LORETTA WASN’T SURE what had changed. She still had a mess on her hands, with too many food vendors and not enough space. She still wasn’t completely happy with her artisanal breads and couldn’t figure out exactly how she would promote her bakery at the festival. But her problems didn’t seem quite so serious now.
She couldn’t believe that an hour of wild sex could make such a huge difference in her life. But after she came home from Luc’s and returned to her baking, everything seemed different. She was relaxed. She felt a sense of peace. She was able to add up columns of numbers with ease, and her formerly unmanageable budget didn’t seem like such a bear.
Even Zara sensed Loretta’s new attitude. “Did anything happen while I was at my fiddle lesson?” she asked innocently.
Loretta tensed. “What do you mean?”
“You just seem happier. You’re not psycho like you were this morning.”
“Zara, it’s not nice to refer to your mother as psycho, even if she is.”
“Sorry. How about whacko?”
“I’m just feeling like I have things under control, now that Luc has promised to help me with my music festival stuff. We’re going to meet tomorrow at Grandma and Granddaddy’s house to work out all the details. Oh, and he’s going to get my crawdads from Bryan at a decent price-he promised.”
“That’s good, because I left the ones I caught at Luc’s.”
Loretta’s serenity lasted only until the following afternoon, when the meeting actually took place, because Luc’s grandmother came with him. She’d invited herself, apparently. The woman was eighty-five years old-she announced this herself almost before introductions were over-yet she was remarkably well-preserved. Although slightly stooped, she was slim and vibrated with energy. She had gorgeous bone structure and clear, smooth skin. She wore her silver hair in a French roll, a jeweled comb adorning it.
Her sharp, darting eyes seemed to miss nothing.
Luc carried in a large box, and they all settled in the living room. Adele Castille fixed them all sweet iced tea and served cookies, and Celeste seemed to appreciate the civility of it. She managed not to get a single crumb on anything.
“Now, then, Luc,” Celeste said, taking control of the meeting, “if you’ll open that box, there are some things I wish to show you all.”
Luc followed directions, and the first thing he pulled out was a sort of presentation album. Celeste laid it on the coffee table and opened it. “I took the liberty of having my interior designer draw up some plans for the booth. Now, don’t worry about the expense. We can borrow a few things from the B and B.”
Loretta almost fainted at the lavish drawing. Celeste wanted to deck out their booth like the Taj Mahal.
“It’s beautiful,” she said, meaning it. “But I’m afraid our space isn’t that big.”
“Then how are we going to display all the pictures?” Celeste nodded at the box.
Luc began pulling photographs and news clippings out of the box-some of them framed, some not. They were a treasure trove of Indigo history, dating back as early as the Civil War. There were even pictures from the old Indigo plantations that had given the town its name, and each was meticulously described and dated.
“My family has always been interested in history,” Celeste explained. “These pictures belonged mostly to my father. Blanchards have been a part of Indigo’s history for hundreds of years. This music festival is the perfect opportunity to highlight that history-and the history of the whole town, of course,” she added.
Loretta marveled at the pictures a few moments longer. She found photos of the B and B-the huge oak trees that surrounded it now had been much smaller-and some of the opera house.
“Hey,” Vincent said, “there’s my grandfather! He captained a mail boat that ran up and down the Bayou Teche way back when.”
Just then, Loretta got a brainstorm. “What if we used this idea for the opera house, instead of our booth? People are going to be touring the building anyway, and there will be some performers there. We could make the second-floor gallery into a temporary museum. And we could give you the credit, Mrs. Robichaux. We could make up a plaque.”
Celeste seemed pleased. “I was thinking of donating these things to the town to start a collection of some sort. I have letters and some other museum-quality artifacts, too.”
Adele clapped her hands together, excited as a child. “That would be wonderful! And so educational for the children.” She was a retired schoolteacher who still volunteered at the school.
“Um, not to be a wet blanket,” Luc said, “but who’s going to make all this happen? Loretta and I have our hands full with coordinating the food.”
“I’ll do it,” Adele said, full of enthusiasm. “I have too much time on my hands, anyway. With your input, of course, Mrs. Robichaux. And we’ll have to get the cooperation of Marjolaine Savoy, who’s coordinating the festival. But she’s also on the committee to resurrect the opera house, so I can’t imagine she’ll object.”
