Jennifer Crusie Bundle (44 page)

Five minutes later, Tess had Elise on the line.

“Concentrate darling,” she told her mother. “This is important. Remember when I asked you about Lanny?”

“Of course I remember,” Elise said. “I'm not senile.”

“Right. I'm sorry.” Tess tried again. “Somebody else was looking for that manuscript and he found it. What I couldn't figure out was
how
he found it. But then I thought, what if this guy knew Lanny, too? What if he was in the commune with us when Lanny wrote the story? So I want you to remember if there was another guy around that summer. Shorter than Lanny. Fatter. Maybe a little older.”

“Well, there were a lot of men in the commune, dear.”

“This one's name was Welch,” Tess said. “Norbert Welch.”

“No,” Elise said slowly. “I don't remember anyone by that name.”

“Damn,” Tess said. “I was sure this guy had recognized my picture and that's why he invited me to his party—to see if I'd remember the story. It was too big of a coincidence otherwise. The commune and me and Lanny and the story…How could Welch have—”

“The only Welch I remember was Lanny,” Elise said.

Tess dropped the photo.
“What?”

“Lanny Welch,” Elise said. “He was the only one. No Norbert.”

“Lanny's name was Welch? Why didn't you tell me?”

“You didn't ask. And I didn't remember it until you said the name. We didn't use last names much. Is it important?”

“Yes. Thanks, Elise.” Tess hung up in a daze. Lanny Welch? A brother of Norbert's maybe? But then why had Norbert recognized her picture if he wasn't at the commune? She punched a button on the intercom. “Christine? Is Norbert Welch's real name Norbert Welch?”

“Yes,” Christine said. “Norbert Nolan Welch.”

Tess blinked. “Nolan?”

“Nick just called,” Christine said. “He's on his way in. He said to tell you he's sorry you had to wait and he hopes you're not bored.”

“No,” Tess said, trying to digest what she'd just learned. “I'm not bored.”

Nolan.

Lanny.

Norbert Welch was Lanny.

The office swung around and then righted itself as she tried to decide how she felt about that, about how Lanny's greatest enemy was Lanny himself, about how Lanny had betrayed everything he believed in and everything she believed in, too, about how her quest to save a long-lost friend ended in losing that friend forever. Lanny wasn't dead, but he might as well have been.

He was Welch.

But somehow, once she'd absorbed the enormity of the fact, that wasn't where her mind wanted to go. It wanted to think about Nick. Nick and that partnership. No matter how she felt about that damn partnership, it was vital to Nick and it rested on Welch. And now she had Welch right where she wanted him. Welch wanted to run for office as a conservative, but she could tell the world he'd been a radical in the sixties, that he'd written the fairy tale he was making fun of and had meant every word of it at the time. His snotty little book wouldn't seem nearly as funny if people knew he'd written the fairy tale in the first place. It didn't seem like much to her, but it would to Welch because it would make him look foolish. All she had to do was say, “Don't publish that book or I'll tell the world about Lanny and CinderTess,” and she had him. Everything was in place, and the book wouldn't be published.

And Nick wouldn't get the account, because without the book there was no contract to negotiate.

She looked at it from every angle she could for the next fifteen minutes, and from every angle it looked the same. If she stopped the book, she stopped the partnership. If she didn't stop the book, she was sacrificing everything she believed in for Nick's partnership.

Hello, Mrs. Jekyll.

“Oh, damn,” she said, and Nick heard her as he breezed through the door.

“What's up?” he said, dropping his briefcase on the desk. “No, don't tell me now. We've got five minutes before we have to be at the restaurant. What the hell are you wearing?”

Tess looked down at her T-shirt and miniskirt, momentarily distracted. “I just grabbed something,” she said. “Gina—”

“Oh, great,” he said. “And we're having dinner at The Levee.
Christine!
”

The secretary appeared in the doorway. “You bellowed?”

“Did you replace that jacket?” Nick said, not taking his eyes off Tess. “If you cover up that god-awful T-shirt, the skirt won't look too bad. Good thing you've got great legs.”

Christine faded out of the room and then back in, handing Nick a suit box. “Donna Karen, navy pin-stripe,” she said. “Don't say I didn't warn you.”

Tess froze, looking at the box.

“Warn me about what?” Nick said, but Christine was already gone.

“What's in that box?” Tess asked in a strangled voice.

Nick handed it to her. “A suit jacket. You'll look great. Put it on and let's go.”

“I have a suit jacket. A great navy jacket. I love that jacket.”

