Welcome to Temptation/Bet Me

by Jennifer Crusie

  Cal grinned, and she relaxed because he looked like Cal again. “Nah, I just like kissing you.”

  “Oh, good,” Min said, recovering. “Except, stop that because we’re not doing that. I was just relieved because I thought you were never going to want to see me again. I’m positive your family doesn’t want to.”

  Cal put the key in the ignition and started the car. “Oh, some of them do.”

  “Harry.” Min leaned back in her seat, and tried to think about something else besides kissing him. “That’s just because I gave him my ice cream.”

  Cal slowed the car. “He had yours and his?”

  “Yes,” Min said. “He said he didn’t throw up ice cream.”

  “He lied.” Cal stopped the car. “It’s sugar in general that makes him sick.”

  “Do we have to go back?” Min said, alarmed.

  “Christ, no.” Cal pulled out his cell phone. When he’d warned Bink about the imminent vomiting, he started the car again.

  “Great, I poisoned her kid,” Min said. “Now she hates me, too.”

  “No. She knows Harry and the cons he pulls for sugar. She likes you.”

  “She didn’t look like it.”

  “No, she really likes you,” Cal said as he pulled out into the street. “She offered me a hundred thousand dollars to marry you.”

  “What?” Min laughed. “I didn’t think she had a sense of humor.”

  “She does, but she wasn’t joking. She can afford it.” Cal picked up speed as they left his parents’ street and sighed. “Thank God, we’re out of there.”

  “Wait a minute,” Min said, not laughing. “She honestly offered you—”

  “She’s been going to dinner there every Sunday for ten years,” Cal said. “That was the first one she enjoyed. When you figure that my parents are in their fifties and likely to be around for at least another thirty years, she’s looking at a minimum of sixteen hundred more miserable Sundays. That’s her estimate. Add in holiday dinners, and she says a hundred K would come out to about sixty dollars a dinner, which is a real bargain in her book.” He thought about it. “Actually, that’s a bargain in my book, too, although nothing on this earth could get me there every Sunday.”

  “My Lord,” Min said.

  “Plus Harry’s been singing ‘Hunka hunka burning love’ since we went to lunch yesterday. She said the expressions on my parents’ faces alone were worth a hundred grand.”

  There was a smile in his voice now, and Min said, “Well, that’s a mind-boggler.”

  “It wasn’t the only one this afternoon.” They drove on for a while and then he said, “How did you know I was dyslexic?”

  “Roger told Bonnie so I looked it up on the net. And then you wouldn’t write the recipe for chicken marsala down when I asked. You never say no to me, so I knew it had to be something you couldn’t do.” Min rolled her head on the back of her seat to look at him. “Are you upset?”

  “No,” Cal said. “Is that true, about dyslexics starting their own businesses?”

  “Yes,” Min said. “Everything I told them was true. How’d you know about my promotions?”

  “Bonnie told Roger,” Cal said, and turned into a parking lot.

  Min squinted at the storefront. It looked expensive and snotty. “Be right back,” he said, and went inside. Fifteen minutes later he came back with a glossy shopping bag embossed in gold, which he tossed in her lap as he got in the car.

  “What?” she said, catching it. It was heavy, so she peered inside at the square white cartons sealed with gold labels.

  “The ice cream my mother serves,” he said as he pulled out of the lot. “Eight flavors. I’ll send flowers, but you deserved this now.”

  “Oh.” Min clutched the bag tighter. He really wasn’t mad. Relief swept over her, and she realized just exactly how much she didn’t want him out of her life. It was not a good realization.

  “Everything okay?” Cal said, and she forced a smile at him.

  “Well, no,” she said, trying to sound exasperated. “Where’s the spoon?”

  Without taking his eyes from the road, he took a plastic spoon from his suit pocket and handed it to her.

  “I’m crazy about you,” she said without thinking.

  “Good,” he said. “I’m crazy about you, too.”

  “In a friendly kind of way,” she said, hastily.

  “Right,” Cal said, shaking his head.