Celeste obviously enjoyed being deferred to. “We can work together. Perhaps we can form our own committee. I’ll bet Michel would enjoy working on this, as well.”
“Who is Michel?” Adele asked.
“I believe you all know him as ‘Doc.’”
Did Celeste’s eyes sparkle just a bit at the mention of the town’s charming doctor? Oh, surely that was just Loretta’s imagination.
“What about the booth?” Luc objected. “Promoting our businesses? Wasn’t that the point?”
But Celeste seemed less interested in a booth now that she had a better plan for showcasing her family history. “Whatever you think is best, Luc. You know the hotel business better than me. Mrs. Castille, shall we walk over to the opera house and have a look at the space? Perhaps Miss Savoy would join us.”
“Great idea,” Adele said. “I’ll get my camera and a tape measure. And please, call me Adele.”
Zara popped in, out of breath from playing outside with the Castilles’ Labrador retriever, Bubba. “Mama, can I go to the opera house with Grandma and Mrs. Robichaux?”
Loretta struggled for a reason to say no. Probably Mrs. Robichaux wouldn’t want to be distracted by a small child. But before she could answer, Celeste spoke up.
“By all means, child, come with us. I daresay you can stand to learn a bit more about your town’s history.”
“Oh, I know lots about history, ’cause Grandma is a teacher.”
“Zara, don’t contradict your elders,” Loretta said.
But Celeste was smiling. “I can tell you a few things you would never learn in school.”
“I’ll bet she has a few stories, too,” Vincent said after the trio left through the front door. “In the summers, when the Blanchards and Robichauxs were still using the summer house, I used to hang out with Pierre. We were just little kids, but we found more ways to get in trouble. And your grandmother, no offense, used to scare the bejeezus out of me.”
“You knew my father?” Luc leaned forward in his chair, eyes keen with interest.
“Your father?” Vincent repeated. “You mean Pierre? Oh. I didn’t make the connection. I mean, I knew you were Celeste’s grandson, but I thought you were one of Anne’s kids.”
“I was just wondering what my father was like as a kid,” Luc said. “I didn’t know him very well. He didn’t hang around long.”
“Oh, Pierre, he was a hot-headed one. Always with the big ideas, big plans. Everyone liked him, and he could draw anyone into his schemes. The girls, they especially liked him.” Vincent studied Luc. “You look a little bit like him. Not your coloring. But something about your eyes, and the shape of your chin.”
Luc rubbed his chin self-consciously. “Maybe we should get back to planning the booth.”
Loretta’s heart ached for Luc, for the father he never quite had and the obvious hole it had left in his life. Zara often expressed curiosity about her absent father, and Loretta answered her questions as honestly as she could. But it was only recently that she’d begun to sense a yearning in her, too.
Maybe it was only now that her little girl fully realized what she was missing.
THE PLANNING of the booth went fairly smoothly. Loretta and Luc decided to drape colorful fabric as a backdrop and would each have a banner made bearing their logo. Luc would have brochures and photos on hand, and a raffle for a free weekend stay at the B and B, while Loretta and her father would offer free samples as well as sell their goods. When they’d nailed down the details, Vincent left to tend to his bees.
Luc and Loretta moved to the back porch, where a pillowed porch swing allowed them to take in the setting sun and the muted autumn colors of the woods and the beehives.
Luc wasted no time in pulling Loretta into his arms and kissing her. “I’ve been waiting all day to do that.”
“Me, too. I’m going to tell my parents tonight at dinner that we’re…you know. Seeing each other.”
“You probably won’t have to tell them. Not your mother, anyway. Grand-mère will fill her in.”
Loretta gasped. “I forgot all about that-she saw me prancing around in your bathrobe. But she wouldn’t gossip, would she? Seems like she has more manners than that.”
“She’ll say whatever it takes to make everyone around her as uncomfortable as possible. That’s her mission in life.”
“Really? She doesn’t strike me that way. A little starchy, maybe…”
“Starchy? That woman is so mean-” But he stopped himself. That was his father talking. Pierre had filled Luc’s head with stories about his mother, about how manipulative she was, how cruel. He said she’d virtually kicked him out from the bosom of his family and cheated him out of what was rightfully his.
