The Four Corners of the Sky_ A Novel - Michael Malone [175]
“We succeed?”
Annie tried not to laugh; it was painful.
Georgette felt she needed to ask one little thing. “Did your dad tell you who your mother was?”
Annie said, “No. He told me he wouldn’t tell me.”
Georgette sighed loudly. “Okay. Now, at the risk of sounding like a therapist, how do you feel about Daniel Hart?”
“Oh, come on.”
“Just blurt it out. The truth. Whatever comes to mind.”
Annie looked at the braid on her military jacket cuff, at the asphalt, at the sky, at the cheerful alligators on Rafael Rook’s shirt off in the distance as he chatted with Mrs. McGreb. All right, she told Georgette. The truth? The truth was that last night she’d had the best conversation, the most fun, the greatest sex, the easiest time with a man in her adult life. And it terrified her. The truth? Loving and being loved was scarier than landing a jet plane on a rolling ship. But if you did it right, how wonderful. She was unable to stop thinking of Dan Hart even now, in midst of, frankly, chaos.
Georgette was silent a moment. Finally she said, “Chaos is good. For you, it’s good.” She added, “What about Brad?”
Unconsciously, Annie looked around the parking lot as if Georgette might be going to warn her that Brad was in it somewhere. All she saw was Jackie Stump pulling her elderly aunt away from Raffy and shoving the old woman into the long white limousine. Annie repeated, “What about Brad?”
“Just a second…” Georgette put Annie on hold. “Sorry, apparently I’ve got a patient naked in the cafeteria. Brad, your husband, who’s looking for you all over Miami.”
“Why does everyone keep calling Brad my husband?”
“Isn’t he?”
Annie just wanted to point out that her life was none of Brad’s business.
“Um hmm. So where is Brad this morning?”
Annie assumed that he was still asleep at the Dorado.
“Brad and Dan both. Um hmm.”
“Georgette, please stop saying um hmm.”
“That’s what psychiatrists say. It takes a lot of training not to say anything more than um hmm.” Georgette took another call; a patient with agoraphobia was going to be late again because it was so hard for him to leave his house. “Annie, à bientôt. Please lock yourself in your room and get some rest. For God’s sake, you’re having sex with a stranger on a windsurfer. Don’t cops have partners? Maybe I could fly down tonight and meet him.”
It was Annie’s impression that Dan had had a partner before he’d gotten fired but she really didn’t know that much about him.
Georgette suggested wryly that she shouldn’t bother learning at this point. “It’s too late to start getting to know somebody after you’re already in love with him. Just go with the flow.”
Annie gave her puff of disgust. “I’m not in love. You think I’m in love?”
It certainly sounded that way to Georgette.
“You’re right,” Annie suddenly admitted. “I don’t even know him and I want to spend the rest of my life with him.”
“That’s what I call going with the flow! Okay, I’ve got to see about this naked patient. But did you happen to find out from your dad if that woman who looked like my aunt Ruthie was my aunt Ruthie?”
“No, that was just a stupid idea of mine.” Annie explained that she’d learned from Rafael Rook that the woman she’d seen at Golden Days was named Helen Clark and she was the mistress of a Miami racketeer. Thinking she could be Ruthie Nickerson had been a crazy idea. It was just an odd resemblance. “Why, did you find out something else about Ruthie?”
“No, nothing. A tout à l’heure.” Georgette felt very guilty for not telling Annie what she’d learned from Sam. But she’d decided she should honor Sam’s wish that she wait until Annie herself brought up the subject of Ruthie’s being her mother. On the other hand, obviously Jack had told his daughter nothing about Ruthie, because no matter how bad Annie’s hangover or how alluring Sgt. Daniel Hart, if she had had any idea that her best friend’s aunt might be her mother, she would have mentioned the fact. On the other hand, surely Annie should be able to count on her best friend to tell her what Sam had said. On the other hand