His Uptown Girl

“You gonna call me and let me know how he do, ain’t you?”

“Yes, ma’am. I know you’d skin me alive if I didn’t.” Tre smiled as he swerved around the oncoming traffic and headed toward the store on Magazine. Luckily, he had only one more delivery, and it was a Queen Anne settee. Since the delivery was on the West Bank, Eleanor said he could take the van over the bridge—as long as he locked it up tight—and make Shorty D’s game.

“How’s Cici getting on with that new job? She going in on time, ain’t she? I worry about her.”

“Yes, ma’am, she doin’ fine.” Kind of. His aunt had missed work a few weeks ago and had to plead with the shift manager to put her on probation. Since then, she’d done good, making it on time every day, but he was worried because she’d started hanging with her former girls, going out, leaving Kenzie with him. Tre had threatened to call Child Protective Services if she went out anymore. He didn’t like threatening his aunt, but his cousin Kenzie needed a mother who wasn’t strung out and banging with the 3-N-G, a local street gang that hung on Third and Galvez.

He wasn’t worrying Big Mama about Cici or anything else. Her health wouldn’t tolerate no worrying. He wanted her to get stronger so maybe she could come back and breathe some life into that rambling house of hers where they all lived. Things weren’t the same with Big Mama gone. It had been too long since he’d smelled greens and hocks cooking and tasted her fried corn bread. Been too long since he’d heard her laughter in the kitchen and felt the tenderness in her faded hands.

“The doctor says maybe I can come home ’fore too long. They still working me to death, but I’m walking pretty good now. Maybe won’t be long, chile.”

Big Mama had fallen and broken her hip almost seven months ago. After extensive surgery, she’d done well, until the pneumonia had set in several weeks later. She’d been in a nursing facility ever since, determined she wouldn’t live out her days at Plantation Manor.

“That’s good. You keep doin’ what they tell you. Dr. Tom said you’ll be home to dye Easter eggs for Kenzie.”

Big Mama cackled. “Lordy, that’s in two months. I need to see that baby hide her eggs. Gotta make her a dress, too.”

Tre drove through the alley between the Queen’s Box and a vintage clothing store, and put the van in Park. A loading platform on his right led up to rusted double doors. “I’ve got to go now. Got to make another delivery before I can get out of here.”

“Tre, you don’t worry about me. You got enough to worry about. Try to take some time for yourself, chile. You not even twenty years old yet.”

He felt a hell of a lot older. “I know. I got time.”

His grandmother huffed but didn’t say more, and after promising again to call her about Devontay’s game, he hung up.

Pocketing the keys, he slid from the van, careful to lock it. As he came around the side of the van, Eleanor met him.

“Hey, Tre, we need to talk if you have a minute.”

He looked up, sensing what was coming. Winnie Dupuy had called. “Yeah?”

“Mrs. Dupuy called me a few moments ago.” Eleanor held tight to the door, looking embarrassed. “Is there something you want to tell me?”

“No, ma’am.”

“Oh, well, she said you made her feel uncomfortable. Uh, like in a sexual way.” Eleanor stared him in the eyes and he could see her discomfort, but she didn’t shy away. He, at least, liked that about her.

“No, ma’am.”

Eleanor looked hard at him and nodded. “She’s lonely.”

Folding his arms over his chest, he met her gaze. “Yeah, I guess she is.”

For a moment they were both silent. Her studying him. Him bearing her scrutiny, defensive on the outside, hoping she believed him on the inside. As the seconds ticked by, Eleanor’s posture changed. Relief gathered in him because he knew she’d worked out the facts rather than jumping to conclusions.

“Winnie propositioned you?”

“What you mean?”

Eleanor rolled a hand, still looking as though she’d rather clean toilets than have this conversation with him. “Make a pass? Come on to you?”

“Why you think that?”

“Because the more I think on it, the more I see the flaw in this accusation. Winnie’s husband ignores her, she’s lonely and you’re awfully nice-looking,” she said, holding open the heavy steel door and jerking her head toward the black yawn that led into the back room. “She’s a good customer, but I don’t necessarily believe you’d have to hit on older ladies when you’ve likely got plenty of girls your own age blowing up your phone.”

