Cry Wolf

Chapter Two

Things were hopping at Frenchie's. Friday night at Frenchie's Landing was a tradition among a certain class of people around Bayou Breaux. Not the planter class, the gentlemen farmers and their ladies in pumps and pearls who dined on white damask tablecloths with silver as old as the country. Frenchie's catered to a more earthy crowd. The worst of Partout Parish riffraff-poachers and smugglers and people looking for big trouble-gravitated over to Bayou Noir and a place called Mouton's. Frenchie's caught everyone in between. Farmhands, factory workers, blue collars, rednecks all homed in on Frenchie's on Friday night for boiled crawfish and cold beer, loud music and dancing, and the occasional brawl.

The building stood fifty feet back from the levee and sat up off the ground on stilts that protected it from flooding. It faced the bayou, inviting patrons in from fishing and hunting expeditions with a red neon sign that promised cold beer, fresh food, and live music. Whole sections of the building's siding were hung on hinges and propped up with wooden poles, revealing a long row of screens and creating a gallery of sorts along the sides.

Even though the sun had yet to go down, the crushed shell parking lot was overflowing with cars and pickups. The bar was overflowing with noise. The sounds of laughter, shouting, glass on glass underscored a steady stream of loud Cajun music that tumbled out through the screens into the warm spring night. Joyous and wild, a tangle of fiddle, guitar, and accordion, it invited even the rhythmically challenged to move with the beat.

Laurel stood at the bottom of the steps, looking up at the front door. She had never set foot in the place, though she knew it was a regular haunt of Savannah 's. Savannah, who made a career of flouting family convention. She may even have been sitting in Frenchie's at that moment. She had slipped out of Aunt Caroline's house around five, dressed like a woman who was looking for trouble and fairly glowing at the prospect of finding it. All she had told Laurel was that she had a date, and if all went well, no one would see her before noon Saturday.

Suddenly the hound skidded around the corner of the gallery and came to a halt, looking wide-eyed straight at Laurel. If she'd had any misgivings about coming to Frenchie's Landing-and she'd had a few-the sight of the marauder dispelled them. She was on a mission.

A trio of men in their twenties, dressed and groomed for a night on the town, walked around her and started up the steps, laughing and talking, telling ribald jokes in Cajun French. Laurel didn't wait for the punch line. She rushed after them and snatched at the sleeve of the biggest one, a bull of a man with a close-cropped black beard and a head of hair as thick as a beaver pelt that grew down over his forehead in a deep V.

"Excuse me," Laurel said. "But could you tell me who that hound belongs to?"

He cast a glance at the dog on the gallery, as did his companions.

"Hey, dat's Jack's dog, ain't it, Taureau?"

"Jack Boudreaux."

"Mais yeah, dat one's Jack's," Taureau said. His look softened, and a grin tugged across his wide mouth as he gave Laurel a once-over. "What, you lookin' for Jack, sugar?"

"Yes, I guess I am." She was looking for justice. If she had to find this Jack Boudreaux to get it, then so be it.

"Dat Jack, he's like a damn magnet, him!" one of the others said.

Taureau snorted. "Son pine!"

They all shared a good male belly laugh over that.

Laurel gave them her best Cool Professional Woman look, hoping it wasn't completely ruined by her baggy dress and lack of makeup. "I didn't come here to see his penis," she said flatly. "I need to discuss a business matter with him."

The men exchanged the kind of sheepish looks boys learn in kindergarten and spend the next thirty years honing to perfection, their faces flushing under their tans. Taureau ducked his big head down between his shoulders.

"Am I likely to find him in there?" Laurel nodded toward the bar's front door as it screeched back on its hinges to let out an elderly couple and a wave of noise.

"Yeah, you'll find him here," Taureau said. "Center stage."

"Thank you."

