Authors: Nancy Gideon
“Her, who? You mean that sweet little doctor you
been sniffing after?” No sooner had he said those words than he was yanked up onto his toes, nearly strangling in his collar.
“If you bother her, if you even
think
about bothering her, I’ll be on you thick as spit on a sidewalk.”
Temper flaring as well, Philo gave Jacques a hard push, growling, “I got no interest in your pretty piece, so back the hell off ’fore I start thinking there’s some reason I
should
be givin’ her a closer look.”
Jacques let him go, caution overcoming aggression. Philo had become someone of influence, not on Savoie’s level, but a reckoning force within the clan nonetheless. He was not someone to provoke unnecessarily. And he was a friend. Jacques blew out a breath and placed his hands on Philo’s tense shoulders.
“I’m sorry, Tib. I didn’t mean to go all crazy on you. She’s got my eyes crossed and my head about to explode. I don’t know what I’m thinking half the time.”
A true ladies’ man, Philo was instantly sympathetic. “I doan think it’s your head that’s about to blow. What’s this about? Somebody spook your lady friend?”
“Broke into MacCreedy’s place, where she’s staying. She stumbled in on ’em. Says she didn’t get a look at ’em but scratched one of them on the neck.”
“What were they after? Did they take anything?”
Jacques shrugged. “She doesn’t have anything but that chip on her shoulder. Maybe it had something to do with MacCreedy. He rubbed some pretty bad characters the wrong way before settling here.”
“Could ask around if you like,” Philo offered, relaxing
his stance. “Maybe one of the boys knows something or heard something.”
“’Preciate it, Tib. This one’s special. Don’t know why, but she is.”
“You got her stashed away someplace for safekeeping?”
“She’s staying with me.”
Philo nearly choked on that. “At the trailer. Lordy, lord, I wouldn’t take no lady to a place like that.”
Jacques winced. “Didn’t have a choice. ’Sides, I mean to keep her close. That’ll make anyone out for mischief think twice.” He caught Philo’s right hand and lifted it into the light. “What’s that?”
Grinning fiercely, Philo pushed up his sleeve to reveal a new tattoo. “Me and the boys all got them.” The bold red and black tribal graphic was of a snarling wolf’s head on the swell of his forearm bleeding into flames that ran down over the back of his hand. “You’ll be seeing a lot more of them soon.”
“Subtle,” Jacques remarked, not sure why the tat bothered him, but he couldn’t shake his uneasiness. “How are Boyd and Nicky?” He felt bad for not following up on the two the Tracker had torn into at the club.
“Mending. Don’t suppose your lady stumbled on more like that one, do you?”
If she had, she wouldn’t be safely under his covers. MacCreedy would be washing her out of his carpet. Just the thought made Jacques queasy. “More I think on it, more it seems like just a break-in gone bad.”
“Probably just what it was. I’ll catch up with you later at the club.”
“See ya, Tib.”
Jacques watched his friend cross the wide dock area to where a cluster of his Patrol members were loitering. And he hated the suspicion hanging heavily on his heart.
Straightening his collar with a tug and a shrug, Philo Tibideaux was quickly surrounded by his followers like a leader circled by his pack. The gratifying feeling went a long way toward dulling the guilt he felt over lying to his friend. His shrewd gaze fixed on one of the others.
“Morris, you’d best be covering up them marks. LaRoche sees ’em, you won’t have anything left above your shoulders.”
The not-much-for-brains but obedient Morris put his hand over the gouges in his neck. “For a doctor, she sure were a feisty one. Nailed me before I could catch onto her.”
“Well, ’less you want Jacques to be catching on to you being the one who roughed up his lady, you’d best stay out of his sight. What did you boys find?”
“Nothing, Tib,” the other part of the duo, Anderson, spoke up. “Jus’ a lotta fancy clothes and this here picture. We didn’t get a chance to go through her purse with all the ruckus she was making.”
Philo took the photograph and studied it for a long, sinking moment before tucking it into his shirt pocket.
He took a breath and toughened his attitude. “I want to know more about this Dr. Duchamps. She just happens to show up and we got Trackers drooling down our necks? I don’t think it’s a coincidence. See what you can find out, but don’t let LaRoche know about it. What he doan know woan get us killed.”
