Faking It - Crusie Jennifer - Страница 37

When they got back to the gallery, they heard voices in the office. Davy followed Tilda in and saw Eve and Gwen and a rotund younger guy he’d never seen before gathered around a tearful Nadine.

“Oh, no,” Tilda said, and went straight to her niece.

“What happened?” Davy said, looking for blood or broken bones.

“It’s a Poor Baby,” Tilda said, not turning around.

“That miserable little tick Burton dumped her,” Eve said, standing militant in front of her daughter. “I think he should be castrated.”

“Later for that,” the new guy said, his arm around Nadine. “Poor Baby first, revenge later.”

That’s got to be Jeff, Davy thought.

“He was just wrong for you, Poor Baby,” Gwen said from Nadine’s other side. “He had no soul.”

“He was a vampire. Pasty little bastard,” Jeff said. “Poor Baby.”

“But he was so cute,” Nadine wailed.

“This is true,” Tilda said.

Gwen glared at Tilda. “You’re not helping.”

“Poor Baby,” Tilda said obediently. “The thing is, Dine, the good-looking ones are always doughnuts. They’re so pretty they don’t have to develop fiber. Look at Davy. Perfect example.”

“Hey,” Davy said, faking outrage. “I’m full of fiber.”

Nadine sniffed but she stopped dripping tears to look at him.

“I,” he went on, “am clearly a muffin.”

“As in ‘stud’?” Tilda said. “No.”

“Hopeless doughnut,” Gwen said, and Nadine gave Davy a watery smile.

“Muffin,” Davy said, “and to prove it, I’m willing to go find Burton and beat the crap out of him.”

“Absolute doughnut,” Tilda said, turning her back on him. “So what did this Davy-in-training give as his miserable excuse? Poor Baby.”

“Who cares?” Jeff said. “He’s scum. You deserve better. Poor Baby.”

“He said I was too weird,” Nadine said, wincing, and Davy felt like beating up the kid for real.

“Okay,” Tilda said to Davy. “Go get him.”

“No,” Nadine said, sniffing, “I mean, really, that was it for me. I wore the Lucy dress to his gig, and he told me today that I had to stop wearing such weird stuff or it was all over.”

“And you said it was all over?” Tilda said.

Nadine nodded, and Eve said, “Oh, that’s my girl,” while Jeff pounded her on the back and said, “Way to go, kid.”

“Clearly not the kind of guy who deserves a Goodnight,” Davy said.

“He was only a speed bump,” Tilda agreed, “on the great highway of love.”

“I know,” Nadine said, sniffing again. “I’m not really crying for him. I just needed to get it out, you know?”

“Of course,” Gwen said, “you should always get it out,” and Davy wondered if there had ever been any emotion that any Goodnight had ever left unexpressed.

Except for Tilda. He watched her comfort Nadine and wondered what she’d been like when she’d been part of the Rayons, when she’d been singing and laughing with Eve and Andrew. If she’d ever smiled all the time like she’d smiled at him today.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Gwen was saying to Nadine. “I can stay.”

“Where are you going?” Tilda said.

“She’s having a late lunch with Mason Phipps,” Eve said, raising her eyebrows to her hairline. “It’s a day-yate.”

Uh-oh, Davy thought. Clea was not going to be happy about that.

“No it is not,” Gwen said. “He wants to talk about the gallery. And I get free food.” She turned back to Nadine. “Unless you want me to stay.”

Nadine sniffed. “Bring me your dessert if you don’t eat all of it.”

“Good enough,” Gwen said and went out into the gallery.

“Ice cream,” Eve said to Nadine. “I’m thinking Jeff drives and we all go to Grater’s.”

“That would be good,” Nadine said, and sniffed again, but Davy got the distinct impression that she was now enjoying herself. Well, good for her.

Jeff stopped by Davy on his way out the door. “Welcome to the family,” he said, offering Davy his hand. “Andrew says you’re helping Tilda with a problem.”

“Family?” Davy said as he shook Jeff’s hand.

“Anybody the Goodnights rope into problem-solving is family,” Jeff said. “Not that I want to know what the problem is until you need bail.”

“Jeff’s a lawyer,” Tilda said.

“Handy guy to have around,” Davy said.

“Hey,” Jeff said. “Tonight we play poker. It’s our standard Sunday-night family bonding. Do you gamble?”

“Why am I sure he gambles?” Tilda said to the ceiling.

Davy looked down into her weird light eyes, and said, “Yes.”

“I play rough,” she warned. “Don’t bet anything you’re not ready to lose.”

“Not a problem,” he said. “I don’t have anything to lose.”

She grinned that crooked grin at him again, her eyes connecting with his, and he felt dizzy for a moment. There was a possibility that he could lose his shirt to this woman. With a great deal of enthusiasm.

But later that night, sitting around a poker table with Tilda, Eve, Gwen, Jeff, Andrew, and Mason, who had somehow escaped from Clea for an hour, Davy felt back in control. Poker was second only to pool in Michael Dempsey’s list of skills his children should have. It clearly hadn’t been on Tony Goodnight’s or Father Phipps’s list at all. The first deal said it all. They picked up cards and sorted them, and every one of them had faces like billboards: Gwen’s face fell when she looked at her hand, Eve smiled and then frowned to hide it, Jeff sighed and shook his head and pulled his money in a little, Andrew tried to keep a stone face but was clearly delighted, Mason leaned back and folded his arms because he thought he had something, and Tilda-

Tilda was looking right at him.

She shook her head and picked up her cards, the only other person at the table smart enough to know that poker was about the people you were playing with, not about the cards you were dealt. That’s my girl, he thought, and watched her play, bluffing nervelessly, losing and winning without batting an eye, and always, always watching the others.

Nadine joined them later and played almost as well as Tilda, but she also had an unfortunate tendency to buy into bluffs. After Davy had taken her for the third time, he said, “Dine, if it seems too good to be true, get out.”

“I’m optimistic,” she said, her chin in the air.

“Smart is better,” Davy said.

The last hand ended when everyone but Eve and Davy were out, even Mason, whose ironclad optimism had been nothing short of astonishing as he lost hand after hand, making a nice match for Gwen, who didn’t even try to hide her reactions to her cards. Eve tried to bluff Davy out of a pot with nothing, which he knew because when Eve had nothing, she tapped her worst card three times and sighed. It was one of the most blatant tells he’d ever seen, and when she did it this time, he saw Tilda close her eyes in sympathy, and he wondered what it must have been like being the sharp one in the family, the one who watched everybody else and played the smart game while the rest went on their feckless way, having fun.

Maybe it was time she had fun, he thought as he raked in the last pot. In fact, maybe it was his duty as a guest to make sure she had fun.

It was only the polite thing to do.

“SO YOU’RE a cardsharp,” Tilda said to Davy after he’d turned all his winnings over to Gwen “for the muffins and orange juice I’ve been bumming off you.” Mason had gone home to Clea, and the rest of the family had drifted off to bed. “A real Cool Hand Luke.”

“Cool Hand Luke was a convict,” Davy said, opening the refrigerator. “Get your allusions right.”

“Okay, you’re whoever was a really sharp poker player.” Tilda tried to think of one. “Maverick.”

“Very good,” Davy said. “When Gwennie was teaching you to stay in character in kindergarten, my daddy, like Maverick’s, was teaching me not to draw to an inside straight.” He held out the orange juice carton. “Drink?”

“Yes,” Tilda said. “Your daddy sounds like an interesting person.”