Forgotten First Kiss

“There you are.” Rufus gave us a scolding look. “You were supposed to return that cart by four. The next group who’d reserved it had to walk.” He muttered something that sounded like, “Of course, they needed the exercise, if you ask me.” Then, he shooed us out of the cart and drove it back to the golf cart corral.

I waited for his return and shook his hand. “Sorry for the inconvenience. I’ll call tomorrow and pay for the extra time.”

“Your credit card has already been charged, Mr. Hotston.” So Rufus knew me. Or at least he’d seen my name on the roster of cart rentals. “Don’t worry, we didn’t overcharge you just because of the Georgetown and Prince acquisition. Though don’t think we didn’t consider it. You can afford to buy your own golf cart, man. A whole fleet of them.”

Good point.

In the truck on the drive back to Danica’s place, she asked, “What was Rufus saying about golf carts and Georgetown?”

“Georgetown is a neighborhood in Washington, D.C.” I sounded so stupid right now. “I’m guessing they have a nice golf course or two there, to keep the politicians happy.”

“Jeremy.” Danica was having none of my obfuscation. “Fine. I’ll look it up online. I’ll look you up online.” She whipped out her phone.

“You mean you haven’t done that already?”

“I was allowing you the courtesy of revealing yourself through what you wanted to share with me.”

That was noble. Something few people in this world would do these days. “I appreciate it.”

She put her phone away and turned to look at me pointedly. I rolled us up to a drive-through of a burger place. “Do you want cheese on your burger?”

I ordered through the intercom for us both, and then, when we had our paper sack of dinner, I pulled over at the town park. From here, the whole ski resort was visible, and at the top of the hills, if there’d been enough moonlight, we would have been able to see the changing of the leaves.

We found a picnic table, and I handed her a cheeseburger. “I have a company in the city. It’s been really successful, especially lately. A deal we did last month got a lot of publicity in medical practice sales circles, and a little beyond them.”

“Oh? Go on.” She took a big bite of the burger and chewed, allowing me time to gather more thoughts.

“And I will probably need to wind up my time here in Wilder River pretty soon and get back to my responsibilities there.”

“You’re leaving?”

“I mean, eventually, yeah.”

“By eventually, do you mean before the end of the year? Before the end of the week?”

I laughed and placed my index finger on her nose. “I don’t know. We’ll go fishing again first, though. For sure.”

“Jeremy.” Her brows pushed together, and she rewrapped her burger, as though it no longer appealed. “I guess I thought …”

She’d assumed I was staying in Wilder River, clearly.

If only I could.