To My Senses The Nicci Beauvoir Series Book 1 (43 page)

I was packing a small duffel bag with
clothes when I heard a knock on the door.

“
Come in, Dad.”

He pushed the door open and
entered my room. “Going somewhere?”

I nodded.
“Hammond.”

He gave me a big grin. “I
guess this means the moron is history.”

“
You were right. I can’t
marry Michael. Seeing David again made me realize that.” I stuffed
some extra socks into my bag and fought with the zipper. “I thought
I was over him. I was wrong.”

He sat on the edge of the
bed. “Does David know that?”

I finally got the bag
zipped. “No, but he will.”

“
I’m very proud of you,
Nicci. It takes a lot of courage to walk away from the easy life
you could have had with the…well, with Michael. People aren’t
willing to give up the comfort of their well-planned futures for
their dreams.”

“
If you, Uncle Lance, and
Val hadn’t rescued me, I—”

He cut me off with a wave
of his hand. “Sooner or later, you would have left Michael. We just
sped up the process by bringing David here. I needed to wake you up
from the fog you had been walking around in since he
left.”

“
I was a fool to think
Michael could help me forget about my feelings for David.” I
touched his arm. “He said you had his address.”

My father clamored from the
bed. “It’s in my study.”

I followed him downstairs.
He ran into his study and later emerged with a small piece of paper
in his hand.

“
Heading out that way
now?”

“
No, I have one stop to
make before I go.” I held up my left hand with the engagement ring
on it.

“
I see.” He walked me to
the door and kissed me good-bye. “Good luck, Nic. Be
happy.”

“
I will, Dad. Now I know I
have the right man to make me happy.”

***

Michael was at the front
door, still in his pajamas, with a coffee mug in his hand, when I
let myself inside.

“
Feeling
better?”

“
Fine.” I walked past him
and into the hallway.

“
You are not going to my
mother’s in that!” He pointed to my outfit. “She’ll think you are
selling it on the street. Go upstairs and change.” He motioned to
the stairs, but I did not move. “Hurry up. We have to get there and
help her with the guest list, before the invitation people meet us
at one.” He chuckled. “However, after last night, I’m sure she’ll
just want to spend the day in bed with a headache.”

“
I’m afraid I’m not going
to your mother’s.”

He reprimanded me with his
stern blue eyes. “Now what…running off to join a cult or something?
Stop wasting time, Nicci. We have to get moving.”

“
Michael….” I took in a
fortifying breath. “I don’t want to marry you.”

His face fell a little, but
then he recovered. “Very funny.”

“
You can have all the
clothes you bought me. I don’t want them. I will come by later for
my other things.” I placed my key to his house on a table by the
door. “Here is your key.” I reached into my shirt pocket and pulled
out my engagement ring. “And here is your ring.” I dropped the ring
next to the key.

His mouth fell to the floor
when he realized I was serious. “What…what is all this about? Is
this about last night? You’re still mad about that? Come on, Nicci.
We had a fight. You don’t end relationships over that.”

He was moving closer to me,
but I took a step back. “Michael, we never had a relationship. You
had the relationship. I just went along for the ride.” I took
another step closer to the door. “You need a wife that will dote on
you and be supportive of your practice. I don’t love you enough to
do that.” I paused for a moment and sighed. “I’m in love with
someone else. I never realized until last night at the party, when
he reappeared in my life. I can’t begin to apologize for
everything, but I’m sorry if I hurt you.” I turned away and headed
for the front door.

“
We can’t work this out?”
Michael hollered. “We can’t see somebody? Get some kind of
counseling? You’re not even going to try and save what we have? I
can forgive you anything, Nicci. We are good together.” He followed
me to the door.

“
Michael, we were never
good together.” I opened the front door and turned to face him. “I
want you to be happy. Go find yourself a nice girl and have a bunch
of kids.” I kissed his cheek, and then looked into his eyes. I
thought of David’s smoldering gaze, and added, “You know, there was
always something missing from your eyes.”

“
What? Nicci?” he
pleaded.

“
Good-bye,
Michael.”

I trotted down the front
steps, and ran to my car, without ever looking back.

Chapter 25

The ride into Hammond
resembled something right out of a Richard Clague painting. Dense
cypress swamps rose from the side of the interstate, teeming with
all forms of native wildlife. The ground rose from the swamps and
you quickly found yourself in the city of Hammond. Dotted with old
plantation homes, Hammond was a place where nouveau riche families
pretended their history was as lavish as the houses they lived in.
Most of the old Southern families had died out in this area.
Immigrants, who started out by working for the nearby sugarcane
mills, had taken over the lands that once belonged to such names as
Roman and Destrehan. Now families with names like Bordonaro and
Yeager resided in the city’s landmark homes.

The GPS system in my car
only got me so far around the country back roads. I still had to
stop and ask for directions to David’s house, which was located
well past the city limits. The road leading to it was made of
gravel, and my little Honda shimmied across the uneven ground. The
house was over a mile from the main road and it seemed to take
forever to get there, but when I finally passed a high row of
bushes, the structure came into view.

It was a modest Acadian,
surrounded by a wide porch with four square, white posts supporting
the front of the house. There were two swings hanging from either
end of the porch. The entire structure was built out of wood and
brick, and there was a fresh coat of white paint on all the wood
trim around the front door and windows. The sloping roof was
covered with shiny new tin that glistened in the sunlight. A
bricked path led to the porch, and wound its way around three huge,
moss-covered oaks. Off to the left was a two-car garage.

