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She looked at him in astonishment. “Why ever should I nag him about his golf?”
“You're not going to get rid of him. You realize that, don't you? Now that he knows Teddy's his boy, he's going to keep popping up whether you like it or not.”
She'd already come to the same conclusion, and she nodded reluctantly.
He stroked the brush along the smooth curve of the wood. “My best piece of advice, Francie, is that you use those brains of yours to figure out how to get him to play better golf.”
She was completely mystified. “What are you trying to tell me?”
“Just exactly what I said, is all.”
“But I don't know anything about golf, and I don't see what Dallie's game has to do with Teddy.”
“The thing about advice is—you can either take it or leave it.”
She gave him a searching look. “You know why he's being so critical of Teddy, don't you?”
“I got a few ideas.”
“Is it because Teddy looks like Jaycee? Is that it?”
He snorted. “Give Dallie credit for having more sense than that.”
“Then what?”
He propped the club head on a rod to dry and put the brush in a jar of mineral spirits. “You just concentrate on his golf is all. Maybe you'll have better luck than I've had.”
And he wouldn't say anything more than that.
When Francesca went upstairs, she spotted Teddy playing with one of Dallie's dogs in the yard. An envelope lay on the kitchen table with her name scrawled across it in Gerry's handwriting. Opening it, she read the message inside.
Baby, Sweetie, Lamb Chop, Love of My Life,
How's about you and me tie one on tonight? Pick you up for dinner and debauchery at 7:00. Your best friend is the queen of the morons, and I'm the world's biggest chump. I promise not to cry on your shoulder for more than most of the evening. When are you going to stop being so lily-livered and put me on your television show?
Sincerely,
Zorro the Great
P.S. Bring a birth control device.
Francesca laughed. Despite their rocky beginning on that Texas road ten years ago, she and Gerry had formed a comfortable friendship in the two years since she'd moved to Manhattan. He had spent the first few months of their acquaintance apologizing for having abandoned her, even though Francesca told him he'd done her a favor that day. To her astonishment, he had produced an old yellowed envelope containing her passport and the four hundred dollars that had been in her case. She had long ago given Holly Grace the money to repay Dallie what she owed him, so Francesca had treated the three of them to a night on the town.
When Gerry came to pick her up that evening, he was wearing his leather bomber jacket with dark brown trousers and a cream-colored sweater. Sweeping her into his arms, he gave her a friendly smack on the lips, his dark eyes sparkling with wickedness. “Hey, gorgeous. Why couldn't I have fallen in love with you instead of Holly Grace?”
“Because you're too smart to put up with me,” she said, laughing.
“Where's Teddy?”
“He conned Doralee and Miss Sybil into taking him to see some horrid movie about killer grasshoppers.”
Gerry smiled and then sobered, looking at her with concern. “How're you really doing? This has been rough on you, hasn't it?”
“I've had better weeks,” she conceded. So far, only her problem with Doralee was any closer to solution. That afternoon Miss Sybil had insisted on taking the teenager to the county offices herself, telling Francesca in no uncertain terms that she intended to keep Doralee until a foster family could be found.
“I spent some time with Dallie this afternoon,” Gerry said.”
“You did?” Francesca was surprised. It was difficult to imagine the two of them together.
