Patriot games - Tom Clancy [88]
"Why is it that a doll needs a house?" Jack asked plaintively. "I mean, the friggin' doll's already in a house, isn't she?"
"It must be hard, being a chauvinist pig. You dodos just don't understand anything," Cathy noted sympathetically. "I guess men never get over baseball bats-all those simple, one-piece toys."
Jack's head turned slowly. "Well, the least you could do is have another glass of wine."
"One's the weekly limit, Jack. I did have a big glass," she reminded him.
"And made me drink the rest."
"You bought the bottle, Jack." She picked it up. "Big one, too."
Ryan turned back to the Barbie Doll house. He thought he remembered when the Barbie Doll had been invented, a simple, rather curvy doll, but still just a damned doll, something that girls played with. It hadn't occurred to him then that he might someday have a little girl of his own. The things we do for our kids, he told himself. Then he laughed quietly at himself. Of course we do, and we enjoy it. Tomorrow this will be a funny memory, like the Christmas morning last year when I nearly put this very screwdriver through the palm of my hand. If he didn't enlist his wife's assistance, Ryan told himself, Santa would be planning next year's flight before he finished. Jack took a deep breath and swallowed his pride.
"Help."
Cathy checked her watch. "That took about forty minutes longer than I expected."
"I must be slowing down."
"Poor baby, having to drink all that champagne all by himself." She kissed him on the forehead. "Screwdriver."
He handed it to her. Cathy took a quick look at the plans. "No wonder, you dummy. You're using a short screw when you're supposed to use a long one."
"I keep forgetting that I'm married to a high-priced mechanic."
"That's real Christmas spirit. Jack." She grinned as she turned the screw into place.
"A very pretty, smart, and extremely lovable high-priced mechanic." He ran a finger down the back of her neck.
"That's a little better."
"Who's better with tools than I am, one-handed."
Her head turned to reveal the sort of smile a wife saves only for the husband she loves. "Give me another screw. Jack, and I'll forgive you."
"Don't you think you should finish the doll house first?"
"Screw, dammit!" He handed her one. "You have a one-track gutter, but I forgive you anyway."
"Thanks. If it didn't work, though, I had something else planned."
"Oh, did Santa come for me, too?"
"I'm not sure. I'll check in a few minutes."
"You didn't do bad, considering," his wife said, finishing off the orange plastic roof. "That's it, isn't it?"
"Last one," Jack confirmed. "Thanks for the assist, babe."
"Did I ever tell you what-no, I didn't. It was one of the ladies-in-waiting. I never did find out what they were waiting for. Anyway, this one countess she was right out of Gone With the Wind," Cathy said with a chuckle. It was his wife's favorite epithet for useless women. "She asked me if I did needlepoint."
Not the sort of thing you ask my wife. Jack grinned at the windows. "And you said "
"Only on eyeballs." A sweet, nasty smile.
"Oooh. I hope that wasn't over lunch."
"Jack! You know me better than that. She was nice enough, and she played a pretty good piano."
"Good as yours?"
"No." His wife smiled at him. Jack reached out to squeeze the tip of her nose.
"Caroline Ryan, MD, liberated woman, instructor in ophthalmic surgery, world-famous player of classical piano, wife and mother, takes no crap off anybody."
"Except her husband."
"When's the last time I ever won an exchange with you?" Jack asked.
"Jack, we're not in competition. We're in love." She leaned toward him.
"I won't argue with you on that," he said quietly before kissing his wife's offered lips. "How many people do you suppose are still in love after all the time we've been married?"
"Just the lucky ones, you old fart. 'All the time we've been married'!"
Jack kissed her again and rose. He walked carefully around the sea of toys toward the tree and returned with a small box wrapped in green Christmas