His Uptown Girl

“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.”