Fancy Pants (38 page)
Teddy shook his head, his small, blotched face contorted with misery.
"I have to go! I mean it, Mom!
I have to go! Dallie's a jerk! I hate
him!"
"Teddy—"
"No!" Using all his strength, he twisted out of her hands and before
she could catch him, he'd raced
from the room. She heard his feet
making fast, angry thumps down the stairs.
She sagged back on her heels. Her son, who liked every adult male he'd
ever met in his life, didn't like Dallie Beaudine. For a moment she
felt a petty rush of satisfaction, but then, in a sickening flash of
insight, she realized that no matter how much she might hate it, Dallie
was bound to become a factor
in Teddy's life. What effect would it have
on her son to dislike the man who, sooner or later, he must realize was
his father?
Shoving her hands through her hair, she got up and pushed the door shut
so she could get dressed. As
she pulled on slacks and a sweater, she
saw a vision of Dallie's face as he had looked when he was watching
them. There had been something familiar about his expression, something
that reminded her
of the lost teenage girls who waited for her outside
the studio at night.
She scowled at herself in the mirror. She was too fanciful.
Dallie Beaudine wasn't a teenage runaway, and she refused to waste a
moment's sympathy on a man
who was little better than a common criminal.
After peeking into the sewing room to reassure herself that Doralee was
still asleep, she took a few minutes to collect herself by making a
phone call to set up an appointment with one of the county social
workers. Afterward, she went in search of Teddy. She found him slumped
on a stool next to a workbench in the basement where Skeet was sanding
the bare wooden head of a golf club. Neither of them was talking, but
the silence seemed to be companionable rather than hostile. She saw
some suspicious streaks on her son's cheeks and slid her arm around his
shoulders, her heart aching for him. She hadn't seen Skeet in ten
years, but he nodded at her as casually as if it had been ten minutes.
She nodded back. The heating duct above her head clattered.
"Teddy here's gonna be my assistant while I regrip those irons over
there," Skeet announced. "Most times I wouldn't even think about
letting a little kid help me regrip clubs, but Teddy's about the most
responsible boy I ever met. He knows when to talk, and he knows when to
keep his mouth shut. I like that in a man."
Francesca could have kissed Skeet, but since she couldn't do that, she
pressed her lips to the top of Teddy's head instead. "I want to go
home," Teddy said abruptly. "When can we go?" And then
Francesca felt
him stiffen.
She sensed that Dallie had come into the workroom behind them even
before she heard his voice.
"Skeet, how 'bout you take Teddy upstairs
for some of that chocolate cake in the kitchen?"
Teddy jumped up from the stool with a rapidity that she suspected spoke
more of his desire to get away from Dallie than of his craving for her
chocolate cake. What had gone on between the two of them to make Teddy
this miserable? He had always loved Holly Grace's stories. What had
Dallie done to alienate him so completely? "Come on, Mom," he said,
grabbing her hand. "Let's go get some cake. Come on, Skeet. Let's go."
Dallie touched Teddy's arm. "You and Skeet go on up. I want to talk to
your mother for a minute."
Teddy tightened his grip on Francesca's hand and turned to Skeet. "We
got to regrip those clubs, don't we? You said we had to do those clubs.
Let's get started right now. Mom can help us."
"You can do it later," Dallie said more sharply. "I want to talk to
your mother."
Skeet put down the wooden club head he was holding. "Come on, boy. I
got some golf trophies I want
to show you anyway."
As much as Francesca would have liked to put it off, she knew she
couldn't postpone the confrontation. Gently disengaging herself from
Teddy's grasp, she nodded toward the door. "Go on now, sweetheart.
I'll
be up in a minute."
Teddy's jaw set stubbornly. He looked at her and then at Dallie. He
began walking away, his footsteps dragging, but before he got to the
door, he spun back around and angrily turned on Dallie. "You better
not
hurt her!" he shouted. "If you hurt her, I'll kill you!"
Francesca was shocked, but Dallie didn't say a word. He just stood
looking at Teddy.
