by K. A. Ware
The comment should have seemed so simple. Such a grandmotherly thing to say in a time of crisis. But as Savannah and I exchanged shocked glances, my heart sped up and that little vein in my temple began to pulse with adrenaline. As if we were kids again, I reached out and grabbed Savannah’s hand, and she squeezed it just as hard.
“What the hell did you just say, Babs?” Savannah squeaked, her voice uncharacteristically thin.
“You heard me.” Babs muttered, pulling out a piece of wood and a knife for a new whittling project.
She was right. We’d heard her. We’d also heard the exact same line from a crazy-ass psychic in the French Quarter who I’d written off as twenty-dollars wasted on a bullshit fortune.
At what point did fortune become prediction and prediction become reality?
“He’s tailgating us.”
Savannah stopped petting Kevin long enough to glance over her shoulder at Zep’s black monster truck hugging our bumper at such a close proximity, if it wouldn’t risk our lives, I’d slam on the brakes.
“He’s not tailgating us, Ads.” Leaning over, she peered at the speedometer and clucked her tongue. “You’re driving like a grandma. Fifty-two miles per hour? For real? It’s seventy-five and as long as you don’t see blue lights, you can go eighty. We’re getting lapped by student drivers.”
I opened my mouth for a comeback when Zep laid on his horn for an excessively long time, shredding my last nerve. “Why did you make me call him?”
Holding Kevin in her lap, Savannah laughed as she lovingly held his front hooves and forced him to tap dance to the song on the radio. “I didn’t make you do anything. With the van in the shop, you know good and well we couldn’t move everything in Daddy’s truck. Bam-Bam is already in NOLA, and besides, he’s out on the boat. Zep was the logical choice with a big enough vehicle to help us move.”
She was right. My head knew that, but the newly minted defiant side of me wanted to fight the logical side of her argument. After the awkwardness between us, I didn’t want to see his willingness to help or his initiative in setting up an apartment for us to look at later today, or his ability to stick to our agreement to ignore each other.
“Fine,” I growled. “But someone needs to teach him how to drive. If my desk flies out of the back of his truck bed, I’m letting Kevin shit in his apartment.”
If I hadn’t been driving, I would’ve closed my eyes. I didn’t want to think of him. I did everything not to think of him. I worked late. I went to the gym and demolished the treadmill. I’d taken up nightly drinking with Babs. I’d even allowed Mama to set me up on an innocent blind date. The guy was cordial and proper enough, but I’d might as well had been out with Bam-Bam for as much chemistry as we ignited.
Nothing worked. I spent every night reliving his mouth on me, and the rush I felt as his hands and lips fought for dominance over my body. I’d never felt so alive as when we were together, and in thirteen years I’d forgotten what that felt like. Sex with Roland had been contractual—as if he’d been closing a deal negotiated with a couple of ‘I do’s’ and a handshake. Once we married, I’d resigned myself to a life of monotony, void of fire and ferocity.
One weak moment with Zep reminded me of what drove me into Roland’s predictable arms in the first place. I’d always been the one with a level-head—the one people could count on to not be irrational or impetuous. At seventeen, Zep LeBlanc took my perfect, safe, snow globe plastic world and shook the shit out of it until it was nothing but bubbles, disorganized fake snow, and destruction.
The perfect girl didn’t fall for the bad boy. Not in my life plan. But that was exactly what happened. I fell for him. He used me then threw me away.
Predictability and monotony seemed to be the opposite of Zep, therefore it’d be the opposite of what would hurt me.
Strike two, Addie. One more and you’re out.
Taylor Swift began singing and Savannah rolled her eyes. “Seriously, do you listen to anything else?”
“Shut it,” I warned while pointing to my purse on the floor. “Can you answer it? I’m kind of driving here.”
Digging far deeper than she needed to, Savannah finally pulled out my phone and spoke low into it while I strained to hear. “Addie’s phone, her personal servant and mistreated much more pleasant sister speaking.”
As I flipped her off she blew me a kiss. “Oh, the next exit? So soon? Oh, okay, cool.” Grabbing a pen from my purse, she balanced the phone between her ear and her shoulder while writing on her palm. “Turn right off the exit, go three miles then take the first left after the stoplight. Got it.”