But after spending time with the Marchands-his Aunt Anne and her daughters-he’d realized how wrong Pierre had been. Anne had grieved for her missing brother and had spent a lot of time, energy and money trying to track him down. And apparently her husband Remy had given Pierre a huge sum of money to pay off his gambling debts in the Cayman Islands, something Pierre had never mentioned.
Luc even had to admit that Celeste was not the monster Pierre had described.
“What is it?” Loretta asked.
“She’s not mean,” Luc corrected himself. “But she is controlling, and she expects people to fall into line behind her no matter what. She might feel it’s her duty to inform your mother of our, um, whatever you want to call it.”
“It’s a relationship, Luc. Does that word scare you?”
He laughed. “No. That just seems such a lofty word when this is all so new.”
“Well, it’s a better word than ‘fling’ or ‘affair.’”
“Definitely.” He kissed her again, but then she forced him back to business. She had lists to go over with him, contacts and phone numbers for those she’d already contacted regarding the VIP dinner. Then she handed him the folder. “Promise me I won’t hear another word about this dinner until the night of the event. Then, I’ll be there with bells on to serve food or wait tables or pour wine.”
“That’s a deal.” Which meant he would be the one coordinating with Melanie. That was okay-his cousins had softened toward him a lot. And the less time Melanie spent with Loretta, the less chance she would get to spill the beans about his past.
“MAMA, GUESS WHAT? Tante Celeste bought me an ice-cream cone.”
Loretta was in her mother’s kitchen getting things started for their regular Sunday family dinner together when Zara burst in, breathless with excitement.
“Tante Celeste?”
“She told me to call her that. She said she has a granddaughter named Sylvie who’s an artist and has red hair, just like me, and that I’m like she was when she was younger.”
“That’s very sweet of her.”
Zara’s gaze hadn’t stopped darting around since she’d walked in the door. “Where’s Luc?”
“He had to go home. He has guests to take care of at the B and B. But I told him either Grandma or I would take Mrs. Robichaux home.”
“You don’t have to. Miss Marjo took her. They got all excited talking about the opera house.”
Well. Celeste was winning fans right and left. “Where’s Grandma?”
“She went to find Granddaddy, I think. What’s for dinner?”
“Roast beef with mashed potatoes.” She put Zara to work making a salad, but Loretta’s hands shook. Had Celeste gossiped about her and Luc? She had no reason to think her parents would disapprove. In fact, they often reminded her that she was still a very young woman and urged her to get out more and socialize. They both seemed to like Luc.
Still, it was unnerving. They’d been so disapproving of Jim, and so hurt when she’d run off and married him without their blessing. So dating was kind of a sore subject, for her, at least. Anyway, she’d wanted to be the one to tell them she was seeing Luc-and to do it without Zara around.
She would tell Zara tomorrow, when Luc came to their house to pick Loretta up for their first official date.
When her parents returned from tending the bees, she watched them closely to see if they knew anything, but they seemed perfectly normal.
She waited until after dessert, when she sent Zara to watch TV. “Don’t I have to help clean the kitchen?” she asked, puzzled.
“Not tonight. You can have the night off.”
Zara didn’t question her good fortune and dashed into the den. Vincent tried to wander off himself, but Loretta called him back.
“I have something to tell you all,” she announced.
Her mother put a hand to her mouth. “Oh, my God, you’re pregnant.”
“Mama! No.” At least that little matter had been laid to rest. As of a couple of days ago, she was sure she wasn’t pregnant. “But Luc and I are seeing each other.”
“Oh.”
“Is that your big news?” Vincent asked. “We knew that was coming. Saw it a mile off. “
“You could have clued me in.”
“Everyone in town knew.”
“What? Since when?”
“I dunno,” Vincent said, glancing at the newspaper.
“Any fool could see you two are besotted with one another,” Adele said. “Even before we talked about Luc the other day, I knew. About a month ago, we ran into him at the grocery store, remember? And your face got all pink, and you two talked about which fruits were in season. I knew then.”
Loretta remembered the incident well. She’d been tongue-tied, which was unusual, and later she realized it was because her mother was right there, and she was embarrassed by the surge of inappropriate sexual longing that had descended on her in front of the blueberries.
