“Hey, Em, don’t you have to leave soon?” her partner, Belle Pitot, asked as she entered Emelie’s studio from the front showroom, where she’d been arranging some costumed mannequins.
Five years ago, Emelie had purchased this shotgun house in the French Quarter with a legacy from her grandmother, enabling her to go into business with her good friend. Emelie made the masks, while Belle made high-quality costumes. The bottom floor housed the retail shop for E & B Designs, studios for herself and Belle, and storage space. Upstairs, which could be accessed from an interior, closed-door stairway at the front of the shop, or from exterior back steps, was her spacious apartment, which opened on the back gallery from her bedroom to a lush, fountained courtyard, and from a salon/living room onto a balcony that overlooked the street in front.
In recent years, the pre-Lenten Mardi Gras balls had become even more popular than the traditional parades. In fact, New Orleans was now the number one market in the United States for formal wear, including floor-length evening gowns. And, of course, exclusive costumes and masks.
There were six weeks until Mardi Gras, and they both had lots of work to do yet, but glancing down at her wristwatch, she realized she had only two hours to get ready for her moonlighting job. Once a week, on Saturday night, she had a gig as a blues singer, something she did just for fun, certainly not for the money or fame. Besides, it was a favor to her grandmother’s friend Ella Pisano, who owned the club named Ella’s… what else? In these hard economic times, Emelie worked for cheap.
Luckily, her studio was only three blocks from the restaurant, which specialized in Italian food, a change from the usual Creole or Cajun dishes famous in New Orleans. Her stomach growled, a reminder that she hadn’t eaten since breakfast. She would have a plate of Ella’s crawfish gnocchi in red sauce after her performance, she promised herself. Her stomach growled again, this time in anticipation.
After a quick shower, an upswept hairdo, chandelier earrings, and a layer of makeup thicker than she usually wore, Emelie pulled on a pair of white linen slacks and a black T-shirt. She would dress at the club. No way was she walking the French Quarter streets in a strapless sheath and stiletto heels, especially with her late-night return. She’d be mistaken for a hooker with her figure, which had been likened to Marilyn Monroe’s, except for her black hair and height of five foot nine. The resemblance had been a bane, rather than a blessing, over the years. Especially when she was a young girl, definitive curves were not the ideal.
Just before she opened the front door to leave, Belle called out to her, “I’ll lock up in a half hour, but did you check the mail?”
Emelie stopped and walked back into the showroom, which was beginning to resemble a fantasy wonderland. Several mannequins were dressed head to toe in Mardi Gras regalia. Murals on the wall depicted a stereotypical Southern plantation house. There was even a fake live oak tree with hanging moss. On the counter, she saw a number of envelopes, including the one she’d been waiting for. Emelie’s heart skipped a beat. The return address said: “Dr. Charles Benoit, Southern Reproductive Services.”
“Chuck’s Sperm Bank?” Belle inquired, her right eyebrow arched with disapproval.
Emelie ignored Belle’s teasing nickname for the reputable, highly renowned clinic and nodded. Had she been approved for insemination by one of the candidates she’d chosen? Did the letter contain a specific appointment for the procedure? Was it possible she would be holding her very own baby a year from now? She held the envelope against her heart.
“Honey, you don’t know what you’re doing, taking on a child.” This from the single parent of thirteen-year-old twin boys, Michael and Max; she had a placard on her desk that read, MOTHERS OF TEENAGERS KNOW WHY ANIMALS EAT THEIR YOUNG. At the same time, her desk was cluttered with many framed photos of her little darlings from birth to Little League.
Emelie just smiled.
“I still say you should do it the old-fashioned way.”
“Belle,” she sighed, “I’m almost thirty-four years old, I was married once, a long time ago—”
“So, ask Bernard.”
“If I didn’t want to remain married to Bernie, why would I want him in my life forever as the father of my child? Nope, I do not want the baggage of a man in my life permanently.”
“He’s not that bad.” Having never been married, Belle had long been hopeful that someday a Prince Charming would come riding his Lexus down Bourbon Street to sweep her off her feet. Unfortunately, lately, Belle was willing to settle for a good man with a pickup truck and a job.
