Bayou My Love: A Novel (24 page)

“I’m
fine,” he said, turning his head away.

I
climbed onto his lap, my knees by his hips. “Hold still,” I said. His body
tensed beneath me, and he stopped squirming.

“Only
scratches,” he said, his eyes steady on mine.

“I
know, tough guy. Just humor me.” I dabbed the cut on his jaw first. “Does that
hurt?”

“No.”
He rested his hands on my thighs, and a tickling heat traveled over my skin
like an electric current.

I
swabbed some ointment on his eyebrow, and he flinched. “Sorry,” I said. They
didn’t look bad enough for stitches, but I put a tiny bandage on the deepest
one to hold it together. “How about this?” I asked, touching the bruise around
his eye. “Does that hurt?”

“A
little.”

I
kissed his brow lightly, just above the cut. “And here?”

“No.”

I
kissed him on the neck, just below his jaw. “What about here?”

His
hands slid beneath my skirt, up to my hips. “No.”

With
my lips barely touching his, I said, “And here?”

He
sat still, but didn’t kiss me back. “What’s the matter?” I asked.

He
placed his hands back on my knees and said, “Maybe we’ve been thinking about
this backwards. Maybe I need to get as far away from you as possible.”

“What
happened to ‘I’m not letting you out of my sight’?”

He
sighed. “If Remy’s after me, then the worst thing I can do is stay near you.
That just keeps you in danger.”

“So
you don’t want to stay with me, and you don’t want me alone. That doesn’t leave
a lot of options.”

“You
could stay here.”

“Jack,”
I said, frowning. “I’m not putting Buck and Josie out like that.”

“They’d
love to have you.”

“No.
I need to get back to Vergie’s. I’m done being scared.” I already felt silly
not going back tonight, despite the nausea that hit me every time I pictured
sleeping upstairs in the house.

“I
could send one of the guys to stay with you and keep an eye out,” he said.

“Absolutely
not. It’s you or no one.”

“While
I’d be thrilled to hear that in any other situation, I think in this one you
need to reconsider.”

“I
don’t need bodyguards,” I said, pushing a lock of hair behind his ear.
“Besides, they won’t take care of me quite the way you do.”

“It’s
nothing to take lightly. Whatever this is,” he gestured in the space between
us, “we need to put it on hold. Just until everything blows over.”

I
stared at him, my jaw slack.

He
took my hand. “It’s not safe for you to be so close to me. And I can’t stand
the idea of you being hurt because of me.”

“Jack,”
I said. “Don’t.”

“I
can’t be with you if it puts you in danger. I couldn’t live with myself if
something happened to you.”

“I’m
a grown woman, Jack. I get a say in this. You don’t get to decide without me
that it’s best you leave.”

He
squeezed my knee. “It’s the only way to keep you safe.”

“I’m
not about to let somebody like Remy decide how I live my life. Or who I spend
it with. If he wants to come after me, then fine. I’ll be ready.”

“It
most certainly is not fine,” he said, his hands tightening. “If he’s gunning
for me, I want him to come after me when I’m alone. Not when I’m with you.”

“But
I—”

“End
of discussion,” he said, his voice gruff. “I won’t have you in the middle of
this.” He lifted me off his lap and set me down as he stood, like he expected
me to stay wherever he put me.

I
couldn’t believe he was saying this, that he was leaving me. Especially now.

“Don’t
you ‘end of discussion’ me,” I said.

He
sighed, running his hands through his hair.

“Don’t
you dare leave,” I said. “We’re in this together.” My voice started to crack,
and I felt a surge of panic, like I had when the flames had reached the
ceiling, when it seemed like I’d made a fatal mistake. My throat tightened. It
hurt to breathe. “I don’t know what I’d do without—” My voice broke with a sob.

He
strode to me so quickly that I thought he would bolt past me and through the
door. But he slipped his arms around me and pulled me tight against him.
“Easy,” he whispered. “It’s OK.” He held me so close I could feel his heart
hammering against my chest. He stroked my hair, whispering in my ear.

Still,
I trembled.

