Daniel knew something was different at Bayou Rose when he returned from the hardware store. His first clue was that there were no vehicles parked in the front driveway. Not Aaron’s truck, though he was probably still at work. Nor the FBI or police unmarked cars, which meant the meeting was over. Even Samantha’s BMW was missing.
Daniel felt a sudden lurch of despair. For some reason, he’d thought Samantha and her gang would be staying another few days. Something must have happened.
He drove around the side of the house and parked as close as he could to the slave cabin, rather “the cottage,” which he supposed was more politically correct. Edgar, who’d stayed behind, came out to help him unload all the plumbing and paint supplies he’d purchased. The celery green paint for the walls . . . not moss green, nor sage green . . . but celery green, as ordered by Tante Lulu before she’d left. As if she was some kind of bleepin’ construction foreman for this project.
Even though he kept emphasizing that this was only a one cottage venture, Tante Lulu was making plans, he could tell. In fact, she’d called his cell phone this morning and without preamble declared that all the cottages should be painted a different color, like Sunshine Yellow for the first, and others could be such cornball colors as Bluebird Blue, Grassy Green, Pansy Purple, and so on. Apparently she’d had a dream about them. Samantha would have a fit about the historical inaccuracy of the colors, if she ever found out.
Edgar asked Daniel to come inside and see what he’d been doing while Daniel was out shopping for supplies. Edgar, his face flushed with pride, paused in the act of tossing some cushions onto the sofa.
Daniel glanced around at the used furniture arranged on a green-and-black area rug, and he had to admit that the room looked nice. The oak coffee table with matching end tables, brass lamps, even a bookcase. Once the walls were painted, a few pictures hung, and maybe some curtains put on the windows, it would be a cozy little retreat for the parent of a sick kid. Just what he’d envisioned, but more.
It occurred to Daniel that, if Samantha and Angus and Lily Beth were no longer here, he could call the workers to return for work on the mansion. Somehow, the thought wasn’t heartening. More pounding and scraping and power tools!
“Where is everyone, by the way?” he asked with as casual a tone as he could manage.
“They all left after that meeting with the police and FBI goons. Man, don’t think I wasn’t nervous with all those police cars around?”
“So, the FBI said it was safe to leave here now that the arrests were made.”
“Well, not exactly. It was when Samantha’s daddy showed up and raised hell.”
“What?”
Edgar went on to tell a preposterous story, which had been related to him secondhand by Lily Beth, about this kilt-wearing Scotsman and a woman named “Hatchet Face” interrupting the FBI/police meeting. Afterward, Daniel said, “So, it’s over.”
“It’s not over ’til the fat lady sings,” Edgar opined.
Daniel didn’t know any fat singers, but he did know a witchy Cajun matchmaker, who probably thought she had the final say in anything affecting any and all members of her extended LeDeux family.
Unfortunately, or fortunately, Daniel was a member of that family.
When all else fails, go to the expert . . .
Samantha was back in her New Orleans home, considerably lighter on animals, but heavier in the heart.
She now had only Axel, Maddie, and Emily . . . and Clarence, of course, who was going to be adopted soon. She hoped.
But she was a different woman now. A woman in love. Dammit! Unrequited love. Dammit. How had this wonderful/awful attachment happened so quickly and so powerfully?
Well, it wasn’t so quickly, she was beginning to realize. Over the past few years, since she’d first met Daniel at John LeDeux’s wedding, there had been a spark. She’d always considered it a spark of hostility, but now she was beginning to think there had been an attraction from the get-go, and she’d chosen to handle it with snarkiness. After all, he was a doctor and she’d been committed to lumping all doctors in one big dungpile of egotism, selfishness, and greed.
Which made her think of Nick, of course. His funeral was tomorrow. How sad, that such a bright, handsome man could have gone down the path he had! She felt no regrets, except that she would have wished him in prison, rather than wherever he was now.
To add to her misery, every member of her family had been on the phone to her. Commiserating. Wanting details. Discussing past associations with Nick.
“So sad!” (Yep!)
