'If I love him back, everything changes.”
Odette smiled, leaned over to shut off the light. 'It surely does,' she murmured and continued to stroke Lena's hair. 'It surely does.”
As host of Remy's bachelor party, Declan felt socially obligated to stay till the bitter end. The bitter end was some dingy, backstreet dive in the Quarter where the liquor burned holes in what was left of a man's stomach lining and the strippers were woefully past their prime.
Nobody seemed to care.
In the spirit of good-fellowship, Declan tucked a final dollar in the frayed garter on a flabby white thigh, then hauled a glassy-eyed Remy to his feet.
'Let's go, pal of mine.”
'Huh? What? Is it morning?”
'Close enough.”
As they stumbled out, arm in arm as much for necessity as friendship, Remy looked around. His head bopped like a puppet's on a jerked string.
'Wherez everybody?”
'Passed out, in jail, dead in an alley.”
'Oh. Wimps.' Remy grinned his rubber grin. 'You 'n me, Dec, we still got it.”
'I'm starting a course of antibiotics in the morning to get rid of it.' He tripped and had to wrap both arms around Remy to keep from falling on his face. 'Too much gravity. There's entirely too much gravity out here.”
'Let's go find us another naked woman.”
'I think we found all of them already. Time to go home, old buddy, old pal.”
'I'm getting married in three days.' Remy held up four fingers to demonstrate. 'No more carousing for Remy.' He looked around. The streets were nearly deserted and oily with the light drizzle. 'Do we have to bail anybody out?”
'Screw 'em.”
'Damn right. Where's my girl? Effie!' He shouted it, and the name echoed back, making Declan snort drunkenly.
'Stella!' Cracked up by his own wit, he sat down hard in a puddle. 'Fuck it, Remy. Let's just sleep here.”
'Gotta go find my girl, gonna make sweet, sweet love to my Effie.' 'You couldn't get it up right now with a hydraulic pump.”
'Bet?' Remy fumbled for his zipper, and Declan had just enough brain cells left to stagger up and stop him.
'Put that thing away before you hurt yourself. Get us arrested for decent exposure.”
''S okay. We're lawyers.”
'Speak for yourself. Find cabs. We must find cabs.”
'Cab to Effie. Where's my blushin' bride?”
'Home in bed, like every other good woman is at …' He lifted Remy's wrist, tried to focus on the watch. 'Whatever o'clock in the morning. Lena, she's in bed. She thinks I'm a woman.”
'You must not be fucking her right then.”
'No, you ass. And remind me to punch you for that later. She thinks I'm Abigail.”
'You haven't been trying on her underwear or anything weird like that, have you, son?”
'I like the little black lace panties with the roses best. They slim down my hips.”
'Pretty sure you're joking. Wait.' He stopped, leaned over the curb, hands braced on his knees. Then slowly straightened again. 'False alarm. Not gonna puke.”
'There's good news. Cab!' Declan waved desperately when he saw one cruising. 'In the name of God. You first,' he said and all but shoved Remy inside before diving in after.
'Where do I live?' Remy demanded. 'I used to know, but I forgot. Can I call Effie and ask her?”
Fortunately Declan remembered, and as Remy snoozed on his shoulder, he concentrated on remaining conscious until he fulfilled the last of his duties and got his friend home alive.
At the curb, he elbowed Remy and brought him up like an arrow from a bow. 'What? Where? Sum bitch, I'm home. How 'bout that?”
'Can you make it from here?' Declan asked him.
'I can hold my liquor. All six gallons of it.' Shifting, Remy caught Declan's face in his hand and kissed him hard on the mouth. 'I love you, cher. But if you'd been Abigail, I'd've slipped you some tongue.”
'Ugh,' was the best Declan could manage as Remy climbed out.
'You're the goddamnedest best friend I ever had, and that was the goddamnedest best bachelor's party in the history of bachelor's parties. I'm gonna go up, puke, and pass out now.”
'You do that. Wait till he gets in the door,' Declan told the driver, and watched Remy waver, split in two. Both of them stumbled inside the building.
'Okay, the rest is his business. You know where the old Manet Hall is?”
The driver eyed him in the rearview mirror. 'I guess I do.”
'I live there. Take me home, okay?”
'That's a long way out.' The driver shifted, turned, eyed Declan up and down. 'You got enough for the fare?”
'I got money. I got lotsa money.' Declan pawed through his pockets, came up with bills, littered the cab with them. 'I'm loaded.”
'You're telling me.' With a shake of his head, the driver pulled away from the curb. 'M/'ve been some party, buddy.”
'Tell me,' Declan muttered, then slid face first on the backseat.
The next thing he knew, clearly, a Dixieland band was blasting in his head. He was still facedown, but the beach of Waikiki had ended up in his mouth and his tongue had grown a fine fur coat.
Some sadist was hammering spikes into his shoulder.
'Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners.”
'No point falling back on that now. Just roll over nice and slow, cher. Don't open your eyes yet.”
'I'm dying here. Call a priest.”
'Here now, Lena's got you.' Gently and with great amusement, she eased him over, supported his head. 'Just swallow this.”
He glugged, choked, felt something vile wash over the fur, through the sand and down his throat. In defense, he tried to push the glass away from his lips, and opened his eyes.
He'd go to his grave denying the sound that had come out of his mouth had in any way resembled a girlish scream.
Lena clucked her tongue. 'I told you not to open your eyes.”
'What eyes? What eyes? They've been burned to cinders.”
'Drink the rest.”
'Go away, go very far away, and take your poison with you.”
'That's no way to talk to someone who's come to tend you on your deathbed.”
He slid back down, dragged a pillow over his face. 'How'd you know I was dying?”
'Effie called.”
'When's Remy's funeral?”
'Fortunately, he's marrying a woman with a great deal of tolerance, understanding and humor. How many titty bars did y'all hit last night?”
'All of them. All the titty bars in all the land.”
'I suppose that explains why you have a pasty on your cheek.”
'I do not.' But when he groped under the pillow, he felt the tassel. 'Oh God. Have some mercy and just kill me.”
'Well, all right, honey.' She applied just enough pressure to the pillow to have him flapping his hands and shoving up.
His face was flushed, his bloodshot eyes just a little wild. 'That wasn't funny.”
'You had to see it from this side.' And she laughed. He still wore his clothes, the wrinkled, liquor-spotted shirt
