All Fore Revenge Read online

  “Well, let’s do it then.” He grabbed me and yanked my top off, burying his face between my breasts for a minute while his hand fondled my sex. When I tried to unbutton his shorts, he did it, stripping himself down so I couldn’t. He wouldn’t let me go down on him, not at all. Obviously, I was being punished. Most guys would have gone for a blow job, but not Cam, not if he was mad.

  He was fine doing me in the foyer that day. He started out doggie-style until I yelped from his deep penetration. I couldn’t tell if he was more angry with himself or with me when he realized he was hurting me. It seemed his objective was to not look at my face, because he ended up on his back, with me straddling him and facing away. It was a position we’d tried before. He hadn’t liked it much then, because he came fast (and because there was no eye contact?). This time, coming fast and getting it over seemed to be what he was after. He spared no energy to make sure I had a good time, pushed me off as soon as he was finished. Unsure how to handle him, I went straight to the bathroom afterward.

  I came back out dressed.

  His hand was already on the doorknob. I didn’t intend to speak, thinking maybe he’d leave without a word, feel he’d got the best of me. Let him move on, find some lucky woman he could make happy. But then a surge of anger bested my intentions to let him off easy. What right did he have to use me like that? We’d both agreed to a sexual relationship, and I had just as much right to enjoy it as he did! So what if I came to the door wet for him every day. Didn’t he arrive erect?

  I cleared my throat.

  He turned toward me, his face still red with anger.

  Lifting my chin, I mustered all my sarcastic levity. “So, was it good for you?”

  He blinked, then looked at his feet.

  “Because if it wasn’t, we might as well call it quits.”

  “Wasn’t that what you wanted? For me to treat you like a piece of meat and then leave? What will you do next?”

  “You mean who will I do next. Let’s see, maybe the phone guy, or the pool boy. The guy who does the lawn doesn’t speak English, that might be better…”

  Cam grabbed my wrists and pushed me against the wall, then kissed me. His lips were hard and angry at first, but then they calmed and started an apology. Tears I hadn’t noticed caught Cam’s eye, and he kissed them away. “I’m sorry, Ali. So damn sorry. Please…”

  “Cam. Quit. It’s okay. Be mad, okay? It’ll be better that way, for both of us. I can’t be what you’re after. Not now and maybe not ever. Please just go. Go away mad.”

  I tried to push him away, but he held me, kissed my neck, rubbed my bottom. Oh, it was good when he rubbed my bottom.

  “No, this isn’t good. This is wrong. Oh, God. I want you so much, but go away. Go have a life with somebody, Cam. Oh, screw it.”

  His hand was flossing back and forth between my legs.

  “I want you, Cam. Please.”

  I kissed his salty neck, licked, then sucked hard enough to leave a mark just under his collar. A taste of him wasn’t enough. I wanted more. I felt hungry, wanted to eat him up. I wanted his skin between my teeth. When I nipped at his chest through his shirt, he moaned and pulled his shirt back off, then returned to the hand job he was giving me. He knew how to make me come with his fingers, but it wasn’t going to be enough this time. Even after the hard ride he’d given me, I needed to feel him against me, in me.

  “I need you inside me. Do you want me, Cam? Tell me you want me.”

  “I do, Babydoll. I really do.” He kept rubbing me, teasing. “Tell me why. Why do you need me?”

  “You’re good. So fucking good. I miss you. Always miss you,” I panted against his neck. If I could just shift to the side a little, maybe I’d come and be out of this limbo of need. “Please Cam. I need you so much. Need you. Please?” My begging smacked of more than just a bitch in heat, and I wasn’t pleased to hear it. It sounded like more than sexual need, which was probably why he finally gave in.

  He wouldn’t fix my problem quickly, though, or without an emotional price we’d both pay. He carried me to the den, laid me on the couch, and peeled my shorts back off. He tortured me with kisses up and down my tummy and legs. He paused time and again to kiss me deeply, making my heart race with more than lust. My hands were all the while tugging at his shoulders and I struggled to shimmy against him and get him naked.