“I wish you’d told me,” Loretta said.
“Well, I’m glad it’s official. Zara told me a couple of weeks ago she thought Luc was going to be her new daddy.”
“Ah, Zara. I had to straighten things out with her. Luc and I aren’t that serious. I mean, we’re taking things one day at a time. Luc’s a bit commitment-shy and, frankly, I’m not sure I ever want to get married again.”
“Oh, Loretta.” Adele said it the way she might if Loretta had just announced she had a fatal disease.
“Seriously. Zara had Luc and I married off when we’d never even held hands. I had to disabuse her of those notions. So don’t go putting any ideas in her head, okay?”
“Who, us?” Vincent said as he put away the dishes Loretta was drying by hand. Her mother had a perfectly good dishwasher but for some unknown reason didn’t like to use it.
Adele turned off the water and dried her hands. “But why wouldn’t you want to marry someone as nice as Luc?”
“For one thing, he has no plans to stay in Indigo. Once the B and B renovation is complete, he’s leaving. And I’m not.”
“Oh. I see. Well, I’d rather you didn’t move away. But sometimes a woman has to follow her man.”
Loretta was shocked. “That’s not what you said about Jim.”
“Jim was an itinerant sharecropper without a dime to his name and he had shifty eyes,” Adele explained. “I didn’t want you going anywhere with him-or staying here with him, for that matter. Luc is an entirely different matter. Besides, you’re grown up now. Yes, I want you and Zara close by. But I also want to see you happy.”
“I am happy, Mama. I have wonderful parents, a wonderful daughter, a business I love. If I could have a man, too, that’d be great, but it’s not a necessity.”
“Hmm,” her father said.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“I’D LIKE TO SEE my new boat, please.”
Luc had been dreading this moment since Celeste’s arrival two days earlier. She’d initially loved the idea of offering cruises to the B and B guests, but she’d become downright balky when it came to forking over the dough to buy a boat.
But Luc had talked her into it, confident he had plenty of time to refurbish the grimy pontoon boat he’d found before she saw it.
All he’d done so far was hose off several years of accumulated swamp scum. He still needed to replace the cushions and canopy. It was, however, seaworthy, and the engine was in perfect running order.
But Celeste wouldn’t focus on that.
“Good morning, Grand-mère,” Luc said with faux cheerfulness, as he continued to beat the eggs for the omelets he had planned. With only two guests in residence, plus Celeste, he could afford to get fancy. He was going to customize each omelet, cooking it to order. “I can show you the boat right after breakfast.” He saw no other choice; it was her boat.
“Very good,” she said. “Now then, for breakfast, I’d like one plain croissant with butter and strawberry jam and two slices of lean, crisp bacon. Also some hot, decaffeinated tea with honey.”
A plain croissant. It figured Celeste would ask for the one thing Loretta hadn’t delivered earlier that morning. “How about a chocolate croissant? Or an almond one?”
She looked scandalized. “Why would anyone want to ruin a perfectly good, traditional French pastry with a lot of sugar and other nonsense?”
He took it that meant no. “I’m sorry, Grand-mère, I don’t have any plain croissants. I have white, wheat, rye and pumpernickel bread, cranberry orange muffins, low-fat blueberry muffins, coffee cake-”
“What is the point of sleeping with a baker if she doesn’t provide you with the correct breads?”
Luc gritted his teeth. His grandmother had made a career of provoking people. Sometimes he thought she was testing him to see how far she could push him before he blew-before he proved he was his father’s son, lost his temper and walked out on her and her bed-and-breakfast. At which point she could have him arrested and force him to serve the remainder of his sentence behind bars.
He wouldn’t play her game; he wouldn’t give her the satisfaction.
“I’m not merely sleeping with Loretta,” he said, keeping his voice even. “She’s a very special person to me. I have a great deal of admiration and respect for her. But since I am not psychic, I didn’t know that you would require a plain croissant this morning. So would you like one of the other choices? I can manage the bacon and the tea and all the rest.”
He could have sworn the right corner of Celeste’s mouth turned up, just slightly. So she was playing him for her own amusement.
“I’ll just have what everyone else is having,” she said. “And coffee is fine, never mind the tea. I’m used to having whatever I want at the Hotel Marchand when I visit, and I forget that a bed-and-breakfast is set up differently. Is there a newspaper I might read while I’m waiting?”
