Bayou Angel

by Sandra Hill

  “What does it matter to you? You’ve got your family here.”

  “Of course you matter to me.”

  “Angel can’t hear you from back there, so you don’t have to put on any fake show of motherly love.”

  “I do love you, Andrea. And furthermore, you’re not going anywhere ’til we’ve settled things between us. You’re coming with me.”

  “Who are you to tell me what to do?”

  “Ah, sweetie! I’m your mother.”

  They were both crying when they got to Angel’s truck. And, honest to God, she could swear there were tears in Angel’s eyes, too.

  How many boulders could life put in her path?...

  Grace was being pulled in fifty different directions, and she wasn’t sure how much emotional drama her nerves could take. At least Angel was sticking around—for a while.

  While he was in the kitchen, calling the numerous LeDeux family members, and Samantha and Stanley Starr, too, she sat in the living room with Lena and Andrea. Putting an arm over Lena’s shaking shoulders, she tried to comfort her. “Honey, you have to trust that Luc will take care of this. He’s a wonderful lawyer.”

  “But they must be so scared. Especially Miles.”

  Grace was sure they were. “No harm will come to them, and Luc is working as fast as he can to get a temporary restraining order against CPS. They’ll be back with you in no time, pending a court date.”

  “It’s a weekend. The courts aren’t open on the weekend, are they?”

  Grace had no idea. “I’m sure they convene for emergency situations.” The only question was, would some golf-playing or sports-fishing judge be willing to give up an afternoon for what could be postponed until Monday? If Tante Lulu weren’t in jail, she’d be calling in dibs from her high-placed friends. Barring that, they might have to work within the system, like regular folks.

  “I knew this would happen. I just knew it would. I told everyone that it was better if we laid low in our trailer and didn’t call attention to ourselves.”

  “That couldn’t have gone on forever. Besides, you were sick, Lena, and the children are getting older, needing more than you would ever be able to offer. Like college at some point.”

  She nodded.

  “And don’t be worrying about Tante Lulu. Believe me, she’s probably having the time of her life.”

  Lena tried to smile. “I appreciate everything you’ve done for us, Grace. And Tante Lulu, too. She’s one crazy old lady, but she’s been like a mother to us. You both have.”

  She could tell that remark didn’t go over well with Andrea. “Tante Lulu has been good to us all, honey.”

  “Honey,” she heard Andrea repeat, in a mutter, from across the room.

  She raised her eyebrows in question at Andrea, but she just scowled at her. Apparently any sentiment left from that little weeping session at the park had worn off. She suspected that Andrea resented the attention she was giving to a “stranger” while she had just met up with her daughter for the first time a few hours ago. Grace felt obligated to help Lena, but at the same time perhaps her first concern should be for Andrea. What to do? What to do?

  “Andrea, honey, would you mind sitting here with Lena while I go talk with Angel? You and I have lots to talk about, and I hope you won’t begrudge me the time to settle things here first.”

  Obviously, she did begrudge the time, because she sat, unmoving, in her chair, pouting. “Don’t worry about me. You never have before.”

  “You don’t have to stay with me,” Lena told Andrea.

  Which at least caused Andrea’s face to bloom pink with embarrassment as she realized how small-minded she must appear. Getting up, Andrea went over to sit next to Lena and directed Grace, “Go. We don’t need you here.”

  The LeDeux Principle: If trouble brews, a LeDeux is probably stirring the pot...

  “This is a world-class FUBAR situation,” Angel, leaning against the kitchen counter, told Grace as she sat down at the small dinette table. He’d just finished his last call.

  “FUBAR?”

  “Fucked Up Beyond All Recognition.”

  “How so? I mean, how so more than usual?”

  “Tante Lulu is refusing Luc’s efforts to get her out on bail. On some Cajun principle or other. Stanley Starr is at the jail demanding to be incarcerated with Tante Lulu, if they won’t drop the charges, which are numerous, by the way. CPS is pissed about being duped and kept out of the loop where these Duval kids are concerned. The kids’ whereabouts at the moment are unknown. There are about two dozen LeDeuxs converging on the courthouse, as I speak. That’s just for a start.”

  “Add to the mix my daughter Andrea coming on to the scene.”

