Page 25 of Perfect Praise

When she studies my very serious face, she nods, her cheek just slightly pressing into my hand like she’s reassuring herself that I’m real.

I’ll deal with Craig later.

“So, you really don’t like golf?” I ask her playfully.

“I mean… no?” she says, unsure. “I don’t know. I’ve never played. I’ve always just watched, sat in a golf cart. It’s not that fun watching. What’s your favorite part of playing?”

“It’s personal,” I say.

Her huff makes me laugh.

“Not like that,” I add. “I mean it’s literally personal. Most of the time, it’s like I’m playing against myself if that makes sense. Always trying to beat yourself. No team that relies on you. And you can never reach perfection.”

She nods. “That actually does make sense.”

“What if I taught you how to play?” I chuckle.

“What? No!” she scoffs. “You’re the last person I’d want watching me learn to play golf.”

“Why’s that?”

“I—” Maren hesitates then smiles sweetly, brings her wine glass to her lips, and says instead, “You know why.”

“I do?”

“You’re the best golfer, like… ever. Is that what you want to hear?”

“No,” I challenge her, “I want to hear what you were initially going to say.”

She sighs, almost as if she’s about to melt to the floor, but she tells me anyway. “Your eyes kind of scare me.”

I don’t think she would be saying any of this if she wasn’t on her third glass of wine. “Iscareyou?”

“Your eyes scare me,” she says, tipping her chin up with confidence. “The way you look at me, I mean. They’re really dark. And I’m scared of the dark. And they… they’re almost black. The way you look at me is really intense.” Her giggle gives away how nervous she is.

“It’s fun to be scared sometimes though, right?” I ask her rhetorically, leaning in. “Then you feel proud and brave that you faced your fears.” My voice is low, and I’m so close to her face, I can smell her shampoo. It’s a mix of strawberries and peaches, and the thought of her in the shower flashes across my mind. She swallows, licks her lips, gives herself away—that she agrees with me but doesn’t really know why. “And why are you always wearing those little golf dresses if you don’t like golf?”

Maren flushes. “Because they’re cute—because I like them, and they’re comfortable.”

“Because they’re cute?”

She takes another sip, and somehow this is the sip that pushes her over the flirty line. “You tell me.”

“Snarky, tipsy Maren is moderately cute,” I say.

“Look at me going from mild to moderate,” she jokes, scrunching her nose, “but stop calling me cute.”

God, her freckles do something to me. I want this woman under me, on top of me, bent over for me.

“Maybe eventually I will,” I whisper, leaning down until my lips hover just above the shell of her ear. “I know what you do want to be called now.”

I crossed a linelast night.

Though I don’t know what the line was.

Fake friends to… fake friends I want benefits with?

A tiny part of me cares that I let this happen. This isn’t what I set out to do. And a huge slice of me doesn’t give a shit, which easily wins out when I see her sticking her tongue out at me and taking a step closer to me as Conrad and I find my ball on the fairway of the third hole.

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