Wondering how he was ever going to drag himself through a night behind the bar, Jacques unlocked the door to the trailer and opened it wide. He stood on the threshold, too startled to enter. He took a deep breath, wondering at the unfamiliar smell.
Clean.
Someone had been busy.
The vacuum he’d forgotten he owned shut off and Susanna emerged from the bedroom. For a moment, he forgot how to blink.
She had one of his blue bandanas tied about her head to keep the hair out of her eyes. A fine glimmer of perspiration shone on her brow and neck and dappled the gentle curve of breasts barely covered by the oversized shirt she had knotted beneath them. A pair of eye-popping short shorts topped gloriously bared legs, and painted toes peeped out of jeweled flip-flops.
“I thought I heard the door,” she said a bit breathlessly.
“Excuse me, ma’am. I think I must have walked into the wrong place. I’m looking for a Dr. Duchamps. Have you seen her?”
She laughed, fingertips toying with the cuffed hem
of her shorts, immediately drawing Jacques’s attention to the minuscule inseam. “Nica picked them out for me. Not exactly my taste in clothing but just right for a little housecleaning.” She blushed slightly. “I hope you don’t mind. I couldn’t find your copy of
The Scarlet Letter
. I started digging and one thing led to the other.” When he didn’t respond, she grew worried. “Please don’t be mad that I moved your things around. I think better when I’m busy and you told me to stay inside.”
“I’m not mad,” he said at last. “I’m mind-boggled. I didn’t know I had a rug.”
She grinned and relaxed. “A nice one, too. I found a whole set of matching glasses under the couch. And some rather risqué reading material.”
Now he blushed. “I don’t know how those got there. They’re not mine.”
“Then the other Jacques LaRoche must be wondering what happened to his subscription.”
As Susanna stood in the center of his alarmingly tidy room, all flushed and sexy and happy, Jacques’s world took a sudden turn in a direction he never would have believed. Here was a female dangerously close to capturing his well-guarded heart. And the thought of that provoked an adverse reaction.
“I don’t expect you to pay for your keep by being my maid. It’s beneath you.”
The wounded shock in her dark eyes was quickly masked as her chin tipped up defiantly. “There’s no shame in hard work. I enjoyed it and I enjoy breathing in here a lot better now.”
“I’m sorry my existence offends you.”
“Your existence doesn’t. Your attitude does.” Her nose wrinkled. “Go take a shower before you spoil all my efforts.”
“We can’t have that, can we?”
“No,” she said tartly, “we can’t. You’ve got just enough time before dinner.”
He stared at her. “You made dinner.”
“Well, no, not exactly. I’m warming it up. Nica brought some sort of beans and rice dish over. She thought we might starve to death on what’s in your refrigerator.”
“Good old thoughtful Nica.”
“Yes, isn’t she. Hurry up. I’ve got to finish making the bed.”
Now his jaw dropped. “You did my laundry?”
She shuddered delicately. “I’m not
that
grateful for a roof over my head. I bagged it up and Nica stuffed it in your trunk.”
He chuckled and asked, “How am I supposed to repay you for all this hard work on my behalf?”
“Oh, believe me, it was for my benefit, too.” She studied him for a moment through bold, bright eyes, and said, “But I’m sure I can think of some way.”
Jacques couldn’t get the water cold enough to curb the heat in that suggestion.
She’d done his dishes. She’d scrubbed his counter and tabletop. She’d tidied up the clutter and arranged his work space into a neat, efficient area. She’d rounded
up his wayward socks and stray T-shirts and the sundry cocktail napkins and matchbooks with names and phone numbers scrawled on them and probably alphabetized them in case he wanted to refer to them again. He didn’t and wouldn’t. And she’d put fresh sheets on his bed after sleeping in it.
He’d rather she left the old ones on so her scent would still be there.
He’d feared they’d be bumping into each other in the small space but the opposite was true. There was too much distance between them and he’d change that if he could.
If she’d let him. If his conscience would allow it.
Then suddenly that gap between them was filled with absent others: with his forgotten mate and her faraway family. Ghosts he brought with him to the table.
“Smells good,” he commented as he took a seat. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d used the table for a meal. Usually it was takeout on the couch or on the run.
“So do you,” she slipped in casually before adding, “Nica wanted me to tell you that Silas made it so you wouldn’t worry about her having a hand in the cooking.”
“Handy fellow, that Silas,” he grumbled as he filled his plate.
