In Dreams

Pacified by his explanation, she echoed him. “Impulse, right. Me, too. I was too freaked out to think clearly. But afterward, I had time to give it some thought, and I was going back to New Orleans, straight to the police, when those creeps caught up to me. Now I don’t know what to do.” Another way of saying she was afraid, Lucy supposed. She didn’t want to end up dead like that poor woman last night. “What about you? Are you going to turn me in?”

“Interesting turn of phrase,” Justin mused. “But no. I don’t want to bring you more trouble than you already have. I’m aware that things aren’t always black or white, and secrets have a way of staying hidden in bayou country.”

A thrill shot through Lucy, and she wondered if he meant something beyond her own situation.

She certainly wasn’t a bayou country kind of girl, so the hiding part was only temporary. Sooner or later, she was going to have to return to New Orleans and deal with this mess.

But the ache in her side and fear made her opt for later.

LUCY RYAN was hiding something. That much was obvious. And she was afraid.

Looking out over the bayou where a lazy alligator pretended to be a floating log, Justin let all his questions drift at the back of his mind.

Let her be, part of him thought. But letting her be could get her killed, and I don’t need another death on my conscience.

Whether he liked it or not, he was going to have to go back to New Orleans sooner than he liked.

Hearing movement at the door, he turned to face Lucy, who’d insisted on cleaning up the breakfast dishes. Funny the way, each time he looked at her, she got more appealing. With her womanly hip pressed against the doorjamb, her gaze soft and her lips parted slightly, she was downright tempting.

He cleared his throat. “You ready to go to town?”

She met his gaze and lifted both hands. “These are the only clothes I have, so what you see is what you get.”

Justin liked what he saw and wouldn’t mind getting some of it for himself, he thought, his groin tightening.

Her soft body wasn’t weak, merely inviting to a man’s hardness. Her reddish brown hair made her complexion appear pale and delicate, despite the splash of freckles across her short nose. She had alluring gray eyes and a luscious bow-shaped mouth. The thing that tempted him most, however, was the smooth expanse of skin between her short top and low-cut pants. Skin that he’d had to look at and touch when he’d tended to the wound in her side. Skin that he longed to taste….

For a moment, he forgot about New Orleans and murders and guilt. For a moment, he wondered what it would be like to take her right there, in the doorway. For a moment, he felt so connected to this woman that he didn’t even know what he might do to protect her.

And then the moment passed.

Fighting off the sexual haze, he decided any questions he had for her could wait.

“No bridge?” Lucy asked, looking around at the nearby bank in confusion.

“No bridge. No vehicles out here, either.”

“Then how do we get to town?”

“Pirogue.” He indicated the shallow, flat-bottomed boat tied to the houseboat.

“We’re both going to fit in there?”

“Unless you want to walk through the swamp.”

“Been there, done that,” she muttered. “I have no desire to be a snack for an alligator.”

He stepped down into the boat and held out his hand. She took it and then stepped in gracefully.

Still, the pirogue tilted slightly and her body brushed against his. He slipped his hands around her waist to steady her. Her eyes flared and he dared to think her reaction was personal. With one hand, he touched her cheek. A becoming color again filled her face. He rubbed the fleshy part of his thumb against her mouth until her lips parted, and she flashed her tongue over the full lower one as if in expectation….

What the hell was he thinking? They were standing in the pirogue in the middle of the swamp, breathing hard like two teenagers.

“You’d better sit down,” he said more softly than he was feeling.

She nodded curtly, then dropped like a rock.

He untied the pirogue and pushed off.

“What’s the name of the town?”

“LeBaux.”

“You have people there?”

He immediately thought of his mother who would be ecstatic when he walked into the house with a woman on his arm. She’d been after him to marry for years. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to marry. He’d even felt love for a woman before, but that emotion had been fleeting. They hadn’t meshed in the essential way two people needed to so they could make a life together. He’d drifted from one woman to another, and once he’d hit his thirtieth birthday still single, his mother had played matchmaker. He’d come to Sunday family dinner several times in the past year only to be treated to a prearranged companion. Nice women, but he’d felt no connection, not like he did with Lucy.

“My mother,” he said, “twin younger brothers, two aunts and an uncle, assorted cousins.” He’d been the only one in the family struck by the urge to move to the big city. “But to tell the truth, the whole town is like family. Anyone there would do anything for one of their own.”

“I don’t even know my neighbors,” she admitted.

He shoved off, and as always, ever since he’d been a kid, nature held him in thrall.

They drifted through patches of duckbill grass and under cypress trees draped with Spanish moss. Here and there a water lily poked out of the water and wild flowers were scattered along the banks. Ahead, an otter swam, and overhead a blue heron wheeled and then dove to pluck a fish from the waters.

“This place is a paradise,” Lucy said, turning to smile at him.

“A nice place to visit,” he agreed.

“Under the right circumstances. I am a city girl at heart, though. I don’t fit in here.”

“Where do you fit?” he asked, thinking she’d fit perfectly in his bed.

“In a town house at the edge of the French Quarter. Dana Ebersole and I have been renting it for more than a year now.”

He couldn’t keep his disappointment at bay when he said, “Ah, so you live with someone.”

“Oh, no, not like that. I mean, Dana isn’t a man. She’s been my best friend since we were kids. She’s my business partner, as well.”

A clarification that brought a smile to his lips. “What kind of business?”

“A shop in The Quarter called Bal Masque.”

“Souvenirs.”

“That, too. And masks for Mardi Gras. But mostly art pieces. We also give classes teaching people how to make their own masks.”

“Are you an artist?”