“Shhh,”
he said at last. “If you want me to stay, I’ll stay.”

Shivering,
I wound my arms around him. I couldn’t get him close enough.

“I’m
sorry,” he said. “I just want you to be safe.”

“I
only feel safe with you.”

He
kissed me on the forehead. “Come on. You’re exhausted.”

I
let him lead me up the stairs to the green bedroom. He pulled back the sheets
and eased me onto the bed. Climbing in on the other side, he slipped his shirt
and jeans off and tossed them onto the chair in the corner. I turned onto my
side, and he pulled me to him. He slid his leg over mine, holding me in place,
and at last I felt like the world wasn’t going to explode around me. His lips
brushed my ear as he said, “Get some rest, cher. You’re safe now.”

I
felt the sting of tears as I closed my eyes, listening to the night birds
calling outside. Lying there with him, feeling the warmth of his body
encircling mine—there was no other place I wanted to be. But in a couple of
weeks, this would be over. I would leave. He would leave. For the first time, I
thought of the house not as Vergie’s, but as another place someone else would
live in, a place I could never go again.

And
I hated the thought.

Chapter 19

My
father’s visit had given me renewed purpose. I was ready to tackle the next
round of repairs and prove this was only a minor setback. Nothing I couldn’t
handle.

Jack,
after insisting on stopping for coffee and beignets, drove us back to Vergie’s.
He licked powdered sugar from his fingers as we pulled into the driveway, and I
knew he did it just to punish me for sliding out of his grasp when we first
woke. Buck and Josie had already left for the hardware store, so we had the
house to ourselves. He’d threatened to keep me in bed all day, whispering his
plans in my ear with his limbs tangled around mine. If it hadn’t been for my
father’s threats the day before, I would have stayed there and let him make
good on all of his delicious promises.

But
my father had hijacked my brain, and with his voice ringing in my ears, there
was no way I could spend the day in bed with Jack. I could deal with a lot of
different kinds of weird, but not that kind.

Now
Jack took great delight in torturing me, staring at me as he sucked the sugar
from his fingertip.

“Come
on,” I said. “Enough already.”

“I
don’t know what you mean, cher.”

“Whatever.”
I climbed out of the Jeep, grinning to myself as he followed me up the porch
steps.

Because
the insurance agent had instructed us to leave the damaged room alone for a few
days, I started back on my list, pretending there was no burned room to contend
with.

Instead,
Jack and I started painting the first room upstairs in “Virginia Beach,” the
shade of blue he’d chosen. He’d left the room as a spare, with hardly any
furniture. There was a roll top desk, a love seat and an oriental rug. Built-in
bookcases boasted an array of books and knickknacks. With little wall space, it
was a cinch to paint. We’d made our now-standard island of furniture in the
center of the room, draped some cloths over everything and rolled up the rug.
I’d plugged in the record player outside in the hallway, and Jack had surprised
me by dropping the needle onto an early Al Green record. He surprised me even
more by crooning along.

We
were nearly halfway finished with the walls when the dog started barking in the
yard.

I
went into Vergie’s bedroom to look out the window and saw a car in the
driveway.

“Hey,
Jack,” I called, “someone’s here.”

He
met me in the hallway, still holding a paintbrush. “I’ll go,” he said, brushing
past me down the stairs. Just like that, he’d shifted back to protective mode,
all business and no more Al.

The
doorbell rang when we were midway down the steps.

“Jack,
really. I think it’s safe for me to open the door to my house.”

He
tossed me an annoyed glance and beat me to the door.

A
man in a bright blue shirt and suit pants stood on the porch, his finger
hovering above the buzzer. He held a small notebook and clipboard under his
arm. His salt-and-pepper hair was gelled into a kind of wave.

Jack
leaned against the door, almost blocking my view. He braced his other arm
against the door frame in a way that meant no one was coming through him.

“Hi,”
the man said. “I’m looking for Miss Parker. Mr. Parker asked me to come over
and take a look around. I hope now is a good time. He asked me to work this in
today.”

