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She just kept remembering another night, another dark, storm-tossed night long ago. A night she had buried in that secret place in her mind and soul. Was she confusing the two?
“I just can’t get it out of my mind,” she said, completely unaware that she’d spoken.
Until Mick took her trembling hand in his. “You survived a major catastrophe, Lorna. It’s understandable that you might have some sort of post-traumatic reaction.”
She had to laugh at that. Placing a hand over her mouth, she tried to stifle the giggles. Sometimes, she thought her whole life since her parents’ death had been one big post-traumatic reaction.
Mick looked down at her as if she’d lost her senses. And she supposed she did look quite mad laughing at his very serious observation. “I’m sorry,” she said, sobering and becoming quiet. And becoming so very aware of the man standing in front of her. He sure cleaned up nicely. And smelled like a fresh forest after a gentle rain.
To make amends for acting like an idiot, she said, “It’s just been a rather long day, and I’m exhausted. We’ve had to cancel guest reservations for the weekend and send others away. None of us has had any rest since the storm hit, and it’s only going to continue until we get this place cleaned up and open to the public again.”
He guided her to a nearby high-backed chair, gently pushing her down on the thickly hewn straw bottom. “And it’s understandable if you don’t feel up to having company for dinner.”
He rose to leave, but Lorna’s hand on his arm stopped him. “No, stay.” Then she jumped up, rushing past him to check on the bread. “I mean, we’ve set a place for you and Aunt Hilda is looking forward to talking with you. You can’t leave now.”
He leaned on the long wooden counter in the middle of the room, then looked at her in a way that left her senses reeling, in a way that made her think he could easily read her deepest secrets. Then he smiled again. “I guess that would be rude.”
“Yes, it would. Just ignore me. I’m all right, really.” Pushing at his arm, she said, “Why don’t you go into the front parlor with Aunt Hilda and Lacey. I think my brother Lucas is there, too. I’ll be out just as soon as I cut the bread.”
“And you’ll be okay?”
Lorna ignored the little spot in her heart that longed to shout for help, for someone to soothe all the pain and make her feel better. She didn’t need, didn’t want, pity or sympathy. And she couldn’t bring herself to ask for comfort.
“I’m a big girl, Mick. I think I can manage through supper.” She pointed a finger toward the swinging door. “But if you could tell Rosie Lee I’m ready to serve now…”
“Sure,” Mick said, backing toward the door. “I saw her and Tobbie in the dining room. I’ll get her for you.”
“Thank you.” Lorna watched him leave, then turned to the stove, letting out a long breath that she hadn’t even realized she’d been holding.
She didn’t understand why being around Mick seemed to turn her into a bubbling, blathering mess. She’d been in charge of her senses early this morning, even when he’d landed smack on top of her. Even when he’d saved her from that tree limb.
Saved her.
Lorna saw her distorted reflection in one of the wide, paned kitchen windows, and knew instantly what was the matter with her.
Mick had saved her life, or had, at least, thrown himself between her and danger. These strange, erratic stirrings deep inside her were only gut reactions to what he’d done. She felt gratitude toward him, and she didn’t know how to express that gratitude.
“That’s all it is,” she told herself. “The man protected me from that giant oak limb.” And I didn’t even bother to thank him.
A voice rang as clear as a dinner bell inside her head. And maybe…Mick Love saved you from yourself.
It had been a long, long time since Lorna had allowed anyone else to be her protector. She’d never accepted that she needed rescuing, had never allowed anyone other than her immediate family close enough to see her fear. But because of what could have been a freak accident, because she’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time, Mick had gotten way too close.
Had he seen her fear? Was that why he seemed so solicitous of her? Was that why she felt so vulnerable around him?
“Leave it to me to do a foolish thing like stand underneath a broken limb.” But then, she reminded herself, she always somehow managed to be in the wrong place when things turned from bad to worse.
Or maybe she’d been in the right place at the right time. Aunt Hilda always said God put people in certain circumstances to get them where they needed to be.