The smoking reform movement had yet to make in-roads in south Louisiana. The instant Laurel stepped into the bar, she had to blink to keep her eyes from stinging. A blue haze hung over the crowd. The scent of burning tobacco mingled with sweat and cheap perfume, barley and boiled crawfish. The lighting was dim, and the place was crowded. Waitresses wound their way through the mob with trays of beers and platters of food. Patrons sat shoulder to shoulder at round tables and overflowing booths, laughing, talking, stuffing themselves.

Laurel instantly felt alone, isolated, as if she were surrounded by an invisible force field. She had been brought up in a socially sterile environment, with proper teas and soirees and cotillions. The Leightons didn't lower themselves to having good common fun, and after her father had died and Vivian had remarried, Laurel and Savannah had become Leightons-never mind that Ross Leighton had never bothered to formally adopt them.

Caught off guard for an instant, she felt the old bitterness hit her by surprise and dig its teeth in deep. But it was shoved aside by newer unpleasant feelings as her strongest misgivings about coming here surfaced and threatened to swamp her-not the fear of no one's knowing her, but the fear of everyone's knowing her. The fear of everyone's recognizing her and knowing why she had come back to Bayou Breaux, knowing she had failed horribly and utterly… Her breath froze in her lungs as she waited for heads to start turning.

A waitress on her way back to the bar bumped into her, flashing a smile of apology and reaching a hand out to pat her arm. "Sorry, miss."

"I'm looking for Jack Boudreaux," Laurel shouted, lifting her eyebrows in question.

The waitress, a curvy young thing with a mop of dark curls and an infectious grin, swung her empty serving tray toward the stage and the man who sat at the keyboard of an old upright piano that looked as though someone had gone after it with a length of chain.

"There he is, in the flesh, honey. The devil himself," she said, her voice rising and falling in a distinctly Cajun rhythm. "You wanna join the fan club or somethin'?"

"No, I want restitution," Laurel said, but the waitress was already gone, answering a call of "Hey, Annie" from Taureau and his cohorts, who had commandeered a table across the room.

Homing in on the man she had come to confront, Laurel moved toward the small stage. The band had slowed things down with a waltz that was being sung by a small, wiry man with a Vandyke and a Panama hat. A vicious scar slashed across his face, from his right eyebrow across his cheek, misshaping the end of his hooked nose and disappearing into the cover of his mustache. But if his face wasn't beautiful, his voice certainly was. He clutched his hands to his heart and wailed out the lyrics in Cajun French as dancers young and old moved gracefully around the small dance floor.

To his right Jack Boudreaux stood with one knee on the piano bench, head bent in concentration as he pumped a small Evangeline accordion between his hands.

From this vantage point Boudreaux looked tall and rangy, with strong shoulders and slim hips. The expression on his lean, tanned face was stern, almost brooding. His eyes were squeezed shut as if sight might somehow hinder his interpretation of the music. Straight black hair tumbled down over his forehead, looking damp and silky under the stage lights.

Laurel skirted the dancers and wedged herself up against the front of the stage. She thought she could feel the inner pain he drew on as he played. Silly. Easily half of Cajun music was about some man losing his girl. This particular waltz-"Valse de Grand Mèche"-was an old one, a song about an unlucky woman lost in the marsh, her lover singing of how they will be together again after death. It wasn't Jack Boudreaux's personal life story, and it wouldn't have concerned her if it had been. She had come to see the man about his dog.

Jack let his fingers slow on the keys of the accordion as he played the final set of triplets and hit the last chord. Leonce belted out the final note with gusto, and the dancers' feet slowed to a shuffle. As the music faded away and the crowd clapped, he sank down on the piano bench, feeling drained. The song brought too many memories. That he was feeling anything at all told him one thing-he needed another drink.

He reached for the glass on the piano without looking and tossed back the last of a long, tall whiskey, sucking in a breath as the liquid fire hit his belly. It seared through him in a single wave of heat, leaving a pleasant numbness in its wake.

Slowly his lashes drifted open and his surroundings came once more into focus. His gaze hit on a huge pair of midnight blue eyes staring up at him from behind the lenses of man-size horn-rimmed glasses. The face of an angel hid behind those ridiculous glasses-heart-shaped, delicate, with a slim retroussé nose and a mouth that begged to be kissed. Jack felt his spirits pull out of their nosedive and wing upward as she spoke his name.