  “You said it, babe.”

  “Thank you for sticking around, Angel.”

  “How could you even think I would skip town at a time like this?” When he’d seen Grace at the Lafayette Hotel, he’d determined to put up this glass wall around himself—a Grace-repellant glass wall—where he would be shielded forevermore from anything to do with their lost cause. The glass wall was still there, but that didn’t mean he would abandon her in her time of trouble. As a friend. There was no longer any hope of a future for the two of them.

  The voice in his head said, Oh, you of little faith!

  “I’ve given you more than enough reason.”

  “Yeah, you have.”

  “What should we do?”

  “About what? Tante Lulu, the kids, or us?”

  “Is there an us?”

  “No. I don’t know. Hell, no! I’m so damn mad at you.” He stared at her for a long moment. She looked crushed. In any other circumstances he would take her in his arms, to offer comfort, as a friend, and she knew it, too. He couldn’t do that now. He just couldn’t. And, clearly, his lack of action was hurting her. Big deal! He’d been hurt by her a lot, and over a long period of time.

  “Is there anything we can do, other than stay here with Lena? I feel so...ineffective.”

  “Me, too. How ’bout we go visit Tante Lulu, if they’ll let us, and see if there’s anything she wants us to do? To close up her cottage or whatever.”

  “Good idea.”

  “Will Andrea be okay staying here with Lena?”

  “Probably. They’re both so miserable. They can cry on each other’s shoulders. Teenage angst and then some.”

  “Andrea’s strong, just like her mother.”

  Grace’s face brightened. “That’s a scary thought. Two Graces.” She laughed.

  “That’s my girl,” he said.

  “I wish,” he thought he heard her say before she went back into the living room to inform the girls of their plans.

  If he was smart, he would drop Grace off at the jail and head for the hills. But when had he ever been smart when it came to Grace?

  She’s in the jailhouse now...

  “Add this ta the list, Gracie. I need ’bout two dozen of them little plastic St. Jude statues fer us jailbirds here. See if ya kin find one of them orange prison jumpsuits fer me; they dint have any my size here a-tall, can ya beat that? Make sure ya water my vegetable patch, pick a mess of that okra, and give it ta Mr. Boudreaux down at the general store, and set out some Cheez Doodles fer Useless. An’ take over more of that salve fer Lester Sonnier’s noodle.”

  Grace was taking notes as fast as she could in the visitor’s room at the parish inmate detention center, where Tante Lulu was sitting on the opposite side of one of those bulletproof Plexiglas partitions that separated visitors from the bad guys—or gals. As if Tante Lulu was dangerous to anyone but herself! And, really, how long did she expect to be here?

  “Noodle?” Angel mouthed to her. He was standing at the beverage machine, which was eating up his quarters like a coin-eating piranha. At the rate he was going, one soda pop would be costing him ten dollars.

  “You don’t want to know,” she mouthed back.

  “Will ya stay with Grace at the Duval house t’night?” she asked Angel. “I doan
want any more unexpected visitors worryin’ Lena.”

  Angel hesitated, looked at Grace for a long moment, sighed in resignation, then nodded.

  “And Grace, ya need ta buy some clothes and makeup and stuff fer yer little girl. Lena tol’ me that all she had was in a backpack. A gal cain’t live from a backpack. Or mebbe Charmaine could take her shoppin’.”

  “No!” Her reply was more vehement than she’d intended, but, really, she didn’t want Charmaine dressing her daughter as a bimbo.

  “Face it, girlie, Charmaine has better taste than all the wimmen in Loo-zee-anna. She was Miss Loo-zee-anna, after all, even it if was a bit ago.”

  Like twenty-five years? “I can handle it myself.”

  “You ain’t got time fer nothin’ with all yer worries, bless yer heart.”

  Grace raised her chin with affront. Like she wouldn’t know how to take care of her daughter or make time now that she was here. Actually, she had to be honest, with all that was happening, maybe she would have been a bit remiss, without Tante Lulu’s reminder.

  “Mebbe we should have a welcome party fer the girl. Whatdaya think? We could do it in both our back yards, combined, iffen we take out the divider hedge.”