“Zep?” I mouthed, anxiety roiling in my stomach.
She waved me away with a shit-eating grin and continued talking. “Her? No, she hasn’t mentioned you at all. Why would she mention you, Zep?”
I smacked her as Kevin snorted unhappily at me, nudging my leg with his wet snout. Laughing, she smacked me back as I swerved all over the road, cursing her name with my new-found love of the F-bomb. “Josie Gereaux. Got it. Thanks Zep. Addie’s blowing kisses, yeah, me too, bye.”
I smacked her again, effectively getting honks and hand gestures from all four sides of the car. “What the fuck, Sav? I’m not blowing kisses! And who the hell is Josie Gereaux?”
Savannah just shook her head, glancing at me with that side-eyed look of hers that told me she was contemplating how to drop some seriously shit on me.
“What?” I repeated.
“Turn off this next exit. I’ve got directions to the house we’re looking at.” She paused, chewing on her lip before patting my fingers curled tightly around the steering wheel. “Put some sway in those hips, big sister and stake your claim. Josie Gereaux is the rental property manager we’re meeting.”
“And?”
“And she’s an old friend of Zep’s.”
Something foreign ripped through me. Something heated and sharp.
Jealousy.
“Old friend, huh?” I bit out, sarcasm oozing from every pore in my body. “Well, let’s just meet this old friend, shall we?” Making a sharp right, hard enough for Savannah to let out a squeal and reach for the ’oh, shit handle,’ I let out a humorless laugh. “This should be all kinds of fun.”
If Josie Gereaux was an old friend, I was an Olympic pole vaulter.
Old friend Josie had a perky rack of D cups that I was positive had paraded down a Victoria’s Secret runway at some point in their existence. With long blonde hair and bright green eyes, she looked like an American Barbie doll who’d been air dropped down from the heavens just to remind me that God most definitely had a sense of humor.
“So, Adelaide? What do you think?” Josie smiled, showing off perfectly straight teeth that most likely had seen a few years of braces. As she ran her tanned hand up Zep’s bare arm, I clenched my teeth, causing the veins my neck to tighten and pulse around my jaw.
I think I want you to remove your hand before I twist your fingers until they pop off.
“It’s fine,” I gritted through a fake smile.
Savannah bowed her head beside me. “Oh, shit.”
Zep cocked his head, pinning me with a stare as if I were the most ungrateful bitch to ever grace his presence. “Fine? It’s fine? Addie, Jesus, it’s a fifteen-hundred square-foot row house right outside the French Quarter. And you can’t beat the asking price.” Turning toward Josie, he gave her one of his patented side grins and winked. “Josie even knocked seventy-five dollars off the monthly rent because we’re friends.”
Friends.
And by the googly-eyed nauseating way Josie grinned back at him, that word should be followed by “with benefits” to describe their relationship. My stomach knotted again as a horrifying thought clouded my good sense.
Was Josie Gereaux the reason Zep was late to my Pappy’s will reading? He was taking a “friend” home. Was it her?
I stole a hard glance at Josie again. She wasn’t naturally beautiful. With a horrid spray tan that didn’t quite reach
around all her fingers, it was obviously she took great pains with perfect liquid liner cat eyes, pore fillers, and lip plumper gloss that made her mouth look like it’d just been attacked by a swarm of bees with asses full of collagen. She had to work at being perfect. So, how did she win over a man like Zep, who seemed to value realness over store-bought beauty?
Simple. Confidence. Josie Gereaux exuded it. She walked with a swagger of a self-assured woman who knew her worth and dangled it like a designer carrot in front of men who were drawn to self-assured go-getters.
The complete opposite of me.
“There’s a crack in the foundation,” I blurted out, crossing my arms over my pink t-shirt and turning away.
But Savannah was having none of my shit, motioning around the room with exaggerated sweeps of her hand. “What crack? Addie, this place is perfect. Did you see the stairs? There are stairs leading up to the front porch. A porch, Addie!” Lifting a booted foot, she stomped it hard on the floor, causing Josie to wince. “And hardwood. Hard. Wood, Ads. Not that linoleum shit I left behind. Kevin could piss on this and it’d just wipe up, no more steam cleaning.”