She wasn't the usual type of woman who pressed herself up against the stage and tried to snag his attention. For one thing, there was no show of cleavage. It was difficult to tell if she was capable of producing cleavage at all. The blue cotton sundress she wore hung on her like a sack. But imagination was one thing Jack Boudreaux had never been short on. Scruples, yes; morals, yes; imagination he had in abundance, and he used it now to make a quick mental picture of the woman standing below him. Petite, slim, sleek, like a little cat. He preferred his women to have a little more curve to them, but there was always something to be said for variety.

He leaned down toward her as he set the accordion on the floor and unfurled the grin that had knocked more than a few ladies off their feet. "Hey, sugar, where you been all my life?"

Laurel felt as if he had turned a thousand watts of pure electricity on her.

He looked wicked. He looked wild. He looked as though he could see right through her clothes, and she had the wildest urge to cross her arms over her chest, just in case. Annoyed with herself, she snapped her jaw shut and cleared her throat.

"I've been off learning to avoid Lotharios who use trite come-on lines," she said, her arms folding over her chest in spite of her resolve to keep them at her sides.

Jack's smile never wavered. He liked a girl with sass. "What, are you a nun or somethin', angel?"

"No, I'm an attorney. I need to speak to you about your dog."

Someone in the crowd raised a voice in protest against the absence of music. "Hey, Jack, can you quit makin' love long enough to sing somethin'?"

Jack raised his head and laughed, leaning toward the microphone that was attached to the piano. "This ain't love, Dede, it's a lawyer!" As the first wave of laughter died down, he said, "Y'all know what lawyers use for birth control, doncha?" He waited a beat, then his voice dropped a husky notch as he delivered the punch line. "Their personalities."

Laurel felt a flush of anger rise up her neck and creep up her cheeks as the crowd hooted and laughed. "I wouldn't make jokes if I were you, Mr. Boudreaux," she said, trying to keep her voice at a pitch only he could hear. "Your hound managed to do a considerable amount of damage to my aunt's garden today."

Jack shot her a look of practiced innocence. "What hound?"

"Your hound."

He shrugged eloquently. "I don't have a hound."

"Mr. Boudreaux-"

"Call me Jack, angel," he drawled as he leaned down toward her again, bracing his forearm on his thigh.

They were nearly at eye level, and Laurel felt herself leaning toward him, as if he were drawing her toward him by some personal magnetic force. His gaze slid down to her mouth and lingered there, shockingly frank in its appraisal.

"Mr. Boudreaux," she said in exasperation. "Is there somewhere we can discuss this more privately?"

He bobbed his eyebrows above dark, sparkling devil's eyes. "Is my place private enough for you?"

"Mr. Boudreaux…"

"Here's another trite line for you, angel," Jack whispered, bending a little closer, holding her gaze with his as he lifted a finger and pushed her glasses up on her nose. "You're pretty when you're pissed off."

His voice was low and smoky, Cajun-spiced and tainted with the aroma of whiskey.

Drawing in a slow, deep breath to steady herself, she tilted her chin up and tried again. "Mr. Boudreaux-"

He shot her a look as he moved toward the microphone once again. "Lighten up, angel. Laissez les bon temps rouler."

The mike picked up his last sentence, and the crowd cheered. Jack gave a smoky laugh. "Are we havin' fun yet?"

A chorus of hoots and hollers rose to the rafters. He fixed a long, hot look on the petite tigress glaring up at him from the edge of the stage and murmured, "This one's for you, angel."

