A Better Reason to Fall in Love (8 page)

Naomi looked up from her texting, triumphantly smiling as she said, “Yes. Professor Anthony Lowery. He’s in town again this weekend, and he’s taking me to dinner tonight.”

“Oooo! Tell us if he’s a good kisser,” Emmy teased.

“I swear, Emmy. Don’t you think about anything else?” Naomi exclaimed, shaking her head in displaying disapproval—although the blush on her cheeks and the breadth of her smile spoke volumes in revealing her true feelings.

Once she’d parked the car, Tabby hurried to get out of it. She couldn’t wait! She’d heard wonderful things about the restaurant. Her dad and mom had tried it out the week before and raved about the food and atmosphere. They felt it beat any restaurant in the city for both.

Tabby smiled as she studied the building for a moment. An old house restored to closely resemble what it had looked like a hundred or more years ago, Sweet Genevieve’s was as inviting as a dream. The building was very rustic in appearance. Its weathered wood siding reminded Tabby of something someone might see on a tour of the old South, maybe something near a river or bayou. What looked to be lilac trees enveloped its perimeter, and Tabby could only imagine how alluring the scene would be in late spring when the lilacs were in full bloom.

“Okay, Tabby,” Naomi said, smiling. “I like it.”

Tabby smiled, enchanted as they crossed the parking lot to hear classic blues music drifting over the air. The outward appearance of the restaurant combined with the piped blues music was like a lure—some kind of hypnotic lure one could almost taste—at least for Tabby.

Stepping into the restaurant had an even more sensational effect on her. The lights were dimmed, naturally, the entire interior done in roughly finished wood. Spanish moss hung from the large ceiling beams painted to look like cypress limbs. Fishnets adorned many of the walls, and in one corner was a water feature with a pond at its base filled with fish. Several taxidermied alligators were placed in and about the entry, and several small boats turned upside down served as benches. The entire ambiance of the restaurant was surreal. Tabby felt as if she’d stepped out of the office and into some bayou in the Deep South! The titillating aromas of fish fry, spices, and Tabasco sauce caused her stomach to growl on the spot, and she couldn’t wait to be seated—to look at a menu and hear the noontime entertainment that was supposed to be part of the Sweet Genevieve’s experience.

A hostess podium stood just inside the door. As Tabby glanced around the interior of the restaurant, she saw that the hostess podium seemed to serve as the median between the side of the restaurant to the left—obviously housing the kitchen and patron dining tables—and the lesser area to the right—which was still very spacious but filled with chairs and a few smaller tables facing a small, raised platform stage.

At the sight of the stage, Tabby smiled. Her dad had assured her Sweet Genevieve’s featured live music during lunch and dinner on the weekends—blues and jazz. Tabby knew at once that, though the Acapulco would probably always be Jocelyn and Emmy’s favorite restaurant, she had just found hers.

“Welcome to Sweet Genevieve’s!” an older woman happily greeted as she approached the podium. “Y’all here for somethin’ to eat? Or have ya come to feel the blues?”

Tabby glanced to Emmy and Jocelyn, happy to see they looked as excited as she felt. Naomi, not unexpectedly, wore her usual expression of reservation.

Tabby sighed, relieved that the relaxing atmosphere of Sweet Genevieve’s was serving to calm her nerves. She felt as if she hadn’t taken a good breath in days, and the delicious aromas of the restaurant were just what she needed to relax.

After a minute or two of silent menu perusing, Emmy asked, “Should I get the blackened catfish or the jambalaya?”

“I don’t know. Maybe the pan-seared shrimp,” Jocelyn suggested. “It comes with the rosemary cornbread, see?” she added, pointing to an item on the menu.

Naomi closed her menu and opened her cell phone. “I’m going to try the seafood gumbo and rosemary cornbread,” she said as she smiled, her thumbs flying on her phone keyboard as she answered another text.

“Well, Anthony’s different,” Naomi said, nodding her thanks to the handsome young waiter who was busily placing glasses of water on their table.

“Thank you, ma’am,” the waiter said, smiling and nodding. “I know y’all will enjoy your meal…and be sure to stick around for the music.” The young man glanced up to a clock on the wall—a clock set inside an enormous alligator head. “I think the show begins in about thirty minutes.”

“Is that real?” Naomi asked, frowning as she stared at the alligator head mounted on the wall.

“Yes, ma’am,” the waiter answered. “But don’t worry, ma’am. It wasn’t hunted for sport…though it was hunted down in its day, for chompin’ down a man. It’s over forty years old. Miss Genevieve’s husband killed it, performed a bit of taxidermy, and turned that ol’ gator into a clock.”

“Yes, ma’am,” the waiter said. His smile broadened as he nodded to Naomi, adding, “And yes, ma’am…I’m named after
that
Rhett.” Tabby giggled as the waiter winked at Naomi, adding, “I’ll give you ladies a minute or two. All right?”