“This one is better.” Nick snapped his fingers at her and moved back toward the door. “Move it, babe.”

“No,” Tess said, and Nick froze at the edge in her voice and then turned to face her. “You took my jacket,” she said coldly. “I told you not to, and you took my jacket.”

“Tess, it was moth-eaten and it looked like hell,” Nick said. “What's the big deal?”

“The big deal is that it was my jacket, and you didn't like it so you threw it out. And you're doing the same thing to me.” Tess thrust out her chin. “You're throwing me out. You're turning me into Mrs. Jekyll. Be quiet, be polite, don't get involved. I listened to you and almost let Park and Gina screw up their lives. I know you want me to stay out of things and just look decorative, but I can't, Nick. I can't live in designer clothes with my hands tied behind my back while everything goes wrong around me. Today I had to explain to Gina why I stood by and let Park lie to her, and somehow ‘Nick asked me not to get involved' didn't quite satisfy either one of us.”

“She found out?” Nick said, appalled.

“Park's dad told the society page his son was marrying Corinne.”

“Oh, hell.” Nick closed his eyes and tipped his head back a little before he looked at her again. “So now what?”

“I fixed it,” Tess said. “Park's introducing Gina to his parents tonight at dinner.”

Nick looked at her as if she were insane. “Oh, great, you fixed it all right. That's great. That'll impress Welch.”

“Welch has his own problem,” Tess said. “Me.”

Nick stopped, wary. “Tess, I told you if you waited until after dinner—”

“You're always telling me,” Tess said. “Now I'm telling you. There are things that are wrong in my life. And I'm going to fix them. And if you can't deal with that, then you can't deal with me. You've got to take me as I am, or not take me at all.”

“Is that an ultimatum?” Nick asked, his jaw tight.

“Pretty much,” Tess said. “I tried it your way. I can't do it. So this is it.” She swallowed once, and when Nick didn't say anything, she put the suit box down on the desk and opened it. The jacket was beautiful. She took it out and shook it once but then was distracted by something else in the box. She dropped the new jacket on the desk and pulled back the tissue paper. “Well, good for Christine,” she said, and pulled her old jacket from the box. She shrugged into it not looking at Nick. “We'd better get a move on. We're going to be late for dinner,” she said, and then she looked at him, defiant in her tattered tweed.

Nick opened the door, stone-faced, and followed her out.

T
hey were late to the restaurant, and Kent and Melisande and Welch were already seated. Tess could see them through the archway, a little triumvirate of privilege and arrogance, and she thought about how rude she wanted to be and how ineffectual rudeness would be. Nick had taught her something. Tact. Diplomacy. Underhandedness. She was going to charm the socks right off Welch and then attack him when he was well fed—just like taking a pig to the slaughter.

“If I'm going to behave all night, I need a drink,” Tess said.

“Get me one, too,” Park said behind them, and Tess turned to see Gina standing blankly beside him, her eyes red from crying, her face slack with fear.

“Gina?” she said. “Are you all right?”

“I'm fine,” Gina said. “I'm perfectly fine. Everything's going to be fine. I'm ready to meet Park's parents. Really I am. I'm fine.”

“I'm not,” Park said. “Get me a drink. We took a cab, so drunkenness is not a problem.”

“Gina, honey?” Tess asked.

“I'm fine,” Gina said again. “Can I have some gum?”

“No,” Tess said.

“Oh, hell,” Nick said.

T
HE SEATING ARRANGEMENTS
could have been better, Nick thought as he surveyed the situation. Somehow they'd ended up with the Pattersons on one side of the big round table, staring across at Park and Gina who had Welch on one side and him and Tess on the other. Park winced under his father's gaze like a sinner on Judgment Day with a few things to explain about the little ethnic woman by his side who was obviously not Radcliffe material, while Gina sat, dazed with terror, across from Melisande, a woman who was never amused and often appalled. And clearly, Melisande had never had as much to be appalled about as she had now. In desperation Nick gestured to the waiter.

“Bring wine,” Nick told him. “Any wine. Now.”

“Very good, sir,” the waiter said.

Kent Patterson smiled tightly. “The Chateau Rothschild, Dennis.”

“Very good, sir.”

Kent Patterson commandeered the menu. “I'll order for us all.” He didn't see Welch roll his eyes as he began. “We'll start with the gravlax and pumpkin soup,” he said, relaxing as he exerted authority. “And then the goat cheese and endive. It's very good. Remarkable, really. Then the Muscovy duck, and for dessert crème brûlée.”

