Threads of Steel (Bayou Cove) (11 page)

After helping her out of the car, he placed his hand at the small of her back.

His light touch was barely discernible, but she knew his hand was there. Today she’d watched him use those hands to lift heavy golf bags, grip his clubs, and knock off dirt from his golf balls, but the touch she now felt was nothing like that. It was gentle and soft, and she wondered how it would feel to have his hands take her to another level as he made love to her
.

She blinked.
Why did she think of that?

Pushing that thought aside, she walked alongside of him, hoping he hadn’t felt the unexpected heat that shot through her body.

As soon as they stepped into the building, a waitress waved to him.
“Hey, Doug.
How’re
you
doing today?”

“Great, Carla.
Just great.
This is Anna Marie
LaFaire
. She used to live around here, but lives in New Orleans now.”

The middle-aged lady walked over to them and took her hand. “I’m so glad you can join us today. We love Doug around here.”

“Thank you, Carla. I’m glad to be here. I used to come here when I was in high school, and Doug tells me the seafood is still great.”

“He would say that. He eats here two or three times a week.”

“Yeah.
That’s why I have to go to the gym the other three or four days. You pack the pounds on me.” He looked around. “Can we have one of the tables on the outside deck?”

“Yes, sir.
It’s much too pretty not to be outside today. Maybe you’ll catch a beautiful sunset.”

They followed the lady through the restaurant. Doug waved to several customers sitting at a bar and spoke to the bartender and to a waitress. They all knew him by name.

“You’re quite the celebrity around here, aren’t you?” she said over her shoulder as they walked out to the back deck.

“Not a celebrity,” he said after a chuckle, “just a regular who has the time to sit around with all these old men and to keep their register ringing. I played golf a few times with Ryan
Browden
, the owner’s son, but he hasn’t been around for the last few years.”

They sat at a table with an unobstructed view of the channel that curved through the bayou.

“Wow, this is still as gorgeous as I remember it to be,” she said.

The waitress handed her a menu. “It’s best view around. Enjoy it.” She took their drink orders than left them alone.

“So this is where you spend your time when you’re not on the golf course.”

Doug nodded.
“Yeah.
I don’t have much variety in my life.
Pretty pitiful, huh?”

“I wouldn’t say that. Good food.
A beautiful view.
A crowd of men and women who seem to like you.
I think it’s pretty special.”

Anna Marie turned to look out over the bayou. The restaurant sat on the east side of a small harbor with a winding channel that meandered through tall marsh grass. She knew that it led to the Mississippi Sound and then to the Gulf of Mexico. Here in the harbor working shrimp boats and small pleasure boats shared docks along the piers. Today a high tide concealed the usual black mud that lined the edges of the bayou, giving the area a clean, fresh look.

Anna Marie relaxed against the chair back, her mind beginning to wander through the happenings of the last three days.

“You feel like talking about it?” Doug asked.

She turned around to find him looking at her with a raised eyebrow.
“Maybe.”
She looked back out over the bayou. “It’s hard to believe that something this beautiful is here all the time, even when people are being hit by drunken drivers, being buried or lying in a hospital bed dying. It’s pretty unbelievable that all of this beauty coexists with tragedy.”

“I know what you mean. I’ve often thought the same thing.” He looked out over the channel, then back to her, but didn’t elaborate on that subject. “So, have you gotten to see any of your old friends? Even in the mist of all the horrible things you’ve had to do I’m sure you’ve enjoyed seeing some of the people from your past.”

She nodded. “I spent a little time with my best friend Nancy. She still lives here, and we don’t get to visit often so that’s been a bright spot.”

“So there is a bright spot to all of this.
How about old boyfriends?”

She chuckled. “That’s strange you ask. I even ran into my former husband at the funeral.”

He grimaced.
“And?
How did that go?”

“I guess the best it could’ve gone. It was the first time we actually talked since the divorce.”

“Bad marriage or just bad divorce?”

“Good marriage.
Bad divorce.
At least in
my eyes that’s
the way it was. I thought my marriage was a good one. When we were first married, Ronnie and I talked about so much that we wanted to do together, but I guess those things didn’t mean as much to him as they did to me. He chose to do all those things with my best friend.”

Doug grimaced again. “That’s got to hurt. I’m so sorry.”

“I’m over it now.”

“Are you? You look as though you might need to talk about it. It helps, you know.”

“Dinner isn’t long enough to tell you everything that happened.”

“I have an empty evening. Talk away if it you want.”

Anna Marie bit her bottom lip. Did she really want to confess how she’d been betrayed by her husband and
Doti
?

She took a deep breath. “I guess I can let you in on some of the sordid details, but you’ll get the short version.
Doti
and Nancy and I were best of friends. We three were inseparable all the way through childhood and high school and even after our marriages.
Doti
married and quickly divorced. Nancy married and is still married to the same guy.
Has
four adorable kids. I married
Ronnie. It lasted only two years before I found out that
Doti
and Ronnie were having an affair. I divorced him and he married
Doti
.”

“Ouch. That’s a bummer.”

The waitress came to take their order,
then
Anna Marie continued.

“Yes, it was a bummer. I felt like a fool. Their affair ended our friendship and my marriage. They’re divorced now.”

“Was she at the funeral today?”

