As everyone laughed, he glanced at Kate to see her looking at him gratefully.

Rachel exchanged what he was sure was a knowing look with the other girls. “Uh-huh,” she said. “Well, you figured it out just in time because it’s your turn. Go grab some mallets and stop holding all of us up.”

Dawson would have gotten one for Kate, but when he started to head over to where the mallets were, she fell into step beside him.

“You didn’t have to do that,” she said softly.

He grinned. “Sure, I did.”

She smiled. “Well, I’m not sure if they believed you, but thank you anyway.”

“You’re welcome.” He picked up one of the mallets and handed it to her. “Come on, let’s go show ’em how the game is played.”

Kate laughed. “I would if I knew how. I’ve never played croquet before, remember?” She hefted the mallet. “Looks dangerous.”

He grabbed a mallet for himself, then gave her a wink. “Any implement can be dangerous if you don’t know how to use it.”

She looked up at him from beneath lowered lashes. “I take it that means you’re an expert at using your implement then?”

His mouth quirked. “I think you already know the answer to that one.”

Taking her hand, he started over to where their friends were waiting. Someone had already placed a colorful croquet ball at the starting pole for them and he led Kate over to it.

She gazed down at the big colored ball and the pole planted in the ground for a moment, then gave him a curious look. “So, I just whack the ball with the big wooden hammer?”

He chuckled, watching as she leaned over the ball like a golfer would. “Something like that, but your form is a little off. Here, let me show you.”

Dawson supposed he could have just demonstrated the proper form using his own mallet, but it was much more fun to wrap his arms around her from behind and guide her through the motion. He took his time showing her how to swing the mallet back and forth between her legs, not because he thought she wouldn’t catch on, but because it made her sweetly curved ass rub against his groin.

Off to the side, Rachel eyed them with amusement. “This looks like it’s going to take a little while,” she said to the rest of the wedding party. “Maybe we should just play through and let them catch up later.”

“That okay,” Dawson heard John say. “We can wait.”

“No, we can’t,” Kristen told her husband. She grabbed his arm and urged him in the direction of his own colored ball. “They’ll catch up in a bit.”

A few moments later, Dawson found himself alone with Kate, or as alone with her as he could with the other couples all within earshot. He couldn’t help but notice everyone seemed to be looking at them out of the corners of their eyes.

Kate turned her head to smile at him. “Guess they must think I’m a slow learner.”

His mouth edged up. “We’ll soon fix that.”

As he spoke, Dawson reached his arms around Kate again and guided her through the swinging motions a few more times. God, he liked the feel of her ass rubbing against his cock as she leaned over. And the way her silky hair brushed his cheek as she moved wasn’t half bad, either. Focusing on the fundamentals of croquet was going to take a lot more concentration than he’d originally thought.

“Now, for the first part,” he said, his mouth close to her ear. “The objective is simply to use your mallet to whack the pole so that the ball rolls through the first wire hoop over there.”

She half turned her head to give him a flirtatious look. “Are you sure it’s okay to go right for the pole like that? Shouldn’t I start off with the balls…I mean ball…and work my way up to the pole?”

Dawson couldn’t help but notice she was doing a whole lot of unnecessary wiggling with her ass as she spoke. Not that he or his cock minded. In fact, if she kept doing it, he wasn’t going to need a croquet mallet to play the game.

“We are talking about croquet, right?” he asked softly.

“Of course.” She blinked at him with innocent green eyes. “What else would we be talking about?”

He felt a grin tug at the corner of his mouth. “I just wanted to be sure. To answer your question, yes, you always start off by giving the pole a good firm whack.”

Kate shrugged. “Okay, if you’re sure.”

She took a tentative swing at the start pole and missed.

“Hold on a second,” she said, turning her head to look at him again. “I don’t think I’m doing this correctly. It doesn’t feel right.”

Dawson stifled a groan as she pushed her ass more firmly into his crotch. “Feels like you’re doing it right to me.”

“I don’t think so,” she insisted. “I mean, what kind of grip should I use on the shaft of my mallet? Should it be firm or loose?”

Inside his jeans, his cock was hardening to new and painful proportions. He couldn’t help but wonder if she knew the effect her words were having on him. “I’ve always preferred a rather firm grip myself.”

She gazed down at the mallet she was holding as if considering that. “But if I hold it too firmly how will I slide my hand up and down the shaft? I am supposed to move my hand up and down the shaft as I move it between my legs, right?”

Damn, she was good at this. She acted like she didn’t have a clue what she was talking about with her innuendos, but she was driving him crazy.

“Oh, you definitely need to slide your hand up and down the shaft,” he said. “But it’s all in the technique. Your grip shouldn’t be too firm or too loose.”

She sighed and turned her head to look at him. “This is much more complicated than I thought. Maybe you better demonstrate how you handle your own. I wouldn’t want to do it wrong.”

He lifted a brow. “So you like to watch, huh?”

Her lips curved into a seductive smile. “Uh-huh.”

“Well, if you’re a good girl, maybe I’ll give you a private demonstration later. Right now, we need to concentrate on croquet.”

She gave him little pout. “But I thought we were concentrating on croquet.”

“Right.” His mouth quirked. “You know, if we don’t catch up to everyone else soon, they’re going to come see what’s taking us so long. Though I think they’ll figure it out pretty quick when they see the bulge in my jeans.”

“It is sort of a giveaway, isn’t it?” Kate laughed. “Who knew croquet could be such a turn-on?”

Not him, that was for damn sure. The last time he played the game was at his grandfather’s birthday party and it definitely wasn’t this much fun. Then again, he didn’t have a sex kitten like Kate flirting with him the whole time, either.

She tightened her hold on the mallet and gave the pole a stout whack. Her ball rolled halfway toward the first wire hoop, then stopped.

“Not bad,” he said as she stepped to the side so he could take his turn.

Dawson didn’t often put aside his competitive nature, but for some reason he found himself striking the pole with his mallet more gently than he normally would. As a result, his croquet ball gently rolled to a stop behind hers.

Kate’s next swing sent her ball rolling across the grass and into the side of the hoop hard enough to nearly knock the metal wicket down. She caught her lower lip between her teeth and gave him an embarrassed look.

“Ooops,” she said.

Hurrying over to the metal hoop, she bent over to straighten it, giving him a sexy shot of leg as she did. She took her time getting the wicket perfectly set and as he watched her gorgeous ass wiggle from side to side, he began to think she knocked over the hoop on purpose just to torture him. When she stood up a few moments later to give him a sultry smile over her shoulder, he decided he was right. Minx.

From that point on, any thought he and Kate might actually come from behind and win the game disappeared. Every time she smiled or laughed, his cock got hard all over again and his concentration went out the window, something that allowed Heather and her husband Eric to win easily. That was okay with Dawson. Flirting with a sexy woman like Kate was better than winning at croquet any day.