The knot in his gut unraveled as he started up the steps. Eleanor believed him over Winnie Dupuy. The thought startled him, put a dent in the shield of mistrust he kept between him and his employer. Between him and everyone. “Did you just say ‘blowing up my phone’?”

Eleanor made a face. “Blakely says that all the time. Guess it seeped into my vocabulary without me noticing.”

Tre didn’t smile much, but he had to smile at her admission. He hadn’t yet met her daughter, since Blakely was away at college, but from the way Eleanor talked about her, she had attitude to spare. He liked a girl with attitude. Someone who wasn’t all mealymouthed. His Big Mama had always said to never trust mealymouths. They’re the sneaky ones.

“I’m sorry Mrs. Dupuy accused you of something so awful.”

He shrugged. “Don’t matter.”

Eleanor stopped him, pressing a hand to his shoulder. He flinched, but didn’t pull away. “It does matter.”

“She just embarrassed is all.”

He met Eleanor’s gaze and an understanding lit in them. He knew she saw he tried to be an honorable man—the kind of man Big Mama would be proud of. The kind of man who didn’t screw lonely old white women just ’cause he could. He had pride, integrity and respect for himself.

Eleanor could see all that in his gaze.

The dent grew wider.

“Maybe so, but I’ll take care of it. She can’t make those kinds of accusations against my employees and think it’s okay. Go ahead and wrap the Queen Anne and get it over to the Wilkies. Sign out for three o’clock and then you should be able to make Shorty D’s game.”

Devontay’s nickname sounded funny on Eleanor’s lips. “Thank you.”

Eleanor closed the door and started for her office. “Oh, and tell Shorty D I’ll buy him a Tastee doughnut for every point he scores.”

Tre shook his head. “He scored ten last time.”

She smiled. “I know. I’ll plan on picking up a dozen.”

* * *

ELEANOR SHRUGGED OUT of her khaki pants and tossed her new T-shirt on top of the laundry hamper in the corner of her bathroom. Fragrant lavender perfumed the air as her bath filled, automatically soothing her, pulling her mind away from Winnie Dupuy’s tirade, Blakely’s request for more money and her mother-in-law’s message on the answering service. Margaret Theriot didn’t like to be ignored. Or so she said.

So many people giving her grief.

And no one to take it away.

Eleanor eyed the old claw-foot tub, hoping her best bath salts would do the trick. Her day had been longer than most because she’d had to run errands after work, including the dreaded grocery store. Before she could blink it was a quarter of eleven o’clock and past her bedtime.

She snorted as she grabbed her toothbrush. “God, you’re acting like an old person, Elle. In bed by ten o’clock is sealing your doom, baby.”

She didn’t respond to her own taunts. What could she possibly say? Then the cell phone sitting on her dressing table buzzed. She picked it up and eyed the number. Margaret. Again. Shouldn’t her mother-in-law be in bed?

She tossed the phone down, peeled off her underwear and put her hair in an old scrunchy. No friggin’ way would she let Skeeter’s mother ruin the most precious time of the day: her cocktail bath.

Grabbing the highball glass, she sank into the tub and used her big toe to turn off the hot water.

“Ahhh,” she said to the wall on her right.

The wall said nothing in return...as well it shouldn’t. After all, she’d only started on the drink.

The swirl of the water around her felt like a sweet embrace as she slid down, burying her nose in the soft bubbles as the phone jittered again. And then again. Then the home phone jangled in the hallway.

“I’m not answering you, damn it!” she called out, studying the chipped polish on her left toenail as she took a sip of her vodka tonic.

Vodka tonic—one of the many good things her late husband Skeeter Theriot had taught her to love. Every night before they’d gone out to art exhibits or political fund-raisers, they’d indulged in the drink and conversation about what they should say, who they should pander to and why they needed to keep the goal in mind.

Ha.

An illusion built like a house of cards.

But the past didn’t bear dwelling upon, did it? All that hurt and bitterness was supposed to be locked up, chained with determination and dumped in the nearest pit of forgotten dreams.

Eleanor closed her eyes and focused on the good things she had in her life—a store, a healthy daughter, another year before she turned forty. And Nutella. A whole new jar in the pantry.

She’d just grabbed the handmade green-tea soap and a soft cloth when the doorbell rang.

“Really?” she said to the ceiling, blowing an errant bubble off her shoulder. “All I want is a bath. And a drink. And some blasted peace!”