And Lorna had been in that place at that time, praying for something, someone to help her understand. She’d told Mick that God had answered her prayers by sending him. That much was the truth, at least. He’d come along exactly when she needed him.
That was a debt Lorna wasn’t ready to accept or repay. Yet somehow, she knew she’d have to find a way to do just that.
Mick found Rosie Lee and Tobbie Babineaux busily setting up the dining room, little Tobias at their feet playing with a hand-held computer game. Mick watched as the couple laughed and worked together, side by side. He envied their easy banter and loving closeness. They were married with six children, yet the radiant smiles on their faces showed how much they enjoyed being together.
“Hello,” he said as he strolled toward them, then touched a hand to Little Tobbie’s arm in greeting. “You folks need any help?”
“Mr. Love,” Rosie Lee said, laughing so hard her whole belly shook, “you the guest. We the workers.”
Mick shrugged and laughed right along with her. He liked her strong Cajun accent. “Sorry. I’m just used to earning my keep.”
Tobias immediately jumped up. “I saw you up in a tree. Don’t you get scared, being way up high like that?”
“Nope,” Mick replied, leaning over to ruffle the boy’s shining black hair. “I’m so used to it, I don’t even think about it.”
Tobias’s black eyes burned with questions. “I can climb way up high, too. Maybe I can be a tree man one day.”
His mother groaned, then turned to her son. “You stay out of Mr. Love’s way, you hear? Don’t go climbing any more trees, either. You almost got stuck the other day, remember?”
“I need me one of them buckets like Mr. Mick uses, I guess.” Tobias grinned, then scooted away before his mother could grab him.
“I’m going out back to play,” he called, already running out the open door.
“Don’t bother Mr. Love’s equipment,” his father warned.
Mick grinned, then turned to Tobbie. “I bet he’s a handful.”
“Yep. And his older brothers just make it worse by teaching him their bad ways, too. Our house is always full of fightin’ boys.”
“And a couple of quiet girls,” his wife said with a grin and a nod.
Mick glanced around the beautiful room. “Sure is quiet around here tonight.”
Tobbie winked at him. “All the other guests gone and checked out. Storm got to ’em. So we gonna treat you like royalty—you and your men, that is.”
“Nah, now,” Mick replied, holding up a hand. “I’m just a regular joe—no prince. But I have to admit, I could get used to this. This place is amazing.”
Just like the women who run it, he thought to himself. Especially the woman now alone in the kitchen. The woman who didn’t want him to see that she was still frightened as a result of the tornado.
But what else was scaring Lorna? He thought about asking Tobbie what had happened to Lorna’s parents, but footsteps from the front of the house halted him.
“Hey, man, c’mon up here to the parlor,” Lucas called from the wide central hallway, his cowboy boots clicking on the hardwood floors as he walked toward Mick.
“Coming,” Mick said, lifting a hand to Rosie Lee and Tobbie. “Oh, Lorna’s ready to serve now,” he remembered to tell them.
Lucas had an accent similar to theirs, but a bit more cultured. Yet he seemed every bit as Cajun as the Babineaux, while his sisters seemed more refined and pure Southern. But then, this family was as mysterious and full of contrasts as the swamp down below the back gardens.
Maybe if he made small talk with her family, Mick would be able to get a handle on Lorna. He didn’t yet understand why she brought out all his protective instincts, or why she fought so hard to hide behind that wall of control. He reckoned it had something to do with him falling headlong into her out there beneath the great oaks this morning.
Saving someone from near death did have a dramatic effect on a person. Didn’t that mean he had to protect her for life now? Or was that the other way around? Did she now owe him something in return? That option was certainly worth exploring.
“How ya doing?” Lucas asked, as Mick approached him. “Want some mint iced tea or a cup of coffee? We’ve even got some kind of fancy mineral water—Lorna insists on keeping it for our guests.”
“I’m fine,” Mick replied, his gaze sweeping across the winding marble staircase. “Hey, this house is unbelievable.”
