The old lady stepped back to stand with her family and a stool was placed in front of the microphone. The lights dimmed, except for a single spotlight, and a cowboy stepped onto the stage, carrying a guitar. He sat on the stool, head bent over, as he tightened the strings on the guitar in a nervous manner.
A stone silence permeated the room as he strummed softly, then sang, almost in a whisper at first, the lyrics to that old Elvis song, “Love Me Tender.” Only then did he look up, directly at Emelie, and she saw that it was Justin.
Not nude as she’d once jokingly requested, but wearing an open cowboy shirt over jeans tucked into well-worn cowboy boots. On his head was a white Stetson, and he was playing what must have been his father’s guitar.
“Oh, my God!” She slapped a hand over her mouth, and darted a glance right and left to see that everyone at her table had left her alone, even Belle, who stood a short distance away, giving her a little hands folded in prayer gesture of encouragement.
This was so humiliating, Emelie thought, but then immediately realized that it must be way more humiliating for Justin, who was not a professional singer, by any means. Not even that good of a guitarist. But he was doing this… why?
When he finished the first song, Justin kept strumming and spoke as he played soft chords, “Y’know, us men are clueless when it comes ta women.”
Laughter rippled among the crowd, and one woman yelled, “Tell us about it, cowboy!”
He sang a few stanzas of “Are You Lonesome Tonight?” and then said, “Are you ever lonesome, Em? I sure as hell am.”
People were craning their necks to see who he was talking to.
“A wise person told me that men need to make a grand gesture if they want to win a woman’s love.”
Tante Lulu waved from behind them to let everyone know that she was the wise person in question.
“I thought about hirin’ a band ta serenade her beneath her window, but that seemed too corny.” Under his breath, he muttered, “Like this isn’t corny!”
“Aaah,” the women in the audience said, and the men agreed, “Corny!”
“I could hire an airplane to fly overhead with a banner reading, FORGIVE ME, CHÈRE, but waitin’ fer you ta make the first move just isn’t workin’.”
“Why dint ya jist knock down her door and carry her off?” a drunk called out.
Cage tilted his head to the side. Why hadn’t he thought of that? He laid down the guitar, kicked the stool aside, and jumped off the stage. Before she could blink, and to the howls of the crowd, he picked Em up off her chair and carried her across the dance floor toward a hallway.
“Are you crazy? Stop it! Put me down. Good Lord, we’re not kids anymore, Justin.”
“No, we’re not, baby,” he said. “The things I want to do to you are definitely not for kids.”
She was swatting at him and squirming to beat the band, speaking of which, was now playing a rowdy Cajun country classic, “Knock, Knock, Knock,” with the crowd joining in with howls and stomping feet every time the band hit the stanza “Knock, Knock, Knock.”
Gator was coming out of the office, took one look at Cage and opened the door wide for him to enter, then closed it after them.
He kind of lost it then as he set Em on her feet. He was kissing her and murmuring love words against her open mouth and unbuttoning her blouse all at the same time, afraid to stop or pause to be zapped with one curt “No!”
But there was no protest. In fact, Em was yanking his open cowboy shirt out of his jeans and kissing his chest.
He pulled back and looked at her. Her blouse was half off one shoulder, dangling outside the waistband of her jeans. How had he managed that? Exposed was a red lace bra. “Oh, man, I love red, and lace, and you,” he said.
She smiled.
Thank you, God!
She was rolling his shirt off his shoulders and undoing his buckle. When she said, “Keep on the cowboy hat,” he knew he was home free.
“Whatever you say, babe.” He was no fool.
“You were almost killed,” she murmured, kissing the scar on his belly.
Oh, damn! She was kneeling before him. When had that happened? No way could he handle that right now.
He drew her up and set her rump on the desk, which was fortunately cleared. “ ‘Almost’ is the key word, honey. ‘Almost’ doesn’t count in baseball or life.”
She arched her brows. “You saved Bernie’s life.”
“Hah! And now he trails me like a caboose everywhere I go. I keep tellin’ him this is what we do.”
“SEALs?”
“Uh-huh.”
“I’m proud of you, Justin.”
He grinned. “How proud?’
It might have been the shortest fuck in history, but it was mighty satisfying, for both of them. By the time they finally crawled off the desk and set it to rights, and tried to straighten out each other’s clothes and hair, they were laughing. It was only then that they realized that the band was still playing “Knock, Knock, Knock” over and over.