“Furthermore,” Emelie went on, “I’m fulfilled by my mask-making career and singing sideline. I’m financially stable. I enjoy time out with a small circle of friends. I take the occasional lover.”
“Occasional is right,” Belle muttered. “You could be a nun, if you asked me.”
Okay, so Emelie hadn’t been in a relationship for two years. That was just another reason to seek alternative paternity, in her mind. “Hey, I’ve even made peace with my father for what he did seventeen years ago. There’s only one thing missing from my life. A baby.”
Belle just shook her head at her. “You’ve become obsessed with the idea.”
“No wonder! My biological clock feels like Big Ben these days. Tick, tick, tick! People probably hear it when I pass by.”
“I thought it was your stomach growling with hunger.”
“Honestly, I notice every baby I see on the street or at the mall. I stop at displays of baby items in store windows.”
“You even bought a baby name book,” Belle pointed out with a grin. “That’s understandable, but I still say you should have a baby the old-fashioned way.”
“Too complicated!” For some reason, a picture popped in Emelie’s mind of a long ago time when she’d thought differently. Of course, she’d only been sixteen to her boyfriend’s seventeen, but the big plans they’d made seemed silly now. They were going to get married, move to California, and have four kids, two boys and two girls. What they had been going to do for a living had never mattered then. They’d thought they were in love.
She laughed at the memory. It had been years since she’d even thought about Justin LeBlanc, hadn’t a clue where he was these days. Probably prison, which was the road he’d been headed on the last time she’d seen him, thanks to her dad, the longtime sheriff of Terrebonne Parish. When she’d refused to leave with him, thumbing his nose at her father and the entire justice system, Justin had the nerve to swear that there would be snow on the bayou before he ever returned. As if it had been her fault! Later, she’d heard that he joined the Navy, but by then her life had changed immeasurably.
With a shake of her head, Emelie placed the unopened envelope back on the counter. Time later to angst. Should she or shouldn’t she?
After waving good-bye to Belle, she headed down Chartres Street, swinging her tote bag beside her. She had so much to be thankful for, even without a baby.
Life was good. Sometimes a little lonely, but good.
Chapter Two
A Cajun hurricane hits the California coast…
Holy moly! I ain’t seen so many hard man-tushies since you and me went ta that Chippendale show at the Moose Club in Baton Rouge. Remember that guy with the mustache who pulled you up onta the stage ta dirty dance with him? Whoo-ee!”
“Tante Lulu! Shhhh!” Charmaine LeDeux-Lanier cautioned her great-aunt, peering right and left to make sure they weren’t overheard. “And just for the record, that was fifteen years ago, long before I was married. I don’t do things like that anymore.”
Tante Lulu snorted her opinion. “Was that before or after you decided ta be a born-again virgin?”
Charmaine loved the old lady dearly, but after twelve hours in various airports, confined in an airplane, and then a taxi with her, she was pretty close to wringing a scrawny, ninety-something-year-old neck. It was hard to know the exact age of the dear old bat since she kept changing her birth date, and the original records had myst
eriously disappeared from the parish courthouse. Really, Tante Lulu would tax the patience of a saint, no matter her age.
Biting her tongue, Charmaine gave a “Whatever!” toss of her long black hair over her shoulder; it was a trick she’d learned years ago when she was Miss Louisiana, more years ago than she cared to admit. A woman could do or say just about anything, especially to a man, if she learned the hair toss trick. Her husband, Raoul Lanier—Rusty—for example, was always susceptible. Unfortunately, it didn’t faze Tante Lulu.
They were standing inside a big, black-tarp-covered, chain-link fence in Coronado, California, looking over an asphalt area that resembled a penitentiary yard surrounded by a quadrangle of low buildings, including the Navy SEALs special forces building, where they had a scheduled meeting with the big kahuna. In the old days, before 9/11, visitors to Coronado could walk up to the fence and watch the SEALs exercise or run on the beach. Not anymore. Security was way too tight. Terrorists would love to get a bead on one of these superheroes.
