Jolie Blonde (Vigilare Book 3) (9 page)

She nods, valiantly slipping out the exit.

Pretty little rolling stone

What do you do when all you got is gone

You search within yourself

Dig deeper than anyone else

Late in the evening after an eventful day at the marsh, preceded by a close-call at the dentist’s office, Brianna returns to the Castille residence. Rowing up to the dock in the flat-bottomed pirogue that Lon conveniently left for her on the other side of the swamp, she quietly hops out securing it to a hitch beside the Castilles’ large motorized airboat. Under the impression everyone is asleep, she tiptoes around.

Out of the darkness a blinding light shines, spooking her as it flashes into her eyes, causing her to scream.

“Shh,” Lon’s voice soothes, his eyes peeking out from under the mini spotlight he wears attached to his forehead by a stretchy band.

“Jeepers, Lon!” Brianna exhausts in a whisper, clutching at her heart. “You scared the crap out of me.”

He holds back a chuckle at her reaction, intent on being put out by her involvement with Johnny Vito.

“What are you doing?” she inquires at his peculiar headpiece.

He stoops over, ducking his head back down, focusing his spotlight on the airboat engine, his hands busily tinkering. “I’m fine-tuning this engine for Pop. Started acting up on the way back in today.”

“You know how to do that?” she asks, a hint of intrigue in her voice.

He stands erect, removing the spotlight band from around his forehead, relieving the warm glow. “Johnny Vito’s not the only one who knows how to do things,” he gruffs.

“Lon,” she begins, the words ‘I’m sorry’ prepped on the tip of her tongue. Her mind returning to the jailhouse and Johnny, his reprimand rings through her head—
Stop apologizing!
Brianna stiffens her form, quickly nixing her remorse. “Go ahead. Pout, if it suits you.” She hastily grabs her camera case from the pirogue, strutting by him toward the house.

Lon watches her walk away, surprised and slightly amused by her unusual response. He reassembles his forehead strap, turning the spotlight on and gets back to business with the boat engine. “Dumbass,” he scolds himself.

Momentarily, Brianna returns. Freshly showered, she wears her nightclothes, a tank top and shorts. She watches Lon, who maneuvers around the engine, one hand prying, the other holding a tool in place. An escaped bolt falls through the engine landing in the bottom of the boat. He growls with the thought that he would be most suited for this job if only he had three hands.

“Can I help?” she offers.

He nods, unable to look at her just yet. “If you’ll hold that bolt right here,” he directs, “that’d be great.”

She does as he asks, while he fastens it down. His head stooped in position, a trail of sweat runs from his forehead to his temple, the Louisiana night unforgiving with its heat. Instinctively, Brianna softly runs her hand along the side of his face, catching the moisture before it?” runs any further.

“Thank you,” he says, his body and his mood softening with her touch. He taps on the engine after securing the bolt. “That should do it.”

“That’s all?” She pries, looking at him, hopeful he will return her gaze.

“Yep,” he answers curtly, making busywork out of reassembling tools into their case so as not to look at her. Further evading, he removes his spotlight, wiping his face and head with a shop rag.

Brianna says nothing but gently pulls the rag from his face, exposing his eyes to her.

His steel blues grow humble and appealing at their contact with her emerald greens—his Achilles’ heel. “I’m sorry, Brie. I don’t know what got into me. Well, I do know what got into me,” he references the green-eyed monster of jealousy, his boot busily rooting at the ground as he follows it with his gaze. “Guess I’m just used to having all your attention.”

She shrugs. “Maybe I’d feel the same way.”

“What? If I started hanging out with another girl?” Lon grins at her, hopeful.

Her lips curve slightly. “Maybe.” Ducking her head, she makes her way to the elevated chair inside the airboat, looking up at the stars.

He joins her, sitting across from her at the bow of the boat. “So, what were you taking pictures of?” He references her camera, the one he noticed her hauling out of the pirogue.