  “Just so you know,” Min said, and opened the first carton.

  “He calls her Minnie,” Cynthie said when David picked up the phone that evening. “He gave her his ball cap.”

  “Well, if he gives her his class ring, let me know,” David said. “Could I have one Sunday in peace?”

  “I don’t know, David,” Cynthie said, her voice dangerous. “You want any of them in the future to be with Min?”

  “Yes,” David said. “But she hated lunch, and she won’t return my calls. Look, Cal always dumps his girlfriends after a couple of months. It seems to me the smartest thing to do is wait until he dumps her and then comfort her.”

  “And it doesn’t bother you that he’s going to be fucking her blind for those two months?” Cynthie said.

  “Hey.” David sat up. “That’s—”

  “You have no idea what that man can do to a woman in bed,” Cynthie said. “What makes you think you’re going to be able to please her once she’s slept with him?”

  “I do just fine in bed,” David said, outraged.

  “Cal does more than fine,” Cynthie said. “If I were you, I wouldn’t wait until she finds out how much more.”

  “Cynthie, this is distasteful.”

  “Fine,” Cynthie said. “Let him win.”

  Her voice was like a fingernail down a blackboard. “It’s not about winning,” David said and thought, The bastard’s going to win.

  And he’d lose Min. It was all her fault, really. She was the kind of woman who just asked to be taken for granted, and now that Cal Morrisey was showering attention on her to win a bet, she was flattered. He thought about how grateful Min would be if he went back to her and paid attention. She was such a simple woman. Which was why Cal could get to her. Which meant it was his duty to stop Cal. And save her.

  “David?” Cynthie said, prompting him. “You do want her back, don’t you?”

  “Yes,” David said.

  “Then go over to her apartment and dazzle her,” Cynthie said. “Tell her how important she is. Take her a gift, she likes snow globes, take her a snow globe. Give her joy, damn it.”

  “Snow globe,” David said, recalling there had been some on Min’s mantel.

  “And if she resists, leave something there so you can go back and get it and try again the next day,” Cynthie said. “Your tie or something.”

  “Why would I take off my tie?” David said.

  There was a short silence, and then Cynthie said, “Just do it, David. I don’t have time for remedial seduction lessons.”

  “All right,” David said. “I’ll go over after work. I’ll surprise her. We’ll talk about marriage.”

  “Talk?” Cynthie said, exasperated. “For once in your life, could you do more than talk?”

  “Well, I’m not going act like a caveman with her,” David said.

  “Ever tried that?” Cynthie said.

  “No, of course not.”

  “Then how do you know it doesn’t work?”

  “Well,” David said. “Oh, hell, all right. I’ll kiss her. She’s a good kisser.”

  “Good to know,” Cynthie said. “Don’t screw this up, David.”

  “I won’t,” David said, but she’d already hung up. “God, you’re a witch,” he said to the dial tone, and then he hung up, too.

  On Monday morning, Nanette called Min to find out how dinner at the Morriseys’ had gone. “Tell me everything,” she said.

  “Mother, I’m at work,” Min said.

  “Yes, but your father would never fire you,” Nanette said. “He
’d never betray you.”

  “Mom?” Min said.

  “What was their house like?” Nanette said. “Did his mother like you?”

  “It was very beautiful,” Min said, “and his mother hated me.”

  “Min, if she’s going to be your mother-in-law—”

  “She’s not going to be my mother-in-law.”

  “—you’re going to need her. For when you hit the bad times. Not that your grandmother ever helped me in the slightest—”

  “When did you ever need help with Daddy?” Min said.

  “Well, now,” Nanette said, goaded.

  “Well, she’s dead now,” Min said. “She can’t help. What’s wrong?”

  There was a long silence, and then Nanette said, very dramatically, “He’s having an affair.”

  “Oh, he is not,” Min said. “Honestly, Mom, when would he? You know where he is every moment of the day.”

  “It’s those lunches,” Nanette said darkly.

  “He has lunch with Beverly,” Min said. “Beverly who adores her husband and would really like not to work through lunch. He is not having an affair with her.”

