Sweetheart Reunion (19 page)

Where were they? Where was Julien?

Alma closed her eyes and repeated her prayers over and over again, asking for a safe return of those she loved.

“Why don’t they call?” Virginia asked. She rocked back and forth, back and forth on the sofa.

Reverend Guidry cleared his throat. “I’m sure we’ll hear something soon.” He lowered his head in prayer.

Alma tried to follow his baritone voice while he asked God to spare these men, to bring them home to the women who loved them. She closed her eyes, wishing with all her heart she’d told Julien just once that she had always loved him, always.

Then she looked up at Callie. Her sister was crying, too. She rushed to sit down beside Alma. “I can’t lose Papa. I can’t. We’ve already lost our mother, Alma. I can’t lose Papa, too.”

Alma’s heart hurt for her sister. Callie was so sweet and strong, and she’d been through more than most women who’d lived a lifetime longer than she had. And Brenna. They’d called her hours ago to let her know the news. Hopefully, she was with her friends and her fiancé in Baton Rouge.

“I need to call Brenna again,” Callie said, wiping her eyes. “She’s probably wondering what we’ve heard since I called her earlier.”

Before she could pull out her phone, the front door opened and Brenna rushed in. “Callie!”

Callie and Alma fell into their baby sister’s arms. “We told you not to drive in this weather,” Alma mumbled.

“I don’t care,” Brenna said. “I had to come. I couldn’t stand not knowing. Any word?”

“No,” Callie said, wiping her eyes. “Where’s Jeffrey?”

Brenna shook her head. “He didn’t want to come. And I don’t want to talk about it.”

Callie pushed at Brenna’s wet auburn hair. “You drove here by yourself? That’s more than an hour and a half trip.”

“Almost three hours in this weather,” Brenna said. “The roads are bad. Flooded, washed out, trees down. I wasn’t sure I’d ever get here.”

“It’s so late,” Alma said, glancing at the clock. “I’m glad you’re okay.”

Brenna kissed her sister. “What can I do?”

Alma glanced at Virginia. “Help me make up the guest room for Mrs. LeBlanc. She looks exhausted.”

“Okay,” Brenna said. She tossed her designer handbag on the kitchen counter and tugged her overnight case into a corner out of the way. “I’ll get the linens.”

Alma went to Virginia. “We’re making up a bed so you can rest. I know you won’t sleep, but you can at least lie down.”

Virginia smiled and patted her hand. “Do you mind if my sister stays with me?”

“Of course not,” Alma replied. “I don’t want my sisters to leave, so I’m sure not gonna send Miss Martha away. She’ll be good company for you. For all of us.” She glanced at Mollie. “You’re welcome to stay, too.”

Mollie bobbed her head.

“Until we hear,” Virginia said, tears in her eyes.

“Yes, until we hear.”

Alma guided her to the bedroom down the hallway, her prayers mirroring the hope she saw in Julien’s mother’s eyes.

Until we have them back safe, Lord.

Chapter Nineteen

A
lma came awake, disoriented and wondering why she was asleep in the wing chair. Then she remembered. Glancing around, she saw Brenna and Callie curled up on the sofa, their heads on opposite pillows, their feet almost touching as their toes peeked out from the chenille blanket they’d both tried to use for cover. Mollie lay sprawled on a folded blanket near the empty fireplace, another blanket tangled against her jeans.

Julien.

Papa.

Pierre.

Tebow and the others. Where were they?

Alma glanced at the clock. Five in the morning. And still no word. She checked her cell phone. Nothing.

Slowly, she moved to get up, every muscle in her body sore and screaming. Careful and sluggish, she made her way to the kitchen then looked out the back window. The rain had stopped, but the waters of the bayou had risen into her yard. Thankfully, this house was up on a hill and it had been built on sturdy six-foot-tall pillars on the back side. She didn’t have to worry about flooding right now.

But she did have to worry about the loved ones still lost out there somewhere.

Please, Lord, let them be safe. Let them be safe.

She silently prayed this single prayer over and over as she went about making coffee and pulling frozen homemade cinnamon rolls out of the freezer. Then she tiptoed down the tiny hallway and checked on Mrs. LaBlanc and her sister Martha. They were asleep, thankfully.

Please, Lord, let them be safe.

“Alma?”