I
squeezed past Jack and extended my hand. “I’m Enza Parker. And you are?”

“August
James,” he said, shaking my hand a bit too firmly. “Your father said you were
looking to sell as-is and sent me to get some information from you and work up
some comps.”

“He
what?”

“He
explained you were on a tight schedule,” he said. “I can give you an idea of
asking price by tomorrow.”

“I
think there’s been some mistake,” Jack said.

But
I knew there had been no mistake. I felt everything in me tighten like a
spring.

“Mr.
James,” I said, my voice even, “I’m sorry my father wasted your time, but he’s
not in charge of this sale. I’m afraid I’m not selling this house as-is. Maybe
I could contact you in a few weeks when the repairs are finished.”

His
lips parted.

Jack’s
hand came to rest at the small of my back, and I relaxed.

“I’m
very sorry for the confusion,” I said.

He
looked stunned. “I don’t understand. You don’t want comps?”

“No,
but please leave your card,” I went on, “because I’ll be handling the sale and
will be looking for a real estate agent in a few weeks.”

He
pulled a business card from the pocket of his shirt and handed it to me, his
brow furrowed. “Don’t you want me to just look around and give you a ballpark?”

Jack
crossed his arms over his chest.

“Well,
please call me if you change your mind,” August said. “This is a lovely
property.”

“Thank
you,” I said. “I’m sorry for your trouble.”

He
gave us a quick look over his shoulder as he walked back to his car, an
impossibly shiny black sedan with a sunroof.

After
I closed the door Jack said, “I can’t believe that just happened.”

“Oh,
I can.” My father had left after one conversation, and that was never a good
sign.

~~~~

When
the painting was finished, I finally approached the burned room. Right after
the fire, Jack and Zane had taped plastic over the windows and the doorway. I
pulled it back and stepped inside.

Before,
when I’d looked in this room with the investigator, all I’d seen was black. Now
I saw the freshly painted walls were gray with spots where the fire had had a
burst of intensity. Clumps of charred plaster were scattered on the floor,
holes in the walls left thin backing boards exposed like ribs. The floorboards
were blackened and dull; the ceiling was dark like a thunderhead. Springs
popped out of the wingback chair like broken bones. Everything would have to be
replaced.

I
truly was in over my head. I’d always felt pressure from my father, thinking my
work wouldn’t be good enough—but now I felt like I might not be able to finish
at all.

I
pulled the real estate agent’s business card from my pocket and stared at his
name, embossed in gold ink, and wondered if I’d have to concede that my father
was right. How could I ever finish the house now? Walls needed to be rebuilt. A
floor needed to be replaced. How could I finish this in two more weeks?

“Hey,”
Jack said, coming up behind me. “You OK?”

“Sure,”
I lied. “Just wanted to take a real look around.”

He
slid his arm around my shoulders. “It’s going to be OK, you know.”

I
nodded, though right then that was the last thing I thought to be true.

“I
know some guys, friends of Buck’s. They can knock this out for you inside a
week, and meanwhile you and I will tackle the rest.”

I
nodded again, and he kissed me on the forehead.

~~~~

After
lunch, Jack called me upstairs.

“I
found something for you,” he said. He was standing in the closet of the room
we’d just painted—the one that looked like it hadn’t been used in years.

“There
was a box of Vergie’s things in here,” he said, placing a faded pink hat box in
my hands.

“Did
you just find this?”

“I’d
honestly forgotten it was here,” he said. “I was going to clear my stuff out of
the spare rooms and remembered there were some things stashed in the closets.”

I
thanked him as I opened the box.

He
shrugged. “I’m going to repair a few of the tiles in the bathroom. I’ll leave
you to it.”

I
hardly heard him as I was too busy digging through the contents of the box.
Photos, a couple of journals, and a stack of letters with a rubber band around
them. I didn’t recognize the return address. I opened one of the envelopes,
addressed to Vergie, and when I turned it over, I saw it was signed “Martine.”

