That evening
“I knew it,” Roche said to Bleu. “You’ve got a secret life. I didn’t know this place existed. But I don’t get out much.”
Her laugh was more embarrassed than amused. “You ought to change that,” she said, her voice all but lost in the heavy blues beat from a small, gravelly group. “You know what a woman of the world I am—flitting around the countryside every night. If you’re looking for the latest hot spot, just call me.”
He put his elbows on the table in their booth and grinned at her—not that she was likely to see the finer points of his facial expression in the gloom. “Auntie’s, huh? Interesting place. When’s the last time you were here?”
She inclined her head. “Well—when I remember, I’ll let you know.”
Her choice made Bleu uncomfortable. Rather than ask for advice, she had picked a place out of the Lafayette telephone book. Fine dining and music sounded great, but now she wasn’t sure exactly what it was supposed to mean. Little food seemed to be served.
“I like all the red,” Roche said.
“It is very red in here,” Bleu said. In fact, everything was red, including the lighting. Velvet-covered booths, tablecloths and napkins, walls, hanging glass lamps, carpets, the abbreviated sequined tuxedos worn by the waitstaff—male and female.
“I like the music, too,” Roche said.
Bleu listened and nodded. “Me, too.” Even if it was suggestive and heavily moody.
A waiter, his chest bare under his jacket, but with a bow tie in place, lighted a candle on the table. “Is this your first time at Auntie’s?” he asked.
“Yes,” Bleu said at once and bowed her head.
Roche laughed and echoed, “Yes.” He asked her if she liked champagne and ordered a bottle when she said she did. Bart, who would be “looking after them,” giggled and told them to “trust him,” with “nibbles.”
“I’m sorry,” Bleu said when they were alone again. “I was trying to be sophisticated and find a nice place. This is awful.”
“Don’t be sorry,” Roche said. “I want to be with you and I don’t care where that is.” He flexed muscles in his jaw. He couldn’t seem to stop himself from being too honest around this woman.
Bleu looked sideways at him. Her eyes shone in the candlelight and there wasn’t a hint of a smile on her face.
“Did I just say too much?”
“No,” she said. “I’d have to be fool to think that was too much. I wanted to be with you, too. That’s why I chased after you the way I did.”
“D’you want to tell me what changed your mind about coming out with me? Or being anywhere at all with me, alone?”
Bart arrived with a champagne bucket, complete with bottle up to its neck in ice, and glasses. The nibbles were a small dish of nuts and another of pretzel sticks.
“How about some oysters to go with that?” Bart asked and winked at Roche.
“Yes,” Bleu said. “We’d like that, wouldn’t we?”
Roche nodded. If he suggested they go somewhere else, she would be mortified. And he’d meant what he said about only wanting to be with her. He prayed things were as sleazy as they were going to get.
The champagne wasn’t bad. Roche felt almost ridiculously grateful, and pleased when he saw Bleu wrinkle her nose and look happy. He’d have to remember that bubbles relaxed her.
There were all kinds of bubbles…
Her dress—simple, white, sleeveless with a round neck and straight skirt—couldn’t have looked better if it had been designed for her. Her only jewelry was a pair of crystal earrings that shot sparks of reflected red across her neck.
He drank deeply. Tonight, he was Mr. Model Date. He would not do anything but respond to her, with restraint. Tonight, he would prove how unthreatening he could be.
“This is good,” Bleu said. Champagne wasn’t something she’d had often, but she liked it. Roche, relaxed, more approachable than she ever remembered him, smiled back at her and managed to turn her heart more times than could be good for it.
He’d removed his black silk sport coat and his hair looked a little damp and very dark against an open-necked white shirt.
She would not start telling herself she didn’t belong with a man like him.
Things were going to change with her. She would get past putting herself down and learn to feel desirable again. With enough guts, she could let go of her fear of getting close to a man—to this man.
“Oysters off your starboard side,” Roche muttered.
She didn’t have a chance to move her head before “Shelly” arrived, also without a shirt beneath her sequined jacket.
“I’m going to make these easy for you,” Shelly said, leaning over the table until Bleu found the only safe place to look was at her own hands.
Shelly shucked oysters like a pro. “What else can I do for you?” she said.
“I can’t think of a thing,” Roche said, doing his best to avoid a view of naked breasts some plastic surgeon must have ordered special implants for. They were huge, with saucer-sized nipples.
He saw Bleu glance up and take a deep breath. Now, hers were the breasts he wanted to see naked.
“People don’t know we specialize in couples,” Shelly said.
Bleu frowned at her.
“You’re fine where you are as long as you’re comfortable. We insist our customers are comfortable. But when you’re ready, so are we.”
Stunned, Bleu had difficulty meeting Roche’s eyes. “Is this a…place?” she asked when Shelly left.
“I’m not sure what it is,” he said honestly. “But it’s interesting.” He carried one of her hands to his mouth and kissed it lightly. And he set it gently back on the table afterward.
“Yes, yes it is.” She emptied her champagne and Bart appeared to refill the glass.
