by Tia Siren
Most recently, with Randy Savoie, my good-for-nothing ex-husband who still came into the diner every night expecting free food like it was part of our divorce settlement.
The other was Davy Boone, my high school sweetheart. Davy joined the navy the day after graduation and hadn’t been heard from since.
His mama died three years ago from cancer and he didn’t even come home for the funeral. Everybody just figured he died in some war somewhere overseas and the government hadn’t gotten around to telling us about it.
My three shithead younger brothers even made up a song to taunt me with when he was leaving.
Davy joined the navy! Danny’s goin’ crazy!
I know, stupid. I told you they were shitheads.
It just showed you what people would do for fun in Bellegrade, Louisiana: population 1,043 souls, at least until somebody died.
The population never went up in Bellegrade, only down.
I mean, why would it go up?
Who the fuck would ever want to move to the armpit of the Louisiana bayou?
But I digress…
Randy and Davy couldn’t have been more different in the lovemaking department.
Davy was my first and only true love.
We started hanging out when I was fourteen (my daddy wouldn’t let us call it dating).
I let Davy get to first base on my fifteenth birthday.
He made it to second a week later.
The next week he rounded third base without stopping and slid into home before I even knew what hit me.
I just remember feeling him push the crotch of my panties to the side and a minute later, BAM!
That’s not your finger, is it, Davy?
No, ma’am, it’s not. You want me to stop?
I reckon not…
I dug my nubby fingernails into his back and scissored my legs around his skinny waist and gritted my teeth through the shock and pain of his pecker sliding in and out of me like a jackrabbit.
What was a pecker?
It was what we called a man’s penis here in the South: a pecker, like a rooster’s beak. Roosters pecked around the ground looking for something to eat. Men pecked around looking for something to stick their pecker in, and then they pecked till their toes curled.
Anyway, that was how my mama explained it to me.
Welcome to sex education, southern style.
Davy, being a typical teenage boy with a raging hard-on and no clue, was so ecstatic he’d found something to stick his pecker into that he thought my screams were from pleasure rather than pain.
Looking back now, I was glad he didn’t stop.
It didn’t last more than a minute, and once I got over the initial shock and pain of having a foreign object invade my body, I kind of enjoyed the ride.
In fact, once it was over, I immediately wanted to get back on.
We were parked out by the lake in the middle of winter in his daddy’s old pickup truck. We steamed up the windows real good, and I left a bare footprint on the side glass without realizing it.
When Davy’s mama saw it, she went and told his daddy.
When his daddy saw it, he spat tobacco juice on the ground between Davy’s feet and shook his head.
Davy laughed as he told me the story.
“You need to stop puttin’ it to that little Robicheaux gal in my truck, Davy boy,” he said with a smile. “Your mama don’t seem to like it.”
Over the next two years, Davy and I had sex as often as we could, wherever we could, whenever we could. It was only by the grace of God and sheer luck that I didn’t get knocked up.
Deep down, I kind of wish that I had gotten knocked up and had a baby. At least I’d have something to remember Davy by.
Babies never crossed our minds.
We liked to have sex a lot, and we got really good at it.
Davy was a creative boy with a long pecker and a strong back. I was a skinny girl with long legs and a spine as limber as a noodle. He could lift me up and turn me this way and that, and I could wrap myself around him like a hot salted pretzel.
I loved Davy more than words could say, and I knew he loved me because he told all the time and showed me every day.
He was supposed to be gone for three years, and then he was coming back to get me. I got one letter from him six months after he left and nothing since. That letter was still in my nightstand at home.
I hadn’t seen him in six years, and not a day went by that I didn’t hope he walked into the diner.
When it came to Davy, hope was all I had left.
A year after Davy left, I married Randy Savoie. I’d known him my whole life and knew what a worthless sack of shit he was, but there weren’t a lot of available men under the age of sixty to choose from in Bellegrade, Louisiana.
I went into the relationship thinking that something was better than nothing.
Boy, was I wrong.
Randy started sweet talking me and buying me little gifts and keeping his tab paid to impress my daddy, who ran the diner back then.
Keeping a tab current at the diner wasn’t something most patrons did. Most folks were always a week or two behind. Mama used to say that daddy extended credit to more folks than the Bank of Louisiana.
Daddy would just shrug and say, “Folks gotta eat. It’s a sin to turn away a hungry man just because he ain’t got a dollar in his pocket.”
Daddy’s heart had always been a size or two bigger than his brain.
Daddy was duly impressed that Randy paid his bill every payday just like clockwork, and he quickly became a fervent member of Team Randy.
To impress me, Randy got a job working on an oil rig out in the Gulf and promised to buy me a new trailer for Christmas and a new car for my birthday.
I never got either one.
I was a stupid girl who fell for his bullshit - hook, line, and sinker.
So, I said I would marry him the tenth time he asked.
I think it shocked both of us.
Randy was not a romantic like Davy was. The term “making love” just made Randy snicker. He was more of a “get in, get out, get a beer, get in the boat” kind of guy.
