Нора Робертс - Midnight Bayou

"How long have you had it?”

"Let's see now." She'd already eaten her single slice, so speared a forkful of one of the four she'd piled on his plate. "Going on six years now.”

"You opened a bar when you were twenty-three?”

"Hey, how do you know how old I am?”

"Remy.”

She looked up at the ceiling. "Et la! Gonna have to take a strip off his ass for that. Man oughta know better than flapping about a woman's age. What else he flap about?”

Declan gave his breakfast his undivided attention. "This is really great. What do you put in this stuff?”

She said nothing for a full ten seconds. "I see. Men just can't stop themselves from crowing about their sexual exploits.”

Uneasy, for himself and his friend, Declan replied, "It wasn't like that. It was nostalgic. And it was sweet. You meant something to him. You still do.”

"It's a good thing for him I know that. And that I feel the same. Do you remember the first girl you got into the backseat, Declan? Do you remember her fondly?”

"Sherry Bingham. A pretty little blond. I loved her desperately through most of my junior year in high school.”

She liked him for coming out with a name, instantly. Even if he'd made it up. "What happened?”

"She dumped me for a football player. Left tackle. Jesus, a football player with no neck and the IQ of a pencil. I'm still pissed off at her. But to get back to you-and by the way, you're really good at deflecting personal questions, but I was a lawyer. Anyway, how did you manage to pull it off? Twenty-three's pretty young to establish a business, one that's proven itself out when most go under within three years.”

She leaned back. "What difference does it make? Counselor.”

"Okay." He shrugged and kept eating. "I'll just assume you robbed a bank, paid off the Mob, seduced then murdered the previous owner– after he left you the building in his will. And continue to run illegal gambling and prostitutes out of the back room.”

"Why I've been so busy. But I like your version better. Mine's very dull in comparison. I worked after school and summers, saved my pennies. I'm very good at saving pennies if I need to. Then I worked, tending bar, serving drinks, and went to business school part-time. Just before I turned twenty-two, my grandpapa died. Fell off a ladder, broke his damn fool neck.”

Her eyes filled as she said it. "Guess I'm still pissed off at him.”

"I'm sorry." He covered her hand with his. "You were close.”

"I loved him more than any man in the world. Pete Simone, with his big laugh and his big hands. He played the fiddle and always carried a red bandanna. Always. Well …" She blinked away the tears. "He had an insurance policy, bigger than it ought to have been considering. Half for me, half for Grandmama. In the end she made me take all of it. Nothing you can do to change her mind when she digs her heels in. So I invested the money, and a year later I opened my place.”

"There's nothing dull about that. You run a good bar, Lena.”

"Yes, I do." She rose, picked up the plates. "You'd best get yourself dressed, cher, if you want a ride home.”

He couldn't talk her into coming inside. He had to settle for a mind-numbing kiss before she pushed him out of her car and drove away.

Arriving home at nine in the morning in a wrinkled suit gained him a grin and a wink from Big Frank as the man carted dead tree limbs to a burn pile.

"You fell into some luck last night, Mister Dec.”

Into something, Declan thought and, rubbing his heart, went into the house to get to work.

She wouldn't see him that night, or the next. He had to content himself with phone calls that made him feel like a teenager as he wandered the house with his portable phone and rattled his brains for any conversational ploy that would keep her on the line.

Mardi Gras celebrations, and business, were under way, she told him. While they were, she didn't have time to come out and play.

He knew when he was being tested and stalled and tangled. And decided he'd let her string out his line. Until he reeled her in.

Remy dropped by one afternoon wearing Hugo Boss and gold beads. He took the beads off, tossed them over Declan's head. "When you coming into town?”

"I thought I might join the insanity over the weekend.”

"Cher, it's Mardi Gras. Every night's the weekend.”

"Not out here. Come take a look." He led the way into the parlor, where Tibald was high on a ladder patiently detailing the ceiling plasterwork.

"Hey, Tibald." Remy hooked his thumbs into his pockets and craned his neck back. "That's some job.”

"It surely is. How's Effie doing these days?”

"Driving me to drink with wedding plans. Picked out the cake yesterday, and you'd think it was a matter of life and death whether it has yellow rosebuds or full-blown roses around the edges.”

"Best thing a man can do in these situations is nod at whatever she likes best, and just show up on the day.”

"You might've said something of that nature before I told her I liked the big, fat roses when it turned out she had her mind set on the buds." He pulled a small bottle of Tylenol out of his pocket. "You got something I can down this with, Dec? That woman's given me the mother of all headaches.”

Declan picked up a half-empty bottle of water. "Did you come out here to hide?”

"Till she cools off." Gulping down the pills and water, Remy wandered over the drop cloth. "You do these walls in here, Dec, or you hire them out?”

"I did them." Pleased, Declan ran his fingers over the smooth surface of the Paris green walls. "Spent the last three days on this room." And nights, he thought. "I think this color will make the room seem cooler than a patterned paper, and I like the way it looks with the trim.”

"You're a regular Bob Vila and Martha Stewart combined. What do you tackle next?”

"The library. Still some details to deal with in here, and the kitchen, but the library's on the slate for next week. After that, I'm hoping to move outside for a while. Give me a couple of those aspirin.”

"Sure." Remy handed over the pills and the water. "You got work problems or female problems?”