“He always was a louse!” (Well, yeah! Hindsight is 20/20.)
“But he wore a pink tie when he visited me!” (Well, duh! He was trying to con you.)
“Do you think I’ll ever get back the money I loaned him eight years ago?” (When gators fly!)
“Are you going to the funeral?” (Hell, no!)
“What will happen to his new building?” (Sold to settle debts, I would think.)
The news media was after her, too. She was tempted to go back to Bayou Rose to hide out till the scandal blew over, but her pride was too great. And Daniel hadn’t invited her.
Her father and Florence had taken Angus to Costa Rica with them for a “little vacation,” which meant that the law was being laid down, and strict rules set for Angus’s future. He was going to return to college when they got back and/or get a job. And he was going to live at home until his finances were in better shape. The prospect of living with Florence would straighten him out, if nothing else would.
Samantha wasn’t really alone, she had to remind herself. Lily Beth was staying with her until her brother Vic got home on leave in a few weeks. She hadn’t told her preacher brother, Paul, about the pregnancy, but she had told the soldier brother in Afghanistan. Turned out Vic was delighted for her. He was engaged to marry a girl from Lafayette and he said he could buy a small house when he returned for them all to live together, including the baby. And she could continue her studies, if she wanted. Lily Beth had no intention of telling her brother about Nick, which was none of Samantha’s business.
So, all’s well that ends well, she thought. For some people.
It was Lily Beth in all her youthful wisdom who gave her the answer, after another day had passed and no word from Daniel. “What do ya really want, Samatha?”
“Daniel,” she answered without hesitation. Yeah, she wanted him to want her. She wanted him to chase her. She wanted him to coax her into coming back. But bottom line? She repeated, “Daniel.”
“Well, golly gee, Samantha, bless yer heart, why don’t ya go get him then?”
Was it as simple as that?
No, Samantha was a list maker. She made plans and then acted them out. But how to do that? She had an idea. Could she? Should she? She picked up her cell phone.
“Hello. Tante Lulu?”
“Yes, is that you, Samantha?”
“Yes. I hate to impose, but . . .”
“But what, dearie?”
“I need help.”
“Ta get Daniel?”
“How did you know?”
Tante Lulu laughed. “I may be old, but I ain’t blind.”
“Can I come over to tell you what I’m thinking?”
“I’ll put the coffee on and the cake’s already in the oven.”
Nothing soothes a woman like shopping . . . at the local porn shop . . .
Charmaine was with Louise when Samantha’s phone call came.
Louise explained the situation to Charmaine.
“I swear, that Daniel is two times a fool, worse even than Tee-John when he was fallin’ in love with Celine,” Charmaine said. “Do you think Samantha would mind if I stay? I have a few things to tell her that might help.”
“Stay, and if she’s uncomfortable, ya can leave.”
They had just made a cake together . . . a new one for Louise. Orange Marmalade cake, according to a recipe Louise had found in a series of books about a preacher in some town called Mitford. With a few modifications, if the cake turned out as good as it smelled, Louise might very well have a new specialty, Cajun Orange Marmalade Cake, as good as her Peachy Praline Cobbler Cake. A woman was never too old to learn something new.
Samantha arrived an hour later, just as they were icing the four-tiered cake and decorating it with little mandarin oranges.
Louise reached up and gave Samantha a hug. And she really did need to reach because Samantha was tall for a woman. But then, Louise was small, compared to anyone.
Samantha greeted Charmaine warmly, too, and she only revealed with a sudden widening of her eyes how she felt about Charmaine’s attire today. An off-the-shoulder blouse, Daisy Duke short shorts, and high-heeled wedgie sandals. Her hair was swept up on top of her head and she wore that new lipstick featured in her salons, “Rose Satin.”
Louise asked, “Do ya mind if Charmaine stays? She might have an opinion or two ta help.”
Samantha hesitated, but then she said, “Sure.”
“I assume this is about that pighead, prideful Daniel?” Charmaine said right off. “All the LeDeux men are the same, bless their Cajun hearts.”
