like this. And I will love you whether or not you’re helping me win some fucking game. We. Are bigger. Than a game. Someday, when you’re done being angry with me for this, I will be waiting to show you that. I’ll invent new ways to show you.” He covered his eyes with a hand and took a long shuddering breath. “But right now, you have to go.”
The words were hardly out of his mouth before Josephine was moving blindly through the apartment, scooping her things off various surfaces, the floor, her legs almost too unsteady to hold her up. Was she mad at him? Unspeakably. He had no right to cut her off at the knees like that. Who did he think he was, making choices for her? Calling her father?
Throwing in her face how easily she’d been willing to abandon her own dream.
I have to get out of here. Before I try to convince him to let me stay.
Before I betray myself again.
Josephine was undoubtedly leaving personal items behind, but she didn’t care. Eyes blurred with tears, she pulled on some jeans, ordered an Uber that would probably cost her a fortune, bundled her overnight bag to her chest, and speed-walked toward the front door.
Wells tried to step into her path, but she had too much momentum and easily skirted past him without braking. “Josephine, stop.”
“You just told me to leave.”
“Don’t go like this,” he growled, catching her around the waist with a forearm and dragging her back against his chest. “Tell me you fucking love me.”
“I love you!”
Air burst out of him, followed by a ragged intake of breath, and Josephine knew that he hadn’t really expected her to say it. That made two of them. Maybe when those three words were so unequivocally true, they couldn’t be kept inside if someone invoked them. “Tell me we’ll get through this,” he begged into the back of her neck.
Now that, it appeared, was a request she couldn’t grant. Not when she was this hurt, angry, and confused. “I can’t see into the future, Wells.”
“I can. My future is with you. That’s the only future I’ll ever want.”
Anything resembling energy was ebbing from Josephine’s limbs. The shock of being fired and told to leave by the man she loved was rendering her numb, like a small mercy. She needed to go, before she slumped back into his arms and cried like a baby. Her self-respect was full of holes after nearly abandoning her dream. Her pride was weak after having her offer to stay rejected. So she mustered up what little of those qualities she had left and wiped her eyes. “Don’t be afraid to lay up on that par five at Augusta. Slow and steady, okay?”
She pulled open the door and left, closing it on an anguished rasp of her name.
