Jewell (A Second Chance Novel Book 2)

by Tina DeSalvo

  She hung up. “I love you,” she whispered.

  Hello, God. You’re the only one I can talk to now. People talk to me, though. When I try to talk back to them, the words mostly don’t come out of my mouth. And, when they do, they’re not in English. I don’t remember English words most of the time. Momma is teaching Twinnie and me to speak English by singing songs to me when she braids my hair... I taught ma sucrée to speak French by singing songs with her. I like songs...I need a bath. Ma sucrée sings to me while giving me a bath. In French. I like that. I don’t like that she sounds sad.

  I don’t like bubbles in my bath water.

  I don’t have much of a past or a future but I like this moment…it’s my moment…it’s all I have…I’m not a priest…one time ma sucrée confessed to me that she understands her place in the world. I started to cry. She cried too. Her words hurt my heart. She says she’ll be totally alone to walk, live and breathe and that’s okay. I shook my head no, that it’s not okay. And it’s not true… the handsome Cajun man who looks at her with love in his eyes won’t leave her to be alone. She started to sing again and I couldn’t tell her about that man…what is his name? Oh, she’s singing my momma’s song. I miss my momma. Do you hear me God? I hope you speak French. Mr. Knucklehead…That’s his name…the name of the Cajun man who loves ma sucrée.

  My boyfriend left me alone. Then I had Pauline. He had to go back to his wife. I didn’t know he was married. I loved him. I don’t want ma sucrée to be alone… I’m going to say my prayers now, God. I sure hope momma taught you how to speak French in heaven so you can understand me.

  ***

  “Well, I never thought I’d see the day.” Ben walked through the mudroom into the kitchen of Beau’s house without knocking. “You look like crap, cuz.” With a laugh, he went up to where Beau was sprawled on the sofa and snatched up the bag of potato chips from his bare chest.

  Beau glared at him. “Hey!”

  Ben ate a handful of chips. “Is this your breakfast?”

  “I think it was supper.” Beau shrugged. “What difference does it make?”

  Ben glanced around the room. “I don’t see any other food or drinks out. There’s just your dirty clothes and shoes and socks tossed around.” He smiled. “Yes, sir. You’re a mess, and your house is a mess. Hell, I better check the weather forecast. We might have a blizzard coming way down south here in Cane, since hell must’ve frozen over.”

  Ben dropped across from Beau on the leather chair. A few chips bounced out of the bag onto the wooden floor, and he looked at Nancy lying on Beau’s extended crossed legs. “She must be as depressed as you not to come after these chips,” Ben said, calling for the sweet puppy. She turned her head, but didn’t lift it from where it was resting on her crossed paws. Ben shrugged and ate a handful more chips. He extended a chip to Beau.

  Beau didn’t bother responding. It took too much effort, and he felt exhausted. Drained. He just continued staring at the TV that wasn’t on, thinking maybe he should climb into bed and take a nap.

  “Yep. You’re a mess. This is a first,” Ben said, grinning. “I can’t remember the last time I saw your hair dirty, uncombed and sticking up like a porcupine’s.” He nodded. “Wait, I want to take a picture.” He reached into his pocket to pull out his phone.

  Since his cousin had clearly just come from working with a hunting dog, wearing camo jeans and shirt and smelling like the marsh, Ben damn well had no room to mock him. So what if he wanted to hang around in his gym shorts and no shirt.

  “Say cheese.” Ben snapped a picture and Beau threw a pillow at him. “Well, I’m glad to see you still have some fight in you.” He nodded, then tilted his head to the side and stared at Beau’s hand. Crap, Beau knew what he was looking at. He tucked his hand under his hip. “Is that a lady’s pinky ring you have on? With pink stones?”

  “Go to hell.” Beau tossed another pillow at him.

  Ben started laughing, and Beau had no doubt his laughter was rattling the dishes in the kitchen cabinet. “It is a pink pinky ring.”

  “It was a gift from Mignon, so shut up.”

  “Oh, man, it’s worse than I thought. You miss the old lady, too.” He shook his head. “So which bedroom you picked out as Mignon’s?”