  Take out a twenty-foot hedge? Like that’s an easy job! Is she crazy? Oops, stupid question.

  “Wait ’til I get outta the slammer. I gots a power chainsaw what kin take down a telephone pole. We kin use it ta take care of the job lickety-split.”

  Grace exchanged a glance of horror with Angel at the prospect of this ninety-three-year-old dingbat wielding a sharp electric tool.

  “And Angel, kin ya go over ta Remy’s storage shed and bring out one of them hope chests, the one with yer name on it?”

  Angel, who’d finally managed to shake a soda out of the machine and was in the process of lifting a can to his mouth, choked and spurted out Pepsi in five different directions from his mouth and nose.

  Grace chuckled. It was a sign of her deteriorating mind that she got her kicks in such a pitiful way.

  But then Tante Lulu turned her attention back to her. “And, Gracie, I want ya ta take that box outta the crawl space at my cottage. It has yer name on it.”

  Angel, who’d finished wiping his face and shirt with a paper napkin, turned a toothy smile on Grace, even as he addressed his question to Tante Lulu. “And what might be in that box?”

  “Why, her monogrammed pillowcases and doilies and St. Jude place mats and bride quilt and such. Whatdaja think, honey chile? I was makin’ this stuff up a year ago, before you two busted up. Now that yer back t’gether I ’magine we kin get this weddin’ on the road again.”

  Both Grace and Angel dropped their jaws, simultaneously, then clicked them shut with consternation.

  “I’m leaving Louisiana as soon as this mess is fixed up,” Angel contended.

  “And what mess might that be?” Tante Lulu asked him sweetly, but showing a shark-toothed smile.

  “Well...well...you know. The Duvals. Grace’s kid. You being in jail. All of it.”

  “Oh, really? Here I was thinkin’ ya were stickin’ around fer Gracie. Excuuuuuuse me!”

  “Yeah, I wanna help Grace, too.” His face was a telling shade of pink as he avoided looking at Grace.

  “Also, I have too much on my plate right now, with Andrea and everything,” Grace added, trying to help Angel out. “Not that I was thinking about getting married.”

  “Plate, schmate,” was Tante Lulu’s contribution. Angel, instead of appreciating Grace’s help, gave her a dirty look.

  “What?” she asked him.

  “Nothing. Not a damn thing.”

  “Well, you aren’t thinking about getting married, either, so don’t be giving me that look.”

  “Same old Grace!”

  “I beg your pardon. You’re the one skipping town.”

  “Call me crazy, but I didn’t hear you ask me to stay!”

  “Stay, then, dammit!”

  He laughed. “You sweet talker, you.”

  “Bite me!”

  “No, thanks.”

  They were both glowering at each other by now.

  “It’s hard ta book a summer weddin’ at Our Lady of the Bayou Church when it’s this late, so ya better get on it quick-like. Tell Father Pete that Louise Rivard sent ya,” Tante Lulu said, as if neither she nor Angel had said a thing.

  Grace put her face in her hands, and Angel was banging his head against the soda machine, which began to shoot out cans of soda like bullets. One, two, three...

  Grace went over to help him unload the unexpected booty. She lost count at eleven. Some cans were dented. Others were spraying their contents like fountains. And the machine was still popping them out.

  A guard rushed in and gave them all a dirty look. “I should have known a LeDeux would be in here causing trouble.”

  “Hey!” Tante Lulu yelled at the insult. “I resent that.”

  “We’re not LeDeuxs,” Grace and Angel said at the same time.

  “They’re honorary LeDeuxs,” Tante Lulu disagreed.

  And the guard said, “That figures.” Turning to Angel, he surveyed the scene and concluded, “I figure you owe the parish about fifty dollars for this mess.”

  “I’m not paying fifty dollars for anything,” Angel protested. “I put enough money in this frickin’ machine to pay for all these cans and then some.”

  “Ya have proof of that, sonny?” the guard asked.

  “Here,” Grace said, slamming a fifty-dollar bill down on the table. “That should cover it.”

  “No way! I want to file a complaint,” Angel shouted, picking up the bill and trying to shove it back in Grace’s purse.

  “You wanna file that complaint from a jail cell?” the guard taunted as other personnel moved into the room to see what the ruckus was about. Some of them had weapons drawn.

