Fancy Pants (46 page)
* * *
Francesca had agreed to meet Dallie at nine o'clock at a neighborhoodrestaurant they both liked that served southwestern food. She slipped
into a black cashmere T-shirt and zebra-patterned slacks. Impulsively,
she fastened a pair of wildly asymmetrical silver earrings to her
earlobes, taking devilish pleasure in wearing something outrageous to
tease him. It had been a week since she had seen him, and she was in
the mood to celebrate. Her agent had concluded nearly three months of
difficult negotiations and the network had finally given in. Beginning
in June, "Francesca Today" would be a monthly special instead of a
weekly series.
When she arrived at the restaurant, she saw Dailie sitting in a
high-backed booth at the rear away from the crowd. Spotting her, he
stood and for a fraction of a moment, a puppy dog grin flashed over his
face, an expression more appropriate to a teenage boy than a grown man.
Her heart gave a queer thump in response.
"Hey, honey."
"Hey, Dallie."
She had attracted a great deal of attention as she walked through the
restaurant, so he gave her only the briefest of kisses when she reached
him. As soon as she sat, however, he leaned across the table and did
the job right. "Damn, Francie, it's good to see you."
"You, too." She kissed him again, closing her eyes and enjoying the
heady sensation of being near him.
"Where'd you get those earrings? Ace Hardware?"
"They're not earrings," she retorted loftily, settling back into the
booth. "According to the artist who
made them, they're free-form
abstractions of conceptualized angst."
"No kidding. Well, I sure hope you had them exorcised before you put
them on."
She smiled, and his eyes seemed to drink in her face, her hair, the
shape of her breasts underneath her cashmere T-shirt. Her skin began to
feel warm. Embarrassed, she pushed her hair back from her face. Her
earrings jangled. He gave her a crooked grin, as if he could see every
one of the erotic images that flashed through her head. Then he settled
back in his chair, his navy sport coat falling open over his shirt.
Despite his smile, she thought he looked tired and troubled. She
decided to postpone telling him the good news about her contract until
she found out what was bothering him.
"Did Teddy watch the tournament yesterday?" he asked.
"Yes."
"What'd he say?"
"Not too much. He wore the cowboy boots you gave him, though, and this
unbelievably hideous sweat shirt that I can't believe you bought."
Dallie laughed. "I'll bet he loves that sweat shirt."
"When I tucked him in that night, he was wearing it with his pajama
bottoms."
He smiled again. The waiter approached, and they turned their attention
to the blackboard that listed the day's specials. Dallie opted for
chili-spiced chicken with a side helping of barbecued beans. Francesca
hadn't been hungry when she arrived, but the delicious smells of the
restaurant had piqued her appetite and she decided on grilled shrimp
and a small
salad.
He fiddled with the saltshaker, looking a little less relaxed. "They
had the pin placement all screwed up yesterday or I would have done
better. It threw me off. And there was a hell of a lot more crowd noise
than there should have been. One son of a bitch clicked his camera just
when I got to the top of my backswing. Damn, I hate that."
She was surprised that he felt the need to explain himself to her, but
by now she was also too familiar with the patterns of his professional
career to believe any of his excuses. They chatted for a while about
Teddy, and then he asked her to save some time for him that week. "I'm
going to be in the city for a while. They want to give me some lessons
on how to find the red light on the camera."
She gazed at him sharply, her good mood evaporating. "You're going to
take the announcing job they offered you?"
He didn't quite look at her. "My bloodsucker's bringing me the
contracts to sign tomorrow."
Their food arrived, but Francesca had lost her appetite. What he was
about to do was wrong—more wrong than he seemed to realize. There was
an air of defeat about him, and she hated the way he wouldn't look at
her. She probed at a shrimp with her fork and then, unable to contain
herself, confronted him. "Dallie, you should at least finish the
season. I don't like the idea of your quitting like this with the
Classic only another week away."
She could see his tension as his jaw set and he stared at a point just
above the top of her head. "I have
to hang up my clubs sooner or later.
Now is as good a time as any."
"Television announcing will be a wonderful career for you someday, but
you're only thirty-seven. Lots
of golfers still win major tournaments
at your age or older. Look what Jack Nicklaus did at the Masters last
year."