His fingers stretched over the keys of the battered old piano, and he pounded out the opening notes of "Great Balls of Fire." The crowd went wild. Before the first line was out of his mouth, there were fifty people on the dance floor. They twirled and bounced around Laurel like a scene from American Bandstand, doing the jitterbug as if it had never gone out of style. But her attention was riveted on the singer. Not so much by choice as by compulsion. She was caught in the beam of that intense, dark gaze, held captive by it, mesmerized. He leaned over the keyboard, his hands moving across it, his mouth nearly kissing the microphone as his smoky voice sang out the lyrics with enthusiasm, but all the time his eyes were locked on her. The experience was strangely seductive, strangely intimate. Wholly unnerving.

She stared right back at him, refusing to be seduced or intimidated. Refusing to admit to either, at any rate. He grinned, as if amused by her spunk, and broke off the eye contact as he hit the bridge of the song and turned his full attention to the piano and the frantic pace of the music.

He pounded out the notes, his fingers flying up and down the keyboard expertly. All the intensity he had leveled at her in his gaze was channeled into his playing. The shock of black hair bounced over his forehead, shining almost blue under the lights. Sweat gleamed on his skin, streamed down the side of his face. His faded blue chambray shirt stuck to him in dark, damp patches. The sleeves were rolled back, revealing strong forearms dusted with black hair, muscles bunching and flexing as he slammed out the boogie-woogie piece with a skill and wild physical energy rivaling that of Jerry Lee Lewis himself.

Making music this way looked to be hard work physically and emotionally. As if he were in the throes of exorcism, the notes tore out of him, elemental, rough, sexy, almost frightening in intensity. He dragged his thumb up and down the keyboard, stroking out the final long, frenzied glissando, and fell forward, panting, exhausted as the crowd whistled and howled and screamed for more.

"Whoa-" Jack gulped a breath and forced a grin. "Bon Dieu. It's Miller time, folks. Y'all go sit down while I recuperate."

As a jukebox kicked in, the rest of the band instantly dispersed, abandoning the stage in favor of a table that was holding up gamely under the weight of more than a dozen long-necked beer bottles and an assortment of glasses.

Leonce clapped Jack's shoulder as he passed. "You're gettin' old, Jack," he teased. "Sa c'est honteu, mon ami."

Jack sucked another lungful of hot, smoky air and swatted at his friend. "Fuck you, 'tit boule."

"No need." Leonce grinned, hooking a thumb in the direction of the dance floor. "You got one waitin' on you."

Jack raised his head and shot a sideways look at the edge of the stage. She was still standing there, his little lawyer pest, looking expectant and unimpressed with him. Trouble-that's what she looked like. And not the kind he usually dove into headfirst, either. A lawyer. Bon Dieu, he thought he'd seen the last of that lot.

"You want a drink, sugar?" he asked as he hopped down off the stage.

"No," Laurel said, automatically taking a half step back and chastising herself for it. This man was the kind who would sense a weakness and exploit it. She could feel it, could see it in the way his dark gaze seemed to catch everything despite the fact that he had been drinking. She drew deep of the stale, hot air and squared her shoulders. "What I want is to speak with you privately about the damage done by your dog."

His mouth curved. "I don't have a dog."

He turned and sauntered away from her, his walk naturally cocky. Laurel watched him, astounded by his lack of manners, infuriated by his dismissal of her.

He didn't glance back at her, but continued on his merry way, winding gracefully through the throng, stealing a bottle of beer off Annie's serving tray as he went. The waitress gave an indignant shout, saw it was Jack, and melted as he treated her to a wicked grin. Laurel shook her head in a combination of amazement and disbelief and wondered how many times he had gotten away with raiding the cookie jar as a boy. Probably more times than his poor mother could count. He stepped through a side door, and she followed him out.

Night had fallen completely, bringing on the mercury vapor lights that loomed over the parking lot and cloaking the bayou beyond in shades of black. The noise of the bar faded, competing out here with a chorus of frog song and the hum of traffic rolling past out on the street. The air was fresh with the scents of spring in bloom-jasmine and wisteria and honeysuckle and the ripe, vaguely rank aroma of the bayou. Somewhere down the way, where shabby little houses with thin lawns lined the bank, a woman called for Paulie to come in. A screen door slammed. A dog barked.