She whirled, startled by Brenna’s soft call. “I’m here, honey.”

Brenna crept into the kitchen. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine. I want to hear something, anything. I can’t take the waiting.”

Brenna grabbed the cups Alma offered. “I won’t leave until I know something. I want to see Papa with my own eyes.”

Touched, Alma stopped to stare at her baby sister. Brenna had the best of all of them in her. She had hints of Callie and their mother in the golden streaks coloring her honeyed auburn hair. But she had Alma’s blue eyes and petite size. She also carried their father’s stubborn gene. Maybe they all did.

“What’s going on with you and Jeffrey?” Alma asked to take her mind off her worries.

“I think we’re done,” Brenna said after pouring two cups of the rich, dark coffee. She sipped her coffee, her head down.

Alma stopped buttering rolls. “Seriously?”

“He got mad when I wanted him to drive me here,” Brenna said in a loud whisper. “My daddy is out there somewhere, hurt or worse, and the man I love doesn’t think I need to be here. He didn’t want our dinner with his important clients interrupted. He suggested I wait to hear.” She put her cup down. “I left the restaurant and went home to grab an overnight bag. I didn’t tell him where I was going and I didn’t answer his text.”

Alma took Brenna in her arms. “Honey, I’m so sorry. Sorry that you had to drive here alone in that storm and sorry that Jeffrey is so selfish and petty.”

“How could I have loved him in the first place?” Brenna said on a sniff. “I thought he was perfect. You know, urbane and smart, so up-and-coming. But he’s so stuck on himself he can’t see me at all. He can’t see beyond his own perfect nose. Which makes me so stupid.”

Alma patted her sister’s curly hair. “We’ve all done stupid.”

She thought about Julien and wished for the thousandth time that she’d had more time with him yesterday. Wished he hadn’t jumped to the wrong conclusion about everything. Wished he hadn’t just walked away, all stoic and unyielding.

Yesterday. It seemed so long ago now. He’d promised her a dance at the
fais do-do
. They’d laughed, eaten funnel cake, kissed.

If only she could have one more dance with him, one more kiss, one more touch.

Brenna pulled back to stare at her. “They’ll come home, Alma. They have to. Papa’s capable of surviving anything. We all are.”

Alma bobbed her head and wiped her eyes. “And Julien—he knows these waters. He knows what to do in an emergency.”

“Yes, he does,” Brenna said, her hand touching Alma’s face, tracing her tears. “Alma, he loves you so much he’ll do anything to get back to you. And when he does, hold tight. Hold tight. I only wish Jeffrey had loved me half that much.”

The sisters hugged again.

Then Alma felt another arm on hers and saw Callie standing there. Their older sister wrapped her arms around each of them for a group hug. They stood there, holding each other.

Winnie came out of Alma’s bedroom and joined them. Mollie stood away from the group, but Callie put out an arm and brought the girl into the circle. Winnie spread her arms wide to encompass each of them.

Then Brenna started laughing. “I can’t breathe.”

Winnie giggled. “Okay, a little air here, ladies.”

Alma backed up, but just a bit. “Winnie, say a prayer for us.”

Winnie did just that, her Cajun French as melodious as a song. Alma didn’t have to know all the words to understand the time-honored prayer. It was the twenty-third psalm.

* * *

He could hear the prayer inside his head.

Julien heard it as clearly as if someone was standing next to him. “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.”

He closed his eyes. His head hurt with all the brute force of two alligators fighting inside his brain. And one of them kept whipping Julien with his tail.

Then he opened his eyes and saw an egret flying through the cypress trees. Where in the world was he, anyway?

“Hey, bro, are you awake?”

Julien turned to see Tebow lying covered with a tarp across from him in the speed boat. Then he remembered. They’d gotten caught in the storm. They’d been out with several other boats and the Coast Guard, looking for Pierre and Ramon Blanchard, but the thunder and lightning and wind had been too much. Too much. Tebow’s speed boat had been tossed around like a spinning top.

And his friend had convinced him to pull up and wait it out in a hidden cove at the mouth of the pass into the big bay. A cove that, according to some of the old-timers, Ramon Blanchard liked to fish. Second Chance Landing.

“If your paw took de skiff, he’d want to test it in dat little hidden cove, Julien. Check dere first.”