“Evidence,” she says absentmindedly, causing his head to cock to the side.

“Of what?”

“The marsh.”

“Where we found the skull?”

“Yeah.” Pointing out the Milky Way, she changes the subject. “You have any more of those Cherokee stories?”

“And Johnny’s helping you? Gather evidence,” he refuses to be swayed.

She nods. “I gotta hand it to him.” A smile forms on her lips. “He’s pretty resourceful.”

Lon knocks his knuckles off the steel frame of the bow, ultimately dissatisfied with her smitten reaction to the notorious
bad boy.
Recouping, he simply comments, “That’s not the adjective I’d choose in explaining him, but…” He momentarily eyes the starry constellation, attempting to talk himself out of digging further, quite unsuccessfully. “So, what is it, about Johnny? Obviously you don’t mind spending time with the guy.” He speaks nonchalant, numbing the direness of his inquiry.

“I don’t know.” Brianna shrugs, considering. “I guess I like the fact that he doesn’t treat me any different than he treats anyone else. You know, he doesn’t treat me like I’m soft.” She looks away from Lon, unable to tolerate his
soft
glance. “I guess you could say he challenges me. To challenge myself.” Meeting his gaze purposefully, she continues, “I’m quite capable, you know. More so than I even thought I was.”

“I’m fully aware of that,” he confides, pausing. “So you like a guy who challenges you?” He treads softly while making mental notes. “Does that mean you don’t want me to get the door for you? Or you wanna throw around the
pigskin
with me in the side yard? Maybe you’d like to go fishing with me and Pop, bond over a dip of dusty chaw?” He smiles at her boldly.

“No!” She giggles.

Lon joins her laughing, taking note of the sweet sound of her pleasure, having a hard time remembering when he last heard it.

She quiets herself with his long, lingering stare, growing subconscious. “What?” She says, reaching for her long blonde locks to pull them over the side of her face as a camouflage. Her hand is met with air, a reminder of her drastic make-over. Instead, she pats her hand against the back of her spiky auburn tresses.

“It’s good to hear you laugh, that’s all.”

“Sometimes I think I’ve forgotten how,” she admits, the once infinite action now limited to moments like this.

“It’s going to get better, Brie,” he promises. “You’re going to get through this.”

“I keep telling myself that.” She sighs. “And at times I believe it. Like right now. When I’m here with you.”

“That’s good. I want you to be alright,
especially
when you’re with me.” He flashes her another boyishly handsome grin.

She can’t help but return his affection, looking at the one beautiful constant in her life. “But, I can’t always be with you. I have to be alright with me, too.” She pats her hand against her heart. “For example, today I went by my house, to get my camera. And it hit me all over again. The minute I opened the front door, I wanted so bad for Mama and Daddy to greet me.”

She pauses, holding back tears as memories flicker through her mind: the smell of her mother’s home-cooking, the safety of her father’s arms meeting her at the end of the day with a warm embrace.

Lon rises, moving toward her, his hands perched one on each side of her thighs against the elevated chair.

Brianna ducks her chin to her chest, holding him off with a straight arm. “You’ll only make it worse, if you coddle me,” her voice shaky, her tears now unsuccessful in resisting the urge to fall.

“But don’t you see, you can do that with me. You can feel…cry.” He ducks his head to hers, his thick wavy black hair resting against her forehead. “God must have given me these broad shoulders for a reason, Brie. Pop says it’s a man’s place, to hold a woman up when she needs it.”

“But that’s just it.” She pulls away from him, wiping at the tears on her face. “I need to learn how to hold myself up. I thought I’d always have Mama and Daddy to lean on. They’re gone, Lon. Gone.” She looks at him, ruefully shaking her head. “And I’m not always going to have you, either. If life doesn’t take you away, college will.” The ever-pressing thought of their senior year weighs on her.

“I’m not going anywhere,” he consoles, his hands gently tracking tears as they roll down the dimples of her cheeks.