"Dallie's not going to hurt me," she interjected quickly, distressed by
Teddy's outburst. "He and I are
old friends." The words nearly stuck in
her throat, but she managed a halfhearted smile. Skeet caught Teddy's
arm and steered him toward the stairs, but not before her son had shot
a threatening look over his shoulder.
"What have you done to him?" Francesca demanded the moment Teddy was
out of earshot. "I've never seen him act like that with anybody."
"I'm not trying to win any popularity contests with him," Dallie said
coldly. "I want to be his father, not his best friend."
His answer infuriated her almost as much as it scared her. "You can't
just pop into his life after nine years and expect to take over as his
father. In the first place, he doesn't want you. And in the second
place, I won't allow it."
A muscle jumped in his jaw. "Like I told you at the quarry,
Francesca—we can work this out for ourselves, or we can let the
bloodsuckers do it. Fathers have rights now, or don't you read the
papers? And it'd probably be smart to forget any ideas you might have
about flying back east for the next few days. We need some time to sort
all this out."
At some point in her subconscious she had reached the same conclusion,
but now she looked at him incredulously. "I have no intention of
staying here. I have to get Teddy back in school. We're leaving Wynette
this afternoon."
"I don't think that's a good idea, Francie. You had your nine years.
Now you owe me a few days."
"You kidnapped him!" she exclaimed. "I don't owe you a bloody—"
He stabbed the air with his finger like an angry recruitment poster.
"If you can't even manage a couple
of days to work this thing through,
then I guess all the stuff you told me at the quarry about knowing
what's important in life is pretty much bullshit, isn't it?"
His belligerence made her furious. "Why are you doing this? You don't
care anything about Teddy. You're just using a little boy to pay me
back for stabbing your male ego."
"Don't you practice any pop psychology on me, Miss Fancy Pants," he
said coldly. "You don't have the slightest idea what I care about."
She tilted up her chin and glared at him. "All I know is that you've
managed to alienate a child who likes absolutely everybody in the
world—especially if they're male."
"Yeah?" Dallie sneered. "Well, that's no surprise, because I never saw
a kid in so much need of a man's influence in my life. Were you so busy
with your damn career that you couldn't find a few hours to put him on
a Little League team or something?"
Icy rage filled Francesca. "You son of a bitch," she hissed. Pushing
past him, she walked quickly to the stairs.
"Francie!" She ignored the call behind her. Her heart thudding in her
chest, she told herself she was every kind of fool for having wasted
even a moment's sympathy on him. She raced upstairs and pushed open the
door that led into the back hallway. He could throw all the
bloodsucking lawyers in the world at her, she promised herself, but he
would never get near her son again.
"Francie!" She heard his footsteps on the stairs, but she merely walked
faster. And then he caught up
with her, grabbing her arm to pull her to a stop. "Listen, Francie, I
didn't
mean—"
"Don't you touch me!" She tried to shake him off, but he held on,
determined to have it out with her.
She was vaguely aware that he was
trying to apologize, but she was too upset to listen.
"Francie!" He caught her more firmly by the shoulders and looked down
at her. "I'm sorry."
She pushed against him. "Let me go! We don't have anything more to talk
about."
But he wouldn't let her go. "I'm going to talk to you if I have to
hog-tie—"
He broke off abruptly as, out of nowhere, a small tornado threw himself
at one of his legs. "I told you
not to touch my mother-" Teddy
screamed, kicking and punching with all his might. "You butt-hole!
You're a butt-hole!"
"Teddy!" Francesca cried, whirling toward him as Dallie instinctively
released her.
"I hate you!" Teddy screamed at Dallie, his face florid with rage,
tears running down his cheeks as he escalated his attack. "I'll kill
you if you hurt her!"
"I'm not going to hurt her," Dallie said, trying to step back from
Teddy's flying fists. "Teddy! I'm not going to hurt her."
"Stop it, Teddy!" Francesca cried. But her voice was so shrill she only
made things worse. For an
instant, her eyes caught Dallie's. He looked
exactly as helpless as she felt.
