Page 37 of Skins Game

“God,no. None of their business. And how excruciating.”

His naughty smile returned. “Excellent.”

13

Pebble Beach

NICOLE LAMB

The simulator room was the size of an oversized two-car garage with dual wide bays hung with projection screens. A conversation grouping of a couch and chairs stood between the door and the first simulator.

“Nice set-up,” Kingston said, pivoting in the middle of the room as he scanned the space.

Nicole was too busy watching him. His white dress shirt accentuated the breadth of his muscular shoulders that tapered to his narrow waist and long,longlegs in his navy-blue suit pants. He looked like a superhero in disguise standing there, fists braced on his hips, shockingly handsome even in the fluorescent ceiling lights lining his jaw and strong cheekbones with bright lines.

Nicole stood beside him and powered up the computer. ”Yeah, I think Joe Flanagan wanted to schmooze prospective investors in here, but instead, it became the technicians’ playroom.”

Kingston looked down at her. “No other investors were listed as owners, just Flanagan and the banks that loaned him operating capital. Are there other owners?”

“Nah, he didn’t actuallydoanything about schmoozing other investors. He built this area so he could, if he ever got around to it. That’s probably why Sidewinder was going bankrupt.”

“Indeed. What course should we play first, Pebble or Augusta?”

“Guest’s choice,” Nicole said, firing up the software.

“Pebble Beach.”

Projectors hanging over the bays glared electric blue light onto the screens. Nicole squinted as she clicked through the windows to load the golf courses.

The lush green golf course of Pebble Beach Golf Links flashed into view on the screens of the right-side simulator.

“Wow,” Kingston whispered and walked inside the glowing cube.

Most golf simulators are just a flat screen that the struck golf ball smacks into, and then a virtual simulation of the ball continues into the image as the real ball drops to the Astroturf mat.

Sidewinder’s simulators included the room’s sides, and above it, a bright blue sky scudded with clouds.

He turned back to look at where she was standing at the computer. “This is unreal. Actually, it’sveryreal. It’s like I’m standing on the first tee, except there’s a portal back to the office behind me.”

“Yeah, Joe wanted to put a rear screen with a door on it, too, but that seemed excessive,” she said. “And not conducive to schmoozing.”

He squinted up at the sky. “That’s, what, forty feet up there?”

“Thirty. Optical illusion.”

“It’s a good one.”

“There aren’t any real corners, either. It isn’t four separate films. It’s one huge wraparound video image, so you don’t havethe problem with jiggling or discrepancies in the corners that make some people carsick.”

He turned his back to her again, looking down the course. “The first hole is three hundred eighty yards, par four, dogleg right. This is amazing. I can see every grain of sand in the fairway bunkers to the left of the bend and all those traps right around the green. It’s like standing on the tee box.” He swiveled and looked back at her. “Do you have loaner clubs? Mine are in my car, but you know.”

Yes, their cars were as out of reach as pizza delivery. “Flanagan stocked this room with sets of every high-end club known to golf: Titleist, TaylorMade, Krank, PXG Black Ops, Honma Five-Stars, Bentley Centenary?—”

“Wow.Bentley only released a hundred of those sets.”

“Yeah, so one percent of the world’s stock of them is sitting in this room, gathering dust. We also have prototypes of some of the newer clubs we’re working on.”

“I’d love to play with your prototypes.”