He softened slightly. Maybe he was judging her too harshly. “In the dining room. There are three different ones.” He was almost afraid to offer her the omelet choices. Although he had nine different fillings on hand, she was sure to want something unavailable-anchovies or truffles.
A few minutes later, however, he was pleasantly surprised. His guests raved about the omelets, and Celeste ate a cinnamon roll and a chocolate croissant, obviously enjoying them. The couple from Mobile lured Celeste into conversation about some mutual acquaintances.
When the table was cleared and the dishwasher loaded, Doc tapped on the kitchen door and leaned his head in. “Anyone home?”
“Hey, Doc,” Luc greeted him, “come on in. What brings you around so early?” Doc usually saw patients in the morning on Mondays and Wednesdays-it was as close to retired as he’d been able to get.
“Oh, just out for my morning constitutional. Thought I’d stop by-oh, hello, Celeste. I didn’t think you would be up so early.”
“Early? It’s almost nine o’clock.”
Doc laughed at her curt tone as he poured himself a cup of coffee. “Why, I remember when you were a girl, your mama had a hard time prying you out of bed before noon!”
Celeste glared at Doc. “I don’t think Luc is interested in my girlhood lack of discipline.”
“On the contrary, Grand-mère, I find the details about your past very interesting, especially after seeing all those old pictures you brought.”
Doc grinned, obviously enjoying Celeste’s discomfort, so Celeste did the only thing she could under the circumstances. She took control by changing the subject. “Luc was about to show me the boat he manipulated me into buying.”
Doc’s smile vanished. He’d seen the boat. He could predict Celeste’s reaction as easily as Luc could.
“Manipulated?” Luc objected. “You were the one who wanted to do more to attract the music festival crowd to the B and B.”
“I got caught up in your enthusiasm,” she insisted. “Temporarily.”
“A boat’s a good idea,” Doc interjected. “You wouldn’t believe what people around here charge for a swamp tour. Everyone’s all keen to see a gator, or an ivory-billed woodpecker.”
Celeste stood and smoothed the front of her impeccably pressed beige trousers. “Well, let’s go have a look at this barge, then. Does it run? Can we take it out on the water?”
“Of course it runs,” Luc said. “I wouldn’t buy a boat that doesn’t run. If Doc will watch the B and B for a few minutes-”
“The B and B can take care of itself,” Celeste said. “I want Doc to come with us.”
Good. Celeste was usually on better behavior when non-family members were around.
Luc got the boat keys, then they all went out the kitchen door and around to a wide, red-brick path that meandered across the gently sloping lawn toward the bayou, the same area where he’d found Zara hunting crawfish the previous week. Bricks eventually gave way to a wooden boardwalk over the squishy ground, and then to the dock where the boat was tied.
“Michel, would you give me your arm, please?” Celeste said, her voice almost coquettish. “I’m not wearing proper shoes for boating.”
“Of course, my dear.”
Luc resisted the urge to turn and stare at his grandmother. She was flirting with Doc! And Doc was flirting back. Luc shut his mind to the possibility. He refused to entertain the idea of his grandmother and Doc…what? Dating?
Did octogenarians do more than hold hands?
Luc squeezed his eyes shut and opened them again. “Well, here she is.” He fervently wished he’d parked the boat nose-in the last time he’d taken it out, but he’d backed it up instead. A few leaves had collected on the faded green-and-white canopy, which was folded down for storage, but otherwise the boat didn’t look as bad as he’d thought.
It was the boat’s name, though, that caused him to wince.
Celeste studied the vessel from stem to stern with a keen eye. “Well, now, it doesn’t look so bad. It’s got good lines.”
“I thought so,” Luc said. As a child he’d been interested in boats and had studied pictures and read about them. He’d also worked a huge marine trade show in Las Vegas every year for three years before he’d left home. When he’d lived in Thailand he’d gotten out on the water every chance he had, so he knew a bit about water-craft.
“Let’s see what she can-” Celeste stopped midsentence. “Oh. Mon Dieu, does that say…?” She was staring at the back of the boat. She’d seen it, the name.
“That’s what it says, all right,” Doc said. “Bitchin’ Mama.”