"I hate you! I hate you!"
"Well, now, doesn't this just about beat all?" a female voice drawled
from the other end of the hallway.
"Holly Grace!" Teddy thrust himself away from Dallie and ran for one of
the few safe harbors he knew he could count on in a world that was
growing increasingly bewildering.
"Hey, Teddy." Holly Grace caught him against her and cupped his small
head gently to her chest. Then she gave him a comforting rub across his
narrow shoulders. "You did real good there, honey. Dallie's
big, but
you held your own just fine."
Francesca and Dallie exploded in unison.
"What the hell's wrong with you, tellin' him something like that?"
"Really, Holly Grace!"
Holly Grace gazed at them over the top of Teddy's head, taking in their
rumpled clothes and flushed, stricken faces. Then she shook her head.
"Damn. It looks to me like I just missed the best reunion since Sherman
got together with Atlanta."
her side, she led him out of the hallway and toward the front of the
house, intent on taking him upstairs, packing her things, and getting
out of Wynette forever. But as she walked through the archway into the
living room, she came to a dead stop.
The entire world seemed to have gathered to watch her life fall apart.
Skeet Cooper stood by the window eating a piece of chocolate cake. Miss
Sybil sat next to Doralee on the couch. The cleaning lady hired to help
Miss Sybil had just come in through the front door. And Gerry Jaffe
paced back and forth across the carpet.
Francesca turned to confront Holly Grace with Gerry's presence only to
see that her best friend was preoccupied with wrapping her arm around
Dallie's waist. If there had ever been any question in her
mind about
where Holly Grace's loyalties lay, her protective attitude toward
Dallie had just answered it. "Did you have to bring the entire world
down here with you?" Francesca snapped.
Holly Grace looked past Francesca and, spotting Gerry for the first
time, uttered an oath that Francesca would just as soon Teddy had not
overheard.
Gerry looked like a man who could use a good night's sleep, and he
immediately walked toward Holly Grace. "Couldn't you have
called me and told me what was going on?"
"Called you?" Holly Grace shouted. "Why should I have called you, and
what in the hell are you doing here?"
The cleaning lady took her time hanging up her coat while she regarded
them all with ill-concealed curiosity. Dallie studied Gerry with a
combination of hostility and interest. This was the only man besides
himself who had been able to send the beauteous Holly Grace Beaudine
into a tailspin.
Francesca felt a nagging ache start up at her temples.
"What do you mean, what the hell am I doing here?" Gerry said. "I
called Naomi from Washington and found out that Teddy had been
kidnapped and that you were all upset. What did you expect me to do?
Stay in Washington and pretend nothing was wrong?"
The argument between Holly Grace and Gerry accelerated and then the
telephone rang. Everyone, including the cleaning woman, ignored it.
Francesca felt as if she was suffocating. All she could think about was
that she had to get Teddy out of here. The telephone continued to ring
and the cleaning lady finally began to move toward the kitchen to
answer it. Holly Grace and Gerry abruptly lapsed into angry silence.
At that moment, Dallie looked over at Doralee. "Who's that?" he asked,
his tone displaying little more than mild curiosity.
Skeet shook his head and shrugged.
Miss Sybil rummaged through her needlepoint bag for her canvas.
Holly Grace shot Francesca a disgusted glare.
Following the direction of his ex-wife's gaze, Dallie turned his head
toward Francesca for an explanation.
"Her name is Doralee," Francesca informed him stiffly. "She needs a
place to stay temporarily."
Dallie thought for a moment, and then nodded pleasantly. "Howdy,
Doralee."
Sparks flashed in Holly Grace's eyes and her lips pursed ominously. "I
don't believe the two of you! Haven't you got enough trouble without
looking for more?"
The cleaning lady stuck her head back in the living room from the
kitchen. "There's a phone call for
Miss Day."
Francesca ignored her. Although her head had begun to pound in earnest,
she decided she'd taken enough abuse from Holly Grace. "You just be
quiet, Holly Grace Beaudine. I want to know what you're doing here. All
of this is awful enough without you showing up to flap your wings
around Dallie like some sort of ridiculous mother hen. He's a grown
man! He doesn't need you to fight his battles. And he certainly doesn't
need you to protect him from me."
