The Love Scam - MaryJanice Davidson Page 0,6

but full lips. Mouth too wide, eyes too narrow and oddly colored. Small hands but big feet. Expensive clothing but no jewelry. And she seemed delighted to see him, the first person that day who was. “I was worried I wouldn’t see you again.”

Add another contradiction; she had the smooth low voice of a radio-show host or a phone-sex operator, but spoke in a sort of slur, where all her words ran together, with odd inflections on some of the vowels: Wuz worr’ed I wouldn’t s’ya ‘gin.

He stared at her, dripping. “Wait, you know me? Do—do I know you?”

“Not really. We weren’t formally introduced.” She was fighting a smile, and losing. “Why’d you jump in the canal, you big dummy? Blech!” Why’dya jump inna canal, y’big dummy?

Blech? Did she just say blech?

“I didn’t jump,” he whined, “I fell.” And some goddamned sympathy would be goddamned nice, thanks very goddamned much.

This made her laugh, because she was probably a monster. “How can anyone fall in?” She made a vague gesture, which encapsulated the enormous canal, the vaporettos, the gondolas, the cruise ship passing by in the distance, and the several feet of docks anyone would have to obliviously wander past before plunging into the water. “It’s—y’know. It’s right there. I thoughtcha musta lost a bet’r something.”

“I didn’t lose a bet, I’m hungover. Possibly because I lost a bet.” Somewhere, he knew, Blake was laughing his ass off. He could sense it. He could sense the mocking laughter.

“Yeah, not surprised, alla vermouth you put away.”

“We were drinking together?” And he hated—fucking hated—vermouth. It had to be a lie. Vermouth, as any sane person knew, was the devil’s urine.

“Naw.” She was still grinning at him with her wide mouth and weird gray eyes. “You were drinking. I was buying, on account of how you tried ta help me.”

“Help you? What the hell is going on? What happened last night?” His voice rose to a roar. “How the hell did I end up in Venice?”

“Got me. I tracked you down to introduce you to your daughter, maybe.” She gestured to the child standing beside her, a slight brunette who was silently staring up at him with big dark eyes. Dickens orphan big. Victorian London match girl big.

“Jesus!” He’d been so busy gaping (and dripping), he hadn’t even noticed the kid until what’s-her-face drew his attention to her.

“Hi,” the child replied.

“What is going on?”

“Don’t play dumb,” the woman advised. “Unless you’re actually dumb. In which case you should try to hide it better.”

He opened his mouth to really let her have it, then bent forward and threw up on her shoes.

“Ah hell,” she sighed as the child beside her laughed.

Four

The smirking weirdo and the child

(daughter?)

(nuh-uh, wrong guy, honey)

helped him back into the hotel, which is when he realized he hadn’t grabbed his key card, and had no idea what his room number was. Or what his hotel was, for that matter; all he knew was that he woke up in Venice with a horrible hangover, which had been the nicest part of his day.

“You’re kidding!” his annoying escort said. “D’you remember the floor at least? No?” To the child: “Who does that?”

“I was trying not to puke,” he snapped. “I couldn’t be bothered with minor details like where I slept and what country I woke up in.”

“And it worked,” she replied, “kinda.”

Normally he would have apologized for ruining her sandals and offered to buy replacements, but that was when he came to another sickening realization. “My wallet! I forgot that, too!” He was patting his soaked pockets and realized it was worse than that. Because now that he gave it some thought, he wasn’t sure he’d forgotten it. In fact … “I lost my wallet!”

“Naw, you didn’t.”

“The hell I didn’t.”

“Where was the last place you saw it?” the child asked helpfully.

“I. Don’t. Know.”

“I said you didn’t lose it.”

“How the hell would you know?” God, she was infuriating. Her good mood in the face of his very serious problem was aggravating—

Aggravating beyond belief, Blake’s voice spoke up helpfully.

Well, it was!

It’s like she has no understanding of the seriousness of your situation. Thinks your problems are funny.

Well, she did! The only time she stopped grinning was when he threw up on her. And even then she’d left the child with him, resulting in an awkward chat,

(“You’re having a bad day.”

“I am having an unfathomably bad day, sweetie. Um. No offense.”

“It’s fine. Sweetie.”

“It’s nothing to do with you personally—”

“It’s fine,” she insisted.)

ducked into the bagno delle donne, and