The hound leaped out at Laurel from between a pair of parked pickup trucks and howled at her, startling her to a skidding halt on the crushed shell of the parking lot. She slammed a hand to her heart and bit back a curse as the big dog bounded away, tail wagging.

"That dog is an absolute menace," she complained.

"Don' look at me, sugar."

He was leaning back against the fender of a disreputable-looking Jeep, elbows on the hood, bottle of Dixie dangling from the fingers of his left hand.

Laurel planted herself in front of him and crossed her arms, holding her silence as if it might force a confession out of him. He simply stared back, his eyes glittering in the eerie silvery light that fell down on him from above. It cast his features in stark relief-a high, wide forehead, sardonically arched brows, an aquiline nose that looked as if it might have been broken once or twice in his thirty-some years.

His mouth was set in sterner lines again above a strong, stubborn-looking chin that sported an inch-long diagonal scar. He looked tough and dangerous suddenly, and the transformation from the laughing, affable, wicked-grinned devil he'd been inside sent a shiver of apprehension down Laurel 's back. He looked like a streetwise, predatory male, and she couldn't help second-guessing her judgment in following him out here. Then he smiled, teeth flashing bright in the gloom, dimples cutting into his cheeks, and the world tilted yet again beneath her feet.

"I have it on good authority that hound belongs to you, Mr. Boudreaux." She dove into the argument, eager for the familiar ground of a good fight. She didn't like being caught off balance, and Jack Boudreaux seemed to be a master at throwing her.

He wagged a finger at her, tilting his head, a grin still teasing the corners of his mouth. "Jack. Call me Jack."

"Mr.-"

"Jack." His gaze held hers fast. He looked lazy and apathetic leaning back against the Jeep, but a thread of insistence had woven its way into the hoarse, smoky texture of his voice.

He was distracting her, but more than that, he was trying to do something she didn't want-put the conversation on a more personal level.

He shifted his weight forward, suddenly invading her personal space, and she had to fight to keep from jumping back as her tension level rose into the red zone. She gulped down her instinctive fear and tilted her chin up to look him in the eye.

"I don't even know your name, 'tite ange," he murmured.

"Laurel Chandler," she answered, breathless and hating it. Her nerves gave a warning tremor as control of the situation seemed to slip a little further out of her grasp.

" Laurel," he said softly, trying out the sound of it, the feel of it on his tongue. "Pretty name. Pretty lady." He grinned as something like apprehension flashed in her wide eyes. "Did you think I wouldn't notice?"

She swallowed hard, leaning all her weight back on her heels. "I-I'm sure I don't know what you mean."

"Liar," he charged mildly.

With his free hand he reached up and slid her glasses off, dragging them down her nose an inch at a time. When they were free, he turned them over and nibbled on the earpiece absently as he studied her in the pale white light.

Her bone structure was lovely, delicate, feminine, her features equally so, her skin as flawless as fresh cream. But she wore no makeup, no jewelry, nothing to enhance or draw the eye. Her thick, dark hair had been shorn just above her shoulders and looked as though she gave no thought to it at all, tucking it behind her ears, sweeping it carelessly back from her face.

Laurel Chandler. The name stirred around through the soft haze of liquor in his brain, sparking recognition. Chandler. Lawyer. The light bulb clicked on. Local deb. Daughter of a good family. Had been a prosecuting attorney up in Georgia someplace until her career went ballistic. Rumors had abounded around Bayou Breaux. She'd blown a case. There'd been a scandal. Jack had listened with one ear, automatically eavesdropping the way every writer did, always on the alert for a snatch of dialogue or a juicy tidbit that could work itself into a plot.

"What are you wearing these for?" he asked, lifting the glasses.

"To see with," Laurel snapped, snatching them out of his hand. She really needed them only to read, but he didn't have to know that.

"So you can see, or so the rest of us can't see you?"

She gave a half laugh of impatience, shifting position in a way that put another inch of space between them. "This conversation is pointless," she declared as her nerves stretched a little tighter.