Tabby sighed. The atmosphere of the restaurant was soothing. For the first time in days, she felt calm, at ease, and entirely happy.

“I’ve never had crawfish,” Emmy said, still studying the menu. “I wonder if it’s gross. They have it as an appetizer here. Should we try it?”

“Not me,” Jocelyn said. “I’ll stick with something else.”

Tabby smiled, decided to try the crawfish scampi, and looked to the stage at the other end of the restaurant. This was an escape from the office; this was what she needed.

❦

“It was so good I’m sick!” Jocelyn moaned, leaning back in her chair. “Armando is taking me to a movie tonight. I hope he’s not planning to do dinner too. I’ll pop!”

“What are you doing tonight, Tabs?” Emmy asked. “Any big plans?”

Tabby smiled, feeling sorry for Emmy. Emmy loved Luke—truly, deeply, and almost insanely. However, Tabby knew it was hard for Emmy, when everyone else had romantic dates planned for the weekend, to sit at home and dream of Luke’s return. Of course, Tabby didn’t have any romantic dates planned for that night. In fact, it had been quite some time since she’d had a date at all.

“Me?” she answered, shrugging. “Nope. Just a quiet evening at home, I guess.”

“Me too,” Emmy sighed.

Tabby smiled at her friend. “Maybe we should have a quiet evening at home together,” she suggested. “We could watch a movie or something.”

“That’s right!” Emmy said. “Chloe’s still in Chicago, huh?”

In that moment, the lights in the dining area of the restaurant dimmed. Simultaneously, the white twinkle lights that bordered the small platform stage across the way lit up. Tabby hadn’t even noticed that all the chairs and tables on the entertainment side of the restaurant had been filled by more patrons. She was a little disappointed, for she’d hoped to get a seat in that section of the restaurant in order to enjoy a few minutes of entertainment before having to head back to work.

“Ooo!” Emmy whispered. “They must be starting the show.”

“It’s not Broadway, you know,” Tabby told Emmy, smiling.

Emmy shrugged. “It’ll be fun either way. I’ve eaten lunch while watching clowns, violinists, mariachi bands, and even cliff divers. But I’ve never been in a blues and jazz joint.”

Tabby giggled as she turned her attention to the stage.

“Someone’s setting up,” Jocelyn said.

Tabby squinted, peering through the darkened restaurant toward the performing platform. The so-called stage lights were still off, but she could see a man sitting up on a stool and an amp.

“Even I’m intrigued,” Naomi said, closing her phone at last.

“Test, test,” the man said into a microphone. The man ripped a short electric guitar riff, turned down the amp, and then sat on the stool. He was wearing worn blue jeans, a black mod-western shirt—casually untucked—and silver-tipped cowboy boots. Tabby’s smile broadened as the man hooked one boot heel over the top rung of the stool and the other over the bottom rung.

Tabby giggled and her heart leapt with excitement as the man on the stool began to play. The crowd applauded as the performer began to sing a blues arrangement of the song “Yellow Moon.”

“Ooo, I love this song,” Tabby whispered to Emmy as goose bumps raced over her arms. And she did! The Neville Brothers’ version of Aaron Neville’s “Yellow Moon” was what Tabby’s sister Chloe liked to call “one of Tabby’s old funky favorites.” She was interested to see what kind of an arrangement a blues artist would come up with.

The guitar arrangement was slower than the Neville Brothers’ funky R & B version, but Tabby liked it. It was bluesy, rich, and perfectly fit for the atmosphere of the restaurant. When the man began to sing the first lines of the song, the raspy, guttural sound of his voice caused the goose bumps on Tabby’s arms to increase.

“Ooo! I like this guy,” she whispered to Emmy.

“I guess so,” Emmy teased, brushing at the goose bumps on Tabby’s arm with her fingers.

A spotlight lit up the stage. Tabby squinted as she stared across the room, shaking her head a little, unable to believe what she thought she was seeing.

“You have
got
to be kidding me,” Jocelyn squeaked.

For a moment, Tabitha Flanders felt certain she would pass out. There—coolly sitting on a stool, playing a blues lick on electric guitar, and singing with a voice that could have easily hung with Jonny Lang—sat Jagger Brodie! Tabby squeezed her eyes tightly shut for a moment. Surely she was just dreaming—hallucinating. After all, she’d had Jagger Brodie on the brain for a long time—had him diseasedly on the brain for over a week. She was just freaking out. Yet, when she opened her eyes to see Jagger Brodie still sitting on the stool, to hear the most fascinating blues voice she’d ever heard coming from his mouth, she actually felt ill.

“Unbelievable,” Emmy whispered. “Absolutely unbelievable!”

“Tabby?” Jocelyn said, looking to Tabby. “Are you even kidding me? The Derrière inator is a rock star?”

“B-blues artist,” Tabby whispered, watching as her own trembling hand picked up her glass of water. She took a sip, for her mouth had gone completely dry, and added, “His Royal Hineyness is a blues artist, Joss…not a rock star.”