  Beau answered without thinking. “Downstairs, so she wouldn’t have to deal with stairs, of course. Crap…” He scratched his chest and looked at Ben. Yeah, he’d just told him how he’d been fantasizing about Jewell and Mignon moving in with him. He pointed a finger at his cousin. “Don’t say a damn word. You hear me. Not a word.”

  Ben shrugged, smart enough to know that Beau was hurting too much to take any more teasing where Mignon and Jewell were concerned. He motioned to Beau’s iPad, open near his side. “Have you been reading the news?” Beau nodded. “I guess you saw that Jewell’s trial begins late this afternoon.”

  Beau sat up, lifting Nancy off his legs. He put her on the floor. She immediately trotted to the chips on the floor. Ben picked them up and went to throw them away in the kitchen garbage.

  “I saw it. Nothing I can do about it. She doesn’t want me in her life. Won’t take my calls. Won’t answer my texts.” He stood and began to pace, but every muscle in his body ached. Including his heart. Hell. Maybe he was having a heart attack. What the hell did he care? He dropped on the sofa again. He was exhausted.

  “Elli called Jewell last night to wish her luck and to let her know she was praying for her.”

  Beau nodded. “That’s good.”

  “She told Elli she’d just come back from mass. Had lit four candles afterward.” Ben sat on the sofa. “That’s definitely a woman who’s worried. I’d say even afraid.” He picked up Nancy and started petting her. “Tante Izzy, Ruby, Pearl, Steve and a few other family members are going to the trial for moral support. Elli’s going too.”

  “I’m really glad they’re doing that. She needs friends. She has nobody.” Damn it, he wanted to give her his support, too. When he’d told her that was what he was going to do a few days after she left, all she’d said in response was, “No”. No reason for the no, just a plain, damn, hard-ass no. He was that unimportant to her. What they had didn’t matter. It was freakin’ biological anthropology to her. Nature and science.

  He rubbed his chest. Leaned back on the sofa.

  “You’ve never been dumped before, cuz.” Ben grinned. “It sucks, huh? I bet there are women from here to Atlanta who’d love to buy tickets to see you like this. Lovesick.” Beau nodded. The big ol’ grin on his cousin’s face pissed him off. “The thing is, you wouldn’t be in this stinky state if she didn’t matter to you.” He shrugged. “Maybe you were right. She was a scam artist and you’ve been had.”

  Beau shot out of his seat. “That’s bullshit.” Nancy jumped from the sofa, barking at Beau, but when she saw his anger was directed at Ben, she started to bark at Ben. “You know that she’s refused to pursue trying to find out if Mignon is Martine?” Beau was shouting now, he began to move. “All she really wanted to do was find Twinnie for Mignon. Just like she said. There was no scam. Once she found out where Twinnie was, she stopped looking into it.”

  “Oh, my mistake.” Ben shrugged, walked into the kitchen and got a cold beer from the refrigerator. He returned to the sofa. “So, Elli was right. She wasn’t scamming the family or going after the trust after all.” He took a sip of his beer. “I find it interesting that you assumed she was trying to scam our family the instant you learned she was accused of theft for a New Orleans family. Talk about jumping to conclusions. Why is that?”

  “Because I’m a jerk.”

  “Hell, you’re just figuring that out now?” Ben shook his head. “Well, not that I’m one who wants to cut you any slack, but...did you ever think that her situation or what you thought was her situation pushed all the wrong buttons with you?”

  He looked at Ben. What in the hell was he talking about? “What do you mean?”

  “Your biological father button. The jackass.” Ben
leaned over and pushed Nancy’s back end so she would sit. He rewarded her with an appreciated scratch beneath her ears. “I didn’t think about it at first because what you said made a lot of sense, especially when Mignon opened the hidden nook. Then, Elli was so unwavering in her faith in Jewell’s integrity that it got me thinking. It’s when you least expect it that your past comes back to bite you on the ass. You couldn’t possibly grow up with Cane’s biggest scam artist and not have some baggage because of it.” He stopped scratching Nancy to look at Beau and she tapped his hand with her paw. He patted her on the head and leaned back on the sofa. “You had warned me about him when we first met in kindergarten. Do you remember that?”