He had struck far too close to the truth with his seemingly offhand remark. He appeared to be half drunk and completely self-absorbed, but Laurel had the sudden uncomfortable feeling that there might be more to Jack Boudreaux than met the eye. A cunning intelligence beneath the lazy facade. A sharp mind behind the satyr's grin.

"Oh, I agree. Absolutely," he drawled, shuffling his feet, inching his way into her space again. His voice dropped a husky, seductive note as he leaned down close enough so his breath caressed her cheek. "So let's go to my place and do something more… satisfying."

"What about the band?" Laurel asked inanely, trembling slightly as the heat from his body drifted over her skin. She held her ground and caught a breath in her throat as he lifted a hand to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear.

He chuckled low in his throat. "I'm not into sharing."

"That's not what I meant."

"They can play just fine without me."

"I hope the same can be said for you," Laurel said dryly. She crossed her arms again, drawing her composure around her like a queen's cloak. "I'm not going anywhere with you, and the only satisfaction I intend to get is restitution for the damage your dog caused."

He dropped back against the Jeep in a negligent pose once more and took a long pull on his beer, his eyes never leaving hers. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "I don't have a dog."

As if on cue, the hound jumped up into the driver's seat of the open Jeep and looked at them both, ears perked with interest as he listened to them argue culpability for his crimes.

"A number of people have identified this as your hound," Laurel said, swinging an arm in the direction of the culprit.

"That don' make him mine, sugar," Jack countered.

"No less than four people have named you as the owner."

He arched a brow. "Do I have a license for this dog? Can you produce ownership papers?"

"Of course not-"

"Then all you have are unsubstantiated rumors, Miz Chandler. Hearsay. You and I both know that'll stand up in a court of law about as good as a dead man's dick."

Laurel drew in a deep breath through her nostrils, trying in vain to stem the rising tide of frustration. She should have been able to cut this man off at the knees and send him crawling to Aunt Caroline's house to apologize. He was nothing but a liquored-up piano player at Frenchie's Landing, for Christ's sake, and she couldn't manage to best him. The anger she had been directing at Jack started turning back her way.

"What'd ol' Huey do, anyhow, that's got you so worked up, angel?"

"Huey?" She pounced on the opening with the ferocity of a starving cat on a mouse. "You called him by name!" she charged, pointing an accusatory finger at Jack, taking an aggressive step forward. "You named him!"

He scowled. "It's short for Hey You."

"But the fact remains-"

"Fact my ass," Jack returned. "I can call you by name too, 'tite chatte. That don' make you mine." Grinning again, he leaned ahead and caught her chin in his right hand, boldly stroking the pad of his thumb across the lush swell of her lower lip. "Does it, Laurel?" he murmured suggestively, dipping his head down, his mouth homing in on hers.

Laurel jerked back from him, batting his hand away. Her hold on her control, slippery and tenuous at best these days, slipped a little further. She felt as if she were hanging on to it by the ragged, bitten-down remains of her fingernails and it was still pulling away. She had come here for justice, but she wasn't getting any. Jack Boudreaux was jerking her around effortlessly. Playing with her, mocking her, propositioning her. God, was she so ineffectual, such a failure-

"You didn't do your job, Ms. Chandler… You blew it… Charges will be dismissed…"

"Come on, sugar, prove your case," Jack challenged. He took another pull on his beer. Dieu, he was actually enjoying this little sparring match. He was rusty, out of practice. How long had it been since he had argued a case? Two years? Three? His time away from corporate law ran together in a blur of months. It seemed like a lifetime. He would have thought he had lost his taste for it, but the old skills were still there.

Sharks don't lose their instincts, he reminded himself, bitterness creeping in to taint his enjoyment of the fight.

"It-it's common knowledge that's your dog, Mr. Boudreaux," Laurel stammered, fighting to talk around the knot hardening in her throat. She didn't hold eye contact with him, but tried to focus instead on the hound, which was tilting his head and staring at her quizzically with his mismatched eyes. "Y-You should be man enough to t-take responsibility for it."

