Secret Garden (14 page)

“We’re picking up Molly.” He’d already phoned her this morning, taking full advantage of the phone number she’d given him, and had caught her early enough that her voice sounded rough like she hadn’t spoken to anyone else but him yet.

“Right! Well...thank you again,” she said, obviously flustered. “Molly is happy and my father will be, as well.”

“The laird takes his dog golfing every Saturday morning,”
his grandmother had said. A harmless kindness for them to do, and as a bonus Colin got the opportunity to see Rhiannon again.

He’d been thinking about their kiss all night. And she was still flushed, not looking at him. Maybe she’d been thinking of it, as well.

She darted a glance at him and blushed all over again.

He gave her a meaningful look, liking this new direction of their relationship. “Do you want to come with us?”

“Quite funny. You could be a comedian, Colin.”

He smiled at her. “Can’t blame a guy for trying.” She’d seemed okay with her agoraphobia at the picnic yesterday, he didn’t see where encouraging her a little would hurt.

He glanced at the mixing bowl on the counter. “What are you making?”

Rhiannon wiped the flour off her hands, looking frazzled. “They’re cupcakes for Jessie. I thought...” She sighed, helpless, then just shrugged. “I want to do something kind for your family.”

“Jessie will really appreciate your support.”

Rhiannon gazed up at him, directly into his eyes. She seemed more upset about the funeral than he’d expected. She reached for his hands, grabbed them and just...held them. “Call me today,
please.
”

“I will,” he promised, though her plea shocked him. Her hands were so soft, and she was trembling. He couldn’t help it, he ran his fingers up her bare arm.

She watched him do it, her lips slightly parted. There was something about her—a yearning in her—that made him want to stay in Scotland and watch her break free from her shell. He had no doubt in his mind that someday she would.

He interlaced his fingers with hers. And pulled her closer... Closer to him. He felt her body heat. The life force of her breathing.

“Pardon me.” A discreet cough came from Paul, standing in the entry to the kitchen. “The engine is running outside, and Jessie asked me to remind you, sir, that the two of you have a very strict tee time.”

Colin dropped Rhiannon’s hands and stepped back from her. “I have to go.”

Rhiannon rubbed her arms as if saddened. Maybe he should be more careful with her.

His conscience prickling him, he smiled at her, affecting that old laid-back attitude. “Have a good day with your painting,” he said to Rhiannon as he turned away.

“Go easy on Jessie,” she called.

He laughed and kept walking. “Don’t worry, I won’t outscore her too badly.”

Outside, he jogged across the gravel and swung into the car. Molly was sitting in the backseat, perfectly behaved as if she were human, albeit a human who breathed with her mouth open and drooled somewhat.

His grandmother turned in her seat and smiled when she saw him. “And how is Rhiannon?”

He hadn’t told his grandmother that was why he was going inside. He darted a glance at her. “Uh...she’s good.”

His grandmother seemed pleased. “Sorry to rush you, but we’re on a tight schedule.”

He adjusted the mirror and backed the car out, wondering if she would bring up the funeral again and debated internally whether to have a preemptive conversation with her about his preference for living in the present.

In the end, though, he didn’t need to. She spent the drive chatting about her golf club, discussing the sights they passed on their route and “talking” with Molly.

His grandmother was so much like him, it was scary. When they arrived at the car park, he helped her and Molly out, changed his shoes and set up the golf bags—attaching his to a hand-powered trolley and Jessie’s to a one-person golf cart that closely resembled a motorized scooter but which she called a buggy. To Colin it looked hilarious, especially when Molly trotted faithfully alongside, her tail wagging with joy.

The course starter greeted both Colin’s grandmother and the dog. “How is the laird?” he asked Jessie while petting the golden retriever’s coat.

“He’s quite well, thank you,” Jessie replied. “I’d like to you to meet my grandson, Colin.”

“Ah, Colin. To be sure, we know Colin.” The starter tipped his cap to Colin, then checked them off on his electronic scorecard. “The lads are waiting for you by the first tee.”

Jessie smiled, obviously pleased.

“The
lads
?” Colin murmured to her as they walked across the grass, not as manicured as the courses were in the States, but appealing to him nonetheless.