But they hadn’t found the skiff. Or anyone here for that matter. They only found rushing water and an angry sky and a dark, dark dusk. A fool’s errand. But Julien wouldn’t give up.

Tebow sat up, his clothes damp and muddy. Pushing the dirty black tarp away, he said, “For sure, that was one of the worst tempests I’ve ever been through. Good thing we washed up here, rather than out in that bay, bro.”

“The Coast Guard,” Julien said, his throat dry. “We have to radio someone and find out where they are. The others might have gone home, but the Coast Guard should still be out in the bay searching.” Or they may have called off the search.

“I’ll try,” Tebow said, shaking his head, his hand reaching for the radio. “Most everybody else went home after dark. Too messy to search.”

But
they’d
stayed. Julien had insisted, even though they’d been forced to pull up here to wait out the storm.

Tebow hadn’t put up a fight, but he kept shaking his head all the while.

Tebow put out a call to any nearby boaters, using the name of his boat,
Tebow’s Treasure,
and their location inside what the locals called the Pass Cove.

The radio remained silent except for some static.

Then Julien heard a call. “Mayday, Mayday, Mayday. This is the LeBlanc skiff inside Pass Cove.” The grainy voice named the coordinates. “I need help. Emergency. I need help.”

Tebow and Julien both listened to the location. The other boat was about a mile south of them. Julien grabbed the radio handle from Tebow. “Pierre, this is your brother. Please respond.”

* * *

Seven o’clock in the morning. Alma’s skin crawled with raw nerves, her spine caught in a shivering tingle, her fingers shaking each time she tried to perform a task.

She stopped to stare out the café window. People arrived to begin the vigil. They brought sandwiches and drinks, Bibles and radios, cell phones and maps. She’d opened the café out of desire to stay busy, but everyone else took over the work.

People here knew they could come in, go behind the counter and fix whatever they wanted. Alma’s mother Lila had taught her girls to make people feel welcome. Alma didn’t have to lift a finger, so she just stood near the iris, now back in its place on the long counter. The bulb was sprouting new growth and the one open blossom was a silky, lush light purple.

She needed to plant the iris. She would. Soon. Very soon.

But now, each time she heard a phone ring, she jumped, stopped and listened. People came by, touching her hand, offering her a whisper and a prayer.

Dear Lord, please bring them home. Please bring them home.

She thought of having Julien at her door each morning and how she’d taken that for granted for so long now. She thought of her sweet papa and how she sometimes forgot to call and check on him. She thought of Callie and that mutt of a dog named Elvis. The mutt that had slept on her front porch all night without a whimper or a complaint. Keeping vigil. She thought of Brenna, heartbroken but here and taking charge. She watched as Mrs. LeBlanc and Mrs. Laborde, Winnie and Mollie and the rest of the crew went about their work, silent and stoic, and she longed, oh, how she longed for the joy she always found here each morning.

She’d never find that kind of joy again if Julien didn’t come back to her, if her papa and Pierre didn’t… She couldn’t think it. Wouldn’t believe it.

God is good. Even when I’m hurting and in despair, God is good. But Dear Lord, some burdens are just too terrible to bear.

She only wanted to dance with Julien again. To dance and laugh and love him again. Why had it taken her so long to realize that?

Alma looked around, saw the love and the faith of her family and friends, saw the shining bond of these people and their traditions. And she remembered the words Jacob Sonnier had spoken to her the day before.

Why would you want to give up that quaint little café for some big-city chain restaurant? Trust me, it looks glamorous but it’s a lot of hard work.

Hard work, she knew. Glamour, she didn’t need.

She needed love and family and good food and…Julien.

Her dreams had been right here all along. She could do anything she wanted to do right here in Fleur. With Julien by her side.

If only he’d come home to her.

* * *

“Over there!”

Tebow pointed to a copse of cypress trees so thick with gray moss they looked like a row of ghost soldiers with long gray beards. Knotted broken trunks and tangled roots surrounded the thicket, but Julien spotted the shattered wood of the skiff crammed like an angry fist against the mass of knotted “knees” that made up the whitewashed trunks and limbs.

The skiff was broken and crushed against the unforgiving arms of the swamp thicket. But sitting up on top of one of the broken trunks was his brother Pierre. And lying unconscious across Pierre’s lap was Ramon Blanchard.