“That’s what everybody says. That’s what we all think,” her words crackle over the moisture collecting on her lips. “But we never truly know.” She considers her vulnerable existence juxtaposed to the safeguarded one she became accustomed to before her parents’ death. “I never wanted to go anywhere…leave. But, I want to now.”

“Where would you go?” His question more conversational than probing, his hands coming to rest on her thighs.

“I don’t know.” She fumbles restlessly with the drawstring on her shorts, her eyes trailing the movement, avoiding contact with Lon’s. “I just know I feel lost, restless.” Looking up at him now, her tears subsiding, her mind is pulled to another place in time. “You remember our music theory class? Last semester.”

“Ms. Finnigan,” Lon recalls their ultra-hip, throwback of a teacher. “Man, she makes the seventies sound so cool, doesn’t she?” He engages Brianna with a smile.

She nods agreeably, a grin forming, rendering him content. He watches her, every virile instinct within him still committed and attracted to the once jolie blonde. Even with her eyes all puffy and constant sniffing to keep mucous dripping from her nose, she remains the most becoming thing.

“Yeah, Ms. Finn,” Brianna uses the moniker, “is the coolest. Remember that song she told us about? The one she always played at the end of class.”

“Ahh,” he attempts to recollect, unsuccessfully.

“The one about that woman who was well-to-do. Who had everything. Then she lost it all. You know, the one she said depicted a ‘loss of innocence and harshness of experience,’” she recites Ms. Finningan’s words. “That guy named Bob Dylan wrote it.”

“Yeah.” Lon lights up. “I remember that one…
Like A Rolling Stone.
‘How does it feel…to be on your own…no direction home…’” He sings out indulgently, causing Brianna to giggle.

She settles after a spell, further divulging, “That’s how I feel. I feel like that song.”

He chuckles faintly. “You feel like a
rolling stone?”

“Yeah,” she says, meeting him square in the eye, full sincerity reflecting in her emerald greens.

The look causes Lon’s own heart to hurt, wishing he could take her pain. He runs his hand down the side of her face, scanning her features. “I never saw a rolling stone look so pretty.”

She smiles at him, returning the gesture. “You’re a sweet boy, Lon Castille,” she says, followed by a sleepy yawn.

“Look at you,” he takes note of her weary eyes. “How long’s it been since you’ve slept?”

She shrugs. “A few days, I think.” Covering her mouth, another yawn escapes.

“We better get you off to bed.” He slides his arms underneath her legs, hoisting her into his embrace.

Brianna chuckles, wrapping one arm around the back of his neck, the other resting against his chest. “I can walk.”

“I know,” he says. “But I wanna carry you.” He heads toward the house to tuck her in.

“Let me guess…it’s your
position.”
She giggles, referring to his former declaration about a man holding a woman up when she needs it.

“Nope,” he spars. “I just wanna hold you, that’s all.”

Settling into his frame, her head rests comfortably on his shoulder. “Hold me until I fall asleep?” she asks innocently.

Lon gulps, reining in the physical stimulation such a plea can cause a young, hormonally-charged male. “Love to,” he replies, his romantic refrain delivering as he mindfully chooses honor rather than opportunity.

“‘Like a complete unknown,’” Brianna’s singing voice, at a whisper, continues the Bob Dylan tune where Lon left off.

“‘Like a rolling stone,’” he joins her as they escape the moonlight for the house and a warm bed.

A day and a half later, Lon and his father return to the Castille residence from the lumber yard, their large airboat full of supplies. Anchoring the vessel, Lon helps his father unload two-by-fours pivotal in their construction of a single bedroom addition to their modest home.

“Pop,” Lon begins, “I can’t thank you enough. Can you and Mama afford this?” He worries about the cost of the supplies.

“We do what we always do, son. We make it work.” Alonzo scratches his head, contemplating how to address his immediate concern. “Ya know Mama an me welcome Jolie Blonde, eh?”