My
mother. I read the first letter, dated a year after she’d left my father and
me. In it, she talked about a trip she’d taken to New Mexico, how she’d
traveled to Carlsbad Caverns and seen some unusual rock formation at a place
called Plaza Blanca. She talked about working on a ranch, the crazy things the
tourists did. She talked about when she’d be home next.

Home.

I
opened one of the journals and saw it was Vergie’s, dated ten years earlier. I
started to read but then stopped. I wasn’t sure how much I wanted to know.
About her, about my mother, about everything. For so long, I’d wished I had the
missing parts to the story, but now that it was here, it was too much. Too
fast.

The
answers might not be details I wanted to know.

I
brought the box back to her old bedroom. Jack was in the bathroom, tapping
tiles into place with a rubber mallet. The floor had been missing a few. They
formed a simple pattern, tiny hexagonal tiles that were popular in the 1940s,
and were mostly white, with a smattering of cobalt. Jack must have gone out and
found replacements without telling me.

“Hey,”
I said.

“Find
anything interesting in there?”

“Yeah,
but I can’t look at all of it just yet. How’s it going in here?”

“Lonely.”
He popped a cluster of tiles into place and tapped them with a mallet, smiling
sweetly at me. He carefully applied the adhesive, filling in a tiny area under
the sink. The tiles matched perfectly.

“That
looks great.” I reached down and ran my fingers through his hair.

“You’re
distracting me, cher,” he said, slipping the tile into place.

“Mm,
that’s me. Very distracting.”

“You
have no idea.”

Part
of the allure of having a fling was having nothing at stake and no strings
attached. It was safer that way. But now I felt something different. As much as
I was willing myself not to, I was falling for him. Hard. I hadn’t really let
myself believe it until now.

He
set another tile into place and tapped it with the mallet.

“What
do you think?” he asked.

If
the grout had been down, I couldn’t have pinpointed which tiles were
replacements. “Homey. Vintage. Perfect.”

He
stood, brushing himself off. “Good.” He gave me a quick peck on the lips and
said, “Now, git, before I forget how to do the rest,” and swatted me on the
behind.

“Is
that any way to talk to your landlady?”

He
narrowed his eyes and pointed to the door. “Out, vixen. You want the grout to
match, don’t you?”

I
grinned and backed out of the doorway. “Suit yourself.”

~~~~

Outside,
I walked around the house and made a list of repairs titled “Exterior.” There
was this problem of landscaping that I had to tackle—my least favorite part of
flipping. I was a jinx to all things verdant. Always had been. Planting
flowers, bringing in hedges, planting trees—I could do it, but they could
easily die before the house was sold, and there I’d be with a yard full of
despair. Nobody liked to see dead flowers. It was off-putting.

After
scribbling my notes, the dog following at my heels, I went back inside to find
Jack standing over the stove, tossing an arc of green and yellow vegetables in
a skillet.

“What’s
all this?” I asked, leaning over his shoulder to peek.

“I
was starving,” he said. “Thought maybe you were too.”

“Why
haven’t I been letting you do this all along?” I said, and he smiled, laying
two fish fillets into another skillet.

He
popped the cork off a bottle of white wine and filled two glasses to the top.

“Are
you trying to get me hammered?” I asked, taking the glass.

“Cheers,”
he said, clinking his glass against mine. “You look thirsty.”

He
slid his hand around my back, pulling me against him. He kissed me lightly at
first, but as I tightened my arms around him, he parted my lips with his
tongue. I tasted the sweetness of the wine, the saltiness of him, and he
deepened the kiss until my fingers curled in his hair. When he finally let me
go, I said, “What was that for?”

He
held my face close to his. “We’ve got some time,” he whispered. “That needs to
simmer a while.”

“Sneaky,”
I said. “Luring me into the kitchen with the promise of dinner.”

Sliding
his hands beneath my shirt, he pulled me back against him, his lips grazing my
neck. “We could work up an appetite,” he said, his hands slipping under my
skirt. He took my glass and set it on the counter, then nudged me against the
wall. The warmth of his hands on my bare skin made me shiver.

He
didn’t seem to think of this as casual any more, either. That thought terrified
me.