  He wouldn’t be content until he’d caused an orgasm without penetration, so I faked one out of desperation. Predictably, he felt his responsibility fulfilled then, and finally removed his pants. He knelt on the floor and pulled my bottom to the end of the couch to meet him. My legs were folded Indian-style against his chest and, from the first contact inside me, streaks of fire shot through me. It was like no other day with us had been.

  “Cam. Oh fuck, yeah.”

  He slowed and turned my face to make me look at him.

  Uh-oh.

  “Ali. This isn’t fucking. Say what it is, or I’m pulling out.”

  “Sex. It’s sex. Keep going, oh don’t stop. I’ll die if you stop.”

  He kissed me again, and whispered in my ear, “I’m gonna make love to you. Say you want me to make love to you.”

  “No. Do me, Cam, do me.” I bucked against him, moved myself up and down him.

  “Ali, come on.”

  I could feel him getting softer. This was serious. “Please? I need this so bad. This is all we have. Don’t throw it away. This is it. Please?”

  He started moving again. I’d won the battle. His eyes were squinched shut like he was in pain until he heard me moaning and leaned over to kiss me as we both came.

  Why was I crying? It was just such an intense orgasm.

  When Cam left that day, I got the feeling he may have lost a skirmish, but he had a secret weapon he intended to use to win the war.

  *

  Cam held himself back from me the next day when I answered the door. He walked in with his hands in his pockets and stepped away from me when I moved to kiss him.

  “I met someone, at the bar last night.”

  My breath hitched. “Oh.”

  He seemed to be expecting more, but I had nothing else.

  “I’m seeing her tonight.”

  “Oh. Okay.”

  He was watching my reaction. This was where I could really screw it up for us both if I wasn’t careful. I’d set the rules, so I had to abide by them. I had no stake on him, no right to care if he moved on. I wanted him to move on. Didn’t I? Of course I did.

  “I slept with her last night.”

  “Busy day for you yesterday, huh?” I walked away, toward the kitchen. “Want a drink?” Like some sweet tea, maybe, to go in that sweet mouth I wouldn’t be tasting anymore?

  I had to remind myself to buck up, concentrating on getting the drinks… wanting to douse my drink with vodka, or just skip the tea and pour vodka over ice. “Where will you take her?” My voice was my weapon, my words my ammunition. As long as I kept talking, I could ignore how I felt.

  “Ali.” Cam stood close, took the tea pitcher from me, and held my hands in his. “I didn’t sleep with her. Yet.”

  “Oh.” What?

  “I wanted to see what you’d do. I wanted you to be mad, or jealous. Or offer to leave your husband.” His face got red, and he pushed my hands away. “Dammit, I wanted you to do anything but be interested in my date! What’s it take to piss you off and spur you into action? If you found him banging her here in your bed, would you start feeling again? You don’t fight for him, and you don’t fight for me. Wake up and LIVE, Ali. Jesus!”

  My outlook started hazing over. Things were better blurry—you couldn’t see the ugly things that way. I didn’t need to focus unless I was driving. I’d feel my way through life until this crisis passed. I tried not to think that the crisis was getting bigger with Cam bowing out. With the blur came a good numb, one like I got from the pain killers when I had my wisdom teeth out.

  I handed Cam his tumbler with what felt like a smile. “Hon, I
’m not gonna throw myself to the floor and ask you to cancel your date. You have a right to a life. If things don’t work out, call me and…”

  “It’s the money, isn’t it?” He looked around the house as if for the first time. The expensive TVs and appliances, the pricey print I’d bought and hung above the couch when I moved the boys’ photos to the front room. “He’s loaded and you’re willing to turn your head so you can keep living the high life!”

  My halo of haze vaporized. I was pissed. “First of all, if I divorce Bill, I’ll get a freaking bundle of money. When I divorce him, I’ll get substantial child support, and alimony.” My finger jabbed at his chest and he took a step back, maybe wishing he hadn’t been trying to anger me. “But if I divorce him, the little twat who set her trap will get exactly what she wants and be able to marry him, so then my children will have to compete with her for attention as well as money. How long ‘til she talks Bill into having another family, and Will and Andy fade into the shadows entirely?”