His eyes narrowed and he finally looked at her. "You know something,
Francie. I liked you a hell of a
lot more before you turned into such a
damned golf expert. Did it ever occur to you that I've got enough
people telling me how to play, and I goddamn well don't need another
one?"
Caution told her the moment had come to back off, but she couldn't do
it, not when she felt that she had something important
at stake. She toyed with the stem of her wineglass and then met his
hostile gaze
head on. "If I were you, I'd win the Classic before I quit
playing."
"Oh, you would, would you?" A small muscle ticked in his jaw.
"I would." She dropped her voice until it was a barely audible whisper
and looked him straight in the eye. "I'd win that tournament just so I
knew I could do it."
His nostrils flared. "Since you barely know the difference between a
driver and a one-iron, I'd be mighty interested in watching you try."
"We're not talking about me. We're talking about you."
"Sometimes, Francesca, you are the most ignorant woman I've ever known
in my entire life." Banging down his fork, he looked at her and thin,
hard lines formed brackets around his mouth. "For your information, the
Classic is one of the toughest tournaments of the year. The course is a
killer. If you don't hit the greens in just the right spot, you can go
from a birdie to a bogey without even seeing it coming. Do you have any
idea who's playing in the Classic this year? The best damned golfers in
the world. Greg Norman will be there. They call him the Great White
Shark, and it's not just because of his white hair—it's because he
loves the taste of blood. Ben Crenshaw's playing—he putts better than
anybody on the tour. Then there's Fuzzy Zoeller. Ol' Fuzzy cracks jokes
and acts like he's taking a Sunday walk in the woods, but all the time
he's figuring out how deep he can dig your damned grave. And your buddy
Seve Ballesteros is going to show up, muttering in Spanish under his
breath and plowing right through everybody who gets in his way. Then we
come to Jack Nicklaus. Even though he's forty-seven, he's still capable
of blowing every one of us right out of the running. Nicklaus isn't
even human, Francie."
"And then there's Dallas Beaudine," she said quietly. "Dallas Beaudine
who has played some of the best opening rounds in tournament golf, but
always falls apart at the end. Why is that, Dallie? Don't you want it
badly enough?"
Something seemed to snap inside him. He pulled his napkin from his lap
and wadded it on the table. "Let's get out of here.
I'm not hungry anymore."
She didn't budge. Instead, she hugged her arms over her chest, lifted
her chin, and silently dared him to try to move her. She was going to
have it out with him once and for all—even if it meant losing him.
"I'm
not going anywhere."
At that exact moment Dallie Beaudine finally seemed to comprehend what
he had only dimly perceived as he'd watched a pair of incomparable
four-carat diamond studs sail out into the depths of a gravel quarry.
He finally understood her strength of will. For months now, he had
chosen to ignore the deep intelligence that lay behind her green cat's
eyes, the steely determination hidden beneath that sassy smile, the
indomitable strength at the heart of the woman who sat across from him
so absurdly packaged as a frivolous ball of fluff. He had let himself
forget that she had come to this country with nothing—not even much
strength of character—and that she had been able to look every one of
her weaknesses straight in the eye and overcome them. He had let
himself forget that she had turned herself into a champion, while he
was still only a contender.
He saw that she had no intention of leaving the restaurant, and the
sheer force of her will staggered him. He felt a moment of panic, as if
he were a child again and Jaycee's fist was headed right for his face.
He felt the Bear breathing down his neck. Watch it, Beaudine. She's got
you now.
And so he did the only thing he could—the only thing he could think of
that might distract this bullheaded, bossy little woman before she
sliced him apart.
"I swear, Francie, you've put me in such a bad mood, I'm thinking about
changing my plans for tonight." Surreptitiously, he slid his napkin
back into his lap.
"Oh? What plans did you have?"
"Well, all this nagging has almost made me change my mind, but—what the
hell—I guess I'll ask you to marry me anyway."
"Marry you?" Francesca's lips parted in astonishment.
"I don't see why not. At least I didn't until a few minutes ago when
you turned into such a damn nag."