I parked in the gravel
driveway, but didn’t see the familiar red Jeep out in front. I
stepped from my car and decided to have a look around.

Climbing the steps, I took
in the view from the porch. The house sat alone on several acres,
and the closest neighbor was a good distance away. There was a pond
off to the left and more towering oaks scattered about the
property. High green grass floated lazily in the morning breeze, as
a soft bank of white clouds hovered just over the eastern horizon.
There was only the buzz of an occasional bee and the whisper of the
wind through the trees to distract my thoughts.

I settled down on one of
the porch swings and began rocking gently, back and forth. The
windows in the front of the house had old-fashioned storm shutters
and the glass looked like the antique leaded kind that curved,
giving a distorted view of the house inside. The boards beneath my
feet were worn, but had been recently painted a deep
mahogany.

I sat, peacefully rocking,
losing myself in the solitude of my surroundings. Suddenly, I heard
the sound of the front door opening and then the old porch creaked
as someone emerged from the doorway.

He stepped out into full
view, wearing only his jeans and covered with paint. He was holding
a rag in his hands, wiping the paint from them. How I had missed
the look of his bare chest, glistening with sweat and paint, and
the way his jeans hugged the curve of his round butt and thighs.
His hair was mottled and flecked with paint.

He saw the car and I
waited, as he frantically looked around the driveway and the porch.
When his eyes found me, reclining on the swing, he slowly
smiled.

“
What took you so long?”
David sauntered toward me. “I was hoping you would show up last
night.”

“
Last night?” I raised my
eyebrows and whistled. “You overestimate your effect on women, Mr.
Alexander.”

He stopped a few feet from
me and leaned against one of the white posts along the edge of the
porch. His thick, dark hair reflected the red rays of the late
morning sun. It was longer than I had remembered, just touching the
base of his neck.

“
I figured my kiss must
have evoked some kind of response.” He threw the rag in his hands
to the ground.

“
Thank you, Dr. Pavlov. I
guess next, you’ll try to train me to kiss you every time I hear a
bell.”

“
I have a bell out back. We
could give it a try.” He raised his face to the warm sun. “So what
about Michael?” He peered down at me again, crossing his arms over
his wide chest.

My eyes fell and I stopped
rocking. “Oh, he is probably telling everyone he knows what a bitch
I am.” I regarded the green landscape surrounding us. “I gave him
back his ring this morning.” A pair of blue jays playing in the
tall grass distracted me for a moment.

“
What did you tell
him?”

I turned back to David; his
eyes were cool and detached. “I told him I didn’t love him and I
couldn’t marry him.” I remembered Michael’s face when I walked out
the door. “I told him to find himself a nice girl and have a bunch
of kids.”

“
Did you tell him why you
couldn’t marry him?” David asked, cocking his head to the
side.

“
I don’t know. I really
couldn’t come up with any reasons. I just told him I couldn’t marry
him,” I teased.

“
Nothing about
me?”

“
Your name never came
up.”

“
You didn’t tell him the
reason you couldn’t marry him was because you were in love with
me?”

“
I don’t remember ever
telling you I was in love with you.”

He laughed and the sound
echoed off the side of the old house. “You never needed to tell me,
Nicci. I knew.”

“
Oh, you arrogant
ass.”

I stood up and was about to
go around him when he held my arm. “Still angry?”

His gaze filled me with a happiness I had
never realized. It was as if all the events in my life had led me
to him.

“
This is a very beautiful
place,” I said, ignoring his question. “Good place for a
painter.”

He let go of my arm. “It
took me a couple of weeks to get it into shape, but it’s coming
along. It was a wreck before.”

I leaned against the white
post.

“
So, are you just visiting
or are you planning on staying for a while?” he pressed.

“
I thought maybe I would
stay awhile. If you don’t mind, that is.”

“
Stay as long as you like.”
His voice was playful and mocking.

“
I have a confession to
make.” I hesitated, sucking in an encouraging breath. “The whole
time I was with Michael, I was never able to stop thinking of
you.”

His eyes softened and he
reached for my hair, twirling a lock around his fingers. “I want to
show you something.” He took my hand, tugging me to the front door
and inside the old house.

There was a cozy living
room to the right of the entrance, with a round stone fireplace and
worn hardwood oak floors. David led me past a wide oak stairway, as
we ventured deeper into the back of the house. I noticed there was
little furniture, only scattered wooden chairs and one large round
pine table in the dining room. We went through to the kitchen. It
was painted bright yellow, and a new refrigerator hummed in the
corner, not far from an old-fashioned gas stove.

Behind the kitchen was a
glassed-in porch; it appeared modern and had an air conditioning
unit built into the wall. All along the floor of the porch, leaning
against the walls, were rows of paintings. There were two easels in
the room; on one of them was a portrait of me, or Jenny, in some
casual everyday pose. The other was very different. It was of me
dressed in a pale cream cascading wedding gown and standing before
an altar, but there was no groom next to me. Only the light from
the altar candles illuminated my face.

“
I painted that after your
father told me about your engagement,” David professed. “I was
going to give it to you as a wedding present. Now I shall just have
to hold on to it for a while.”

“
It’s beautiful.” I studied
the painting, taking in the soft hues of white, beige, and
gold.

“
This is my masterpiece,”
he whispered.

I quizzically tilted my
head and frowned at him. “Your masterpiece? I don’t
understand.”

He turned to me. “An art
teacher once told me that ‘In every life, there is one masterpiece;
one thing that you look back on and remember as your crowning
achievement.’” He caressed my cheek. “No matter where I go or what
I do, I will always look back on my paintings of you as my
masterpiece.”