“Surprising you just thought of that,” I said.
“I suppose I’ve been selfish,” she said.
I folded my arms on my chest and pursed my lips and looked at her face.
“Paul,” she said, “for heaven’s sake stop that damned hammering and get your stuff.”
Paul didn’t look up. I looked at her face some more.
“Paul.” She was impatient.
I said, “Patty. This needs some discussion.”
Her head snapped around, “Now just one minute, mister. I hired you to look out for Paul, that’s all. I don’t need to explain things to you.”
“Clever rhyme,” I said.
“Rhyme?”
“Paul and all. Cute.”
She shook her head shortly. I kept looking at her with my arms folded.
She said, “Why are you doing that?”
I said. “There’s a credibility problem here. I’m trying to figure it out.”
“You mean you don’t believe me?”
“That’s right,” I said. “You been living with Stevie Elegant?”
“I’ve been staying with Stephen, yes.”
“You running out of money to pay me?”
“I’ll pay you what I owe you. Just send me a bill.”
“But you can’t afford to keep paying me.”
“Not forever, of course not, who could?”
“Would you like to keep staying with the disco prince?”
“I don’t see why you have to talk about Stephen that way.”
“Would you?”
“I’m very fond of Stephen, and he cares for me. Yes. I’d like to share his life.”
I nodded. “You want to move in with the spiffy one on a permanent basis. But he won’t take the kid. You can’t keep paying me to baby-sit, so you’re going to ship him off to the old man.”
“It’s not the way you make it sound.”
“So in effect your ex-husband is being asked to do you a favor. Does he know that?”
“I don’t see…”
“He doesn’t, does he? He thinks you’ve just been beaten down and have given up.”
She shrugged.
“What do you suppose he’ll do when he finds out he’s doing you a favor?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean he’s spent the last six months trying to get the kid away from you because he thought you wanted to keep him and you’ve spent the last six months trying to keep him from getting the kid because you thought he wanted him. But he doesn’t and you don’t. When he finds out that you’re glad he’s got the kid he’ll want to give him back. You’ll spend the next six months trying to give him to each other.”
“For God’s sake, Spenser, not in front of Paul.”
“Why not? You do it in front of Paul. Why shouldn’t I talk about it in front of him. Neither one of you is interested in the goddamned kid. Neither one of you wants him. And both of you are so hateful that you’ll use the kid in whatever way is available to hurt the other.”
“That is simply not true,” Patty said. Her voice sounded a little shaky. “You have no right to talk that way to me. Paul is my son and I’ll decide what’s best for him. He’s coming home with me now and he’s going to live with his father.”
Paul had stopped nailing and was kneeling, his head turned toward us, listening. I looked at him. “What do you think, kid?” I said.
He shook his head.
“You want to go?” I said.
“No.”
I looked back at Patty Giacomin.
“Kid doesn’t want to go,” I said.
“Well, he’ll just have to,” she said.