"Maybe I didn't just come here for him, did you ever think of that?"
Holly Grace retorted. "Maybe I didn't trust either one of you to have
enough common sense to handle this situation."
"I've heard enough about your common sense," Francesca answered just as
angrily. "I'm sick of hearing about—"
"What should I do about this telephone call?" the cleaning lady asked.
"The man says he's a prince."
"Mom!" Teddy wailed, scratching the rash on his stomach and glaring
daggers at Dallie.
Holly Grace thrust her pointed finger toward Doralee. "There's a
perfect example of what I'm talking about! You never think. You just—"
Doralee jumped up. "I don't have to listen to this shit!"
"This is really none of your business, Holly Grace," Gerry interrupted.
"Mom!" Teddy wailed again. "Mom, my rash itches! I want to go home!"
"Are you going to talk to this prince fellow or not?" the cleaning lady
demanded.
A jackhammer went off inside Francesca's skull. She wanted to scream at
all of them to leave her alone. Her friendship with Holly Grace was
crumbling before her eyes; Doralee looked as if she was going to
attack; Teddy was ready to cry. "Please . . ." she said. But no one
heard her.
No one except Dallie.
He leaned toward Skeet and said quietly, "How about holding on to Teddy
for me?" Skeet nodded and moved closer to the boy. The angry voices
grew louder. Dallie stepped forward and, before anyone
could stop him,
hoisted Francesca over his shoulder. She gasped as she found herself
upended.
"Sorry, folks," Dallie said. "But y'all are gonna have to wait your
turn." And then, before any of them could stop him, he carried her out
the door.
"Mom!" Teddy shrieked.
Skeet caught hold of Teddy before he could run after Francesca. "Now,
don't get yourself riled, boy.
This is the way your mama and Dallie
always carry on when they're together. You might as well get
used to
it."
"I have to go! I mean it, Mom!
I have to go! Dallie's a jerk! I hate
him!"
"Teddy—"
"No!" Using all his strength, he twisted out of her hands and before
she could catch him, he'd raced
from the room. She heard his feet
making fast, angry thumps down the stairs.
She sagged back on her heels. Her son, who liked every adult male he'd
ever met in his life, didn't like Dallie Beaudine. For a moment she
felt a petty rush of satisfaction, but then, in a sickening flash of
insight, she realized that no matter how much she might hate it, Dallie
was bound to become a factor
in Teddy's life. What effect would it have
on her son to dislike the man who, sooner or later, he must realize was
his father?
Shoving her hands through her hair, she got up and pushed the door shut
so she could get dressed. As
she pulled on slacks and a sweater, she
saw a vision of Dallie's face as he had looked when he was watching
them. There had been something familiar about his expression, something
that reminded her
of the lost teenage girls who waited for her outside
the studio at night.
She scowled at herself in the mirror. She was too fanciful.
Dallie Beaudine wasn't a teenage runaway, and she refused to waste a
moment's sympathy on a man
who was little better than a common criminal.
After peeking into the sewing room to reassure herself that Doralee was
still asleep, she took a few minutes to collect herself by making a
phone call to set up an appointment with one of the county social
workers. Afterward, she went in search of Teddy. She found him slumped
on a stool next to a workbench in the basement where Skeet was sanding
the bare wooden head of a golf club. Neither of them was talking, but
the silence seemed to be companionable rather than hostile. She saw
some suspicious streaks on her son's cheeks and slid her arm around his
shoulders, her heart aching for him. She hadn't seen Skeet in ten
years, but he nodded at her as casually as if it had been ten minutes.
She nodded back. The heating duct above her head clattered.
"Teddy here's gonna be my assistant while I regrip those irons over
there," Skeet announced. "Most times I wouldn't even think about
letting a little kid help me regrip clubs, but Teddy's about the most
responsible boy I ever met. He knows when to talk, and he knows when to
keep his mouth shut. I like that in a man."