  “You’re so naïve, Min,” Nanette said.

  “You’re so paranoid, Mother,” Min said. “What’s going on that makes you think he’s cheating?”

  “It’s not the same. We never talk anymore.”

  “All you ever talk about is clothes and the wedding and my weight,” Min said. “He’s not interested. Take up golf. You’ll be chattering away in no time.”

  “I should have known you wouldn’t understand,” Nanette said. “You have your Calvin, after all.”

  “I do not have a Calvin,” Min said, fishing in her drawer for a paper clip. “I’m not seeing—ouch.” She pulled her hand out to see a staple stuck in the end of her finger.

  “You don’t have time to think about your mother,” Nanette said.

  “Oh, for crying out loud,” Min said. “Go back to worrying about the wedding and do not do anything dumb like leaving Dad, because there is nothing going on. As God is my witness, the man is innocent.”

  “The daughters are always the last to know,” Nanette said, and hung up.

  “Nuts,” Min said, and hung up the phone to blot her fingertip on a piece of scrap paper.

  The phone rang again, almost right away, and she answered it to hear Diana say, “Hi,” in a wavery little voice.

  “What’s wrong?” Min said, blotting more blood on the scrap paper.

  “I’m just a little . . . down,” Diana said. “Could we do something together?”

  “Absolutely,” Min said. “How about tonight?”

  “I can’t,” Di said. “I have to go to Greg’s parents’ house for dinner. How was it at Cal’s parents’?”

  “Very bad,” Min said. “How about tomorrow night?”

  “I can’t,” Di said. “Susie and Karen are throwing a sex toy shower for me.”

  “Sorry I’m going to miss that,” Min lied, trying not to think about Worse with a vibrator in her hand.

  “How about Wednesday?” Diana said. “I know you go out with Sweet and Tart that night, but can I come along?”

  “Yes,” Min said, trying not to laugh. “Especially if you promise to call them Sweet and Tart.”

  “Liza would kill me,” Diana said, but her voice sounded lighter.

  “Come here first,” Min said. “And then we’ll go out and you can come back and spend the night. It’ll be like old times. Except we’ll be folding your cake boxes because they have to be assembled, I’ve just found out.”

  “Okay,” Di said. “Okay. I feel better. It’s just pre-wedding jitters.”

  “Right,” Min said. “You haven’t talked to Mom recently, have you?”

  “Well, yes,” Diana said. “I live with her.”

  “No, I mean talk. Because she just called to tell me Dad’s cheating on her.”

  “Oh,” Diana said, sounding taken aback. “No, she hasn’t mentioned that.”

  “Well, good,” Min said, and reassured Diana that their father was not sleeping with his secretary—”It would mean he’d have to skip lunch, Di, and do you really see that happening?”—and hung up with a renewed promise that they would have a wonderful time on Wednesday.

  Then she sat and looked at the phone and waited for it to ring again. She’d told Cal not to call her, that she wanted Monday to herself, but he was not good at taking directions, so maybe . . .

  By five that evening, it had become clear that the bastard had learned to take directions. Min went home and heard Elvis playing on the stereo before she opened the door. She went in and saw the cat splayed out on the back of her couch, his ears close to the speakers. “Turned it on again, did you?” she said, and went over and cuddled him to make up for leaving him all day, something that didn’t seem to bother him much at all. Then she made spaghetti and began the pleasant evening she’d planned with her cat, keeping one ear cocked for a knock at the door, just in case. When it came, she felt equal parts exasperated and happy. Okay, Cal wasn’t good at listening, that was bad, but she was still glad he was there.

  Then she opened the door and he wasn’t, it was David, and her feelings simplified down to just exasperated.

  “What are you doing here?” she said.

  “I need to talk to you.” He walked in and stopped dead, staring at the end of her couch. “My God, what is that?”

  “That’s Elvis,” Min said closing the door behind him. “My cat. I love him. Insult him and you’re history.”

  David sat down on the couch, as far away from Elvis as he could get. “I’ve been thinking about us,” he began as he loosened his tie.