We dated for a year and were married for two. I could count the number of times we had sex on both hands without reusing a finger, and the number of times I had an orgasm on one hand with fingers to spare.
As long as Randy got his, he wasn’t too concerned about me getting mine.
After a while, that was fine with me.
I just wanted him to get it over with and roll his sweaty body off me so I could take a shower and wash away his stench.
He always stank of oil and cigarettes and whiskey and sweat.
The day I booted his sorry ass out and filed for divorce was one of the best days of my life.
He didn’t contest the divorce or give me much crap over it.
He knew better.
Randy was a tough son of a bitch, but he knew I’d kill him in his sleep if he messed with me too much.
I wasn’t a girl who’d take too much pushing around.
So, long story short, it was pretty slim pickings when it came to men in Bellegrade.
I didn’t even think much about sex after Randy.
When I did, I had ten fingers and a vivid imagination.
I was fine being on my own.
Or at least I thought I was until they strolled in the door.
Tony and Terry.
The Wolf brothers.
Every time I thought about the day they walked into the diner, it got me flowing like the Pearl River during a hurricane.
Those boys knew how to make a woman feel special.
They didn’t have peckers.
They had cocks.
Big, long, hard, stiff, thick cocks.
There was a difference.
Trust me.
I knew.
CHAPTER 2: Tony Wolf
Two weeks earlier…
I pulled the black Land Rover into the gravel parking lot and p
ut the gear into park, but I left the motor running to keep the cold air blowing through the vents in the dash.
My identical twin brother, Terry, was in the passenger seat fiddling with his iPhone.
We were northern boys, hailing from upstate New York. We traveled all over the world, but we weren’t used to this southern Louisiana heat and humidity.
Just getting from the private jet to the Land Rover left me sweating like a pig.
It was like walking in hot soup.
I could feel the sweat pooling under my arms.
My polo shirt was sticking to my back even though the Rover had air-cooled seats.
I tapped my fingers on the steering wheel and glanced sideways at Terry. He slid his Oakley sunglasses down his nose and stared out the windshield at the low-slung block building in front of us.
There were a dozen beat-up cars and trucks lined up in front of the place. A wide metal sign on the roof above the door had two words painted on it in big red letters: “CAJUN FOOD.”
“Catchy name,” Terry said, peering up through the windshield at the sign. “Remind me again what we’re doing in... where the fuck are we?”
I told him again. “Bellegrade, Louisiana.”
“Okay, tell me again what we’re doing in Bellegrade, Louisiana.”
“We are here to meet a guy about an investment opportunity.”
Terry gave me a sideways look. “Are you trying to piss me off?”
I shook my head. “No more than usual.”
“It’s too fucking hot to play twenty questions, Tony,” he said with a long breath. “Just tell me what we’re doing here.”
“We are here to meet with a guy named Bob Beecher, who thinks he has come up with a new way to monitor the deep wells that are drilling for oil in the Gulf of Mexico so a Deepwater Horizon type of event never happens again.”
Terry frowned at me. He had my same face but could do so much more with it. He scrunched up his nose and gawked at me as if I were speaking French. “Deepwater what?”
I blew out a long breath. “Do you know how hard it is being the smart twin?”
“Do you have any idea how hard it is being the good-looking one?”
We grinned at each other. It was like looking in a mirror.
I said, “Do you remember the BP oil spill in the Gulf a few years back? The Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded and sank and pumped a couple hundred million gallons of crude oil into the Gulf?”
Terry’s face was devoid of recollection.
I sighed and chose more relatable terms.
“Do you remember that movie we watched with Mark Wahlberg and Kurt Russell about the oil rig blowing up?”
“I do.” He smiled and clicked his tongue. “I fucking love Kurt Russell.”
“That was about the Deepwater Horizon.”
“Ah, okay. Why didn’t you just say that without the history lesson?” He waved a hand at me. “Proceed.”
“Some experts believe the blowout could have been prevented if there had been a better way to monitor the pressure of the gas coming from deep in the ocean floor,” I said, repeating what I’d been told to the best of my recollection.
“This guy Beecher claims to have invented a monitoring system that could alert the crews topside of a problem down below before the shit has a chance to hit the fan.”
Terry sighed as he listened. “And why do we care?”
“Because after the disaster, Wolf Energy’s oil refineries took a hell of a hit until the oil market recovered. We lost hundreds of millions of dollars, and I’d rather avoid that in the future if possible.”
Wolf Energy was just one of many companies owned by our family. The parent company, Wolf Worldwide, had been started by our father thirty years ago and was now managed by my better-looking, less-intelligent brother and I as co-CEOs.
Wolf Worldwide had holdings in every industry you could name: energy, telecommunications, manufacturing, farming, wholesaling, retail, entertainment, hospitality, and technology.
There were very few pools we hadn’t dipped our hands into and pulled great wads of cash out of.
Terry, always the skeptical billionaire, said, “Let me guess. He wants us to give him the money to prove the thing works and get it to market.”
“He is looking for investors,” I said. “Since we were on our way to New Orleans to watch the Bears kick the shit out of the Saints, I figured it was at least worth a pit stop. This technology could be worth a fortune.”