Francesca could have kissed Skeet, but since she couldn't do that, she
pressed her lips to the top of Teddy's head instead. "I want to go
home," Teddy said abruptly. "When can we go?" And then
Francesca felt
him stiffen.
She sensed that Dallie had come into the workroom behind them even
before she heard his voice.
"Skeet, how 'bout you take Teddy upstairs
for some of that chocolate cake in the kitchen?"
Teddy jumped up from the stool with a rapidity that she suspected spoke
more of his desire to get away from Dallie than of his craving for her
chocolate cake. What had gone on between the two of them to make Teddy
this miserable? He had always loved Holly Grace's stories. What had
Dallie done to alienate him so completely? "Come on, Mom," he said,
grabbing her hand. "Let's go get some cake. Come on, Skeet. Let's go."
Dallie touched Teddy's arm. "You and Skeet go on up. I want to talk to
your mother for a minute."
Teddy tightened his grip on Francesca's hand and turned to Skeet. "We
got to regrip those clubs, don't we? You said we had to do those clubs.
Let's get started right now. Mom can help us."
"You can do it later," Dallie said more sharply. "I want to talk to
your mother."
Skeet put down the wooden club head he was holding. "Come on, boy. I
got some golf trophies I want
to show you anyway."
As much as Francesca would have liked to put it off, she knew she
couldn't postpone the confrontation. Gently disengaging herself from
Teddy's grasp, she nodded toward the door. "Go on now, sweetheart.
I'll
be up in a minute."
Teddy's jaw set stubbornly. He looked at her and then at Dallie. He
began walking away, his footsteps dragging, but before he got to the
door, he spun back around and angrily turned on Dallie. "You better
not
hurt her!" he shouted. "If you hurt her, I'll kill you!"
Francesca was shocked, but Dallie didn't say a word. He just stood
looking at Teddy.
"Dallie's not going to hurt me," she interjected quickly, distressed by
Teddy's outburst. "He and I are
old friends." The words nearly stuck in
her throat, but she managed a halfhearted smile. Skeet caught Teddy's
arm and steered him toward the stairs, but not before her son had shot
a threatening look over his shoulder.
"What have you done to him?" Francesca demanded the moment Teddy was
out of earshot. "I've never seen him act like that with anybody."
"I'm not trying to win any popularity contests with him," Dallie said
coldly. "I want to be his father, not his best friend."
His answer infuriated her almost as much as it scared her. "You can't
just pop into his life after nine years and expect to take over as his
father. In the first place, he doesn't want you. And in the second
place, I won't allow it."
A muscle jumped in his jaw. "Like I told you at the quarry,
Francesca—we can work this out for ourselves, or we can let the
bloodsuckers do it. Fathers have rights now, or don't you read the
papers? And it'd probably be smart to forget any ideas you might have
about flying back east for the next few days. We need some time to sort
all this out."
At some point in her subconscious she had reached the same conclusion,
but now she looked at him incredulously. "I have no intention of
staying here. I have to get Teddy back in school. We're leaving Wynette
this afternoon."
"I don't think that's a good idea, Francie. You had your nine years.
Now you owe me a few days."
"You kidnapped him!" she exclaimed. "I don't owe you a bloody—"
He stabbed the air with his finger like an angry recruitment poster.
"If you can't even manage a couple
of days to work this thing through,
then I guess all the stuff you told me at the quarry about knowing
what's important in life is pretty much bullshit, isn't it?"
His belligerence made her furious. "Why are you doing this? You don't
care anything about Teddy. You're just using a little boy to pay me
back for stabbing your male ego."
"Don't you practice any pop psychology on me, Miss Fancy Pants," he
said coldly. "You don't have the slightest idea what I care about."
She tilted up her chin and glared at him. "All I know is that you've
managed to alienate a child who likes absolutely everybody in the
world—especially if they're male."
"Yeah?" Dallie sneered. "Well, that's no surprise, because I never saw
a kid in so much need of a man's influence in my life. Were you so busy
with your damn career that you couldn't find a few hours to put him on
a Little League team or something?"