“No, that’s another episode. It seems she might be ill. I had a message to call her, but things have been a little hectic for me. I just couldn’t deal with anything else. I talked with Ronnie, and he didn’t know she might be sick either.”

“Are you going to call the woman?”

No words came.

“I would be curious if I were you,” Doug said. “Don’t you want to find out what she has to say?” He raised his eyebrow.

“Yes, I’m curious. Nancy told me the same thing, but I can’t call today.
Maybe after I get back to New Orleans.”

“And when will that be?”

“Right after I bury Dad. My company has a bid on a huge wedding contract that might go to someone else if I don’t get my butt home soon.”

“Well, Miss
LaFaire
, I’ll miss you. I really wanted to see that golf score of yours improve.”

Anna Marie smiled.
“Me too.”

The slick waters of the channel soothed her just as Doug’s presence did. She was amazed that in the middle of the most horrible few days of her life, she’d had the good fortune to meet someone like Doug.

Now even though he seemed to want to see her again, she had her doubts it would ever happen.

He was a golfer who toured around the country. She happened to meet him on one of his stays at home, but she’d probably never hear from him again.

Nothing in her life that concerned men had ever gone smoothly. Why would she think it would be any different with this man?

* * *

Doug dropped her off at her hotel. He walked her as far as the steps that led up to her upstairs room. He told her goodbye there instead of walking her to her room because he had a feeling had he told her goodbye at her hotel door he would’ve wanted to kiss her, and he didn’t think neither he nor she was ready for that.

The hotel had an outside walkway and so he was able to watch her as she walked to her door. She inserted the card, opened the door, then turned and waved goodbye to him. With her typical smile, she disappeared.

He stared at the empty walkway for a few seconds,
then
walked to the car, not sure how he was feeling. Anna Marie was a curiosity. She was a beautiful woman, fun to be around, and from what he deduced, she was a successful business woman, but just from listening to her story, he had a feeling she had a lot of unresolved emotional baggage—something he tried to avoid in the women he took out.

Was he a chicken?
Probably.
Life was too short to purposely add problems.

He’d dealt with his share of problems and heartaches over the years he’d been married. His Jennifer was a sweetie. He’d fallen in love with her from the moment he first met her and stayed deeply in love throughout their short marriage, but it wasn’t always easy. Her emotional and physical problems kept her from enjoying life. She was afraid to have children because she thought her mental problems were hereditary and she didn’t want to pass them on.

Nothing he’d said or done would make her change her mind. After her death, he yearned for a child to help him cope with her loss and to have a part of her with him. He’d learned to live alone, stayed busy with the space facility and with golf, but he still missed having someone in his life.

There was never a shortage of women letting him know they were available, but none of them did anything for him but give him a night or two of fun.

With Anna Marie he felt things could be different
.
Something about her made him want to be with her again, but this time he had his reservations. She lived almost two hours away. Not a long distance, but long enough to make having a relationship hard, especially since he was on the road so much with golf. Having to travel just to take her out to dinner didn’t sit well with him at all.

Then, her disastrous childhood and marriage seemed to be a black cloud still following her around.

Could he let himself fall for someone like that, or should he drive away now and not try to contact her again?

He had a feeling Anna Marie would be someone hard to forget
.
If she contacted him again, he’d spend some more time with her. It had been a long time since he’d met someone who piqued his curiosity and made him remember what he’d missed by not having someone to share his life.

Instead of going to the golf club for a drink, he headed toward his home. With one last look in his rearview mirror, the golf resort slipped out of his view, but in spite of his reservations, he hoped it wasn’t the last time he’d get to see the costume designer from New Orleans.

CHAPTER
7

The smell of exhaust fumes, horns blasting from frustrated drivers, and crowds of pedestrians crossing Canal Street welcomed Anna Marie back to New Orleans as she waited her turn to get into the parking garage.

Normally she loved the hustle and bustle of the French Quarter. The constant activity gave her system a jumpstart every morning, but today, that jumpstart resembled slow-moving molasses seeping throughout her veins. For some reason, the traffic congestion and noise grated on her nerves.

The last few days she’d spent in Bayou Cove seemed like a distant dream. Two funerals, spending a little time with Nancy, and, of course, meeting Doug—nothing seemed real. Last night she’d tossed and turned, trying to make sense of all that had happened since she’d left the office four days ago.

Burying Miss Ellie had been as emotional as burying her own mother, but she’d left the cemetery with a sense of peace. Maybe that’s why she’d heard that funerals were for the living. That peace would’ve stayed with her as she headed home to resume her life, had it not been for the situation with her dad.

Yesterday she’d sat in the hospital with Nancy and Doug as her dad’s organs were removed, then the two of them stood by her as she listened to the readings at the cemetery. She wondered if her dad had started attending Sunday services while he was in prison. As far as she remembered, he never went to church while he was still living at home. One day maybe she’d have the opportunity to ask someone about his time in prison.

Sitting in traffic gave her time to push aside her ordeal in Bayou Cove and think about her job here in New Orleans. Her time there had been unreal and unpleasant, but having Nancy and Doug by her made it as bearable as possible.

Glad it was over, she could continue with her life here in the city, but now she had to wonder about
Doti’s
absence and her phone call and, of course, she couldn’t forget the man who lived near the golf course.