She stood, grabbed her plush terry-cloth robe and padded to the door, not bothering with the water streaming down her legs. She’d mop it up once she dealt with whatever person continued to lean on her doorbell. Eleanor stomped down the stairs, shouting, “Coming!”

When she peeked out the door peephole, her heart stopped.

A uniformed police officer stood beneath her gas lantern porch light, hat in hand. A cruiser was parked in her drive.

With a shaking hand, Eleanor set the crystal tumbler on the late-nineteenth-century telephone table next to the door. A cannonball landed in her stomach; her mouth suddenly became a desert. Last time a policeman had stood on her porch, she’d learned her husband had been murdered...by a mistress she hadn’t known existed.

Please, dear God, don’t let it be Blakely. Please.

Eleanor tugged the belt tighter and turned the lock, pulling the door open. Cold crept in, matching the fear in her heart. “Yes?”

“Eleanor Theriot?”

“Yes?”

“We’ve been trying to call you on your cell and home phone,” the officer said, his dark eyes shifting away from her disheveled appearance.

“Why? What’s happened?”

He read her fear. “No one’s hurt. Nothing like that—”

“What then?” Eleanor fussed with the collar of her robe and peered around the police officer as if he might be hiding something horrible behind his back.

“Someone vandalized your store. Some guy from one of the other businesses hit gave us your numbers, but you didn’t answer. I was in the area, so dispatch sent me over.”

Sweet relief stole over her. Blakely was safe. This was not about her daughter. But then realization hit her. Her store had been vandalized. What did that mean? Broken windows? Items stolen? Her heart skipped a beat. “I’ll head down there. Thanks.”

“Dispatch said other merchants are on-site, so you have time to, you know...” he stammered, nodding toward her. She looked down at where her robe gaped and jerked it closed.

“Thank you for coming by,” she said, as he backed down the front porch steps and turned toward the open door of his police car. She shut the door, twisted the lock and scrambled up the gleaming stairway.

Fifteen minutes later she pulled her Volvo to the curb in front of her store and hopped out, clad in an old sweatshirt of Skeeter’s and a pair of jeans. Her teeth chattered as she approached the glass glittering beneath the streetlights.

“Damn,” she breathed, surveying the damage. Whoever had vandalized the store had done a bang-up job. Like serious bang-up. How had no one seen him...or them?

“Got me, too,” said a voice over her shoulder. She turned to find Dez Batiste standing behind her. He wore a beat-up army surplus jacket and straight-legged jeans that fit him like sin. In the lamplight, his skin seemed darker, making him appear more dangerous, and it finally hit her who he resembled—that wrestler-turned-actor who’d done a movie in a tutu. She couldn’t recall his name, but she and Blakely had gone to the movie a few years back.

She peered across the street to the spidered glass in Dez’s window. “How did this happen? And why didn’t my store alarm go off?”

“Don’t know,” Dez said, his gray eyes probing the depths of her store. “You sure you set yours?”

“Always,” she said automatically, even as her thoughts tripped to the actual process of locking up. She always set the alarm before slipping out the back and slamming the dead bolt into place. But she’d been distracted by a last-minute customer who wanted a rush delivery...and by her failed attempt at stepping outside herself to flirt with a man she opposed enough to pen a letter to the city council, a man who now stood before her very much doing his part within the community she wanted to protect. She swallowed the guilt. “At least I usually do.”

Dez propped his fists on his hips, making his shoulders look even broader. The planes of his rugged face were exotic in the glow of the streetlight. “Wouldn’t have mattered. They think it was kids driving by and shooting pellet guns, so an alarm wouldn’t have changed the outcome. Mr. Hibbett has a street cam, so maybe the police can get the license plate off the tape or something.”

Maybe they would...or not. Didn’t really help the short-term situation. She needed lumber to cover the gaping holes and prevent the current open invitation to her stock. After Hurricane Katrina, and the looting that had followed, she was more cautious than probably necessary, which was why the whole not-setting-the-alarm thing didn’t make sense. She slid her phone from her back pocket and started dialing Pansy’s number. Her husband sometimes helped with big deliveries and lived close by. Eddie would have plywood ready for storms in his storage shed. He would let her use some until she could get the glass company to come out in the morning. “Better see if I can get some lumber to patch this up.”