Icy rage filled Francesca. "You son of a bitch," she hissed. Pushing
past him, she walked quickly to the stairs.
"Francie!" She ignored the call behind her. Her heart thudding in her
chest, she told herself she was every kind of fool for having wasted
even a moment's sympathy on him. She raced upstairs and pushed open the
door that led into the back hallway. He could throw all the
bloodsucking lawyers in the world at her, she promised herself, but he
would never get near her son again.
"Francie!" She heard his footsteps on the stairs, but she merely walked
faster. And then he caught up
with her, grabbing her arm to pull her to a stop. "Listen, Francie, I
didn't
mean—"
"Don't you touch me!" She tried to shake him off, but he held on,
determined to have it out with her.
She was vaguely aware that he was
trying to apologize, but she was too upset to listen.
"Francie!" He caught her more firmly by the shoulders and looked down
at her. "I'm sorry."
She pushed against him. "Let me go! We don't have anything more to talk
about."
But he wouldn't let her go. "I'm going to talk to you if I have to
hog-tie—"
He broke off abruptly as, out of nowhere, a small tornado threw himself
at one of his legs. "I told you
not to touch my mother-" Teddy
screamed, kicking and punching with all his might. "You butt-hole!
You're a butt-hole!"
"Teddy!" Francesca cried, whirling toward him as Dallie instinctively
released her.
"I hate you!" Teddy screamed at Dallie, his face florid with rage,
tears running down his cheeks as he escalated his attack. "I'll kill
you if you hurt her!"
"I'm not going to hurt her," Dallie said, trying to step back from
Teddy's flying fists. "Teddy! I'm not going to hurt her."
"Stop it, Teddy!" Francesca cried. But her voice was so shrill she only
made things worse. For an
instant, her eyes caught Dallie's. He looked
exactly as helpless as she felt.
"I hate you! I hate you!"
"Well, now, doesn't this just about beat all?" a female voice drawled
from the other end of the hallway.
"Holly Grace!" Teddy thrust himself away from Dallie and ran for one of
the few safe harbors he knew he could count on in a world that was
growing increasingly bewildering.
"Hey, Teddy." Holly Grace caught him against her and cupped his small
head gently to her chest. Then she gave him a comforting rub across his
narrow shoulders. "You did real good there, honey. Dallie's
big, but
you held your own just fine."
Francesca and Dallie exploded in unison.
"What the hell's wrong with you, tellin' him something like that?"
"Really, Holly Grace!"
Holly Grace gazed at them over the top of Teddy's head, taking in their
rumpled clothes and flushed, stricken faces. Then she shook her head.
"Damn. It looks to me like I just missed the best reunion since Sherman
got together with Atlanta."
Chapter
27
Francesca pulled Teddy away from Holly Grace. With her son clasped to27
her side, she led him out of the hallway and toward the front of the
house, intent on taking him upstairs, packing her things, and getting
out of Wynette forever. But as she walked through the archway into the
living room, she came to a dead stop.
The entire world seemed to have gathered to watch her life fall apart.
Skeet Cooper stood by the window eating a piece of chocolate cake. Miss
Sybil sat next to Doralee on the couch. The cleaning lady hired to help
Miss Sybil had just come in through the front door. And Gerry Jaffe
paced back and forth across the carpet.
Francesca turned to confront Holly Grace with Gerry's presence only to
see that her best friend was preoccupied with wrapping her arm around
Dallie's waist. If there had ever been any question in her
mind about
where Holly Grace's loyalties lay, her protective attitude toward
Dallie had just answered it. "Did you have to bring the entire world
down here with you?" Francesca snapped.
Holly Grace looked past Francesca and, spotting Gerry for the first
time, uttered an oath that Francesca would just as soon Teddy had not
overheard.
Gerry looked like a man who could use a good night's sleep, and he
immediately walked toward Holly Grace. "Couldn't you have
called me and told me what was going on?"