  Despite Angel’s ranting and raving, and Tante Lulu cheering him on, Grace managed to steer him out of the building. Thus it was that Tante Lulu managed to get herself in jail that day, and Grace and Angel barely managed to escape incarceration. Not to mention Grace meeting her daughter for the first time, and Angel trying his best to leave Dodge.

  Just another crazy day down on the bayou.

  Chapter 18

  When angels get pushed too far...

  Enough was enough!

  Angel was not an indecisive person. Hadn’t been even when he was a reckless teenager. Hadn’t been when he’d made a dumbass decision to pose nude for a national magazine. Hadn’t been when he’d straightened his life out and made a good, legitimate living. He was a millionaire, ferchrissake!

  So why the hell was he diddling around, wondering what to do with Grace? Should I, shouldn’t I? Will she, won’t she? What if this, what if that? It was clear what he needed to do. Make love to her ’til his eyeballs rolled like cherries on a slot machine, his bones melted into a puddle of testosterone glue, and his heart got rid of this perpetual heartburn. Yep, that’s what he was gonna do.

  Okay, it was true, he had decided last night that making love with Grace again would be a mistake. Fuck mistakes! In fact, fuck, period! Time he pleased himself and not the whole damn world.

  And then, like some celestial sign from above, the bedroom door opened and Grace walked out. He could swear he heard harps and choirs singing, not hymns, but love songs. In fact, some Motown make-out music. St. Jude had a weird sense of humor.

  It was only nine o’clock, but Lena and Andrea, exhausted mentally by the day’s events, were presumably asleep behind the closed doors of the other two bedrooms.

  Grace’s emerging might have seemed to Angel like a sign of approval from above; however, she wore not some angelic robe, but a neon pink sleep outfit that belonged to Lena, a silk tank top and tap pants. She’d told Grace that she purchased it at the local thrift shop, practically new.

  “Grace?” he said, rising from the couch where his bed had been made up. He wore nothing but his lucky Aces boxer shorts. Not that he w
as going to need any luck tonight.

  “I can’t sleep.”

  Tell me about it. “I can fix that.”

  “Too much has happened today, and—you can?”

  “Definitely.”

  He watched, via the dim light from the kitchen stove and by the moonlight shining through the window shades, as she stopped in the middle of the living room, as if there were some invisible line drawn. There was a line all right, and it was gonna disappear any second now.

  “I just wanted to thank you”—

  Don’t thank me yet, sweetheart.

  —“for sticking around to help me today. I really appreciate it.”

  “How much?”

  “Huh?”

  “How much do you appreciate it?”

  She tilted her head to the side. “You’re wearing your lucky boxers. You planning on getting lucky?”

  “Oh, yeah. And you’re gonna be the good-luck fairy. Come here, Tinkerbell. Peter Pan is gonna show you how to...fly.”

  She laughed. “Don’t you think we should talk about this?”

  “No, no, no! I’m sick to death of thinking and talking. Action time. Let’s just do what feels good and let all the not-to reasons be damned.”

  “You’re being awfully pushy.”

  “I am alpha male, hear me roar.” Stepping over the “line,” he yanked her into his arms and leaned down to kiss her. “Ummm, you taste like bubblegum.”

  “Miles’s toothpaste.”

  “What do I taste like?”

  She smiled against his lips. “Sex.”

  “That’s what I like to hear.” He kissed her seriously then, deep and hungry. While he was still kissing her, he put both hands under her butt and lifted her off the floor, walking her into the bedroom. Tossing her onto the single bed, he walked over and shut the door, locking it with deliberate care.

  “Honey, I’m home,” he said then and came down over her with a smile.

  “About time, too. I’m so hungry, I could eat a—”

  “Me, too.”

  Burying his tongue deep in her mouth, he began the in-and-out rhythm that his lower body yearned to launch. Then she reciprocated, by dipping her tongue into the hot depths of his mouth. The whole time, his calloused palms moved the sexy, soft fabric over her body. Silk caresses. And her hands moved over his back, from shoulders to waist. Skin talk. Then her hands slipped under the waistband of his boxers, cupping his ass.