“Nearly as old as the dirt it’s sitting upon,” Lucas replied, his grin showing a row of gleaming white teeth, his dark eyes shifting to a deep rich brown as the light hit them. “Been here for well over a hundred and fifty years, at least.” He shrugged. “My sisters are the experts on the history of this old house. Me, I prefer hanging out in the swamps where the real history is found.”
That statement intrigued Mick. “I bet you’ve seen some stuff out there.”
Lucas nodded, then, with a sweeping gesture, announced Mick to his aunt and sister. “Mr. Mick Love, ladies.” Then he turned back to Mick. “The swamp holds all of her secrets close, but I’ve seen a few of her treasures and a few of her dangers, yeah.”
Mick thought that best described Lucas’s sister, too. Lorna obviously held her secrets close. But Mick had seen something deep and dark and mysterious there in her green eyes. Something he wanted to explore and expose, bring out into the open. Which might prove to be dangerous, too. He worked too many long hours to even think about getting involved with a redheaded woman.
Glancing around the long parlor, he was once again assaulted by the opulence and old-world elegance of Bayou le Jardin. His gaze swept the fireplace, then settled on a small portrait of a dark-haired man and a beautiful woman with strawberry-blond hair, centered over the mantel.
“Our parents,” Lucas told him in a low voice, his black eyes as unreadable as a moonless night. “They died when we were children.”
Mick wanted to ask Lucas what had happened, but on seeing the look on the other man’s face he decided that might not be such a good idea. Mick had lots of questions, for lots of reasons he couldn’t even begin to understand or explain.
Right now, though, he had to remember his manners and make polite conversation with the Dorsette bunch. And wonder all the while why he was so attracted to Lorna.
“That was one of the best meals I’ve had in a very long time,” Mick told Lorna later, as they all sat around the long mahogany dining table. “I don’t get much home cooking.”
“Oh, and why is that?” Aunt Hilda asked. She sat, stirring rich cream into her coffee, a bowl of bread pudding on her dessert plate. “And while we’re talking, where did you grow up? Who’s your family?”
Mick glanced around the table. Everything about Bayou le Jardin was elegant and cultured, down to the silverware and lace-edged linen napkins. And he was sure the lineage went back centuries, too. Aunt Hilda’s question was typical of blue-blooded rich people. They didn’t really care about you; they just wanted to make sure you came from good Southern stock. He didn’t begrudge her the question, but he did find it pointed and obvious, and amusing. She wanted to know if she could trust him, count on him to do what was right.
Did he really want to tell these people that he’d grown up in a trailer park deep in the Mississippi Delta with an abusive father? Or should he just tell them that after his old man had drunk himself to death, his mother had changed from a weak, submissive wife into a strong, determined woman who wanted the best for her only son? Should he tell them she’d worked two jobs just to make sure Mick finished school and learned a trade? Or that she had died from a heart attack before she could enjoy his success? Should he tell them that he had no one to go home to, now that she was dead? And that the woman he’d planned on marrying had dumped him for someone else? That he’d left the Delta and had never looked back?
Mick looked at Lorna, saw the questioning lift of her arched brows, and knew he wasn’t nearly good enough to be sitting at this table. So he simply said, “I was born and raised in Mississippi, and I still have a home there right outside of Vicksburg—that is, when I can ever get back to it.”
“So you travel around a lot.” This statement came from Lorna. She’d obviously already summed him up.
Mick glanced over at her without bothering to defend himself. She sat there, bathed in golden light from the multifaceted chandelier hanging over the table, her hands in her lap, her hair falling in ringlets of satin fire around her face and down her back. She was beautiful in a different kind of way. Not classic, but fiery and defiant. Mick couldn’t explain it, but he could certainly see that beauty. And feel it. It washed over him like a golden rain, leaving him unsteady and unsure.
Wanting to give her a good answer, he went for the truth this time. “Yeah, we stay on the road a lot. We travel all over the state, and on rare occasions, such as this, we travel out of state. Do a lot of work in Alabama and Georgia, too. I reckon you could say we go wherever the work takes us.”