"Called you?" Holly Grace shouted. "Why should I have called you, and
what in the hell are you doing here?"
The cleaning lady took her time hanging up her coat while she regarded
them all with ill-concealed curiosity. Dallie studied Gerry with a
combination of hostility and interest. This was the only man besides
himself who had been able to send the beauteous Holly Grace Beaudine
into a tailspin.
Francesca felt a nagging ache start up at her temples.
"What do you mean, what the hell am I doing here?" Gerry said. "I
called Naomi from Washington and found out that Teddy had been
kidnapped and that you were all upset. What did you expect me to do?
Stay in Washington and pretend nothing was wrong?"
The argument between Holly Grace and Gerry accelerated and then the
telephone rang. Everyone, including the cleaning woman, ignored it.
Francesca felt as if she was suffocating. All she could think about was
that she had to get Teddy out of here. The telephone continued to ring
and the cleaning lady finally began to move toward the kitchen to
answer it. Holly Grace and Gerry abruptly lapsed into angry silence.
At that moment, Dallie looked over at Doralee. "Who's that?" he asked,
his tone displaying little more than mild curiosity.
Skeet shook his head and shrugged.
Miss Sybil rummaged through her needlepoint bag for her canvas.
Holly Grace shot Francesca a disgusted glare.
Following the direction of his ex-wife's gaze, Dallie turned his head
toward Francesca for an explanation.
"Her name is Doralee," Francesca informed him stiffly. "She needs a
place to stay temporarily."
Dallie thought for a moment, and then nodded pleasantly. "Howdy,
Doralee."
Sparks flashed in Holly Grace's eyes and her lips pursed ominously. "I
don't believe the two of you! Haven't you got enough trouble without
looking for more?"
The cleaning lady stuck her head back in the living room from the
kitchen. "There's a phone call for
Miss Day."
Francesca ignored her. Although her head had begun to pound in earnest,
she decided she'd taken enough abuse from Holly Grace. "You just be
quiet, Holly Grace Beaudine. I want to know what you're doing here. All
of this is awful enough without you showing up to flap your wings
around Dallie like some sort of ridiculous mother hen. He's a grown
man! He doesn't need you to fight his battles. And he certainly doesn't
need you to protect him from me."
"Maybe I didn't just come here for him, did you ever think of that?"
Holly Grace retorted. "Maybe I didn't trust either one of you to have
enough common sense to handle this situation."
"I've heard enough about your common sense," Francesca answered just as
angrily. "I'm sick of hearing about—"
"What should I do about this telephone call?" the cleaning lady asked.
"The man says he's a prince."
"Mom!" Teddy wailed, scratching the rash on his stomach and glaring
daggers at Dallie.
Holly Grace thrust her pointed finger toward Doralee. "There's a
perfect example of what I'm talking about! You never think. You just—"
Doralee jumped up. "I don't have to listen to this shit!"
"This is really none of your business, Holly Grace," Gerry interrupted.
"Mom!" Teddy wailed again. "Mom, my rash itches! I want to go home!"
"Are you going to talk to this prince fellow or not?" the cleaning lady
demanded.
A jackhammer went off inside Francesca's skull. She wanted to scream at
all of them to leave her alone. Her friendship with Holly Grace was
crumbling before her eyes; Doralee looked as if she was going to
attack; Teddy was ready to cry. "Please . . ." she said. But no one
heard her.
No one except Dallie.
He leaned toward Skeet and said quietly, "How about holding on to Teddy
for me?" Skeet nodded and moved closer to the boy. The angry voices
grew louder. Dallie stepped forward and, before anyone
could stop him,
hoisted Francesca over his shoulder. She gasped as she found herself
upended.
"Sorry, folks," Dallie said. "But y'all are gonna have to wait your
turn." And then, before any of them could stop him, he carried her out
the door.
"Mom!" Teddy shrieked.
Skeet caught hold of Teddy before he could run after Francesca. "Now,
don't get yourself riled, boy.
This is the way your mama and Dallie
always carry on when they're together. You might as well get
used to
it."
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