“Don’t worry. I’ve got plenty left from the remodel,” Dez said, jerking his head toward his bar across the street.

She hung up before the call could connect, and nodded. “I’d appreciate it. It would keep me from troubling Pansy and Eddie. And since we’re already up...”

Mr. Hibbett approached carrying a toolbox. “Sons of bitches busted my stained-glass rooster. If I get my hands on those little bastards, I’ll plant them in Cemetery No. 1.”

“I’m sorry, Mr. Hibbett, but Eddie can probably fix it. Let’s see how many whole pieces we can salvage and we’ll call him tomorrow,” she said, giving Mr. Hibbett a pat on the shoulder. The older man had been on Magazine Street for over twenty years, and ran one of the best pastry shops in the Crescent City. Butterfield’s, with its sunny decor, delicious cupcakes and strong coffee, was a local favorite, and the stained-glass rooster had been created by Eddie, who was a glass artist. Somehow the fearless visage of the fowl was welcoming.

Mr. Hibbett shook his head. “Maybe so. I’ll gather the pieces. Here’s my toolbox if you two want to get started on boarding up your windows. I still have to fetch the video loop for the detective.”

Dez took the old-fashioned toolbox from the man and set it by her door, which fortunately hadn’t been hit. “Let me grab some plywood and I’ll be back.”

“I’ll help you,” she said, stepping over the shattered glass and following his broad shoulders.

“I can probably get it myself if you want to stay here.”

“And do what?”

“Sweep up the glass?”

His suggestion had merit but for some reason she didn’t want to be alone. Which was stupid. The perpetrators were likely random kids, and there was little danger with a policeman standing yards away. Dez must have sensed her hesitation because he waved his hand. “Come on, then. I might need an extra set of hands after all.”

She followed him across the street, wincing when she saw that the vandals had knocked holes in his art deco door and the one large window that had earlier held the name of the place—Blue Rondo.

She stopped and stared at the ruined window. “That sucks.”

Dez looked at the destruction. “Yeah, but it can be fixed.”

He opened the front door and stepped back so she could pass. When he reached past her to flick on the light switch, she caught his scent—something woodsy and primal that suited him, and made her very aware of how masculine he was. Of how long it had been since she’d been close to a man she found attractive. Hunger stirred within her. She wanted to touch him, breathe him in.

Light flooded the room and she squeezed her eyes shut against the startling brightness.

“So here we have Satan’s lair,” he said, wryness shadowing his voice along with humor.

She opened her eyes, wondering how he could be jovial when what he’d been working on had been damaged. “Okay, I’ve never actually called it Satan’s lair.”

“Den of iniquity? Palace of prostitution?”

Eleanor snorted, shifting back a step because Dez’s presence overwhelmed her. “I never said any of those things, Dez. Besides, we don’t have time to wade into those waters right now. Maybe another time.”

His gaze flickered over her worn jeans and ragged sweatshirt. She didn’t flinch, but a silly voice that sounded a little like her mother’s whispered she should have taken a bit more time to fix herself up. At least a brush through her hair.

Shut up, voice. It was an emergency.

“Definitely,” he said, with not quite a purr in his voice. Okay. Nothing in his voice indicated he wanted to strip off her clothes, but her fragile ego needed to cling to something, right?

“So where’s the plywood?”

He jerked his thumb at the bar. “In the back. Stay here.”

With the grace of a jaguar...or maybe just a natural athleticism...Dez disappeared behind the bar, giving her time to look around the club.

Clean gray walls met tiles that glowed with metallic patina, making a unique pattern of charcoal and onyx. Several black tables were piled in a far corner, awaiting placement. Cool cobalt-and-gold-glass pendants hung from the ceiling, above where the tables would eventually sit. A covelike stage with plenty of room for a good-size band was on her left, with a grand piano created by the gods sitting front and center. She’d never thought to see a Fazioli in a club across from her shop, but then again, she’d never thought there’d be a jazz club in her sedate block of Magazine either.

“A Fazioli?” she asked Dez when he returned lugging several sheets of plywood and then sliding them onto a piece of cardboard.

He glanced at the piano, and in his gaze, she saw incredible pride. “Yeah, that’s my baby.”

The piano didn’t look like a regular piano, but she’d known exactly what it was, having seen it in a magazine once. The design was called M. Liminal, and it had a futuristic appearance that seemed at odds with the art deco...yet oddly right.