In the booth across from theirs, a couple settled in and wrapped their arms around each other. They kissed, and kissed. The man, beefy, with slick hair, pulled at his partner until he lifted her bottom from the seat. Unfazed, she knelt and pushed her hands into the back of his pants, pulled out his shirt and plunged her hands back inside.
Bleu glanced at Roche but he wasn’t taking any notice of the performance. She felt a little dart of heat between her legs, crossed them at once and felt annoyed with herself.
“It’s been a hell of a day,” Roche said. “Did you sleep?”
They’d hardly spoken on the drive north and Bleu was relieved to feel looser, even if the couple next to them were embarrassing. “A bit. It felt good. How about you?”
He touched the tip of her chin and smiled. “Not a whole lot.”
“Oh.” She frowned. “If you’re too tired—”
“I’m not,” he said. “I didn’t sleep because I was waiting to see you. Are we going to get to know each other, Bleu? No pressure?”
“I want to.” It was true, why not tell him?
The couple in the other booth got champagne—no nibbles. Their waiter sat in with them, cozying up until the woman became a voluptuous, giggling sandwich filling. Whatever they discussed brought loud laughter and a lot of head nodding.
Giggles’ boyfriend was a generous guy. When she gave the waiter a lingering kiss and something that made him squeal, “ooh,” before he left, she was immediately welcomed back into another embrace.
“Why did you want us to get together tonight?” Roche asked.
She didn’t know how much to say. “I haven’t been fair to you. Or me. You don’t need to hold a therapy session, but I am still getting over a bad marriage.”
It touched him that she was honest. “You can talk to me about anything,” he said. “Or nothing.”
“I don’t have a lot of confidence,” she said, and hated the way it sounded. “That’s not what I meant to say. I wasn’t encouraged to be confident, but I’m too strong to let someone else destroy me. I’m getting back into living again and I like it.” She gave him her brightest smile. And she meant what she said, darn it. Maybe she had a long way to go, but she was on her way. Coming out with him tonight proved that.
“You are strong,” he said. She would be, he thought. These were the first steps and he admired her courage.
For himself, the increasing abandon of their neighbors was causing reactions he couldn’t completely squelch. The pair needed a room and he had no doubt there were plenty available somewhere around here.
“You’ve never married,” Bleu said. “You seem like someone who should have a wife and children.”
He met her eyes steadily. “For years, there wasn’t time. Then there wasn’t anyone who interested me in the right way.”
The woman next to them sat on her companion’s lap. He encased her middle with his big hands and slipped them up until her breasts were half-exposed beneath a ruckled top. He limbered up his thumbs on her nipples and she writhed, gasping. Evidently bras were out of favor.
He ought, Roche thought, to get Bleu out of here. But if he made a big deal of it, she’d figure he’d been spending too much attention elsewhere or that he thought she was too naive to cope.
Bleu wished Roche would hold her hand. She spread her fingers on top of the table so that they came close to touching his wrist.
“You must have been young when you got married,” Roche said.
“Yes.” She must have been wrong when she’d been convinced Roche knew the details about Michael, but she didn’t want to think about that now. A soft warmth had crept through her veins. Studiously, she avoided the antics at the next table but couldn’t miss everything. For the second time tonight, bare breasts were on display and this time she supposed they were nice, nice enough for the man to look at them like gourmet ice-cream sundaes before sucking on one nipple then the other.
Bleu cleared her throat and moved a little closer to Roche.
“Would you like to leave?” he said. “It’s getting late to find a meal, but we’d get coffee somewhere.”
Because he thought she was a wimpy, fading flower with no experience? “It’s comfortable here,” she said. “The music’s nice.”
Roche knew she wasn’t comfortable, but it wasn’t his place to say so.
“Did Spike say anything important about his investigations?” Bleu asked. “Madge called me after I got home and said the three of you had been talking back in her office. She thinks Spike’s got an idea about the killer.” It was hard not to sound desperately hopeful.
“He’s trying to think of some crime that was never solved. Here in Toussaint. He called it an incident, so I suppose he means a crime. I don’t recall anything. How about you?”
“I’ve only been here a few weeks,” she reminded him. “Nobody’s said anything to me.”
He spread his arms along the back of the booth and looked thoughtful.
Bleu looked at his solid chest, the crook of his shoulder, and had an urge to cuddle against him. He would put one of his arms around her and hold on. Then she’d tip her head back and he’d kiss her.
“There was a girl who went missing,” Roche said slowly. “A teenager home from school on vacation. I think it turned out she’d run off with a boyfriend. I never heard she was found dead.”
Bleu sighed. “Thank goodness. There’s always so much trouble.”
“Fortunately there isn’t always a murder in St. Cecil’s.”
“Poor Jim.” Bleu couldn’t stand thinking about such a gentle man being exposed to horrendous violence.
“Bleu, I’d like us to go out,” Roche said. “I know we are out. I mean, would you like to consider getting together now and then?”
She hid her smile.
“Don’t answer until you’re ready,” he said.
