“No, I'm wrong,” Holly Grace went on as she took in the black and ivory print Galanos dress Francesca was wearing with an oversize cinnabar red jacket. “She's not the queen of England. She's that lady mud wrestler we saw down in Medina County.”
Francesca grabbed Gerry's arm. “Let's go.”
Gerry's full lips were growing thinner by the minute, but he refused to move. Holly Grace tilted back the brim of her Stetson, studiously ignoring him while she scrutinized Francesca's outfit. “Galanos in the Roustabout. Shit. You're liable to get us all kicked out. Don't you get tired always being the center of attention?”
Francesca forgot about Gerry and Dallie and looked at Holly Grace with genuine concern. She really was acting bitchy. Letting go of Gerry's arm, she walked over to her and slipped into the chair at her side. “Are you all right?” she asked.
Holly Grace scowled into her beer glass, but otherwise remained silent.
“Let's go to the bathroom so we can talk,” Francesca whispered, and when Holly Grace didn't respond, she added more forcefully, “Right now.”
Holly Grace gave her a rebellious look that resembled Teddy at his worst. “I'm not going anywhere with you. I'm still mad at you for not telling me the truth about Teddy.” She turned to Dallie. “Dance with me, baby.”
Dallie had been regarding them both with interest. Now he unwound himself from his chair and looped his arm over Holly Grace's shoulders as she stood up. “Sure, honey.”
The two of them began to walk away, but Gerry took a step forward, blocking their path. “Isn't it interesting the way they grab on to each other?” he said to Francesca. “It's the most fascinating case of arrested development I've ever seen.”
“You go ahead and dance, Holly Grace,” Francesca said quietly, “but while you're doing it, think about the fact that I might need you right now just as much as Dallie does.”
For a moment Holly Grace hesitated, but then she turned into Dallie's arms and together they moved out onto the dance floor.
At that moment, one of the patrons of the Roustabout came up to ask Francesca for her autograph, and before long she was surrounded by fans. She chatted with them while inwardly she was filled with frustration. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Gerry talking to a buxom young thing at the bar. Holly Grace danced past with Dallie, the two of them moving together like one single, graceful body, their casual intimacy so absolute they seemed to shut out the rest of the world. Her cheeks began to ache from smiling. She signed more autographs and acknowledged more compliments, but the patrons of the Roustabout refused to let her go. They were accustomed to having the star of “China Colt” in their midst, but seeing the glamorous Francesca Day was something else entirely. It wasn't long before she spotted Holly Grace slipping out the back door by herself. A hand touched her from behind.
“Sorry, folks, but Francie promised me this dance. You still remember the two-step, honey?”
Francesca turned toward Dallie and, after a moment's hesitation, went into his arms. He caught her against him, and she had the unsettling feeling that she'd been pitched back ten years to the time when this man had formed the center of her world.
“Damn, it feels funny to be dancing with somebody who's wearing a dress,” he said. “You got shoulder pads in that jacket?”
His tone was soft, gentle with amusement. It felt so good to be close to him. Much too good.
“Don't you let Holly Grace hurt your feelings,” he said quietly. “She just needs some time.”
Dallie's sympathy, under the circumstances, surprised her. She managed to reply, “Her friendship means a lot to me.”
“If you ask me, the way that old commie lover has taken advantage of her is bothering her more than anything.”
Francesca realized that Dallie didn't understand the true nature of the trouble between Holly Grace and Gerry, and she decided it wasn't her place to enlighten him.
“Sooner or later, she'll come around,” he went on. “And I know she'd appreciate it if you'd be there waiting for her. Now, how 'bout you stop worrying about Holly Grace and concentrate on the music so we can get down to some serious dancing?”
Francesca tried to oblige, but she was so aware of him that serious dancing was beyond her. The music slowed into a romantic country ballad. His jaw brushed the top of her head.
“You look awful pretty tonight, Francie.”
