Seventeen Against the Dealer Read Online Free PDF Page B

mirror, she frowned. Even she had to admit that fingers hadn’t done the job. She opened the cabinet door and took out a brush. She pulled the brush through her hair a couple of times, then replaced it. She didn’tbother checking herself again in the mirror. If she’d brushed her hair, then it had to look okay. She didn’t have time to waste double-checking, she had things she was supposed to get done this morning. She was hungry, too.
    Dicey ran down the stairs, into what was left of the morning. Baking smells came up to greet her—sweet, warm smells, with nuts and vanilla mixed in—she followed her nose into the kitchen—apples, too, cinnamon, nutmeg. Gram and Maybeth were in there, both working away at the long table. Gram was beating something in the big bread bowl while Maybeth, an apron over her jeans, frowned at the grater she was rubbing an orange against.
    Dicey poured herself a glass of milk and drank it down, watching the two of them. “You slept late,” Gram observed, the big wooden spoon moving steadily even when she turned her attention away.
    â€œI feel—terrific,” Dicey said.
    â€œSammy’s out back, chopping wood. People will be coming soon,” Gram told her.
    â€œI must have been tireder than I thought.” Dicey kept moving around, stepping out of her sister’s way, out of her grandmother’s way, eating bread and jam.
    â€œI thought so.”
    There was no use feeling impatient. Dicey had known that, like on Christmas, she would lose a day’s work on New Year’s. There wasn’t anything she could do about it, anyway, because there were people coming over for the afternoon.
    Over the years it had gotten to be a tradition, people coming to spend the first afternoon of the New Year at the Tillermans’. It wasn’t official and it wasn’t formal—nothing at the Tillermans’ was ever official or formal—it was just something that happened once, and then again, and somehow got grown into a habit. Youdidn’t dress up for it. Dicey wore jeans and a cranberry-red sweater Jeff gave her the first Christmas he ever gave her a present, a mix of cotton and silk that was so soft, every time she put it on she felt like a baby, wrapped around with care, or a royal princess nothing could ever happen to. She knew that was pretty stupid. The history courses she’d had to take had taught her that princesses were at more risk than ordinary people. Babies, she knew, were easy to neglect, or abandon, because they were helpless. But she wasn’t a princess, so she didn’t have to worry, and she wasn’t a baby anymore, either. In fact, helpless was one thing she was sure she wasn’t, she thought, running her hand down over the soft arm of the sweater.
    At midafternoon, Dicey stood leaning against the door frame between the dining room and the living room. She was waiting for the hours to flow by, half of her mind in town at the shop—considering the list of tasks to be done, checking supplies—most of the other half wondering what it was Ken Forbeck had wanted, what he’d say when she called him. The trouble with holidays was you couldn’t even make a phone call.
    From behind her, she heard the voices of Gram and Dr. Landros, talking about something with Mina Smiths. She knew that if she turned around she’d see them, the three women sitting on three of the chairs that had been pulled away from the table, all leaning forward toward the others as they talked. Mina had come without Dexter, so Dicey guessed they were having one of the fights that had characterized the romance, now in its fourth year. She hadn’t had a chance to ask, because seeing Mina unescorted, Sammy had dragged her out to the kitchen to talk about tennis camps.
    The people in the living room had eaten and talked and were settling down to song. Jeff had his guitar ready. Maybeth sat on the floor in front of him, the