"A little of both. Come out on the back gallery, take a look at what the Franks have done with the rear gardens.”

"Heard you escorted our Lena around in a big, white limo a few nights ago," Remy said as they walked toward the back of the house. "Classy stuff.”

"I'm a classy guy." He handed the water back to Remy and opened the French doors of the dining room.

"You got romancing her in mind, that's a good start.”

"I've got more than that in mind," Declan said as Remy tipped back the bottle. "I'm going to marry her.”

Water spewed out as Remy choked.

"Pretty good spit take," Declan commented. "Keep the bottle.”

"Jesus, Dec. Jesus Christ, you and Lena are getting married?”

"I'd like to have the wedding here, in the fall. September maybe." He scanned his gallery, his gardens. He wondered what kind of bird it was that was currently singing its lungs out. "The place won't be finished, but that'd be part of the charm. Of course, if it takes me longer to pin her down, we could do it next spring.”

"That's some fast work.”

"Not really. It's just a matter of keeping at it." He smiled now as he studied Remy's baffled face. "Oh, you don't mean the house. Lena. I haven't asked her yet. She'd just say no. Look out there, bulbs coming up. Daffodils, tulips, calla lilies, the Franks tell me. Buried under all those weeds and vines, maybe blooming under it for years. That's something.”

"Dec, I think you need something stronger than Tylenol.”

"I'm not crazy. I'm in love with her. I'm starting to think I was in love with her before I even met her. That's why there was never anyone else who really mattered. Not like this. Because she was here, and I just hadn't found her yet.”

"Maybe I need something stronger.”

"Bourbon's in the kitchen. Ice is in the cooler. New frig is due to come in tomorrow.”

"I'm fixing us both a drink.”

"Make mine short and weak," Dec told him absently. "I've got work to do yet today.”

Remy brought back two glasses and took a long sip of his as he studied Declan's face. "Declan, I love you like a brother.”

"I know you do.”

"So, I'm going to talk to you like I would a brother-if I had one instead of being plagued with sisters.”

"You think I've lost my mind.”

"No. In some situations, hell, in most situations, a man thinks with his dick. By the time that thought process works all the way to his head, he usually sees that situation more clearly.”

"I appreciate you explaining that to me, Dad.”

Remy only shook his head and paced up and down the gallery. "Lena's a very sexy woman.”

"No argument there.”

"She just sort of exudes those pheromones or whatever the hell they are the way other women do the perfume they splash on to get a man stirred up. She stirs you up just by breathing." "You're trying to tell me I'm infatuated, or in the heavy wave of first lust.”

"Exactly." Remy laid a supportive hand on Declan's shoulder. "Not a man alive would blame you for it. Add to that, son, you've had a rough few months on the relationship train, and knowing the way you cart guilt around like it was your personal treasure chest, I don't imagine you've been clearing your pipes regular since you broke it off with Jennifer.”

"Jessica, you asshole." Amused, touched, Declan leaned back on the baluster. "It's not infatuation. I thought it was, with a good dose of that lust tossed in. But that's not it. It's not a matter of clogged pipes, and I'm not thinking with my dick. It's my heart.”

"Oh, brother." Remy took another good gulp of whiskey. "Dec, you haven't been down here a full month yet.”

"People are always saying something like that, as if time is a factor." And because the critical part of his brain had said the same thing, he was irritated to hear the sentiment from his closest friend. "What, is there a law somewhere that states you can't fall in love until a reasonable, rational period of time has passed during which the parties will socialize, communicate and, if possible, engage in sexual intercourse in order to assure compatibility? If there is, and it worked, explain the divorce rate.”

"A couple of lawyers stand here debating the subject, we'll be here till next Tuesday.”

"Then let me say this. I've never felt like this before, never in my life. I didn't think I could. I figured something inside me just didn't work the way it was supposed to.”

"Well, for Christ's sake, Dec.”

"I couldn't love Jessica." The guilt slid back into his voice. "I just couldn't, and I tried to. I damn near settled for affection, respect and mutual backgrounds because I thought it was all I'd get, or be able to give. But it's not. I've never felt like this, Remy," he said again. "And I like it.”

"If you want Lena, then I want her for you. The thing is, Dec, no matter how you feel, it doesn't guarantee she's going to feel the same.”

"Maybe she'll break my heart, but feeling too much is a hell of a lot better than feeling nothing." He'd been telling himself that, repeatedly, since he'd realized he was in love with her. "One way or the other, I've got to try.”

He swirled the whiskey he'd yet to drink. "She doesn't know what to make of me," Declan murmured. "It's going to be fun letting her find out.”

That night, he heard weeping. A man's raw and broken sobs. Declan tossed in sleep, weighed down with the grief, unable to stop it, unable to give or seek comfort.

Even when silence came, the sorrow stayed.

He didn't know why he came here, to stare at the water while thick green shadows spread around him, as night gathered to eat away at the day.

But he came, time and again, to wander through the marsh as if he would somehow come upon her, strolling along the curve of the river where the swamp flowers blossomed.

She would smile at him, hold out her hand.

And everything would be right again.

Nothing would ever be right again.

He was afraid he was going mad, that grief was darkening his mind as night darkened the day. How else could he explain how he could hear her whispering to him in the night? What could he do but shut off the sound of her, the pain of her?