"Ah, me," Jack said, chuckling cynically. "I don' take responsibility, angel. Ask anyone."

Laurel barely heard him, her attention focusing almost completely inward, everything else becoming vague and peripheral. A shudder of tension rattled through her, stronger than its precursor. She tried to steel herself against it and failed.

Failed.

"You didn't do your job, Ms. Chandler… Charges will be dismissed…"

She hadn't proven her case. Couldn't make the charges stick on something so simple and stupid as a case of canine vandalism. Failed. Again. Worthless, weak… She spat the words at herself as a wave of helplessness surged through her.

Her lungs seemed suddenly incapable of taking in air. She tried to swallow a mouthful of oxygen and then another as her legs began to shake. Panic clawed its way up the back of her throat. She pressed a hand to her mouth and blinked furiously at the tears that pooled and swirled in her eyes, blurring her view of the hound.

Jack started to say something, but cut himself off, beer bottle halfway to his lips. He stared at Laurel as she transformed before his eyes. The bright-eyed tigress on a mission was gone as abruptly as if she had never existed, leaving instead a woman on the verge of tears, on the brink of some horrible inner precipice.

"Hey, sugar," he said gently, straightening away from the Jeep. "Hey, don' cry," he murmured, shifting uncomfortably from foot to foot, casting anxious glances around the parking lot.

Rumor had it she'd been in some posh clinic in North Carolina. The word "breakdown" had been bandied all over town. Jesus, he didn't need this, didn't want this. He'd already proven once in his life that he couldn't handle it, was the last person anyone should count on to handle it. I don' take responsibility… That truth hung on him like chain mail. He leaned toward Frenchie's, wanting to bolt, but his feet stayed rooted to the spot, nailed down by guilt.

The side door slammed, and Leonce's voice came across the dark expanse of parking lot in staccato French. "Hey, Jack, viens ici! Dépêche-toi! Allons jouer la musique, pas les femmes!"

Jack cast a longing glance at his friend up on the gallery, then back at Laurel Chandler. "In a minute!" he called, his gaze lingering on the woman, turmoil twisting in his belly like a snake. He didn't credit himself with having much of a conscience, but what there was made him take a step toward Laurel. "Look, sugar-"

Laurel twisted back and away from the hand he held out to her, mortified that this man she knew little and respected less was witnessing this-this weakness. God, she wanted to have at least some small scrap of pride to cling to, but that, too, was tearing out of her grasp.

"I never should have come here," she mumbled, not entirely sure whether she meant Frenchie's specifically or Bayou Breaux in general. She stumbled back another step as Jack Boudreaux reached for her arm again, his face set in lines of concern and apprehension, then she whirled and ran out of the parking lot and into the night.

Jack stood flat-footed, watching in astonishment as she disappeared in the heavy shadows beneath a stand of moss-draped live oak at the bayou's edge. Panic, he thought. That was what he had seen in her eyes. Panic and despair and a strong aversion to having him see either. What a little bundle of contradictions she was, he thought as he dug a cigarette out of his shirt pocket and dangled it from his lip. Strength and fire and fragility.

"What'd you do, mon ami?" Leonce shuffled up, tugging off his Panama hat and wiping the sweat from his balding pate with his forearm. "You scare her off with that big horse cock of yours?"

Jack scowled, his gaze still on the dark bank, his mind still puzzling over Laurel Chandler. "Shut up, tcheue poule."

"Don' let it get you down," Leonce said, chuckling at his own little pun. He settled his hat back in place, and his fingers drifted down to rub absently at the scar that ravaged his cheek. "Women are easy to come by."

And hard to shake-that was their usual line. Not Laurel Chandler. She had cut and run. Even as his brain turned the puzzle over and around trying to shake loose an answer, Jack shrugged it off. His instincts told him Laurel Chandler would be nothing but trouble when all he really wanted from life was to pass a good time.

"Yeah," he drawled, turning back toward Frenchie's with his buddy. "Let's go inside. I need to find me a cold beer and hot date."