“They’re waiting for us to come back,” Em said, horrified. “They all must know what we were doing.”
“Yeah,” he replied with a wink.
She smacked his shoulder.
“Before we go back, Em, you need ta be forewarned,” Cage said, “I wanted ta do somethin’ real sentimental fer you, and that’s why everyone is waitin’ fer us.”
“Uh-oh!” She narrowed her eyes at him.
As they stepped out of the corridor onto the dance floor, Cage had his arm around Em’s waist. The band stopped playing, and there was a sudden silence. Just then, thanks to Tante Lulu’s pull with some engineering people, a shower of white confetti fell from the ceiling, covering them, like snowflakes.
He went down on one knee before her and said, “I always said I wouldn’t come back to Loo-zee-anna ’til snow fell on the bayou. Honey, here I am. For you.”
She tried to pull him up as she blushed with embarrassment. “Stop it. I don’t need this,” she whispered.
“I do,” he said. “Em, I love you. I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Will you marry me?”
The crowd began to pound its feet, and the band began to play “Love Me Tender” again, waiting for her response.
“I thought you’d never ask… again.”
Huh? Would he ever figure out women?
Loud applause greeted her announcement, and he began to twirl her around, doing what Cajun men did best. Dance. Well, the second best thing.
Epilogue
And the beat goes on…
Justin LeBlanc and Emelie Gaudet were married on June 15 at Our Lady of the Bayou Church in Houma, Louisiana.
Justin’s grandmother, Mary Mae LeBlanc, was not there, having passed a month before, but she did get to share in the happiness of their engagement for several months. During the last few weeks, Emelie had moved into the Bayou Black cottage with Justin, and with the help of hospice, they were able to provide the comfortable setting Miss MaeMae wanted for her last days on this earth. At her funeral, Elvis sang “Amazing Grace,” a song Miss MaeMae had said that Rufus insisted he wanted singing her home. When Rufus had told her that, no one was sure, since she’d been having numerous conversations with him in her dreams near the end.
After the wedding ceremony, Justin in his dress whites led his new bride through an archway of swords provided by Justin’s SEAL buddies—JAM, Geek, Slick, K-4, F.U., Magnusson, Omar, and Pretty Boy, all of whom wore dress whites, too. All of the guys wanted to come because no one had believed that Cage would ever settle down, and they had to meet the woman who could clip his tail feathers. Marie Delacroix, a close friend of Justin’s and a member of the elite Navy WEALS, was also in the sword brigade.
Women were said to be crashing the wedding reception at the convention hall right and left, just to be able to get a look at all the handsome men. One woman was heard to remark, “And I thought the LeDeux men were sexy!” One man said, “I should have stayed ho
me.” Two hundred people attended the reception; and both Justin and Emelie kept exclaiming that they didn’t know they had that many friends.
Belle, who’d designed Emelie’s ivory wedding gown and veil, was the maid of honor. Francine, Charmaine, and Tante Lulu were her attendants. Belle, Francine, and Charmaine looked classy and sensational, everyone said so, in identical ankle-length sheath dresses in pastel shades of blue, lavender, and green. Tante Lulu also wore an identical sheath, but hers was hot pink. Think Pepto Popsicle. Enough said!
There was no flower girl or ring bearer. The hit of the show was Thad, who marched perfectly down the aisle, without a single woof, on a leash held by Belle, the big red bow around his neck holding the ring.
Emelie’s father, who’d married Francine the previous month, walked Emelie down the aisle, and everyone held their breath until he handed her over to Justin. Some said the old man had a shot of bourbon before the “ordeal,” despite his heart condition, just to give him the courage to let her go to his least favorite person. Justin was heard whispering to Claude at the altar, “I’ll grow on you.”
Beer and beer and more beer flowed to wet parched throats at the reception, along with sweet tea, of course. Every possible type of Cajun food was laid out on groaning tables, thanks to the supervision of Tante Lulu, who claimed to be taking over for Miss MaeMae and for Emelie’s mother, both deceased but watching closely from up there. The wedding cake was a humongous Peachy Praline Cobbler Cake extravaganza. The napkins at each place setting were St. Jude ones, of course.
Justin and Emelie danced first to his daddy’s song “Prison Is a State of Mind.” In the past month, Justin had learned that his father’s song was earning impressive residuals, and a prominent agent was interested in Beau’s entire collection of unpublished songs.