Samantha laughed, then nodded.
“Tell us what the problem is, ’zackly,” Louise encouraged.
She did, and Louise tried to bite her tongue about the sex outside of marriage. She wasn’t a prude, but she still didn’t like women offering themselves up without a ring. A little hanky panky would be fine, but the whole shebang? Uh-uh! She was of the old school about men. Why should they buy the cow when they got the milk for free? So to speak.
“Honey, ya need ta understand Daniel’s history. It wasn’t a woman that made him so walled up, though there have been plenty, I’m sure. Workin’ with sick young’uns saps the life out of any doctor, but one as sensitive as Daniel . . . well, after his favorite patient died, a little boy, followed by his mother, he jist broke down. Not like a nervous breakdown, which shows on the outside. He kept his grief all inside.”
Samantha’s jaw dropped. “How do you know all that?”
“I bin talkin’ ta his aunt Mel on the phone. An’ I gotta tell ya, Daniel’s sit-ye-ay-shun is jist lak my nephew Remy’s, before he met his Rachel,” Louise said. “Remy was burned in Desert Storm when he was flyin’ planes fer the Air Force. ’Cause he was scarred all along one side of his body and ’cause he became sterile, he dint think any woman would ever want him. Kept himself shielded up, jist like Daniel.”
Charmaine was nodding.
“Back ta Daniel. We gotta find a way ta shake the boy out of safety nets. How ’bout we stage one of the LeDeux Cajun Village People acts? Mebbe all the females in the family could be dressed in sexy nurse outfits, and you could shimmy out on ta the stage, and—”
“No, I don’t think that would work. For me or for Daniel.” Samantha blushed and said, “I have something else in mind.” She went on to explain something about sexual fantasies. “I have an idea. It probably won’t work. I might not have the nerve to even give it a try.”
Louise, who had been bustling about the kitchen, cleaning up from the cake baking, plopped down on one of the chairs at her kitchen table. She and Charmaine stared at Samantha with interest.
“Go on,” Charmaine encouraged.
“I might shock you,” Samantha confessed.
“Girl, ya cain’t shock me,” Louise asserted.
“Me, neither,” Charmaine said. “Wait ’til I tell ya ’bout the time I became a born again virgin. ’Bout ta gave Rusty a heart attack.”
“My sexual fantasies allus centered on my crush, Richard Simmons. But before that, they starred Phillippe, of course,” Louise told them.
“Mine were about Rusty, from the first time I met him. There’s somethin’ ’bout cowboys that get a girl’s juices goin’,” Charmaine disclosed.
“What about you, sweetie?” Tante Lulu asked.
“First of all, I need a harem girl outfit,” Samantha revealed. “I have no idea where I would even look for one. The Internet, I suppose. But that would take too long to get here.”
“Oooh, oooh, ooh. Wait jist a minute.” Louise rushed out of the room and pulled out a box from under her bed. When she returned she showed them the belly dancing outfit she’d bought in the old days, like ten years ago, when she and Charmaine had been entering belly dancing contests. She spread it out on the table in front of Samantha. All sheer fabric and sequins and little bells along the hem of the pants. “It might be a little small fer you, but it’s supposed ta be one size fits all.”
Charmaine said, “I’d lend you mine, but I wore it out from overuse.”
Samantha said, “This is perfect. But I need some other things, besides. Tools of the trade.” She was blushing redder than a June bride now.
“Tools?” Charmaine asked.
“Velvet handcuffs, that kind of thing.” If her face got any redder, she was gonna explode.
“I allus wanted to get me a pair of velvet handcuffs.”
“I already have a pair. Two pairs, actually. One set fer me, and one fer Rusty,” Charmaine said.
Samantha looked at them both as if they were crazy.
“Well, there’s only one answer to the dilemma. We gotta go shoppin’,” Charmaine said.
“Shopping? Where?” Samantha asked.
“The Frisky Fun Boutique in Houma,” Charmaine answered.
“Whoo-ee, I allus wanted ta go there,” Louise said.