  My question left Cam’s eyes wide. He apparently didn’t believe I’d been thinking this hard over what to do.

  “My boys need a father. Believe me, I won’t have them feel the hurt I did when my dad stepped out on my mom and made himself a new and improved family, complete with a little girl who got every fucking thing I always wanted and never got.” My voice broke and I had to pinch the bridge of my nose a second to hold back the tears that childhood hurt could still bring on. “Third, I have my own money, asshole.”

  Sheer surprise and possible disbelief left my lover’s mouth hanging open.

  “Not that you’ve ever cared to ask what I do with my time around here, since you’re every bit as consumed with doing the dirty as I am, but I’m a writer. Maybe not world-famous, but I’m making pretty good money from royalties that I’ve been socking away. Last, and this is most important,” I said, still following each step he retreated, “I would never, ever stay with a man just because he had money.”

  “Ali.” He reached out to me, probably to apologize.

  “Hold on. I have something for you, then you can go.” I brushed past him and went upstairs to my office.

  When I came back and handed him the neatly folded parchment, he made to open it but I stopped him.

  “Please. Not here. Trust me. It’s kind of all over the spectrum of styles, but it’s just for you.” I’d debated whether to give it to him, but I couldn’t tell him goodbye and have him thinking bad things about me. I followed him to the door, where he turned and kissed me. One or both of us was shaking. I know I was holding back tears, and the second I’d turned the lock behind him, I returned to my spot in the window seat.

  With my arms around my knees, I rocked myself and cried, much the way I had the morning of the day we met. A month had passed, and I was no closer to a solution than I’d been in the beginning. When my cell rang, I knew it was Cam. I knew he’d have read what I wrote and, by then, I regretted giving it to him. I listened to the ringing and tried in vain to forget what I’d written.

  Thank you, sun,

  For bathing us in your glory

  The day he loved me by the pool.

  Thank you, carpet,

  For softening the treads

  The day we shuddered as one on the stairs.

  Thank you, cool tile

  Growing slippery beneath us

  With the effects of our labored passion.

  Thank you, Camden Jarek Moreton.

  You shared willingly, generously,

  Offering yourself to be part of the “us”

  Which was never to be.

  From the beginning, the end would be

  Our Only Option.

  It would cost us both a price

  I can’t begin to afford

  To describe the emptiness

  You’ll leave behind.

  For, despite my best intentions,

  It will certainly hurt.

  All that I meant not to feel

  Took root and grew

  As the stranded pine seed

  Germinates and grows

  On the hard ledge,

  Knowing its potential is limited,

  Its days numbered,

  By the scant grains of soil

  It clings to

  While it dreams of

  Another place… another time.

  All Fore Revenge

  Chapter 3

  I let myself pretend I’d only dreamed Cam had a girlfriend. I let the haze take me over, aided by a healthy dose of vodka. Bill was home that evening, so I claimed a migraine, taking to my bed right after dinner.

  “Al,” Bill said, sliding his hand up my thigh when he came to bed, “there’s a luncheon tomorrow at the clubhouse. If your headache is better, can you come?”

  The luncheons were the club’s substitute for holiday parties. And for the employees down low on the food chain, the luncheons were the only perk. It was their chance for free drinks and time to hob-knob with the likes of Bill and the owners. I was the First Lady to the In-House Pro. Bill probably picked me to be his wife because he knew I’d look good on his arm for clubhouse functions and post-win press conferences.

  “Yeah. Twelve again?”

  “Mmm-hmm. Wear the red dress. Your legs look great in it.” His hand snuck off my hip, around front. I slapped it away, just as his lips hit my neck. “How come we never mess around anymore? Are you mad?”

  “Is there something I should be mad about, Bill?”

  “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

  “Nothing. I’ll be there tomorrow, with bells on.”