“Um, Kevin? We didn’t discuss children,” Perfecto Barbie interjected.
Savannah just waved her off with her cell phone in her hand. “No kids, it’s just my pet pig, Kevin. He’s in the car.” As Josie opened her mouth to object, Savannah pulled me to the side, lowering her voice to an irritated hiss. “Don’t blow this for us just because she’s probably blown him.”
“Thanks for that.”
“Thought you didn’t care?”
“I don’t,” I insisted, wringing my hands at the image out of the corner of my eye. Josie now had both hands on him and he was fucking laughing.
Laughing.
I was about to lose my shit, and he was cracking jokes.
“Savannah, I can’t do this.”
With a frown, she zeroed in on my biggest weakness. “Fresh start, Ads, remember? No Atticus, no Roland, and because you made the decision, no Zep.”
Her words tore through me, reminding me of my failures. Lowering my head, I chewed my lip and bit back tears.
“Look,” she offered in a softer voice, squeezing my hand. “I still don’t know what happened with you two during Mardi Gras because you won’t talk to me. I can’t help you if you won’t talk, and if you won’t talk then you have no right to get mad at him for having fun. Shit or get off the pot, Ads. You can’t have it both ways.”
“I know, but—”
“In the meantime,” she finished, cutting me off mid-sentence, “if you screw this up for me, I’ll have Kevin shit in every shoe you own and hide them until they’re fossils.”
Blowing out a breath of defeat, I raised my palms in surrender, and turned toward my new landlord. I tried to remember my pedigree, the one Roland had ingrained in me for nearly a decade, but for the life of me, as I stood inside a row house in the French Quarter, all I wanted to do was throw some dentures on the floor and spit at her feet.
It’s official. I’m turning into Babs.
“Thank you very much, Mrs. Gereaux, we’ll take the house,” I bit out, baring my teeth and feeling my nostrils flare with every word. “It will be my pleasure to pay you every month.”
Savannah stomped my toe.
“Ooooffff.”
“It’s Miss Gereaux.”
Of course, it is.
She extended her hand. “Well, I’ll have these papers drawn up and you both can meet me in my office about two o’clock to sign the agreement.”
I stepped forward, and begrudgingly shook her clammy hand. “Yeah, thanks.”
Wrapping her body around Zep like a fucking serpent ready to devour its dinner, she gave him a peck on the cheek. “Will I see you soon?”
Over my dead body.
With a quick glance at me, Zep gently peeled her tentacles off his neck. “I’m not sure, Jo. How about I just call you later, all right?”
“Sure thing.” Bouncing eyes between us, Josie smiled a little too tightly. “Well then, Adelaide, Savannah, I’ll see both of you this afternoon.”
In a gag of Coco Chanel, Josie Gereaux floated out of the front door and left the three of us standing alone in a cloud of awkward silence. The tension was so thick you could cut it with a butter knife and serve it on top of a piece of humble pie. Which is exactly what I should have been shoving in my face instead of the words that came out of it.
“Well, she was nice. We’re also hiring a secretary and a dispatcher. Will we be employing your other booty calls as well?”
“Addie!” Savannah stomped my toe again, her mouth hanging open.
“Ouch!” Swinging around I stomped hers right back. “Will you stop doing that? I’m wearing Jimmy Choos, damn it!”
Before I knew what had happened, Zep grabbed me around the arm and pulled me into the kitchen. “We need to have a talk.”
“Let me go, I have nothing to say to you,” I screamed, trying in vain to plant my feet as he dragged me across the hardwood.
“Good,” he growled, backing me against the wall, his hold tightening on my arm. “Then shut your fucking mouth, and I’ll do all the talking for once.”
Opening my mouth to object, the fire shooting through his eyes gave me pause, and I quickly closed it, pursing my lips and glaring at him.
“I drove down to Terrebonne because you asked me to. I hauled all your shit out of your office, loaded it onto two trucks and drove back to New Orleans because you asked me to. I found you and your sister a fucking amazing house in the French Quarter with an absurdly low rent because you asked me to.” His light blue eyes swirled with glints of the ocean as they darkened with anger. “I did all of this for you and you acted like a full-on bitch in there. I want to know why.”
