“Charlie.”
“Charlie, right.” Jackson hung up.
LuAnn went immediately to the wet bar and uncapped a bottle of beer. Lisa started to make noise and LuAnn let her down on the floor. LuAnn watched with a big smile on her face as Lisa moved around the room. Just in the last few days, her little girl had started to really get the hang of crawling and now she was exploring the large dimensions of the suite with considerable energy. Finally, LuAnn got down on the floor and joined her. Mother and daughter made the circuit of the hotel room for about an hour until Lisa grew tired and LuAnn put her down for the night.
LuAnn went into the bathroom and started running water in the tub while she checked the cut on her jaw in the mirror. It was healing okay, but it would probably leave a scar. That didn’t bother her; it could have been a lot worse. She got another beer from the refrigerator and walked back into the bathroom. She slid into the hot water and took a sip of the cold beer. She figured she would need plenty of both alcohol and steamy, soothing water to get through the next couple of days.
Promptly at twelve o’clock, Charlie arrived with several bags from Bloomingdale’s and Baby Gap. During the next hour, LuAnn tried on several outfits that made her tingle all over.
“You certainly do those clothes justice. More than justice,” Charlie said admiringly.
“Thank you. Thanks for all this stuff. You got the size just right.”
“Hell, you got the height and figure of a model. They make these clothes for people like you. You ever think about doing that for a living? Modeling, that is?”
LuAnn shrugged as she put on a cream-colored jacket over a long, pleated black skirt. “Sometimes, when I was younger.”
“Younger? My God, you can’t be far out of your teens.”
“I’m twenty, but you feel older after having a baby.”
“I guess that’s true.”
“No, I ain’t cut out for modeling.”
“Why not?”
She looked at him and said simply, “I don’t like getting my picture taken, and I don’t like looking at myself.”
Charlie just shook his head. “You are definitely one strange young woman. Most girls your age, with your looks, you couldn’t drag them away from the mirror. Narcissus personified. Oh, but you need to wear those big sunglasses and keep the hat on; Jackson said to keep you under wraps. We probably shouldn’t be going out, but in a city of seven million I don’t think we’re going to have a problem.” He held up a cigarette. “You mind?”
She smiled. “Are you kidding? I work in a truck diner. They don’t even let you in unless you got your smokes and plan to use ’em. Most nights the place looks like it’s on fire.”
“Well, no more truck diners for you.”
“I guess not.” She pinned a wide-brimmed, floppy hat to her hair. “How do I look?” She posed for him.
“Better than anything in Cosmo, that’s for sure.”
“You ain’t seen nothing yet. You just wait till I dress my little girl,” she said proudly. “Now that is something I dream about. A lot!”
An hour later, LuAnn put Lisa, who was decked out in the latest Baby Gap fashions, in her baby carrier and hefted it. She turned to Charlie. “You ready?”
“Not just yet.” He opened the door to the suite and then looked back at her. “Why don’t you close your eyes. We might as well do the whole production.” LuAnn looked strangely at him. “Go on, just do it,” he said, grinning.
She obeyed. A few seconds later he said, “Okay, open them up.” When she did, she was staring at a brand new and very expensive baby carriage. “Oh, Charlie.”
“You keep lugging that thing around much longer,” he said, pointing at the baby carrier, “your hands are going to scrape the ground.”
LuAnn gave him a big hug, loaded Lisa in, and they were off.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Shirley Watson was madder than hell. In seeking appropriate revenge for her humiliation at the hands of LuAnn Tyler, Shirley had taxed her ingenuity, to the extent she had any, to the maximum. She parked her pickup in an out-of-the-way spot about a quarter of a mile from the trailer and got out, a metal canister held tightly in her right hand. She looked at her watch as she made her way toward the trailer, where she was pretty certain LuAnn would be deeply sleeping after working at the diner all night. Where Duane was she didn’t really care. If he was there, then she might get a piece of him too for not defending her against the Amazon-like LuAnn.