“I hope you have a crazy-good alarm system.”

He slid the boards closer to her. “Who do you think called the police? I was playing a gig on Frenchmen when I got the call from the alarm company.”

“Thanks for being Johnny-on-the-spot,” she said, walking toward the piano. “This piano’s beautiful in a weird way.”

Dez leaned the plywood against a support column and joined her next to the stage. “It was a gift.”

Eleanor ran a hand over the shiny silver top. “Some gift.”

His gaze shuttered as he stepped onto the platform. “Yeah.”

He lifted the lid and ran his fingers over the keys, his hands masterful, playing a light run of exceptional beauty. How ironic to see such exquisiteness in the chaos of destruction.

Something shivery skipped up her spine, and the moment felt prophetic, as if there was always the possibility of beauty in the midst of ruin, a truth held tightly in a city crumbling away.

The click of the lid jarred Eleanor from her musings, from her appreciation of the man before her.

“We better get back. It’s late,” he said, his voice sounding faraway, as if he, too, felt something in the moment.

She glanced at the Timex on her wrist. 11:56 p.m. “Morning’s one blink away.”

Looking up she caught his gaze and her stomach trembled at the raw desire she saw in his eyes. This time she didn’t have to imagine the invitation. The moment crackled with electricity, making her lean toward him rather than take the steps toward the door. For a moment, she wanted something she shouldn’t with a man who was so far away from her normal kind of guy he was completely off the charts.

His gaze slid to her lips.

Instinctively, she caught her bottom lip between her teeth.

“Y’all coming?” The voice at the door grumped. Cranky Mr. Hibbett.

Eleanor blinked the intense moment away. “Uh, sorry. I’d never seen a Fazioli before.” She pointed to the piano as the older man, whose fuzzy eyebrows knitted together, waved a hand at her and headed toward the leaning plywood.

“Bah. Stare at pianos later. We’ve got work to do.”

Dez leaped off the stage and grabbed the opposite end of the boards, helping Mr. Hibbett maneuver them out the club door.

Eleanor stood there like a fool, watching.

What was wrong with her?

She scratched her head, jerked the ugly scrunchy from the ponytail and scraped a hand through her hair, wishing she didn’t feel so inept, so awkward, so...old.

Dez Batiste was too young for her. Too hip. Too cool. If she wanted to get back into the dating pool, it would be better to don a conservative tankini and slowly descend the steps into the water. Not bling it out in a string bikini and do a swan dive off the high dive into deep waters.

’Cause that’s what Dez Batiste was.

Deep waters in a string bikini.

She needed a nice sedate man who sipped Scotch and talked about the stock market. With gray around his temples and an enviable golf handicap. A guy who wore Dockers and Ralph Lauren. Her type of guy.

Right?

Right.

So Dez could haunt her fantasies, but he wouldn’t be part of her reality. Because he was a young, hot musician and she was a middle-aged mom and antiques dealer.

God. How boring was that?

Sounded as if she’d given up.

Dez popped his head back inside. “You coming?”

She wished.

“Oh. Sorry. Flashback of Katrina,” she said, hurrying toward the door.

Actually, she hadn’t been thinking about Hurricane Katrina, and the way her store had once stood with gaping black windows, the debris from the looting scattered around the sidewalk. She hadn’t been thinking of the empty display case holding the moniker for her store, but Dez didn’t have to know her little moment wasn’t about the past. And he damned sure didn’t need to know she wanted to rip off his clothes and have her wicked way with him.

“I understand,” he said with a reassuring nod. “Not easy to be reminded of a time when we all felt helpless, but we’re not helpless any longer. Let’s get the windows covered, give the police a report and then move forward. Everything here can be restored easily.”

“Right.”

As she passed him, he reached out and patted her shoulder. As though she was his maiden aunt.

Exactly.

She’d totally imagined the thing they had had a few minutes ago. One-sided desire felt by a woman who’d been sidelined too long.

“You okay?” he asked, his eyes kind, searching hers.

“Yeah, I know this vandalism is easily fixed, but—”

“Can we get on with this without all that touchy-feely crap? I want to see the back of my eyelids in the next century,” Mr. Hibbett complained.

Eleanor retwisted her hair into a ponytail. “Lead the way.”