“You probably keep steady,” Lucas said, before taking a long swig of his tea. “There’s always trees around.”
“If you have your way, that is,” Lacey interjected. “Lucas is a naturalist—the protector of the bayou.” She grinned, but Mick didn’t miss the pride in her eyes.
“Among my many other talents,” Lucas said, his dark eyes twinkling with merriment.
“Yes, and if we could just pinpoint what exactly you are good at and make you stick with it, we might all be able to retire with a nice nest egg,” Lorna stated, her attention now on her brother.
Lucas pumped up his chest. “Now, suga’, you know I’m good at whatever I set my mind to.”
His sisters and aunt all laughed, then shook their heads. Soon, they were all talking at once, each giving pointed suggestions as to what Lucas needed to do with his sorry life.
Mick was just glad the conversation had switched away from him. Even if Lorna’s gaze did drift back to him now and again.
Then Lucas made an intriguing remark. “Well, sister, you’re a fine one to ask Mr. Love about traveling.” He grinned toward Mick. “Lorna took off a few years back, traveled all over the world, settled in Paris for a while.”
“I went to cooking school,” Lorna snapped as she stared hard at her brother.
“And now she runs a French restaurant out back and cooks good old Cajun, Creole and American food for the houseguests,” Lacey explained with pride.
“She’s a bona fide chef,” Lucas replied with a wink.
Mick raised his tea goblet toward her in a salute. So she wasn’t just a country bumpkin, all tucked away here on the bayou. He wondered why he’d even thought that. Lorna was as sophisticated as any French woman, and she could definitely speak the language—very colorfully. Lifting his glass high, he said, “And I thought all the great chefs were men.”
“No, men just like to believe that,” she replied, her expression smug.
Mick decided there was probably much more to her travels, but he didn’t press for the details. Yet.
When they’d finished their dessert, Lorna, Lacey and Lucas all helped with the dishes, while Aunt Hilda went up to bed on the third floor where their living quarters were located. Rosie Lee and Tobbie had eaten in the kitchen with Emily and Tobias. Emily also worked at Bayou le Jardin, but now they all chipped in to get the work done. Mick was amazed at the sense of family here, and the way the Dorsettes seemed to think of the Babineaux family as part of their own, even down to Little Tobbie running and playing throughout the vast mansion.
He’d never had that. He’d always been an outsider.
And soon, he’d be gone from Bayou le Jardin. Gone from the mystery and secrets of the swamp. Gone from the scent of azalea blossoms and wisteria sprigs on the night wind. Gone from the green-velvet gaze of a red-haired woman with a heart full of fire and a soul full of secrets.
Mick liked traveling around, liked being on the road. Liked running, always running from his past. But tonight, tonight, he felt a stirring that was as unfamiliar to him as crystal goblets and crisp linen napkins, as unfamiliar to him as polished wood and freshly cut flowers.
For the first time since he’d left that trailer park, Mick Love wanted to stay right where he was. Just for a little while.
Just long enough to find out all the secrets Lorna Dorsette kept hidden so well behind all that feminine fire.
He waited until everyone else had bid him goodnight, then he turned to Lorna. They stood on the back gallery, where the moonlight played hide-and-seek with the Spanish moss in the great oaks, where the wisteria blossoms entwined around the stout gallery columns, showering them with delicate purple rain every time the wind lifted.
He didn’t want to be away from her just yet.
“Show me the river,” he said, reaching out a hand to her as he stepped out into the shadows of the damaged garden.
He watched as moonbeams hit her face, watched as tiny violet-colored wisteria flowers caught and held to her long hair. And again, he saw that distant, disturbing fear in her eyes.
But she took his hand and followed him.
Chapter Four
The big trees cast mushroom-shaped shadows in the moonlight. Lorna walked with Mick through the long front gardens, following the path she’d taken so many times over the years. The dirt and gravel lane was now littered with broken branches and split tree limbs. Thank goodness the storm hadn’t taken any of the ancient oak trees completely down. With Mick’s help, and their own landscaper, they should be able to reshape those that had been damaged.