Thus it was that, three hours later, after another cup of strong chicory coffee and slices of the marmalade cake, which was, indeed, a big hit, Samantha was driving back to New Orleans with not just velvet handcuffs, but vibrating thingees, a strange whip made with feathers, some kind of balls, and nipple rings made of flexible brass, which didn’t require piercing. Ouch!
Louise had also made some purchases for herself, but she wasn’t telling. There might be crotchless panties involved.
Who says big boys don’t cry? . . .
Friday night, and he was alone at Bayou Rose.
Daniel thought about moving all his stuff back to the garconniére, but he would do that tomorrow. He was, frankly, beat after a day of hard labor with Edgar. With shovels and a small rented backhoe manned by Edgar, they’d managed to trench plumbing lines from the mansion to the cabin. They would cover the pipes with dirt tomorrow, and then Edgar could begin the inside plumbing work, installing a bathroom sink, shower, and toilet, plus the kitchen sink.
The inside and exterior painting had been completed, and it did look nice and cheerful. Tante Lulu had sent over some extra curtains she just happened to have.
Daniel was thankful for all the help, and he was very impressed with Edgar’s expertise and work ethic. Next week, the carpenters and painters would return to renovations on the mansion. Daniel had already decided to hire Edgar to work with them, perhaps oversee the whole project.
No matter what use the cabins were put to finally, they would have had to be updated anyhow. The mansion renovations, however, were on hold. He kept picturing Samantha, who got a dreamy look in her eyes every time she talked about this or that historical detail.
There he went again. Samantha on his mind. Wasn’t there a song about that? No, that was Georgia. But it could have been Samantha. Aaarrgh!
Daniel had already decided that he was going to have to dump his pride and approach Samantha. Lay his feelings out before her. And see what happened. If he got shot down again, so be it. But at least he will have tried. Maybe he would see her at Tante Lulu’s birthday party. Then he could appear sort of casual and not have to humble himself.
Who was he kidding? If he was in love, like he was ninety-nine percent sure he was, humble was the least of his problems. He should be crawling on his knees, begging her to . . . what? That was the question. What did he want?
He wanted Samantha, that’s all he knew. And not just for a one-night stand. Did he want to marry her? Hmmm. He hadn’t thought that far.
Enough thinking for tonight. He went over to the garconniére to check on the kittens. Amazingly, they seemed to have doubled in size since their birth a few days ago, especially the little white one. If all went well, Edgar had permission to take Molly out of the hospital for a few hours on Sunday. The one thing she was determined to do was see her kitty, Snowball.
While he was at the apartment, he noticed a UPS package addressed to him, sitting by the door. It had an Alaska postmark on it, but not one he recognized. Aaron must have forgotten to give it to him.
Opening it, he was surprised to see a pile of old superhero comic books. Superman. Spiderman. Captain America. Batman. And there was a letter.
Dear Dr. LeDeux:
Remember me? Jamie Lee Watson, Deke’s dad. Bet you’re surprised to hear from me. Thanks to you, I’ve been clean for two years now, and Bethany and me just had a little girl, which we named Danielle.
But that’s not why I’m writing. We were cleaning Deke’s old room to make a nursery for the new baby when we found a silly little “Last Will and Testment” he’d written before he went into hospice. In it, he willed you his comic book collection. Don’t know what you’re going to do with it, but, hey, I got his goldfish, which have long since gone to the Great Goldfish Beyond. Deke really liked you, Dr. LeDeux, and not just as his doctor.
I just wanted you to know that you made a difference in a little boy’s life, and in mine and Bethany’s, too.
Fondly,
Jamie Lee Watson
Daniel had tears in his eyes when he finished the letter. Maybe this was the closure he’d needed after all these years. Maybe this would be the impetus for his return to medicine.
After watching a little TV, he went back to the mansion, took a long shower, and went to bed. He was sure that tonight he’d be able to sleep.
On the other hand, maybe he would have one of those hot fantasy Samantha dreams. He fell asleep smiling.