“
Very
good, sir,” Dennis said to Kent.

“Steak,” Welch said. “Rare. Baked potato. And a bloody Mary.”

“Henderson is not going to be pleased,” Tess said to him.

“Henderson is not going to know,” Welch said to her. “Unless you rat on me.”

“I should for your own good,” Tess said. “Somebody should tell the truth and save you from yourself.”

Welch looked startled by her tone, but then Kent spoke to him and he looked away.

“What's going on?” Nick whispered to her as Dennis arrived with the wine.

“The dinner party from hell,” Tess said. “You may want to leave now. It's going to get ugly.”

Then Kent turned away from Welch and caught sight of his quivering son. He picked up his glass in disgust and drank his wine.

Melisande looked down her long nose at Gina without blinking and drank her wine.

Gina shook visibly and drank her wine.

Park sighed and drank his wine.

Tess looked at Nick, and they both drank their wine.

“So Park tells me you're a Democrat,” Kent said to Tess. “That must make for some interesting conversations with Nick.”

“Oh, a few,” Tess said.

“Democrats,” Welch snorted, but he watched Tess with the same rapt attention he always gave her, only this time a little more warily than usual.

Kent smiled at Tess patronizingly. “So is it true that politics make strange bedfellows?”

“Really, Kent,” Melisande said with cold distaste.

“Bedpersons,” Park said, and everybody stared at him.

“What?” Kent asked.

“Bedpersons,” Park said again. “Tess would prefer bedpersons. It's nongender-specific.”

“Don't be an idiot,” Kent said, and Park flushed.

“He's not,” Tess said, struck by Park's thoughtfulness if not by his brains. “He's right. I prefer bedpersons,” she lied.

“Politically correct garbage,” Welch said, but he sounded distracted.

“Not much conviction there,” Tess said. “Changing your mind?
Again?
”

“What?” Welch said, and now the wariness was palpable.

“Bedpersons? How odd,” Melisande said, and then she stared at Gina as if she was the offender.

“I think I'd prefer another drink,” Nick said, ignoring the bottle on the table in an attempt to distract Melisande. “Waiter?”

Another waiter brought more wine and genuflected, while Dennis presided over the distribution of the gravlax, bestowing it as if it were the loaves and fishes, instead of just the fishes.

Tess looked down at her plate. “What is this stuff, anyway? From the name, I thought it was going to be fill dirt.”

“Pickled salmon,” Nick said.

Tess looked at the oily pink slab in disgust. “If I ever go out to eat with you again, we're going to Burger King.”

“Tell me about yourself, Miss DaCosta,” Melisande said to Gina when the salmon had been replaced by the pumpkin soup. She'd waited until Gina was sipping soup to ask, and Gina was so startled that she dropped her spoon in her bowl and splattered the peach tablecloth.

“Oh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.” Gina grabbed her napkin to mop up, and Park trapped her fingers with his hand and smiled at her.

“Gina is very talented,” Tess said. “She has a wonderful singing voice.”

“Opera?” Melisande inquired smoothly.

“No,” Park said. “Musical comedy.”

Gina smiled at him wanly.

Nick picked up the bread plate and shoved it under Melisande's nose. “More bread?”

“No,” she said shortly, and turned back to Gina. “So where did you go to school? Perhaps we're alumnae together.”

“Brush High School,” Gina said miserably. “It's in Euclid. In Cleveland.”

“No, no, dear, I meant college,” Melisande said.

“Try the pumpkin soup, Mrs. Patterson,” Tess said. “It's very thick.”

“I didn't go to college,” Gina said. “I didn't even graduate from high school. I went on the road with a touring company of
Oklahoma!
when I was sixteen, and that's what I've been doing for the past eighteen years.”

“So, you're a chorus girl,” Melisande said, pleased to have made her point.

“Yes,” Gina said, and drank all the wine in her glass.

Park began to turn an odd shade of pink under his tan. “Mother, I don't think—”

“Did I tell you I saw Susan Vandervalk on the Cape, Park?” Melisande said. “She always asks after you. She's just finished her master's, and now she's volunteering at the art museum. A lovely girl. You should call her. Remember how much fun you had with her that summer in Paris?”

“No,” Park said, and Melisande blinked at the word, while Welch choked on his bloody Mary and then grinned at Park in appreciation.

Tess knocked her fork on the floor and pulled Nick's sleeve as she bent down to retrieve it.

