Trust Me on This - Jennifer Crusie [4]
“I think this is great,” Patience said. “I think you’re doing the smartest thing possible. I’ll even dog-sit Walter.”
Dennie felt the muscles in her neck relax for the first time since the night before when Patience had tackled her about her too safe life. Patience had stood in the middle of the tissue-papered aftermath of her bridal shower and said, “Dennie, it’s time you moved on too,” and the argument that followed hadn’t been their first, but it had been their worst. “You’re getting by on your charm, Dennie,” Patience had said. “You’re not even using your brains. Go after life and stop sitting around waiting for it to come to you.” Dennie had been so insulted, she’d stomped out, but after a sleepless night, she knew she hadn’t been insulted, she’d been terrified. She’d been afraid, holding on to a safe life that wasn’t giving her what she needed, and now that she was taking steps to break away, she could feel the relief in her bones. “I wouldn’t have done this without you,” she told Patience. “Although I still can’t believe you’re deserting me to get married and move to New York. How could you?”
Patience relaxed back into her chair. “He sleeps with me. You don’t.”
“Walter sleeps with me,” Dennie said. “Although I suppose it’s not the same. How am I going to survive without you around to pick me up when I fall?”
“Don’t fall,” Patience said. “Or better yet, learn to pick yourself up. You underestimate yourself all the time, Dennie. You can do the tough stuff, and you can do it on your own. You just have to believe.”
“Right,” Dennie said. “Believe. Piece of cake.”
* * *
“Don’t tell me it’s a piece of cake,” the brunette told her partner one week later. “We’ve been pushing our luck too long. This isn’t going to work. We have to get out. Please.”
Brian Bond rolled his eyes at the ceiling. “Sherée, I told you, this time it’s foolproof. This time, it’s legal. We can’t lose.”
“No,” Sherée said. “I have a really bad feeling about this. I don’t think we should go.” She fidgeted a little, bending the card in her hand back and forth.
Bond checked his watch to show her how impatient he was. He didn’t really need to check because he always knew what time it was; success was in the details. “We have exactly forty-six minutes to catch the plane for Riverbend,” he told her. “We are going. Move it.”
“Did you hear me?” she asked. “Do you ever hear me? We’re going to get caught. We’ve got to stop this.”
“Can we have this argument on the plane?” Bond tested the lock on his suitcase one last time. “You know you’re going. You’ve gotten cold feet before and you’ve gone, so why even bother talking about it? Now get your bag. We’re out of here.”
“No, we’re not.” Sherée picked the announcement card up from the table. “You know your ‘Four Fabulous Days!’? Well, watch this.” She tore the card in half. “That’s you and me,” she told Bond, her voice quavering. “I’m out of here. You go and get caught. I’m staying out of jail.”
She picked up her bag and walked out the door, and Bond watched her go with some surprise. He’d had no idea Sherée had any backbone at all. Not that it mattered. He could do this one just as well without her. After six months, she’d become a pain in the butt, always needing reassurance, always looking over her shoulder, always looking guilty. Some women just weren’t cut out for crime.
He checked the mirror on his way out the door, smiling his best honest smile. He looked as if guilt never crossed his mind. It didn’t. “Trust me,” he said to the mirror, and the mirror beamed back the face of a towheaded farm boy, right out of Norman Rockwell.
Brian Bond laughed all the way to the airport.
Sherée had turned in her plane ticket for Riverbend at the airport counter, consoling herself that the hefty amount of money she’d lost on