Francesca leaned back into the booth, possessed by an awful feeling
that something inside her was breaking apart. "You don't
just blurt out a marriage proposal like that," she said shakily. "And
with the exception of a nine-year-old boy, we don't have a single thing
in common."
"Yeah, well I'm not so sure about that anymore." Reaching into the
pocket of his suit coat, he drew out
a small jeweler's box. Extending
it toward her, he flipped open the Ud with his thumb, revealing an
exquisite diamond solitaire. "I bought this from a guy I went to high
school with, but I think it's only fair to tell you he spent some time
as an unwilling guest of the state of Texas after he walked into a
Piggly Wiggly with a Saturday night special in his hand. Still, he told
me he found Jesus in prison, so I don't think the ring's hot. But I
suppose you can't be too sure about that sort of thing."
Francesca, who had already taken note of Tiffany's distinctive
robin's-egg blue packaging, was paying only the vaguest attention to
what he was saying. Why hadn't he mentioned anything about love? Why
was he doing it like this? "Dallie, I can't take that ring. I—I can't
believe you're even suggesting it." Because she didn't know how to say
what was really on her mind, she threw out all the logical impediments
between them. "Where would we live? My job is in New York; yours is
everywhere. And what would we talk about once we got out of the
bedroom? Just because there's this—this cloud of lust hanging between
us doesn't mean we're qualified to set up housekeeping together."
"Jeez, Francie, you make everything so complicated. Holly Grace and I
were married for fifteen years, and we only set up housekeeping in the
beginning."
Anger began to form a haze inside her head. "Is that what you want?
Another marriage like the one you had with Holly Grace? You go your way
and I go mine, but every few months we get together so we
can watch a
few ball games and have a spitting contest. I won't be your buddy,
Dallas Beaudine."
"Francie, Holly Grace and I never had a spitting contest in our lives,
and it can't have escaped your
notice that boy of ours is technically a
bastard."
"So is his father," she hissed.
Without losing a beat, he shut the Tiffany box and slipped it back in
his pocket. "All right. We don't have to get married. It was just a
suggestion."
She stared at him. Seconds ticked by. He lifted a forkful of chicken to
his mouth and slowly began to chew.
"Is that it?" she asked.
"I can't exactly force you."
Anger and hurt rose up so far inside her she thought she would choke.
"That's all, then? I say no, and
you pick up your toys and go home?"
He took a sip of his club soda, the expression in his eyes as abstract
as the silver earrings at her lobes. "What do you want me to do? The
waiters would throw me out if I got down on my knees."
His sarcasm in the face of something so important to her was like a
knife through her ribs. "Don't you know how to fight for anything you
want?" she whispered fiercely.
The silence that came over him was so complete that she knew she had
hit a raw nerve. Suddenly she
felt as if the scales had dropped from
her eyes. That was it. That was what Skeet had been trying to
tell her.
"Who said I wanted you? You take everything too seriously, Francie."
He was lying to her, lying to himself. She felt his need as much as she
felt her own. He wanted her, but he didn't know how to get her and,
more important, he wasn't even going to try. What did she expect,
she
asked herself bitter'y, from a man who had played some of the best
opening rounds in tournament golf, but who always fell apart at the end?
"Are you going to have room for dessert, Francie? They got this
chocolate thing. If you ask me, it could use a couple dabs of Cool Whip
on the top, but it's still pretty good."
She felt a scorn for him that bordered on real dislike. Her love now
seemed to be an oppressively heavy weight, too much for her to carry.
Reaching over the table, she grabbed his wrist and squeezed it until
her fingernails had dug into his skin and she was sure he knew for
certain that he needed to listen to
every word she had to say. Her
words were low and condemning, the words of a fighter. "Are you so
afraid of failing that you can't go after one single thing you want? A
tournament? Your son? Me? Is that what's been holding you back all this
time? You're so afraid of failing that you won't even try?"
"I don't know what you're talking about." He attempted to pull his hand
away, but her grip was so tight
he couldn't do it without drawing
attention to them.
"You haven't even gotten out of the starting blocks, have you, Dallie?
You just hang out on the sidelines. You're willing to play the game as
long as you don't have to sweat too much and as long as you can make
enough wisecracks so everybody understands you don't really care."
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