His voice held a trace of huskiness that unnerved her. He drew her infinitesimally closer. “You're such a tiny little thing. I forgot how little you are.”
Don't charm me, she wanted to plead as she felt the warmth of his body seep through into her own. Don't be sweet and sexy and make me forget everything that's standing between us. She had the disconcerting sense that the sounds around them were fading, the music growing still, the other voices disappearing so that it seemed as if the two of them were alone on the dance floor.
He pulled her closer and their rhythm subtly changed, no longer quite a dance but something closer to an embrace. His body felt hard and solid against hers, and she tried to summon the energy to fight her attraction to him. “Let's— let's sit down now.”
“All right.”
But instead of letting her go, he tucked their clasped hands between their bodies. His other hand slipped under her jacket so that only the thin silk of her dress separated her skin from his touch. Somehow her cheek seemed to find his shoulder. She leaned into it as if she had come home. Drawing in her breath, she shut her eyes and drifted with him.
“Francie,” he whispered into her hair, “we're going to have to do something about this.”
She thought about pretending that she didn't understand what he meant, but at that moment coquetry was beyond her. “It's—it's just a simple chemical attraction. If we ignore it, it'll go away.”
He pulled her closer. “You sure about that?”
“Absolutely.” She hoped he didn't hear the slight quaver in her voice. She was suddenly frightened, and she found herself saying, “Gracious, Dallie, this has happened to me hundreds of times before. Thousands. I'm sure it's happened to you, too.”
“Yeah,” he said flatly. “Thousands of times.” Abruptly he stopped moving and dropped his arms. “Listen, Francie, if it's all the same to you, I don't feel too much like dancing anymore.”
“Fine.” She gave him her best cocktail party smile and busied her hands by straightening the front of her jacket. “That's fine with me.”
“See you later.” He turned to walk away.
“Yes, later,” she said to his back.
Their parting was cordial. No angry words had been spoken. No warnings had been issued. But as she watched him disappear into the crowd, she had the vague feeling that a new set of battle lines had been drawn between them.
Chapter
28
Although Dallie made several halfhearted attempts to smooth his relationship with Teddy, the two of them were like oil and water. When his father was around, Teddy bumped into furniture, broke dishes, and sulked. Dallie was quick to criticize the child, and the two of them grew increasingly miserable in each other's company. Francesca tried to act as a conciliator, but so much tension had built up between herself and Dallie since the evening they had danced at the Roustabout that she only succeeded in losing her own temper.
The afternoon of her third and final day in Wynette, she confronted Dallie in the basement after Teddy had run upstairs and kicked a chair across the kitchen. “Couldn't you sit down and do a puzzle with him or read a book together?” she demanded. “What in God's name made you think he could learn to shoot pool with you yelling at him the entire time?”
Dallie glared at the jagged tear in the green felt that covered his pool table. “I wasn't yelling, and you stay out of this. You're leaving tomorrow, and that doesn't give me much time to make up for nine years of too much female influence.”
“Only partial female influence,” she retorted. “Don't forget that Holly Grace spent a lot of time with him, too.”
His eyes narrowed. “And just what do you mean by that remark?”
“It means she was one hell of a better father than you'll ever be.”
Dallie stalked away from her, every muscle in his body taut with belligerence, only to reappear at her side moments later. “And another thing. I thought you were going to talk to him—explain about how I'm his father.”
“Teddy's not in the mood for any explanations. He's a smart kid. He'll catch on when he's ready.”
His eyes raked her body with deliberate insolence. “You know what I think's wrong with you? I think you're still an immature child who can't stand not getting her own way!”
Her eyes raked him right back. “And I think you're a brainless jock who's not worth a damn without a bloody golf club in his hand!”
They threw angry words at each other like guided missiles, but even as the hostilities between them mounted, Francesca had the vague sensation that nothing either of them said was hitting its target. Their words were merely an ineffective smoke screen that did little to hide the fact that the air between them was smoldering with lust.