After that it was a wild Cajun/Navy SEAL affair with drinking and dancing and laughing until the wee hours. Tante Lulu was standing, watching the shenanigans, and remarked to her twin nephews, Daniel and Aaron LeDeux, who were standing on either side of her, “St. Jude allus comes through.” But then she looked at one of them, then the other. “I wonder who’s next?”
“Have you met Simone LeDeux? She’s a cop,” Aaron interjected quickly.
“What? Where? A LeDeux, you say?” Tante Lulu could barely contain her excitement.
For some reason, Daniel, Aaron, and Simone all departed early.
Justin and Emelie were leaving in the morning for a honeymoon to California and a stay in the famous Hotel del Coronado. They planned to divide their time between the West Coast and Louisiana for the next three years, after which they would live in Justin’s homestead, which was already in the process of what would be a slow renovation.
They weren’t able to give Miss MaeMae the gift of a LeBlanc baby, or even news of an upcoming one, before her death. But as always, when men and women think they are the rulers of their own destinies, God, or St. Jude, sticks out His big toe and trips them. Emelie was one month pregnant when she walked down the aisle. If it was a girl, Emelie threatened to call her Snowflake. Justin was horrified. “Kids will give her Flake for a nickname.” They decided to hold off on names until the big event, not wanting to risk any more celestial “big toes” if they set their preferences for girl or boy. After all, the powers-that-be could give them twins.
Later on their wedding night, as the newly married couple lay in their bedroom, he said to her, “Wanna fool around again?”
“Forever and ever.”
Snowflakes were probably falling somewhere.
*dpgroup.org*
A Letter from the Author
Dear Readers:
Many of you have been begging for a new Tante Lulu story. How did you like this one?
When I first started writing my Cajun contemporary books back in 2003, I never expected Tante Lulu would touch so many people’s hearts and funny bones. Over the years, readers have fallen in love with the wacky old lady (I like to say, Grandma Moses with cleavage). So many of you have said you have a family member just like her; still more have said they wish they did.
Family… that’s what my Cajun/Tante Lulu books are all about. And community… the generosity and unconditional love of friends and neighbors. In these turbulent times, isn’t that just what we all want?
You should know that Snow on the Bayou is the ninth book in my Cajun series, which includes: The Love Potion; Tall, Dark, and Cajun; The Cajun Cowboy; The Red Hot Cajun; Pink Jinx; Pearl Jinx; Wild Jinx; and So Into You. And there are still more Cajun tales to come, I think. Daniel and Aaron LeDeux, and the newly introduced Simone LeDeux. What do you think?
For more information on these and others of my books, visit my website at www.sandrahill.net or my Facebook page at Sandra Hill Author.
As always, I wish you smiles in your reading.
Sandra Hill
Miss MaeMae’s Red Beans and Rice
1 pound dried red kidney beans
½ pound bacon
1½ cups diced onions
1 large bell pepper, chopped
1 cup chopped celery
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoons butter
1 pound boudin sausage (smoked sausage can be substituted or ham hocks)
2 quarts water (more if needed)
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper (to start, add more if you want)
Tabasco sauce, to taste
Salt and pepper, to taste
4 cups cooked white rice
Thinly sliced scallion for garnish
Soak the beans overnight in a covered pot or bowl of water. In the morning drain and set in a cast-iron pot or a slow cooker.
In a frying pan, sauté the bacon until it is done but not crispy. Add the Holy Trinity of Cajun cooking (onions, bell pepper, and celery) and the garlic. Sauté until the vegetables are soft and add to the beans. Put the butter in the same frying pan, and add the sausage, which has been cut into chunks. Brown the sausage and add that to the bean pot.
Add at least 2 quarts of water so that the bean mixture is covered. Simmer for 2 hours, uncovered. You will probably need to add more water.
Add as much cayenne as you want, and leave Tabasco on the table for those who dare. Salt and pepper to taste, as well.
Serve over white rice. Garnish with the thinly sliced scallions. Six to eight hearty appetites will be satisfied with this dish.
ALSO BY SANDRA HILL
Tall, Dark, and Cajun
The Cajun Cowboy
The Red-Hot Cajun
Pink Jinx
Pearl Jinx
Wild Jinx
So Into You
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