Bleu rested her face against the back of the booth, the top of her head brushed the underside of his arm. “I would like that,” she said quietly. She looked at his mouth. The outline was definite, the lower lip fuller than the top and the corners flipped up. She passed her tongue over her own mouth.
“That’s great,” he said, giving her chin a mock tap with a knuckle.
Noises next door turned from panting and grunting to escalating sounds of runaway excitement.
Bleu turned her head before she could stop herself. Giggles had her short skirt fashioned into a belt and her partner sagged in the booth while he bopped her up and down on his lap.
“Oh, dear,” Bleu said weakly.
Roche took her by the hand and pulled her from their booth behind him. Bart appeared, all smiles to offer them “whatever their hearts desired,” and Roche pushed some bills into his hand.
“Night,” Roche said with a sloppy salute.
He strode outside with Bleu and settled her in his car.
Her pulse thudded in every place a pulse could thud. She wiggled a little and forced her breathing to settle down. When had she turned into a sex-crazed creature ready to react to any stimulus?
Roche got in beside her, and she sat with her knees primly together when she smiled at him. “I guess it takes all kinds,” she said. “I don’t think I’d make it as a concierge.”
His smile charmed her—all the way from her brain, through every possible spot on the way to her toes. “That would depend on the clientele you were trying to satisfy. Let’s get you home.”
He patted her hand on her leg and she swallowed. Turning toward the passenger window, she let her eyes close. When had she last felt like this? Pliable, sensual and longing for a man’s warmth and strength? Bitterness opened her eyes fast. Regardless of how long ago it had been, she hadn’t been fulfilled.
They drove through a pleasant night. Roche smiled at her often. She felt his contentment. When they got to her place, she would get past all the inhibitions and ask him in. He wasn’t rushing her along. She had nothing to fear from him and just to sit with him close beside her and share a comforting hour would feel so good.
“Tomorrow, I’ve got to catch up,” she said, scrambling for anything at all to say.
“I’m sure. I’ll be busy myself for the next couple of days. Out at the clinic. Things are still very slow in town.”
“That’ll change,” she told him. She couldn’t think of anything she’d like better than an excuse to sit and talk to Roche Savage, to have him listen to her, and look at her.
“It will in time,” he said. “I admit I’m worried.”
“About getting enough patients?” He surprised her.
“No, no. It’s early yet to hope for progress, but someone killed Jim, and they were making a point.”
“It’s funny,” she said. “But we could never find out who did it. What if it was someone passing through? Maybe robbing the collection boxes, and Jim caught them.”
He glanced sideways at her. The dashboard light did nice things for his features. “Do you really think that?”
“No. Anyway, Sam Bush counts the money from the boxes and he’d have said if something was different.”
“Try not to think about it all the time,” he said.
They’d entered the streets of Toussaint and set off into the neighborhood that eventually petered out into the almost undeveloped area where Bleu lived.
If he asked her out tomorrow, Bleu intended to go. Not back to Auntie’s or anywhere like it, though. She blushed at the thought. In her whole life she’d never seen anything like that.
She shifted in her seat again. A woman shouldn’t get all sexy because of a thing like she’d just seen. Should she? Roche didn’t seem affected by it.
He drove up the cul-de-sac, put on the emergency brake and got out.
Bleu let him come around and open her door—and help her get out. With a hand at the back of her waist, he ushered her up the front steps, took her key and opened the front door.
She faced him and looked up under the light on the wall. “I don’t know what to say except, that was wild and I ought to be embarrassed.”
He chuckled. “Chalk it up to the education of Bleu. Not exactly what you need, but part of life. Forget it. I really enjoyed being with you. Thank you.”
“Thank you,” she said and stepped a little closer. “You’re really good company. Will you forgive me for standing you up? That was so childish of me. I think I got cold feet.”
“Understandable,” he said. “You didn’t know if you could live up to my charm.”
She bowed her head then looked at him through her lashes. “Something like that. Would you like to come in for that cup of coffee you suggested earlier?”
Roche rubbed her cheek with the back of a hand, then replaced his hand with his lips. He kissed her lightly and stood back. “It’s been a long day. Get inside and lock up.”
Her head buzzed. Goose bumps popped out on her legs. “Yes. Of course. Good night.” Only then did she realize he hadn’t even turned off his car engine.
“I’ll talk to you soon,” he said.
“I’ll look forward to it.”
“Night.” He took a couple of downward steps.
Bleu went inside, locked the door and sat on the bottom step of the stairs. She crossed her arms and rocked. Darn him, anyway.
On the way back to Rosebank, Roche drove faster than was wise. Eventually, when he became aware of dark trees becoming a blur against a pewter sky, he forced the brake to the floor and fishtailed off the road and on to a rocky shoulder.
He didn’t remember the last time restraint had cost him so much. She would have had him come in, and who knew what that would have led to?
“Oh, my God!”
It could have come to his getting carried away, persuading her into what would have been abandoned sex—he was worked up enough to get so wild he might or might not make her run, screaming, from him.
Okay. He was a saint. But he would have to give himself some breathing room or Saint Roche’s halo would get confiscated.