My lip quivered. “I don’t know.”
His eyes widened, and he leaned back as if seeing me for the first time. “What the hell do you mean, you don’t know?”
I jerked my arm away from him. For some reason his touch burned with the knowledge that I’d disappointed everyone yet again. “I don’t know, Zep! I don’t know why it bothers me that you’re dating her. I have no right to have an opinion on what you do. You’re a free man, you can do what you want, but damn it, do you have to do it in front of my face when my own life is such a fucking train wreck?”
I wanted to be mad. I wanted to scream at him and run away. Instead, I cried. I fucking cried and that pissed me off more than anything. Hot tears rolled down, spilling down my cheeks and nose.
Some women were naturally adorable criers. They patted their cute little noses and dabbed their eyes through sniffles. I wasn’t one of those women. My face puffed up like I’d just had an allergic reaction to being wrong. My nose ran, coating my face with snot, and I hyperventilated.
It was almost comical.
Only Zep wasn’t laughing. He wasn’t even amused. As I squeezed my eyes closed, a rough hand swept across my cheek, wiping the tears away while the other cupped my chin. “Addie, why does it bother you so much what I do? After Mardi Gras, you specifically said you just wanted to keep things professional. You said anything else would be a mistake.” The pad of his thumb brushed across my top lip and the tears fell harder. “Those were your words.”
I couldn’t answer. I didn’t want his comfort. I didn’t deserve it.
“Jesus, Addie, please don’t cry.” Moving closer, he swept me into strong arms, one palm cradling the back of my head while the other rubbed my back. “I could never stand to see you cry.”
As he held me, it finally hit me what had prompted such a violent reaction in seeing Zep and Josie together. I’d been blindsided by it. Just like Roland and Brandi.
Lifting my head from his chest, I sniffled and tried to back away, but he refused to release me. “Addie…”
I guess we’re doing this now.
Defensiveness crept into my chest. “When Savannah and I went to Shreveport, I walked in on my husband and his new whore setting up
house. It just…it just struck a nerve, all right?”
The change in Zep’s face was instantaneous. Soft and gentle understanding shifted to a hardened glare and tightened features that ticked with rage. “He did what?”
“Don’t tell me you don’t know,” I said dryly. No way had the whole parish not traded the gossip about the shame of Shreveport.
“He cheated on you?” He asked calmly.
Too calmly.
“Yes?” I answered, not sure if I was giving an answer or starting a war. “Kicked me out before Pappy’s funeral and told me he was in love,” I laughed at the memory. “And trust me, it wasn’t with me.”
“God, Addie,” he swore, shaking his head, his hand still resting on my hip. “You deserve so much more than a fucking shitbag like that.” His eyes darkened again, seeming to roll the information around in his head. “If he ever shows his face in Terrebonne or New Orleans, you’d better believe we’re gonna have us a man to man talk.”
“It’s not your fight, Zep.”
“No,” he agreed, squeezing my waist. “But I still consider you a friend, Addie, and I don’t take kindly to my friends being disrespected.” Sighing, he wiped away a stray tear, trailing a finger down my cheek. “Besides, he’s a moron. Trust me, he’ll wake up one morning and spend the rest of his life realizing he lost the best thing he ever had. Then,” he shook his head, his face filled with a sadness I couldn’t read, “it’ll be too late.”
Without another word, he released me and joined Savannah in the living room, leaving my heart pounding and a head full of unanswered questions.
Life was funny. When I was seventeen, I thought I’d found the proverbial pot of gold at the end of my own unpredictable rainbow. Of all the women in Terrebonne Parish, Zephirin LeBlanc picked me. Me. Adelaide Dubois. Nice girl. Do gooder. Least pep on the pep squad, and voted most likely to run her own business someday.
And then it was gone.
I swore I’d never let anyone hurt me like that ever again. I swore I’d never speak his name again, keeping that one special moment in time with him sacred—frozen before it’d all gone to hell. I’d kept it locked away in that secret place women kept reserved for their first love—the one they truly never get over, no matter what they tell you.