  Beau thought back to the first day of kindergarten when they had tossed rocks in the schoolyard, talking to each other about swimming in the bayou, dogs and gators. It was crazy that he remembered those things but didn’t remember talking to Ben about his father. He supposed it was because there were a lot of other good things to remember that day. “I remember thinking you were a pretty cool kid.”

  Ben laughed. “I liked you right away, too.” Then his expression turned serious. “Beau, on that first day, you warned me to stay away from your father. You told me that if he saw my new belt with the shiny buckle, he’d pretend to be my friend and talk me into giving it to him. You even used the word scam, telling me about him.”

  “Crap. I don’t remember that.”

  “I remember it clearly. I went home and asked my mom what the word scam meant. I hadn’t heard it before.” Beau folded his hands behind his head and looked out the clear glass window at the leaves waving on the trees just outside. “Hell of a thing for a kid to worry about enough to warn a new friend about it.” Beau nodded, feeling his stomach knot.

  “So you think those old fears, worries, troubles with my jackass father came to roost with Jewell?” He didn’t need for Ben to answer to know the truth. “Damn.” He sucked in a breath that seemed to weigh heavy in his chest. “I’m a nut job.”

  Ben smiled, saluted him with his beer. “Nah. That’s just heavy shit for a kid to grow up with. I think you turned out okay for a knucklehead. Well, I did until you let Jewell walk away.”

  “I didn’t let her…”

  Ben spoke over him. “Have you figured out what a dimwit you are for letting the woman you’ve fallen in love with slip away?”

  Beau looked at Ben, who was frowning at him. “Love her?” He blinked a few times. Everything looked blurry. “She’s terrific. She’s funny. Smart. Got an amazing heart. And, man, she does this thing with wrapping her legs around mine and draping her arm over my chest, right here.” He pointed to his heart. “When she does that it feels so good, I just melt into her.”

  Ben was laughing so hard Nancy was dancing around his feet. “Oh, yeah. You’ve got it bad.” He looked at a text that dinged on his cell phone and stood. “Wait ’til Jackson hears about this.” He walked to the mudroom and shouted. “Hey Jackson, come check out your bro. He’s a freakin’ mess.”

  Jackson Bienvenu walked into the house, tucking his cell phone into the back pocket of his faded jeans. Beau jumped up off the sofa and ran to his younger brother who looked fit and healthy in his dark blue pullover shirt with US Navy written over the chest.

  “Holy crap!” Beau hugged Jackson, so damn happy to see him. He knew it was a desperate hug, but man, he’d missed his baby brother. Jackson hugged him back. It had been almost a year since they'd last seen each other. “I didn’t know you were coming.”

  Jackson shrugged. “Ben called last night. Told me you were in trouble. I hopped a red-eye for you, bro. I just got here.” He held him away. “It’s great to see you, Beau. But hell, man. You look like shit.”

  “So I’ve heard.” He looked over his shoulder at Ben. “A number of times.”

  “Accurately so,” Jackson confirmed. He patted Beau on the back and looked at Ben. “A woman did this to him?”

  Ben nodded and started laughing again. Beau plopped on the sofa, smashing the bag of potato chips beneath him. He didn’t bother removing it.

  “I thought you were smarter than that. No attachments, no problems,” Jackson smiled. “She must be something.”

  Ben grunted. “And to make matters worse, he’s gone and fallen in love with a woman who’s about to go to jail.”

  “Is she guilty?” Jackson asked, sitting on a chair near Beau.

  “Yes and no,” Beau answered. “Not for the felony theft she’s charged with. Her lawyer will have a time proving it, though.”

  “She doesn’t have a lawyer,” Ben said. Both Beau and Jackson cursed at the same time. “She fired the jerk lawyer she hired. He’s been neglecting her case because he had a more lucrative one to work on. She decided not to request an indigent defense because she told Elli that would’ve either delayed the trial, or she would’ve gotten a lawyer at the last minute that was no better than the one she fired.” Ben shook his head. “Her reasoning was that she couldn’t deal with a delay. She felt like she’s been living in shackles, waiting. She needs a resolution, and getting an attorney at the eleventh hour didn’t seem any better than defending herself.”

  Beau was on his feet. He ran his hands through his hair and looked at Jackson. “Give me fifteen minutes to scrape off the funk.”