“You don’t like him much, do you?”
Jacques glanced up to find her intent gaze upon him. “Silas? He’s okay. Smart guy, cool head, good to Nica.”
“Then why do you see him as a threat?”
“I don’t,” he said too quickly. “He and I aren’t in the same league, that’s all. He’s educated, has been places, done things.”
“And you’re what?”
Her insightfulness was getting under his skin. “Not like that. Him and Savoie, they’re . . . they’re more like you.”
“Like me? Other than intelligent and attractive, I don’t see any similarities.”
He almost smiled at that unexpected bit of wit. He stared at her for a moment, searching for a hint of condescension but there wasn’t any. And then that annoyed him, too. “That’s enough, isn’t it?”
Susanna’s eyes narrowed but not before he saw a spark in them. Anger? What did she have to be pissed off about?
She took a dainty bite of her dinner, chewing thoughtfully before saying with deceptive mildness, “So, we’re the elite and you’re what? A big, burly beast? Is that how you see yourself?”
“That’s how you see me, isn’t it?”
She refused to be provoked. “Do you want to know what I see? I see an ambitious, too-attractive-for-my-own-good male, though I’d prefer a bit more hair on your head, who has two successful careers, is respected by his peers, and is determined to improve not only his situation but that of those around him. That’s what I see. But if you’d prefer the role of dumb, downtrodden brute, there’s nothing
wrong
with that. The expectations wouldn’t be as challenging. I would have thought you enjoyed a challenge. All these books and magazines would suggest that. I could be mistaken, but since I’m so terribly clever, I think not.”
He met her cool stare for a long beat, then let out a booming laugh. He was still smiling as he started to fork up his meal with renewed gusto. “Got me all figured out, do you? You being so smart and all.”
She cocked her head to one side, her lips pursing. “Oh, no. You’re not that simple, Jacques LaRoche. There are some very deep pockets I find intriguingly dark.”
“Too bad those deep pockets aren’t filled with cash,” he muttered.
“Cash is overrated.”
“Easy to say if you have it.”
A soft, sexy chuckle. “You’ve got something I value more. Honesty.”
“Come from a long line of wealthy liars up north, do you?”
Some of the lightness went out of her expression. “Truth is flexible where I come from. We hide from it or hide behind it but never exactly stand up for it.”
Jacques regarded her with interest. “Now who’s pretending, doc? I take you for one of those straight-from-the-hip types who doesn’t tolerate bullshit.” He grinned. “Even when it’s as attractively wrapped as mine is.”
She didn’t smile. The sudden sadness in her eyes
made him regret his teasing. “I live the same lies that we all have to. One does what one must to survive.”
“Now you sound like MacCreedy.” Then a shock of insight came to Jacques. “When you said earlier that you were afraid all the time, I thought you meant here. But you were talking about your life up north, weren’t you?”
She stared at her mostly untouched plate, tension defining the line of her shoulders. “It’s like balancing on a high wire, always careful, always mindful of the slightest shift in the breeze, the slightest sway of the tightrope. Because the fall is sudden, long, and fatal, and there’s no net to catch you.”
“I’d catch you.”
She smiled then, a sorrowful curve. “If you tried, you’d fall, too.”
“Then you wouldn’t be alone, would you? Stay here.”
That just blurted from him before he could think it over.
Here, with me
.
Susanna’s dark eyes softened, then filled with anguish. She turned her head away, blinking quickly. “I love it here. It’s so alive, so full of things to experience, to enjoy.” She drew a deep breath and faced him somberly. “I’m not alone, Jacques, and I can’t let Pearl take that fall with me. I won’t.”
Of course not. “And that’s why you’re not like the rest of them, isn’t it? That’s why you have to be so careful where you step, because you care about someone other than yourself while the rest of them are just
self-centered hypocrites.” His tone toughened. “What about this mate of yours? He’d just stand by and let you take a tumble?”
“No,” she said with a conviction that pricked Jacques’s heart. “Damien took a risk he didn’t have to in order to protect me, to protect my daughter. He’s an honorable man, a good man, but there’s only so much he can do, that I’d allow him to do. You don’t understand what it’s like in our world. The dangers, the secrets, the plotting and politics. You say the wrong thing to the wrong person, you stand out when you should blend. You laugh too loud or smile too wide. It’s a cold, airless prison, and I hate it.”