But she and Tante Lulu had been given clearance to enter the compound. On the concrete in front of them, scantily clad, sweating men were engaged in all kinds of tortuous exercises with logs, climbing nets, ropes, and tires. In the distance could be seen huge gray Navy warships in the waters near the Naval Amphibious Base at the other end of Coronado. In another direction was the red-tiled roof of the famous Hotel del Coronado, where movies had been filmed and the rich and famous dined; she’d promised Tante Lulu dinner there later.
On yet another side, beyond the buildings, was the icy blue Pacific Ocean, which shimmered under a blistering sun, almost as pretty as the bayou on a summer morning. That was where their attention had been riveted for the past ten minutes, watching about four dozen men wearing nothing but shorts and boots running along the beach.
And yes, all of their tushies were fine.
With effort, Charmaine did her best to stop complaining for about the fiftieth time over playing shotgun to the Cajun loony bird. You could say it was another Tante Lulu Great Adventure, and really, her heart was in the right place, bizarre as her schemes often were. In this case, she was bound and determined to bring a lapsed Cajun back to the bosom of his family. Justin LeBlanc didn’t stand a chance.
But why did I have to be the one to choose the unlucky straw when it came to picking who would accompany the old lady on this hare-brained trip? Charmaine suspected that one of her LeDeux half brothers had fixed the straws. They were devious that way.
“You’re always shushin’ me,” Tante Lulu complained. Apparently she’d been blathering on while Charmaine had been woolgathering. “Are you ’shamed of me or sumpin’?”
“Of course not. It’s just that we’re here on the sufferance of Tee-John’s contact, who had to pull a lot of strings to get us an appointment. We shouldn’t call attention to ourselves.”
“Number one, if we doan wanna call attention to ourselves, how come you’re wearin’ those skin-tight leopard pedal pushers with high heels?”
“You’re criticizing my clothes? That’s like the gator callin’ the water wet!” Charmaine exclaimed with a laugh.
Tante Lulu wore her Dolly Parton blonde wig, wedgie sandals, and a sundress from the Walmart Little Girl Bimbo collection that exposed about two thousand liver spots on her bare arms and shoulders.
“Are you saying I look like a bimbo?” Charmaine grinned.
“Darn tootin’ you do, Charmaine. Bless yer heart. Not that I’m sayin’ bimbo is a bad thing. Nosirree.”
Charmaine couldn’t help but smile. Everyone knew she relished being called a self-proclaimed bimbo, with class. Still, her great-aunt had the subtlety of a horny bull in a field of pretty cows.
“An’ that shiny red lipstick yer wearin’, Lordy, Lordy, thass what Tee-John calls screw-me-quick lipstick.”
Charmaine sincerely doubted that her cop half brother used the word “screw.” But that was beside the point. “It’s a new line we just started carrying in my beauty salons. I’ll give you some samples.”
“Number two…” Tante Lulu started to say.
Charmaine forgot what number one had been. Following a conversation with Tante Lulu was like trying to catch popcorn over an unlidded popper.
“Any woman what’s been married as many times as you have, bless yer heart, kin hardly talk about hidin’ yerself under a bushel.”
“Huh?” Charmaine said, then shook her head to clear it. “You really shouldn’t be insulting my marriage, Auntie.”
“What marriage are you referrin’ to, sweetie? You been hitched and unhitched four or five times, as I recall.”
“Two of them were to the same man,” Charmaine protested. “Besides, it turns out I was never divorced from Rusty the first time around. So in a way, none of those other marriages and divorces counted.”
Tante Lulu rolled her eyes.
“Anyhow, what do my clothing or my marriages have to do with anything?”
“You’re the one what brought it up.”
“I did?” Popcorn, for sure.
“What difference does it make when we went ta that show anyhow? Studs are studs, no matter what. And these Navy SEALs could make their own calendar, guar-an-teed. I’d buy one, fer sure.” She pressed her nose up against the fence. “Wish I had a pair of binoculars.”
“We’d probably be thrown in the brig as potential terrorists. You saw how hard it was just to get on this base.”
“Ms. Rivard, Ms. Lanier, the commander will see you now.”
She and Tante Lulu spun around to see a guy with one of those painfully short military hairdos in a khaki uniform addressing them. Painful to her, at least, as a hair-stylist. His demeanor was serious, but his widened eyes took in her body, all in one sneaky sweep. Charmaine was used to that reaction from men and wasn’t at all offended.