  “There is no us,” Min said. “There never was an us. The best thing you ever did for me was dump me. I’d be grateful but I’m still mad at you for it.”

  “I know, I know, I deserve it.” David pulled the knot out of his tie, looking more undone than Min could ever remember seeing him. “It was the dumbest thing I ever did.” He patted the couch beside him. “Come here and let me talk to you.”

  Min went over and sat down on the couch. “Make this fast,” she told him. “Elvis and I have a big evening ahead of us.” At the sound of his name, Elvis crept forward on the back of the couch and sat beside her, growling softly, and she put her hand up and rubbed him behind the ears. “Easy, tiger,” she told him. “He’s leaving.”

  David leaned closer, keeping one eye on the cat. “I want to marry you, Min.”

  Elvis reached out a claw and buried it in David’s sleeve.

  “Hell,” David said, scooting back on the couch. “What was that for?”

  “Elvis doesn’t want to get married,” Min said. “I think Priscilla broke his heart. He always loved her, you know.”

  “It’s not funny,” David said.

  “Who’s laughing?”

  “Look, I’m serious.” David reached in his coat pocket and handed her a package. “This is how serious I am.”

  “That’s not a ring, is it?” Min said with horror.

  “No,” David said, so she unwrapped the box. Inside was an expensive, three-inch snow globe with the Eiffel Tower inside.

  “The Eiffel Tower?” Min said. This guy doesn’t know me at all.

  “That’s where we’ll honeymoon,” David said, edging closer. “In Paris. We’ll have a wonderful life, Min. And I don’t mind starting a family right away, we can—”

  “I don’t want kids,” Min said, peering into the snow globe. “David, this isn’t my kind of—”

  “Of course you want kids,” David said. “You were born to be a mother.”

  Min put the snow globe on the end table and looked at the cat. “There are two men, Elvis. One calls you a depraved angel and the other calls you a natural born mother. Which one do you pick?”

  “Well, you’re more than that, of course,” David said. “But—” He stopped when the cat jumped down from the back of the sofa, brushing against him and leaving a smudge of rus
ty cat hair on his sleeve. “Your cat just got cat hair on me.”

  “It’s only fair,” Min said. “Your suit just got expensive suit lint on him.”

  “Min, I know you’re seeing Cal Morrisey,” David said.

  “You do?” Min said, thinking, You miserable son of a bitch, you’re still trying to win that bet. It was enough to make her sleep with Cal just to get even with David. The thought was much more exciting than it should have been.

  “You shouldn’t see Cal,” David said seriously. “Ever again.”

  The cat jumped up on the end table and nosed the snow globe off with enough force that it landed on the stone hearth in front of the fireplace and smashed, water running everywhere.

  “Elvis!” Min shoved herself off the couch to shoo him away. “Stay away from there. There’s broken glass.”

  “He did that on purpose,” David said, outraged.

  “Yes, David, the cat is plotting against you.” Min fished the base out of the water and glass shards and put it on the table. Then she went to get her wastebasket and began to put the glass pieces in it.

  “That cat—” David said.

  “Yes?” Min said as she picked up the biggest piece.

  “Never mind,” David said. “You don’t know what Cal Morrisey’s up to.”

  “Sure, I do,” Min said, picking up another piece. “He’s trying to get me into bed.”

  “Well, yes,” David said. “But it’s more than that.”

  “I know.” Min picked up the third and last large piece and then looked at the rest. “Give me that magazine on the table, will you?”

  David passed the magazine over and she tore off the cover while he said, “You don’t know. He’s capable of anything.”

  “That was the impression I got.” Min slid the cover under the glass while using the rest of the magazine as a broom. She dumped the glass in the basket and then saw one more large piece, a little beyond her sweeping area. “Look, David, you don’t have to worry about me. I am not in love with Cal Mor—ow!” She pulled back her hand as the blood welled up. “What the hell?” She picked up the last piece and dropped it in the basket and then went out to the kitchen to wash off the blood.