Match Play Read Online Free

also knew he was about to enter the most intensive phase of pilot training. Following his head instead of his heart, he suggested they take a break. Hurt and angry, Dayna suggested he take a flying leap.
    Judging by the acid dripping from her voice a few moments ago, she obviously thought he hadn’t fallen far enough or hit anywhere near hard enough.
    With a spear of regret for what they might have had, Luke thrust his hands in the pockets of his jacket and turned away.
    â€œI need to head back to the base,” he told his buddies. “I’ve got mission prebrief in a couple hours.”
    Â 
    More rattled than she wanted to admit by the encounter, Dayna stalked past the Old Course’s eighteenth green. Workmen were busy erecting bleachers and scaffolding for camera crews, but she barely noticed these modern scars on the face of the ancient course.
    She’d known Luke Harper was stationed at the RAF base, dammit. She should have been more prepared for a chance meeting with her old flame.
    That was as good a description as any for him, Dayna thought with a stab of self-disgust. She’d gone off the deep end, but Luke Harper had never loved her. Lusted for her, yes. Driven her half out of her mind with his muscular body and his busy, busy hands, certainly. Yet he’d cut the cord fast enough when their romance began to interfere with their respective training regimens.
    Something to remember, she told herself fiercely as she hailed a shuttle. The gaily decorated carts ferried golfers between the five courses, two clubhouses, modern golf academy and state-of-the-art practice center that comprised the St. Andrews Links complex.
    â€œG’day to ye, Ms. Duncan.” The trolley driver greeted her with the rolling Scots burr that required careful attention by the listener or the services of an interpreter. “Are ye gaein’ oot for a bit o’ practice?”
    â€œYes, I am. Would you take me to the driving range, please.”
    â€œI wud indeed.” Relieving her of her bag, he stowed it on the rack at the rear of the cart. “Off we go, then.”
    Dayna used the short drive and the stiff breeze coming in off the bay to blow Luke Harper out of her head. The man was history. For the next week her sole focus would be Wu Kim Li.
    Kim Li and this course, she thought, eyeing the rolling fairways and deep sand traps. It was the oldest course in Scotland, the playground of kings and commoners, covering a stretch of land beside the sea like an old, crumpled carpet. Unlike the manicured fairways and lushly landscaped grounds of most U.S. courses, St. Andrews pitted man against the elements. There were no stands of pine or oak to blunt the often gale-force winds that blew in from the bay, no banks of colorful azalea or rhododendrons to separate the holes.
    The fairways had been planted centuries ago in a stubby, scruffy native grass that put its roots deep into the sandy soil and sent shock waves through wrists and arms when hit with a club at the wrong angle. Worse, there wasn’t a level patch anywhere on the course. The burns, sways, gorse-topped hummocks and treacherous sand traps required intense concentration on every shot. Dayna would have a real challenge to keep her ball in play and Wu Kim Li in her sights.
    Â 
    She found the North Korean holding court at the practice center.
    A modern facility devoted to the art and science of golf, the center’s driving range boasted sixty bays with air-cushioned mats and automated power tees. Wu Kim Li occupied the center bay—in full view of television crews crammed into the glassed-in viewing area, naturally.
    By shamelessly playing on her name and former Olympic glory, Dayna had snagged the bay next to the teenaged megastar. She waited patiently until the golfer who had it before her finished, then walked out to the open-sided booth. Removing the head cover from her driver, Dayna hooked the club at the small of her back and did a