When they’d first arrived, the receptionist in the special forces building told them the commander was delayed and they could wait in a conference room or go out into the yard and watch the SEALs in training. The red-faced sailor now led them inside the building to an office fronting the quadrangle where the SEALs were training. The plaque on the door said: COMMANDER IAN MACLEAN, U.S. NAVY, SPECIAL FORCES, SEALS. Inside, an officer sat behind a desk. He was about forty with a receding hairline. Not unattractive, but too stern-faced for Charmaine’s taste.
The room was bare-bones military utilitarian, except for a few photos on the wall and a bunch of framed motivational sayings, including the famous Navy SEAL one, THE ONLY EASY DAY WAS YESTERDAY. But there were others, like FEAR IS YOUR FRIEND, SEIZE THE DAY, or THE MORE SEALS SWEAT IN PEACETIME, THE LESS THEY BLEED IN WAR.
Immediately, the commander rose to his feet. “Ms. Rivard. Ms. Lanier. Have a seat, please.”
“You kin call me Tante Lulu. Everyone does.”
The commander nodded, though Charmaine just knew there was no way in the world he was ever going to break protocol like that. And she could practically see the wheels turning in his head as he took in all that was Tante Lulu, wondering what kind of lunatic he had in his office.
That impression was heightened when his eyes widened on taking in all that was Charmaine, as well.
He cleared his throat and asked, “What can I do for you?”
“I need ta talk with Justin LeBlanc,” Tante Lulu said right off.
Charmaine could see the surprise in his eyes. “Cage?” he said before he could catch himself. “You know Lieutenant LeBlanc?”
“Yep. I came all the way from Loo-zee-anna, and I ain’t leavin’ ’til I’ve said my piece ta the boy.”
“The boy?” he sputtered. “Are you family?”
“Not exactly.”
The commander turned to Charmaine for help.
“My aunt is good friends with Justin’s grandmother. We need to talk with him about… well, something personal.”
“Does he know you’re here?”
“No, it’s a surprise,” Tante Lulu said.
It would have been a lo
t easier if they’d had Justin’s home address, but the only way they could have gotten that was to ask his grandmother, and Tante Lulu had been adamant that MaeMae not be alerted to their activities. Charmaine suspected that MaeMae had warned Tante Lulu not to interfere. Hah! That wouldn’t stop her determined aunt.
“Is this a joke?” the commander asked. “I swear, if Candid Camera or Funny Videos, or Punked! jumps out, someone is going to pay big-time.”
“It’s not a joke. We just need to speak with Justin. It won’t take long,” Charmaine pleaded.
“This is highly irregular. Strangers can’t just come here and ask to speak with one of my men.”
“What? You think we’re terrorists or sumpin’?” Tante Lulu asked, narrowing her eyes at the commander. “I doan even have my pistol on me t’day. They wouldn’t let me take it on the plane.”
The commander’s jaw dropped.
Charmaine groaned. Time to intervene before they got kicked out. “Justin’s grandmother is sick, and he needs to go home.”
Straightening with alertness, the commander asked, “How sick?”
“Very,” Tante Lulu said grimly.
“And Lieutenant LeBlanc is unaware of this family crisis?” he asked Tante Lulu.
“Clueless as a crawfish in a hurrycane.”
“Why?”
“Why what? I swear, you mus’ be thicker’n swamp mud, bless yer heart.”
The commander’s jaw dropped even lower. “I still say this is irregular, but…” He picked up the phone and spoke into the mouthpiece, “Petty Officer Farley? Would you come in here, please?”
When the same sailor as before came inside, the commander ordered, “Escort these ladies out to the grinder. Tell Lieutenant LeBlanc to take a break for the rest of the afternoon. Lieutenant Mendozo will cover for him.”
“Oh, my God!” Tante Lulu exclaimed suddenly and jumped to her feet, rushing over to a far wall, where she was staring at a framed photo. To everyone’s dismay, tears streamed down her wrinkled cheeks.
“Ma’am?” the commander inquired with concern, going over to stand beside her. He must have been six foot two, at least. The top of Tante Lulu’s head came only to his chest.