Lorna shuddered in spite of the mild spring night. She should have gone in to get her flashlight. Or better yet, she should have stayed inside tidying up the kitchen, making sure everything was set for breakfast. But then, she reminded herself, all the guests had checked out due to the storm, and she was turning away any reservations until things were back in tiptop shape. It was going to be a long week.
“You okay?” Mick asked. His words echoed over the silent countryside.
Lorna wouldn’t tell him that she never came out here at night. That she never walked around the grounds alone at night, or that she always, always carried her powerful flashlight, even when someone was with her.
She took a deep breath. “Fine. Just tired. We’re almost there.”
The river was across the narrow country road, behind a dirt-and-grass levee that cows grazed on now and then. At this time of year, red clover bloomed profusely along the levee. Lorna could see the clover dancing in the moonlight. It looked like a flowing red scarf winding around the river.
Not wanting Mick to see her apprehension, she held tightly to his hand as he guided her over the cluttered pathway. She managed to let him go long enough to open the black wrought-iron gate that kept uninvited curiosity seekers away from the secluded mansion.
“Looks like the storm clouds are all gone,” Mick said, as their footfalls sounded on the paved road.
“Yes, but the levee will be muddy still. So watch your step.”
With a spurt of determination, Lorna pushed up the soft loam of the levee to distance herself from Mick, then stood on the crest to stare down at the black, swirling waters of the Mississippi River. “Maybe the spring rains will hold off for a while now. The river is just about overflowing as it is.”
Lorna had never realized how beautiful the river was at night. The soft gurgling sound of the tide sang a timeless song, while the buzz of mosquitoes hummed in perfect harmony. She could see fireflies lifting all around them, their flickering iridescent greenish glows like tiny lanterns in the dark.
Which only reminded her that she did not have her own lantern. But she held the panic at bay, determined not to show Mick her humiliating weakness.
Instead, she watched gladly as he trudged up the small incline, right behind her. He stood there a minute with his hands on his hips, then lifted his head to the sky. His silhouette was highlighted by grayish-blue moonlight, casting him in a dreamlike state.
Maybe she was dreaming. She still couldn’t understand why she’d taken Mick’s hand and allowed him to guide her out into the darkness. She’d only met this man early this morning, under the strangest circumstances, and now she’d walked through the moonlight with him. It had been a while since she’d been alone with a man. And she’d never brought anyone other than family out here to the river—and even then only in broad daylight. Usually their guests wandered around on their own, leaving Lorna to do her work.
What’s wrong with me? she wondered now as she watched Mick through the veil of moonlight and shadows.
Her emotions were raw from the storm, her nerves were like stretched, tangled wires curling tightly through her body, and yet, for some obscure reason, she almost felt safe with Mick Love.
Even in the dark.
“Listen to the water,” he said, his head down. “All that undercurrent, all that power. I’ve always been fascinated by nature.”
“Is that why you decided to become a tree expert?”
“Probably. As I told you earlier, I loved getting lost in the woods when I was a child. There wasn’t much else to do around the house, so I’d take off for hours on end, just roaming around, exploring, playing make-believe.”
Lorna could understand that. “When we first came here, I did the same thing. Lacey and I would wander around the house, pretending we were princesses lost in a castle. When I saw this house and the land surrounding it, I thought I’d found a secret garden. It looked like something out of a fairy tale.”
Mick turned then, to look back at the big house looming in the distance. “It’s a beautiful spot.”
“A safe haven,” she replied without thinking.
The image of the great house glowing with yellow lights beckoned her, reminding her that she was safe here. It was an image that caused motorists to slow down and stop, inspired artists to keep painting, enticed photographers to take one more picture. From the narrow road, the house came into view around a winding curve, always catching admirers by surprise.
Lorna still slowed down herself to glance over at the panoramic view of the square, pink-walled house with the massive white columns sitting back behind the oak-lined driveway. And it still took her breath away.
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