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it, the others damned good fakes, close to perfect, but not quite. Surely the forgeries wouldn’t pass the scrutiny of any bank teller worth his or her salt. They probably wouldn’t even get by the cashiers at a quickie mart.
“You bastard,” she said under her breath and closed her eyes. What a complete and utter moron she’d been, all the while thinking she was so damned smart. Now, little Ariel . . . Didi let out a pained mewling sound at the thought of her daughter and that fire . . . What the hell had happened out in the desert? Who had been shooting and why? Was it to cause the horrible conflagration, someone out to get Brett? Or her? Letting out a sigh, she flopped back in the spindle-backed chair and pushed her hair from her eyes. Her platinum wig was where she’d tossed it, on the seat of the old rocker, a piece of furniture she’d planned to replace when . . . She eyed the piles of money again.
When your ship came in?
When you scored on the biggest con of your life?
Face it, Didi, you were the one who was conned, and now . . . and now . . .
It crossed her mind again that she should go to the police, to tell what she knew, but what would happen to her then? She’d be arrested and her remaining children . . . No, that just wouldn’t work. Ever.
She’d been tricked by Brett, played for a fool.
Double-crossed.
Just like you double-crossed him.
She crumpled a few of the fake fifties and tossed them into the air so that they could flutter up near the pendant light, then drift back to land on the pile of other bad bills. How had she been so dumb?
All wasn’t lost, she knew. She still had Brett Hedges’s son, and she would be able to exchange him for Ariel . . . if . . . if her daughter had somehow miraculously survived. She squeezed her eyes shut, refused to believe the worst. Maybe she could somehow set up another con, get Ariel and the money she was owed or . . . or what? What exactly could she do to right this wrong?
She’d been a half-wit to make the trade in the desert, to dress the part of the seductress, to show up in her big car—all to remind Brett of what he’d given up.
“As if he’d ever wanted it in the first place,” she said and dropped her head into her folded arms, letting her last cigarette burn out, unattended. What to do? She heard Adam begin to whimper from the car seat where she’d left it in the middle of the living room. She’d made a horrible mess of her life, a bigger mess than she’d even imagined.
She’d burned her bridges in the Midwest, then again in Hollywood, and now, here in Vegas? How bright was her future? Not very.
Dear God, she was a moron.
No, no, you’re not. Don’t let this get you down. It’s just a setback. Pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and rethink this . . . situation. It’s only a problem if you let it become one. You’re still Didi Storm, still sexy as hell, and smarter than anyone gives you credit for. You’re still young even if you feel older than your years, and you’ve still got one ace up your sleeve, don’t you?
Lifting her head, she spied Adam, looking up at her with wide, innocent eyes. He was beautiful, with his shock of white-blond hair, eyes that were crystal blue, and a button of a nose. Spying her, he waved his little hands and actually smiled, a big, gummy smile that melted her heart. “Oh, you,” she said, as she reached down, unstrapped him, and held him close. He cooed against her, and she closed her eyes. She couldn’t give him up. And she never intended to. Nor had she planned on letting Brett keep their daughter. She’d been certain she could get Ariel back. Now, of course, her confidence was beyond shaken, a hole in her heart.
There had to be a way. Think, Didi, think!
The baby let out another gurgling cry.
“Come on,” she said and carried him over to the makeshift changing table near the hallway. She stripped him of Ariel’s pink onesie, then changed his diaper and slipped him into blue and white pajamas before making a bottle for him. She was weaning the babies because she had to. No one wanted to see a sexy showgirl with leaking tits, and she’d had to prepare both Adam and Ariel for the event of them living with their father, if only for a little while.
Adam took the bottle hungrily, and she sat on the threadbare rocker, one she’d picked up from a secondhand store at the edge of town. It squeaked under her weight, but she rocked steadily, gazing down at the miracle of her son.
How could she ever give him up?
Probably just as easily as you did Ariel.
“It wasn’t easy,” she whispered and fought a fresh wash of tears. What was wrong with her? Probably still the post-pregnancy hormones readjusting in her system. That was it. And what would she tell Remmi tomorrow when it became obvious that she wasn’t about to pick up her daughter from her friend Trudie’s? Not that Remmi had believed her. The look she’d sent Didi had been total disbelief, as if somehow Remmi had known her mother was lying through her teeth.
That damned girl was too smart for her own good.
Where have you heard that before? Isn’t that what your father said often enough? And what had been your mother’s response? “You got that right. But there’s more. She’s too smart and too damned sexy. It’s dangerous, Frank. You got that? Those raging teenage hormones are gonna get her into the worst trouble a girl can get in—you mark my words!”
Her mother’s warnings to her father still rang in her ears, though they had been whispered over fifteen years earlier and had, of course, as it turned out, been spot-on.
Willa Maye Hutchinson had not only suspected her daughter of sleeping around but had known it.
It was all water under the bridge. Didi settled into the rocker with her baby and started moving back and forth again. As Adam finished his bottle and drifted off, she started plotting her next move.
She had to take her emotions out of the situation and come up with a plan, something that would help her and her children.