“It's no wonder you never got married. You're about the coldest woman I ever met in my life.”
“There are a number of men who'd disagree. Real men, not glamour boys who wear their jeans so tight you have to wonder what they're trying to prove.”
“It just shows where you've been putting your eyes.”
“It just shows how bored I've been.” The words flew around their heads like bullets, leaving both of them seething with frustration and putting everyone else in the household on edge.
Finally Skeet Cooper had had enough. “I've got a surprise for the two of you,” he said, sticking his head through the basement door. “Come on up here.”
Not looking at each other, Dallie and Francesca climbed the steps to the kitchen. Skeet was waiting by the back door holding their jackets. “Miss Sybil and Doralee are gonna take Teddy to the library. You two are coming with me.”
“Where are we going?” Francesca asked.
“I'm not in the mood,” Dallie snapped.
Skeet threw a red windbreaker at Dallie's chest. “I don't give a good goddamn whether you're in the mood or not, because I guaran-damn-tee you that you're gonna be shy one caddy if you don't hustle yourself into my car in about the next thirty seconds.”
Grumbling under his breath, Dallie followed Francesca out to Skeet's Ford. “You ride in the back,” Skeet told him. “Francie's riding up here with me.” Dallie grumbled some more, but did as he was told.
Francesca did her best to drive Dallie even crazier during the ride by indulging in a pleasant conversation with Skeet and pointedly leaving him out. Skeet ignored Dallie's questions about where they were going, saying only that he had the solution to at least some of their problems. They were nearly twenty miles outside of Wynette on a road that looked vaguely familiar to Francesca, when Skeet pulled the car over to the side.
“I've got something real interesting in the trunk of my car that I want both of you to see.” Sliding up on one hip, he pulled a spare key from his pocket and tossed it back to Dallie. “You go look, too, Francie. I think this'll make the two of you feel a whole lot better.”
Dallie regarded him suspiciously, but opened the door and climbed out. Francesca zipped up her jacket and did the same. They walked along opposite sides of the car to the back, and Dallie reached toward the trunk lock with the key. Before he could touch it, however, Skeet hit the accelerator and peeled away, leaving the two of them standing at the side of the road.
Francesca stared at the rapidly vanishing car in bewilderment. “What—”
“You son of a bitch!” Dallie yelled, shaking his fist at the back end of the Ford. “I'm going to kill him! When I get my hands on him, he's gonna regret the day he was born. I should have known— That rotten no-good—”
“I don't understand,” Francesca cut in. “What's he doing? Why is he leaving us?”
“Because he can't stand listening to you argue anymore, that's why!”
“Me!”
There was a short pause before he grabbed her upper arm. “Come on.”
“Where are we going?”
“My house. It's about a mile or so down the next road.”
“How convenient,” she said dryly. “Are you sure the two of you didn't plot this together?”
“Believe me,” he snarled, starting to walk again, “the last thing in the world I want is to be stuck in that house with you. There's not even a telephone.”
“Look on the bright side,” she replied sarcastically. “With those Goody Two-shoes rules you've laid down, we won't be able to fight once we get in the house.”
“Yeah, well you'd better stick to those rules or you'll find yourself spending the night on the front porch.”
“Spending the night?”
“You don't really think he's going to come back and get us before morning, do you?”
“You're kidding.”
“Do I look like it?”
They walked for a little bit, and then, just to aggravate him, she started humming Willie Nelson's “On the Road Again.” He stopped and glared at her.
“Oh, don't be such a sourpuss,” she chided. “You have to admit this is at least a little amusing.”
“Amusing!” Once again his hands slammed down on his hips. “I'd like to know what's so damned amusing about it! You know just as well as I do what's going to happen between the two of us in that house tonight.”
