Roll with the Punches (47 page)

"Sunscreen?" James took the lid off.

If I had been Nancy Drew, I'd have somehow kicked the gun out of James's hand at this point, but my shifting skates and slipping hands and screaming joints marked me as shark bait instead. I inched left toward him, anyway.

"James, are you serious? After all we did together? The rose tattoo? I thought you were my friend," I kicked out, trying to raise my left foot to James's side of the path.

"My friend." James mimicked in falsetto, squirting the sunscreen toward my hands. Oh, how embarrassing to be killed by SPF 45 on a railing. But nothing came out of the tube. "You're just a writer with a half-decent plot. One of many needed to create Reynard Jackson." He tried again. This time, the tube made a rude wet fart noise. "Shit, that closet scene with the jacket was rich. Yvette and I laughed all night."

"Yvette?" My body had spasmed into knots. My left knee buckled and my hand slipped. I recovered painfully and tightened every muscle in my body to screaming point.

He squirted air again with an even louder
blaaaat
. "She thought I was Jackson. I let her get just close enough to keep track of her and annoy the hell out of you. Shit! This won't work!" James let the gun hang from a finger to knead the tube with both hands.

"Roll up the end," I yelled, as I summoned up all my strength and kicked out hard at James with my skate, throwing him off balance, but also losing my precarious purchase on the ledge. Then I was hanging in midair again, this time with exhausted, pain-wracked arms and no strength left to climb back up.

Time for the inevitable fall. The big one I’d dreaded my whole life. Cleo would be so proud.

"Charge!" Cathy rolled up where Nadja had just been and said, "Only a .22, James? Gee, from Rhonda's buildup, I expected a ten-gauge!"

A loop of thick rope fell on my head. I grabbed it and looked up to see Largot, standing next to Cathy.

"Put it under your arm!" she said.

The lasso held as I painfully worked an arm through the rough loop, just in time to completely lose my grip on the rail so my body slammed against the cliff side like a giant rag doll. Ow, ow, ow. Pain.

James cocked the gun. Dangling in space, I squinched my eyes, ready for the blast and the fall. My body banged into the cliff again, bashing my helmet pretty hard.

There was a blast, but no fall. Above me on James's side were grunts and groans and yells and thunks, like body parts knocking against rock. My stomach bounced wildly as my body swung and banged several more times against the sharp rock slope. Talk about being at the end of my rope.

Then, miraculously, I was pulled, inch by inch, toward the broken trail. I looked up to see James pushing a curly red head toward the broken railing. Which galvanized my legs to start scrabbling against the rocks again, this time to help the Amazons haul me up the cliff face. For the second time in three days, I applied hands, teeth, and toe stops to a scrabble slope, though this time, my hands and knees were bleeding. Very slowly, Largot, Cathy, and Hippo, sweating and straining with Nazi grips on the other end of my rope, reeled me up to the crumbling path. Finally, with the last push I had in me, I flopped over the lip and beached myself like an orange-helmeted whale amidst a lot of happy shouting from the girls.

"Good thing you looped it around the railing," Cathy said to Largot. "She’s heavy."

"No more French fries for you, Rhonda!" Cathy squeezed me in a huge hug.

As I hugged asphalta firma, and the girls hugged me, I dared a peek across the chasm and saw Kween Viktorious, Yvette, and some Veggie Girls sitting on an inert James. Yvette waved at me as Dal limped up by her and grinned. Then she turned and waved at the passing yacht, where someone waved back from the bow.

At my elbow, Hippo said, "Rhonda, you sure are high maintenance."

I turned and looked her in the eye. "You sure are a big help. Thanks. Anything I can do for you, anything. Just say the word."

Hippo said. "Well, I do have this manuscript I'd like you to read."

"Uh," I was saved from responding to this new terror by a wild-eyed photographer running out of the shadows and shooting our group hug.

He cried, "Great! Reynard Jackson Has Cliffside Lesbian Orgy. Front page stuff!"

"God. I wasted a year on that guy." Back in safe old Besker Park, I sat numb on a wooden bench. Dal sat with an arm around me, scowling at the photographers lurking nearby. The police had just taken James and Nadja away. I moaned. "Geez.
Joane's Crank Yard? Nadja Kay Crosner? Nadja Kay's Corner? Kandajay's Corner
? The whole time, it was right there in front of my—"

"Nose?" Dal asked, showing me his profile.