“What?” he said when they were both below table level. He sounded both distracted and annoyed.

“You might want to announce publicly that we're splitting up now, because I'm going to kill her before dessert and that way you won't be involved,” Tess said, and Nick flinched at the words “splitting up.”

“Wait a minute,” he said.

Tess shook her head. “I know it's not an adult thing to do, but that hag has it coming.”

“I agree,” Nick said. “But get a grip. You'll just embarrass Gina more if you say something. This can't go on forever. I think Gina and Park have the right idea. Keep drinking.”

“There's not enough alcohol in the world,” Tess said.

“And we're not splitting up,” Nick went on. “I hate that damn jacket, but we're not splitting up over it. You can wear sackcloth and ashes if you want, but we're staying together.”

“It's not just the jacket. There's more.”

Then they heard Melisande saying, “Really, children, the waiter will take care of the fork.”

They both swiveled their heads to see the waiter looking down at them.

“The waiter will take care of the fork, Tess,” Nick said, and crossed his eyes at her.

“Of course, how provincial of me,” Tess said, and they both straightened in their chairs.

“More wine, please,” Nick said to the waiter. “Keep it coming.”

By the time the soup was removed, they were all sitting in an alcoholic haze that somehow was not enough to cut the tension. A machete wouldn't have cut the tension, Tess decided. Maybe a chain saw. Maybe if Dennis showed up in a hockey mask and…

Dennis showed up with the goat cheese.

“Ah, goat cheese,” Kent said when the salad plate was placed before him.

“Goat cheese,” Tess said, focusing on it through her wine fog. “I hate this stuff. We used to live in a commune, and I had to milk the goats so we could make this. You wouldn't believe—”

Nick kicked her smartly on the ankle, and she realized she was blithering and shut up before she remembered that she was going to blither from now on whenever she felt like it. She opened her mouth to ask Welch if he remembered the goat cheese, but stopped when Melisande Patterson interrupted her.

“Goats?” Melisande looked at Tess with such tipsy horror that Tess wondered if this was the first time Melisande had realized that goat cheese didn't just spring miraculously from the endive nestled next to it. “You had goats?”

“Of course, goats, Melisande,” Kent said in exasperation.

Melisande turned snapping black eyes on him, and Nick preempted her swiftly. “So, Kent, what's new on the coast?”

“How amusing you should ask,” Melisande said, preempting in return. “We just had a lovely dinner with the Whitneys. Do you remember the Whitneys, Nick? You and Park dated their daughters in college. Bea and Bunny. Remember?”

“Vividly,” Nick said while Tess choked on her drink.

Melisande purred her approval. “Park was quite serious about Bunny. She asked after you at dinner, Park. She's still quite lovely. You should call her.”

“No,” Park said flatly over his wineglass, and Melisande flinched.

“You know, I'm really enjoying this dinner,” Welch said.

“Wait a minute, is that true?” Tess said to Nick when she'd wiped her mouth. “They were actually called Bea and Bunny?”

“You find that amusing, Miss Newhart?” Melisande's voice was cold.

“I find that hysterical,” Tess said.

“I don't get it,” Gina said, peering at them as she lifted her wineglass.

“I believe Miss DaCosta has had enough wine,” Melisande said.

Gina blinked at her.

“Perhaps you're not used to drinking wine, dear,” Melisande went on. “I'm sure Dennis could find you something you'd prefer. Perhaps a beer?”

Park's flushed tan deepened to puce. “That's enough, Mother.”

Gina drained her glass.

“She's
Italian,
” Tess said to Melisande. “They
invented
wine. And they never named anybody Bunny and BeeBee.”

“Bunny and Bea,” Melisande corrected, her head only wobbling slightly from the wine.

“You think that's an improvement?” Tess said.

“This is excellent goat cheese,” Nick said.

“More wine, please,” Gina said in desperation.

“How Italian of you, dear,” Melisande said.

“
Mother,
” Park said disgustedly.

“Listen, you—” Tess began, and then Nick knocked his fork off the table and pulled her down below the edge with him.

“Don't do it,” he whispered to her. “I know she's a horror, but don't do it.”

“How come she's the only one who gets to be rude?” Tess asked. “The hell with this civilization garbage. I'm taking her on.”

“No,” Nick said, and then Melisande said, “Children, the waiter will get the fork.”

“Thank God, you're an orphan,” Tess said.

“Thank God we're drunk or we'd have to kill ourselves,” Nick whispered back. “Listen, I love you.”