  *

  Music from the local light radio station played through speakers in the clubhouse. Caddies and snack bar girls, cartboys and pro shop help all mingled in throngs. As usual, the older help was sneaking booze to the under-twenty-one crowd. There’d be hell to pay in hangovers the next day. It was a wonder the owners had never been sued by parents of underage drinkers.

  I ordered myself a double rum and coke at the bar, which surprised the bartender. In all the years he’d served me, I’d never consumed more than a few sips of wine, and only with the meal. Within five minutes of my leaving the bar and starting small talk with Steve (the manager of the pro shop), the assistant pro and bartender had their heads together. The kitchen manager was next. She got the scoop from the assistant. From their frequent glances my way, it was obvious they were talking about me, and I guessed they all knew about Bill’s affair.

  So much for sticking my head in the sand. The sympathetic pat on my shoulder, which I got from Steve at the end of our conversation, was the final straw.

  Across the room, Bill was the picture of suave virility. No gray marred his black hair, combed so expertly as to disguise how thin it had become. Gorgeous blue eyes twinkled past deeply tanned skin and charming laugh lines. His body was lithe, his waist thickened and thinned according to how many sweets he indulged in. Speaking of indulging, there stood stupid little Brianna at his side. Jesus, even with me in plain sight!

  Cam’s words from the day before about not fighting for my husband haunted me. I had no reason to fight for him for myself. But I’d be damned if I’d let my kids lose him. And I wasn’t going to let this crowd think I’d been steamrolled. Crossing the room with no hesitation, I linked my arm with Bill’s, squeezed between him and Brianna and deliberately smashed her pedicured toenails under my stacked wedge.

  Had Bill paid for that pedicure, or maybe her dress? Ugh.

  “Oww!” she squealed.

  “Oh, I’m sorry, Brianna. I guess I didn’t realize you were so close,” I cooed in answer. “I hope I didn’t chip your polish.” I hoped I’d chipped the toe.

  “Maybe you could get me a sample of a new color,” she answered. “And I need another lipstick.”

  Ah, my perfect opening. One of the course owners was talking to Bill, so it wasn’t the best timing, but we were within earshot of the bartender. “I’m sorry, Brianna. I can’t get you that lipstick anymo
re.”

  “Why?” Her fingers went to her lips, heavily coated in the neon-purple shade.

  “Well, an independent panel decided that color was garish.”

  Her pert little face screwed up in rage.

  I raised my voice a notch. “And unfortunately, there’ve been several reports of that color not quite standing up to the wear as claimed. In fact,” I raised my brows high and opened my eyes wide to emphasize, “a number of reports have come in that the color transferred to fabric, such as boxer shorts!” Bill had quit talking. “And it seems prone to rubbing off on skin in the scrotum area, testicles in particular.” A glass in the bar shattered, and Bill jerked against me as if he’d been shocked.

  Brianna was entirely too obvious when her eyes went to him.

  “Alison?” Bill asked, his face red. “What’s in your drink, love? You didn’t mix your headache medicine and alcohol, did you?” He took my elbow and led me out to the balcony, shooting a glare at Brianna when she attempted to follow. Outside, his voice was a controlled growl. “Goddamn. What the hell was that?”

  “Please, Bill,” I said, raising my drink theatrically to my lips. Air Supply was playing on the outdoor speakers. How romantic. “We’ve known each other far too long to play games.”

  He watched me drink in silence, but I could see the wheels turning as he tried to decide how much I knew.

  “A month, Hon. I’ve known for a month. Imagine my surprise one night, finding that mine weren’t the first lips wrapped around your little prick that day.”

  A pair of caddies at the end of the deck snickered, then ducked inside when Bill pointed at the door.

  “It was pretty great. I can’t believe you didn’t even bother to wash up, at least splash it off in the sink. Fuck.”

  My swearing at the hallowed club seemed to shock him more than my knowing about his affair. “Jesus, Ali. You’re drunk.”

  “Not yet. But I will be.”

  “You’re going home.”

  “Oh, the hell I am! You’ve made a fool of me in front of everybody here, and I’m going to return the favor today. Behave yourself, or it’ll be worse.”