"Yes. They're all anagrams of
Reynard A. Jackson.
Arrrgh!"

"Oh. Nadja spells her name with a—"

"
J.
"

He squeezed me hard enough to make me squeal. "She's cracked. She was out here yelling about how Karrey asked her to edit and rework a book in 2003, claiming it was his. Then, as an editor, he published it very quickly under Reynard's name as a lark, just to see if he could create a fictional bestselling author. Then he publicized the hell out of it and got it selling fast. She claims he told her
afterwards
how he'd taken it from the slush pile. She swears that was her total involvement until James found out about it and started stealing first drafts of manuscripts from various writing groups and blackmailed her and Jeff into buffing up and publishing these at lightning speed so Reynard could keep his national audience. It was a cash cow, and she needed money to start her care home empire. So Nadja claims she was their writing slave."

"My Aunt Fannie." I laughed. "More like their puppeteer. I think she had way more power in that trio than she admits."

Dal said, "I guess I understand why they wanted you to swing—"

"Hey!"

"—when you found your backup flash drive tonight, but why did they go after your dad?"

"He caught James in the act of messing with my computer at home a couple times. He told me about it, but I thought he was dreaming things up with his odd new brain.”

"So James put the pressure on your mom to place Harold, but why didn't they just drug him up once they had him? Why try to kill him?"

"I don't know. Oh, wait. I do. They pushed harder to get Dad after I told James that Dad might not have Alzheimer's, that he might get better and remember everything. Then all hell broke loose.”

I was dozing off on his shoulder. "Hey, Dal," I mumbled. "How did you know I'd be here today?"

Dal paused. "Your mother knows you love the beach like your dad. She told me when you disappeared this evening.”

"I wasn't gone that long."

He looked patient. "Rhonda, I just had this nasty feeling—"

"
You
stole my superpower?"

The paparazzi were taking notes. Headlines would read:
Reynard Jackson's Superpower Stolen by Indian Lover.

He grinned. "Maybe. Along with your backup floppy disk."

Cathy came up. "What's floppy? Oh, so soon? I'm sorry. There are pills for that now." Her crossed eyes flared. "Rhonda! That douchebag James told everybody in Besker Park this evening that like
Paris Hilton
was on the beach, so they all ran down there and nobody heard you yelling. A bunch of us had gotten off the yacht for like, a little free derby show on the beach basketball court. Oh, my God, Rhonda. The hunks down there were orgasmatronic, and there was like this huge crowd like watching us and cat calling and everything. It was awesome. Then E. Lizard Butt was looking through the yacht telescope and saw your orange helmet dangling under the path, and she called us."

"Uh, thanks," I said weakly, and she high-fived me. I sank back, eyes closed, into Dal's chest.

Dal whispered. "Rhonda, never mind. You know your
real
gift is …"

You
, I thought.
But for how long, rolling stone gambler man?

Hippo brought me my cell phone. "You know a Marian?"

Marian gushed down the line, "Hon, George and Jackie and I have discussed it and we think Homeland Security took your book. Could we sue them?"

"Marian," I said, signing a police clipboard. "There is no Reynard Jackson. It was Nadja and James. He was the legs, she the writer. Her ex-husband, the editor, pushed the books through publication super-fast."

"Oh."

"How's Jackie?" I asked.

"Better. I thought sure she'd done it, but it turns out she was blackmailing that councilman guy, Farley Hampton, into stopping development in the wetlands. She threatened to expose an affair he had with her co-worker. I think she kind of let the power get to her head and er—blackmailed some money out of him, as well."

Oh, so the mysterious F. H. was Farley Hampton? "Wow. She okay?"

"Yeah. For someone who's under indictment," Marian said. "But we think Farley had someone run her down. Want to help us prove it?"

"Next week," I said. "Hey, I'm supposed to write a romantic suspense party for that guy!"

Marian said, "Don't bother. Hampton's toast with this scandal. No parties for him.”

"Who was Jackie protecting with her confession?"

"Oh, gee. Must have been George. He was acting so strange that maybe she thought he'd done it. But then we found out he'd just fallen for Yvette, who's really a lovely girl."

I groaned.