A truck whipped by them, tossing Francesca's hair against her cheek. She felt her pulse jump in her throat. “I don't know any such thing,” she replied haughtily. He gave her a scornful look, telling her without words that he thought she was the world's biggest hypocrite. She glared at him and then decided the best course lay in advance rather than retreat. “Even if you're right—which you're not—you don't have to act as if you're heading for a root canal operation.”
“That'd probably be a hell of a lot less painful.”
One of his barbs had finally pricked, and now she was the one who stopped walking. “Do you really mean that?” she asked, genuinely hurt.
He shoved one hand in the pocket of his parka and kicked a stone with his foot. “Of course I mean it.”
“You do not.”
“I absolutely do.”
She must have looked as upset as she felt, because his expression softened and then he took a step toward her. “Aw, Francie...”
Before either of them quite knew what was happening, she was in his arms and he was gently lowering his mouth to hers. The kiss began soft and sweet, but they were so hungry for each other that it changed almost immediately. His fingers plowed into her hair, sweeping it back from her temples to fall over his hands. She wrapped her arms around his neck and, standing on tiptoe, parted her lips to welcome his tongue.
The kiss shattered them. It was like a great typhoon sweeping away all their differences with its strength. One of his hands reached beneath her hips, lifting her just off the ground. His kiss moved from her mouth to her neck and then back to her mouth. His hand found the bare skin where her jacket and sweater had risen above her slacks, and he stroked upward along her spine. Within seconds, the two of them were hot and wet, full of juice, ready to eat each other up.
A car sped past, horn blasting, catcalls sounding out the window. Francesca released her grasp around his neck. “Stop,” she moaned. “We can't... Oh, God...” He lowered her slowly to the ground. Her skin was hot.
Slowly, Dallie withdrew his hand from beneath her sweater and let her go. “The thing of it is,” he said, his voice slightly breathless, “when this sort of thing happens between people—this kind of sexual chemistry—they lose their common sense.”
“Does this sort of thing happen to you often?” she snapped, suddenly as nervous as a cat with its fur being stroked the wrong way.
“The last time was when I was seventeen, and I promised myself I'd learn a lesson from i
t. Damn, Francie, I'm thirty-seven years old, and you're—what—thirty?”
“Thirty-one.”
“Both of us are old enough to know better, and here we are, acting like a couple of horny teenagers.” He shook his blond head in self-disgust. “It'll be a miracle if you don't end up with a sucker bite on your neck.”
“Don't blame me for what happened,” she retorted. “I've been on the wagon for so long that anything looks good to me right now—even you.”
“I thought you and that Prince Stefan—”
“We're going to. We just haven't gotten around to it yet.”
“Something like that you probably shouldn't put off much longer.”
They started walking again. Before long, Dallie took her hand and gave her fingers a gentle squeeze. His gesture should have been friendly and comforting, but it sent threads of heat traveling up Francesca's arm. She decided that the best way to dissipate the electricity between them was to use the cold voice of logic. “Everything is already so complicated for us. This—this—sexual attraction is going to make it impossible.”
“You could kiss good ten years ago, honey, but you've moved into the major leagues since then.”
“I don't do that with everybody,” she replied irritably.
“No offense, Francie, but I remember back all those years ago that once the serious business got started, you still had a few things to learn—not that you weren't a real good student. Tell me why I get the feeling that you've pretty much put yourself on the honor roll since then?”
“I haven't! I'm terrible at sex. It—it messes up my hair.”
He chuckled. “I don't think you care too much about your hair anymore—not that it doesn't look real good—and your makeup, too, by the way.”
“Oh, God,” she moaned. And then, “Maybe we should pretend none of this happened, just go back to the way things were.”
He tucked his hand, along with hers, into the pocket of his parka. “Honey, you and I have been circling each other ever since the second we got back together—sniffing and snarling like a couple of mongrel dogs. If we don't let things take their natural course pretty soon, we're both going to end up half crazy.” He paused for a moment. “Or blind.”