Laughing, she hit him lightly on the arm. “We’re playing a four-ball match with two gents who are club members of mine.”

Four-ball match
meant a regular foursome, in Colin’s terminology.

He chuckled, grateful that there was to be no talk of funerals, and amused that he would be golfing with the geriatric squad, judging by the grizzled beards and graying hair he saw on the men waiting for them by the first tee.

Ah, well, Mack won’t mind so much that I’m golfing without him,
Colin thought.

But if Colin expected an easy, poky game with old codgers, he was sadly mistaken. The other two men in their group were pros as well. One currently played on the tour for golfers over the age of fifty, and the other was a club professional who coached two of their successful junior golfers.

And they
moved
. Unaccustomed to their rapid pace, Colin hustled to keep up. It was the fastest he’d played eighteen holes, ever, and that included time helping his grandmother off and on her buggy. Their play was deadly serious and both men carted their own bags, which were half-full, meaning they contained half the range of clubs by Colin’s standards. This lightened their load and seemed to give them more endurance.

And to Colin’s utter shock, he didn’t win the match. He tied the senior player, who had a superior short game—especially with chipping and bump-and-runs. His course management was better, too, but that was a given, since he was familiar with the turf and Colin wasn’t.

Still, it gave Colin a reality check. Pensive, he nursed a beer in the club lounge afterward and greeted his grandmothers’ friends with only part of his normal humility and good cheer.

“I do see his resemblance to Dougie,” one woman who’d joined them remarked, peering at him closely around the eyes.

Involuntarily, he stiffened. But his grandmother discreetly
shushed
the lady.

Colin put his beer bottle down on the table. “I promised I’d call Rhiannon.”

“Oh, but it’s forbidden to use mobile phones in the clubhouse,” his grandmother said.

“How about in the parking lot?”

“Eh?”

“The car park,” he corrected.

“That’s fine, dear.”

“Great. I’ll come find you when I’m finished.”

Colin left the lounge through the clubhouse—the opposite door that they’d entered by—and immediately found himself in the pro shop, filled with racks of golfing merchandise: clothing, balls, shoes, clubs.

They carried the jacket brand he’d been looking for—down front, near the cash register. Colin detoured to the rack that held his size...and when he glanced up, he was shocked to be staring at a huge, poster-sized picture of himself.

His mouth dropped. That was him—or a younger version of him—when he’d won the US Collegiate Open. In the photo his head was down and his club was lifted nearly vertically behind him in a classic backswing pose.

He’d never seen this shot. The bronze plaque beneath the poster was inscribed:

Colin Walker

Kildrammond, His First Home Club.

Beneath that were his years on the US professional tour. The ending year was left blank.

He shook his head. Just the fact that they claimed him, that they honored him...it seemed to hit him right in the solar plexus. He’d never even known.

The rest of the wall appeared to be a trophy wall, photos of all club members in the past and present who’d ever received major golfing honors. Sure enough, the two men he’d golfed with were on the wall, as well.

He threw back his head and laughed.

“He’s a right ugly bugger, that one, isn’t he?” a voice behind Colin said. A gruff guy, middle-aged, barrel-chested and with a twinkle in his eye, pointed at the poster of Colin.

“Better-looking than you, old man,” Colin said cheerfully. After golfing all morning, he was getting used to the Scottish humor.

“It took you long enough to wander in.”

“Maybe if you’d told me I have a position of honor in your pro shop, I’d have stopped by earlier.”

“Aye. Your granny had it done.”

My nana,
Colin thought. “I was eight years old the last time I played here. My woods were too big for me, and all I cared about was manhandling them to get more juice in my drive.”

The man held out his hand. “McGuff,” he said, shaking Colin’s hand. “If you stay with us long enough, Mr. Walker, maybe we’ll form a local order of Colin’s Crew.”

Colin laughed. “I’d rather not encourage that, thanks.”

McGuff threaded his way back behind the register to ring up somebody’s purchase. Colin found a jacket in his size, tried it on to check that it fit and then brought it over to McGuff.

“If you’re ever looking for a place to stay, we have room for you here, laddie,” McGuff remarked, ignoring the jacket that Colin had set on the counter.