He nodded at the bar through the dusty windshield. “So why are we meeting him here? At a diner?”
“Because according to Mr. Beecher, this place is the epicenter of commerce here in Bellegrade,” I said. “Plus, I asked where we could get an ice-cold beer and some real Cajun food. He said this place had the best home-cooked Cajun food in the state. So here we are.”
“Wonderful,” Tony said, rolling his eyes. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t we already worth a fortune? Do we really need to personally chase after stuff like this?”
“We are worth several fortunes,” I said, switching off the Rover because a man I believed to be Bob Beecher had pulled up next to us and was giving me a wave.
I reached for the door handle and bumped Terry’s arm with my elbow. I said, “Just remember our motto.”
We said it together: “You can never have too much money or too much pussy.”
“Amen, my brother,” I said. “Amen.”
CHAPTER 3: Danielle
I stuck my head in the pass-through window that had been cut in the wall between the dining room and the kitchen and called out to my dad.
He was standing at the stove using one hand to stir the huge pot of gumbo he’d been working on all morning. The other hand held the towel he used to mop the sweat from his round face.
When I took over running the front of the diner, dad moved into the kitchen to cook. He was a much better cook than he was a businessman. His gumbo, red beans and rice, boiled shrimp, and crawfish were legendary in these parts.
“Dad, order up: two gumbo, two shrimp.” I waved the ticket at him and then placed it in the little basket on the ledge we used to keep track of orders.
“Heard,” he said, giving me a smile. He reached for two large bowls and filled them to the top with steaming gumbo, then set the bowls in the window. He looked out into the diner, which was doing a good lunch business.
He said, “Looks like a good crowd.”
“Fridays are always good,” I said, picking up the steaming bowls carefully, trying not to spill any of the gumbo on my hands. Dad insisted on serving his gumbo at the same temperature as molten lava. My fingers were perpetually scared from years of gumbo burns.
“Careful with that,” he said, giving me a concerned look. He brought his eyes up to go around my face. “You all right, Danny girl? You look a little tired.”
“Just tired of this heat,” I said, brushing the hair back from my sweating forehead with the back of my arm. I mustered a smile for him. “I’m fine, Daddy. I’ll deliver these while you get the two shrimp up.”
“Heard,” he said with a grin. My daddy was Cajun, born and raised. His thick accent could draw out even the shortest words into a dozen syllables.
I turned to set the two bowls of gumbo in front of two customers sitting at the counter. They thanked me and smacked their lips in anticipation.
“Careful, boys, that’ll burn the skin off your tongue,” I said. They each scooped out a steaming spoonful and started blowing on it. I picked up their empty beer glasses and refilled them from the tap behind the counter without asking if they wanted another. That was the rule at Robicheaux’s Cajun Diner: if you were occupying a seat, you’d better be eating and drinking.
The bright light of the day caught my attention when the front door opened and closed. I wiped my hands between a bar rag and watched the three men stand at the door for a moment, looking for a table. I recognized the first man as Bob Beecher, a retired gas company engineer who sometimes f
ished with my dad. The two men with him were strangers.
I could tell right away that they were identical twins. They were both tall, six two or three, with short dark hair and deep-set eyes that were scanning the room for a place to sit.
They were lean and muscled, wearing matching black polo shirts with the head of a wolf embroidered in gold over the pocket.
The thickness of their chests and shoulders hinted that they were athletes. Maybe they were a couple of football players from New Orleans who’d heard about daddy’s cooking and come to check it out.
Their narrow waists tapered into tight jeans that hugged their hips and showed off what the good Lord had given them.
I plucked three menus from a rack on the counter and watched them make their way to an empty table in the corner. I hummed my approval. The backs of their jeans looked as good as the front. If they were football players, they were tight ends…
I felt something spark deep inside me, like a pilot light that had been out for a long time was now trying to come back to life on its own.
My breasts tingled in my bra.
I felt a warmth…down there…
A warmth I hadn’t felt in a long time.
Interesting…
I picked up an empty tray and a damp rag from behind the counter. Then I went over to welcome them to Robicheaux’s.
CHAPTER 4: Terry Wolf
The diner was hot and crowded. The place was also small, with barely enough room for a ten-stool lunch counter and a dozen or so tables.
Every stool and chair was taken by rednecks stuffing crawfish and gumbo into their mouths and washing it down with tall glasses of beer.
The air inside seemed as thick and stale as the air outside. I started to tell Tony that he could meet with the guy about whatever the thing was while I took the Rover and found a nicer place to eat that had air conditioning.
Then I saw the redhead standing behind the lunch counter staring at us. The old Wolf radar started pinging like a submarine. I could feel the pulse of it in my balls. Tony felt it, too. He gave me a sideways glance and smiled.
“There’s a table coming empty,” Beecher said in a thick Cajun accent. He was a short, older man with thinning white hair and thick glasses. He was wearing a short-sleeved white shirt and a black tie that hung lopsided off his neck. According to Tony, the guy was a bona fide genius, like some rocket scientist of the bayou.