Marian said, "Rhonda, Yvette's a journalist who was investigating James for an elderly aunt of hers who he'd stolen work from in one of those board and care homes. But she could never get conclusive proof that he'd done anything except flirt with every woman alive. She called your bluff that first night, thinking you were helping him, and then later you really confused her by confessing to being Jackson, you little dickens. By the time she realized you were the new target and not part of the plot, James had destroyed all the evidence that you'd written the book and wouldn't let her near you. Do you ever listen to your cell phone messages, by the way? She left you about a hundred."

I had to call Monica and get that password.

She went on, "And now she and George are engaged, you know. He inherited a mint from his uncle, and they'll be married as soon as she divorces Damned James.”

"Oh, great. Copper curls in the roller league forever." I said, "Marian, I finally found the evidence for the plagiarism suit today—my flash drive from August, with every version of the story on it."

"Great!" she said. "I found your book on CD today, too. It was mixed in with a bunch of CDs my—um—personal trainer borrowed months ago. He thought it was a cookbook. Now you'll be on the bestseller list."

"Maybe. After a long lawsuit." I looked at Dal. "Marian, please tell George I finally found a decent guy to save my life."

*
      
*
      
*

By the time we got back to Acorn Street, trailed by a media caravan of news vehicles, it was nearly midnight. My mother and Arlene were serving all the media folks pinwheel sandwiches and popcorn in the living room, so I headed toward the family room, where Harley was watching Jay Leno. She had scary scarlet hair, with very curly bangs and little horn-like pigtails.

Warily, I flopped on the sofa and let my aching body turn to mush.

"You coming to practice on Thursday?" Harley said. Good. She wasn't spewing pea soup or anything.

"I wish. Falling on a nice, flat wooden floor seems pretty trivial now."

"Hey. We set up the banked track now, so you can fall from eight feet up.”

There was a pause, filled only with the smell of Mom's popcorn and the inane chatter of TV.

"You still mad at me?" I said in a little girl voice that I hated.

The old wild-eyed Harley grin flashed. "Hell, no, Rhonda! I finally found my man! He's not one bit slimy, well, not around me. In the courtroom, he may be a bit … elastic." She yelled, "Henry?"

Henry Dantzig, the boy lawyer from Wonder Bras, appeared at the door, just as a reporter in the hall caught sight of me and lunged my way. Henry stuck out a foot and tripped him, then hauled him back into the living room.

"Wow. Nice guy," I said.

Harley looked at me. "Amazing what you can find on a barroom floor.”

I giggled and high-fived her.

She gestured at her very perky chest. "And check this out. Henry gets me the coolest bras. You need one? What are you, like a 40 AA?"

I punched her. Like old times.

Dal came up behind her, steering clear of her flaming clown hair. Harley saw him and froze.

Uh-oh.

But Harley just fluffed her pigtails. "Guys, I got a new derby name. Braggedy Anne. It was either that or Bipolar Woman. No more copyrighted characters for me."

"But isn't Raggedy Ann … ?" I stopped. "Well, I'm off the team. But if I ever skate again, forget Boudicca. The red hair, the leather bustier, the spear, they just aren't me. I'd prefer someone more Hollywood."

"Gena
Roll
ands?" Harley said.

"No. More fun. Sparkly. A queen of both rink and screen." I grinned.

Harley said, "If you're thinking
Kansas City Bombers,
the name Raquel Belch is sadly taken."

I rolled my eyes.

"Is it a booty name?" Harley asked.

I reddened.

Dal said, "Not … You aren't thinking of … Sonja
Hiney
?"

I threw my pillow at him. "You poop! How did you figure it out?"

They both cracked up, and Dal, choking with laughter, ran to the kitchen for a drink.

"Hey, I liked her movies!" I yelled after him.

Harley got serious. "Rhonda, why are you off the team?"

I lowered my voice. "The folks need a new full-time nanny—me.”

*
      
*
      
*

After everyone left, while Dal was helping Music Man, Mom found me dozing on the sofa. "Rhonda, I've decided to stop protecting you."

Good Lord.
I sat up. "From what?"

"Well, from responsibility." She looked at her perfect nails. "See, I was the youngest in my family, and I know what it feels like to be that free. Once upon a time, I had a career in TV. I was a reporter on a local news show. I'd been the weather girl, and had my sights on a talk show.”