  ***

  Mimi was sitting in the row right behind Jewell with Elli, Tante Izzy, Ruby, Big John, Pearl and four other Bienvenu family members she’d met, including the rubboard player from the Nonc Noon band. Mimi probably hadn’t noticed, although Jewell had, that Tante Izzy, Ruby and Elli were each wearing one of the bright imitation stone rings Mimi had given each of them while in Cane. She’d given the rings as a sign of friendship and generosity. They now wore them as a sign of solidarity. Jewell wondered if the fourth ring, the one Mimi gave Beau, was still treasured as much or if he had tossed it aside. It really didn’t matter, she realized, because Mimi was happy. That was what was important. She was now enjoying being with the chatty people around her, even though she normally would’ve been stressed and anxious over being in a place she didn’t recognize with so much activity going on that she didn’t understand. Instead, she was smiling and patting Ruby affectionately on the arm.

  Jewell looked at the paper work in front of her, and her stomach pinched. She was nervous and frightened, but she was as well prepared as she could be. She’d gotten all of the files her former attorney’s clerk had prepared for trial and used for the pretrial motions. There hadn’t been as much as she had hoped, but it was a good start. And she even had the papers she’d taken from the safe in case she needed to use them, although she still didn’t see why that would ever be a good idea.

  Four law books, with relevant citations she was prepared to use, as well as trial procedural language she might need to refer to were tabbed with color-coded Post-its. A binder full of notes that she’d prepared for her opening remarks and for the cross-examination of the prosecution’s witnesses was open on the desk and ready for her to use too. She’d decided she would approach the trial as if she was teaching a lecture, and hope the judge would be a good student. The DA had requested a trial judge decision instead of a jury trial decision, because Claude Monroe wanted to have as few people with knowledge of his case as possible. He didn’t want a juror providing intimate details of the trial after it was over to a reporter, media outlet or personal social media postings. Jewell thought that not having a jury would work in her favor. She just had to convince one person of her innocence instead of twelve.

  She looked at the prosecutor’s table. Three lawyers were huddled together, whispering to each other while thumbing through black binders. They looked confident. Not nervous. They, unlike her, didn’t look like they wanted to throw up. They had five times as much paper in front of them as she had.

  Behind them sat Frederick Henry, Ralph Bergeron and Claude Monroe. All three men were wearing suits, leaning close to one another and speaking behind their hands. All three men stopped talking and looked
at Jewell. Frederick stood and walked over to her. He extended his hand and she shook it.

  “Dr. Duet,” he said in greeting. “I know you’re busy reviewing your notes, so I’ll make this brief. My client, Claude Monroe, wants to once again offer you the opportunity to walk away from this trial before it begins. The charges will be dropped, if you return the jewelry to him. He simply wants what belongs to him.” His eyes were steady on her. “He really would like to have those items because he needs them to help pay inheritance taxes. I’m only telling you this so you know that his offer is a serious one. He needs the money, and he doesn’t care if you walk free.”

  “I wish to God that I had what he wants,” she said, her voice steady. “It would be so much easier than going through this. Trust me. If I had stolen it, I would return it. But I didn’t steal it. Tell Claude that. I have nothing. And he’s not going to get any justice at this trial for the crime executed against him.”

  “As you wish.” Frederick nodded and returned to his seat to speak to Claude.

  ”All rise,” the clerk of the court announced and everyone stood. Jewell didn’t have a second to think about Claude’s last-minute plea. “Orleans Parish Court is now in session. The Honorable Judge Marcus Brunello presiding.”

  A short man with an average build and a full head of white hair walked up on the dais. He wore the traditional judge’s black robe and a pair of reading glasses. When he sat in his seat, everyone returned to theirs. The courtroom fell silent. The only sound was of the courtroom stenographer adjusting her seat and Tante Izzy telling someone that the judge should put a Fanci-Full rinse in his hair.

  The judge took his time positioning the papers in front of him. Jewell pressed the heel of her hand over the front of the skirt of her dark burgundy suit. She tried not to fidget with the hem of the matching form-fitting jacket or her straight hair that she had hanging loosely for the first time in years.