Fancy Pants (Wynette, Texas #1)(126)

For the first time he looked uncertain. “What are you doing? I don't want those. I'm not holding him for ransom, for chrissake!”

“I know that.” She rolled the diamonds in her palm, letting them catch the glare from the headlights. “I'm not your Fancy Pants anymore, Dallie. I just want to make certain you understand exactly what my priorities are— how far I'll go to get him back. I want you to know what you're up against.” Her hand closed around the diamonds. “The most important thing in my life is my son. As far as I'm concerned, everything else is just spit.”

And then while Dallie watched, Black Jack Day's daughter did it again. With one strong movement of her arm, she threw her flawless four-carat pear-shaped diamond studs far out into the darkest reaches of the quarry.

Dallie didn't say anything for a moment. He lifted his foot and rested his boot on the bumper of the car, staring out in the direction she had thrown the stones and finally looking back at her. “You've changed, Francie. You know that?”

She nodded.

“Teddy's not an ordinary boy.”

The way he said it, she knew he wasn't issuing a compliment. “Teddy's the best kid in the world,” she answered sharply.

“He needs a father. A man's influence to get him toughened up. The boy's too soft. The first thing you have to do is tell him about me.”

She wanted to scream at him, tell him she would do no such thing, but she saw with painful clarity that too many people knew the truth for her to keep it a secret from her son any longer. She nodded reluctantly.

“You've got a lot of lost years to make up for,” he said.

“I don't have anything to make up for.”

“I'm not going to disappear from his life.” Once again his face grew hard. “We can either work something out ourselves, or I can hire one of those bloodsucking lawyers to stick it to you.”

“I won't have Teddy hurt.”

“Then we'd better work it out ourselves.” He took his foot off the bumper, walked around to the driver's door, and climbed in. “Go on back to the house. I'll bring him to you tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow? I want him now! Tonight!”

“Well, now, that's too bad, isn't it?” he said with a sneer. And then he slammed the car door.

“Dallie!” She ran toward him, but he was already heading out of the quarry, his tires spitting gravel. She yelled after him until she realized how futile that was, and then she raced to her own car.

The engine wouldn't start for her at first, and she was afraid she had run the battery down by leaving her lights on. When it finally turned over, Dallie had already disappeared. She raced the car up the steep road after him, ignoring the way the rear end fishtailed. At the top, she caught sight of two dim red taillights in the distance. Her tires spun as she accelerated. If only it wasn't so dark! He turned out onto the highway and she raced after him.

For several miles, she stayed with him, ignoring the squeal of her tires as she accelerated around wild curves, pushing the car to reckless speeds when the pavement straightened. He knew the narrow back roads and she didn't, but she refused to fall back. He wasn't going to do this to her! She knew she'd hurt him, but that didn't give him the right to terrorize her. She pushed the speedometer to sixty-five and then to seventy....

If he hadn't finally turned off his lights, she might have had him.





Chapter

26



Francesca felt numb by the time she returned to Dallie's house. As she climbed wearily out of the car, she found herself replaying bits and pieces of the encounter in the quarry. Most men would be glad to have been spared the burden of an unwanted child. Why couldn't she have picked one of them?

“Uh... Miss Day?”

Francesca's heart sank as she heard the young female voice coming to her from the vicinity of the pecan trees at the side of the drive. Not tonight, she thought. Not now, when she felt as if she were already carrying a thousand pounds on her shoulders. How did they always manage to find her?

Even before she turned in the direction of the voice, she knew what she would see—the desperately young face, | tough and sad, the cheap clothes undoubtedly topped by gaudy earrings. She even knew the story she would hear. But tonight she wouldn't listen. Tonight she had too much trouble clouding her own life to take on anyone else's.

A girl dressed in jeans and a dirty pink jacket stepped just to the edge of a puddle of light that shone dimly on the drive from the kitchen window. She wore too much makeup, and her center-parted hair fell like a double door over her face. “I... uh... I saw you earlier at the gas station. At first I didn't believe it was you. I... uh... I heard from this girl I met a long time ago that... you know... you might, uh...”

The runaways' grapevine. It had followed her from Dallas to St. Louis, then on to Los Angeles and New York. Now it seemed her reputation as the world's biggest sucker had even spread to small towns like Wynette. Francesca willed herself to turn her back and walk away. She willed it, but her feet wouldn't move.

“How did you find me?” she asked.

“I—uh—I asked around. Somebody said you were staying here.”

“Tell me your name.”

“Dora—Doralee.” The girl lifted the cigarette that was shoved between her fingers and took a drag.