Colin raised his brow at him. “Thanks, but I have a home.”

“It would be a seasonal visit. Come in August for a few weeks. Your granny said that used to be your habit.”

“A long time ago.” Colin fiddled with a ball washer that was on the counter. Imagined the life of being a local club pro, giving stance, grip and swing lessons.

He shuddered.

“You and I have something in common,” McGuff said as he rang up the purchase of another lady who came in behind Colin.

“Do we, now?” Colin laughed. This guy was a certifiable character. Colin picked up an open bottle of the local whisky, marked Complimentary, and poured himself half a shot into a little plastic cup. The pro shop doubled as a gift shop, and the area did get a lot of tourists visiting the Highlands, so this must’ve been standard practice. “Is it our love of whisky?” Colin asked.

“Nah, laddie.” McGuff leaned forward. “Somer Grinks.”

Colin froze in the midst of downing the dram. He coughed, the whisky burning his lungs.

McGuff slapped him on the back. “Aye. I trained with him, too. No nonsense, the man is.”

Somer Grinks led a clinic in Arizona—a boot camp for golfers. It was the worst experience of Colin’s career. Grinks had hated him. Barked at him constantly. Told Colin he had talent but no drive.

“We notice you don’t train with a swing coach,” McGuff remarked. “And you’ve got a tournament in two weeks?”

Colin smiled politely, not willing to get into this conversation with someone he didn’t even know. “Were you ever on tour?” Colin asked.

“Aye. The European Tour.” McGuff pointed to the posters on the far wall.

“What ended it for you?”

McGuff stepped out from behind the counter. He lifted the leg of his khaki chinos and showed Colin.

From the knee down, McGuff wore a prosthetic limb. Not a high-tech metal one like what some athletes had, but a limb made from a material that looked like plastic, with a Scottish blue-and-white flag decal.

“What happened?” Colin asked.

“Motorbike accident,” McGuff explained, matter-of-factly.

A purely physical reason—an obstacle that couldn’t be denied. Colin shook his head, not knowing what to say, just feeling sick for him.

“You seem like a good lad,” McGuff said to Colin. “I watched you with the McLeod couple after you came in from the eighteenth. You were kind to them. If you want, I’ll make a call to Grinks on your behalf.”

Colin knew that McGuff was referring to his fall in the rankings, but in a kindly way. “Thanks, but Grinks isn’t one of my biggest fans.”

“Why? What happened?”

Maybe it was because McGuff had just shown him his prosthetic leg, and he wasn’t crying about it, or defiant about it, or ashamed about it, or upset about it. To McGuff...it just
was
. And it was that kind of acceptance that encouraged Colin to tell him the simple truth.

“He kicked me out.”

“Why?”

“Maybe he just didn’t like me.”

“Nah, laddie. He must not have liked your level of commitment. Two very different things.”

“But I was a junior golfer.”

McGuff patted his phone. “I’ll call him for you.”

“You don’t have to do that.”

“I don’t have to give you this, either, but I am.” From behind the counter, he handed Colin a waterproof jacket, the same brand that Colin had been about to buy. When Colin took the jacket, he saw that it was embroidered “Kildrammond,” the name of the golf club.

“Thanks,” Colin said. It was a nice gesture on McGuff’s part.

“You’re one of us.” McGuff thumped his chest with his fist. “You learned here, in our club.”

Yes, he had. Colin’s heart was tight. “How much do I owe you?”

“Put your wallet away.” McGuff gave him a look of outrage. “It’s a gift from me.”

Colin nodded.

“Just remember to come back and see your granny now and then,” McGuff said. “Come in August. She gets particularly sad when it’s August.”

Colin couldn’t speak.

McGuff pulled a silver flask from his pocket and poured some amber-colored liquid into two of the little plastic cups from the whisky display Colin had tried. “Try this instead. We don’t let the tourists drink it, but you’re not a tourist.”

He raised his cup, winking solemnly at Colin. “To Kildrammond.”

Colin repeated the toast. The fire from the whisky instantly warmed him.

“That has a nice kick,” Colin said.

“You’re not really a whisky drinker?”

“Not really.”

“We do need to get you back in Scotland more often.”