Marie’s expression darkened and she murmured, “Oh, dear,” as she shooed them up the stairs.
4
STEPHEN OPENED a door to a room that faced the street and said, “Justin’s room, when he visits.”
In spite of the danger lurking outside, Lucy felt a distinct tingle when she stepped into the room filled with memorabilia of Justin’s youth. She shook the feeling away, and wondering what was going on outside, trying not to let her imagination get the best of her.
In a lowered voice so no one outside could hear, she said, “I thought the boat was simply the family fishing camp.”
“It is. We all use it.”
“So Justin lives…?”
“In New Orleans,” Stephen said.
Which came as a knee-weakening surprise. The idea that Justin lived in the city—her city—where she could run into him at any time shot a thrill of anticipation through Lucy.
“What about you, Stephen?” she asked. “Do you live here? In this house, I mean.”
He was standing in the doorway. Filling it actually. The Guidry boys were not small men.
“Across the hall,” he said. “Well, most of the time. I make a lot of trips to New Orleans for work. I hate hotels, so I keep a small apartment there, too.”
“You never wanted to live in New Orleans full-time?”
“I never took to it, but that might be my fault for taking responsibility so seriously. It makes change difficult.”
Lucy wondered what he meant by that. Did he mean taking care of his mother? Somehow she didn’t think Marie needed anyone to take of her, and she certainly didn’t seem to be the type to ask even if she did. Besides, Marie Guidry was probably only in her early fifties—the prime of life according to women’s magazines.
It must be a Stephen thing, she decided.
“So does Marcus live here, too?”
Stephen laughed. “Nope. Too confining. In case you didn’t guess, Marcus is the free-wheeling type. He has a shack down the road a piece, though he’s here visiting often enough. At least a couple of times a week, actually. Nothing like home cooking, and Marcus takes advantage.”
The small talk kept Lucy’s nerves from stretching taut. What was going on downstairs? Though she heard muffled male voices, she couldn’t make out what was being said.
She drifted closer to the window.
“Hey, stop,” Stephen ordered.
She put a finger to her lips, pressed against the wall so that she wouldn’t be seen through the glass. Then she managed to curl a finger under the sash and lift it slowly but surely until the voices drifted into the room.
“I told you, we haven’t seen her.”
“And if you had, you probably wouldn’t say, right?”
Lucy recognized the voice as belonging to the guy who’d lost a shoe in the swamp.
“What is it you want with this…Lucy is it?” Marcus asked.
“That ain’t none of your business.”
Then Justin said, “You boys don’t have any business here in LeBaux, so I suggest you take yourself back to New Orleans where you belong.”
“We never said we were from New Orleans.”
Lucy’s stomach knotted at the mistake. Now they were going to know…
“You didn’t have to say,” Justin went on. “No one from bayou country wears shoes like those.”
“They’re Italian!”
“And useless. City shoes.”
“He’s criticizing my shoes!” the guy obsessed with his footwear complained.
“Forget the damn shoes!” his companion groused.
Justin mildly added, “I was merely making an observation.”
Marcus didn’t say anything to that. No one did.
Lucy drifted closer to the window and chanced a peek out. The four men below were squared off as if gearing up for a fight. Heart hammering, Lucy prayed there wouldn’t be trouble. Dear Lord, she hadn’t meant to bring trouble to anyone. These men were killers!
“Marcus, Justin!” came a female voice from below. “I thought you boys wanted some of my crawfish étouffée. Get in here now, before it gets cold!”
Marie! Lucy winced, then saw Marie’s ploy worked. Marcus and Justin relaxed as if preparing to go inside, and the men backed off and headed for town.
Lucy paced, while Stephen merely waited patiently, quietly, so unlike his rowdier brothers.
A few minutes later, Justin opened the door to his old bedroom. “Go after them and see what they’re up to,” he told Stephen. “We’ll stay here until they leave town.”
“I’m on it.”
The moment Stephen left the room, Lucy asked, “What if they decide to stay over?”
“Then you’re stuck in this room with me for the duration.”
“You like to give orders, don’t you?”
“I like people to listen when I tell them to do something for their own good.”
She got the feeling this was a criticism. Of her? “People listen,” she muttered.
“Except when they can’t stay away from a window.”
“You couldn’t have seen me.”
“That’s your opinion. If one of them saw you…” He shook his head.
“All right, stop trying to scare me.”
Justin stepped close enough that his potent maleness seared her. “Are you scared, Lucy Ryan?”
“No,” she lied, and sat herself in a creaky old chair near a makeshift desk and away from him.
Of course she was scared.
Scared, tired and sore.
The wound was making itself known once more and she wasn’t feeling so good. As a matter of fact, her head felt a little woozy. Maybe she’d overdone it. Or maybe the adrenaline of the morning had simply worn off and exhaustion was finally overtaking her.
If she expected Justin to continue the discussion, she was disappointed. He remained at the window until a few minutes later Stephen’s voice snaked up the stairs.
“All clear! You can come down now.”
FLEETING SOUNDS of a mournful saxophone followed her as she sloshed through the rain. People were still coming in and out of restaurants. Even a torrent wouldn’t stop those revelers—they would still hop from bar to bar, determined to make every moment count.
Angry and upset as she made her way home, she forced herself to hold together…. Crying could wait until she got to the privacy of her own bedroom.
A block from the town house, she heard a splash behind her, but when she turned to look, she saw nothing but a puddle in the sidewalk. Even so, her flesh crawled and she practically raced down the wet street.
Laughter echoed from one doorway…moans from another. She pressed her hands to her ears and ran. By the time she got to the courtyard, the rain had intensified just like her pulse. Her heart was pumping like she was in the midst of an aerobic workout.
Then she saw him waiting for her, rivulets of wet sheening his face.