The Pepper In The Gumbo: A Cane River Romance (10 page)

            “Alice,
are you coming or should I just go by myself?” Eric walked up, a scowl on his
face. He took in the scene and his eyes narrowed.

            Paul
let go of Alice’s hand. “We’re just finishing up. I need to get going, too. I
have to meet a realtor about an apartment.”

            “You’re
staying in town for a while?” Charlie asked breathlessly. Alice shot her a
look.

            “For
a few weeks. I’m from this area but haven’t been back in years. I thought
visiting during the three-hundredth year anniversary would be a good time to
come home for a while. Looking forward to things like the zydeco festival this
weekend.”

            “I’m
going to that, too,” Charlie exclaimed. “I mean, my mom mentioned it and I
thought it sounded kinda weird, but if you’re going then I’m sure it’s a good
idea.”

            Paul
moved toward the entryway, even though Eric was blocking the spot, face like
thunder. “Plus, we want to make sure the store gets off to a smooth start so
we’re temporarily moving our home base here.” At the last second, Eric turned
and stomped toward the middle of the store.

            “Which
store is this?” Alice locked the case again and followed Paul out of the room. “Did
you buy one of the local businesses? We’ll be neighbors, then. I’m on the
historic district board so if you need anything, I’d be glad to help if I can.”

            “The
ScreenStop store,” Charlie said, bouncing alongside of them. She looked
thrilled to pieces. “This is Paul Olivier, the guy who invented the biggest
online social platform
ever
while he was in college and sold it for like, a bazillion dollars. Then he
started a company that designs some of the best games and got even richer! He
has stores all over the country.” She paused, her voice dropping shyly. “I’d
love your autograph. I can’t believe we’re actually talking in real life.”

            Paul
was used to awkward introductions but this was probably the most awkward, if
only for Alice’s expression. She’d stopped at the register, face blank with
shock.

            “It
wasn’t a bazillion,” he muttered. “That’s not a real number.”

            “ScreenStop?”
Alice whispered.

            “Excuse
me,” Eric called. He was only a few feet away but his voice was loud enough to
reach the end of the store. “Are we going to lunch or not?”

            Alice
whirled toward him and said in a low voice, “No, Eric, we’re not. I have a
store to run. Whether you think this place is important or not, I do. I can’t
walk away from a customer just because you want to order at exactly noon so you
can eat your lunch in exactly fifteen minutes, and have exactly ten minutes to
walk back to your office so you’ll have
exactly
eight minutes to flirt
with your secretaries before patients arrive.” She paused. “In fact, since
we’re having this conversation right now, I’d rather not have any more lunches
with you again. Goodbye.”

            There
was a beat of complete silence and then Eric sputtered something about not
flirting with anybody, that she obviously she wasn’t hungry, and he’d call her
later. He turned around and left the bookstore, letting the door slam behind
him.

            Paul
wanted to offer Alice a big high five but the fierce expression on her face
told him that now was not the right time.

            “I’m
sorry about that,” she said. Smoothing a hand over her hair, she sighed. “That
was extremely unprofessional. It’s just… I suppose it was long overdue.”

            “Not
a problem, really. I completely understand.” He shifted his feet. “You’d been
together a long time?”

            “Huh.
Not even six months. Miss Alice is impossible to please.” Charlie grinned,
leaning against the counter. She was talking about Alice, but only had eyes for
Paul. “In fact, she hates you, too.”

            “Charlie!”
Alice glared at her.

            Paul
knew they’d gotten off to a rough start but thought hate was a rather extreme
response. “Well, maybe we’ll learn to appreciate our differences―” he
started to say.

            “Nope.
Never gonna happen.” Charlie jerked her head in Alice’s direction. “I heard her
on the phone yesterday, trying to track down who gave you that building permit.
She wants to kick ScreenStop out of the historic district. She’d be happier
than a clam if she could kick you all the way out of Natchitoches. She says
people like you don’t belong in a place like Cane River.”

            Paul
turned to Alice, brows raised.
People like you.
She saw him as the poor
kid he had once been, ignored unless he was being ridiculed, denied passage
into the nicer parts of the city. No, Alice had never met that boy. She was
looking at a rich businessman.

            So
she really did hate him before today. Then she hated him when he showed up in
person. The only version of him she seemed to like was his fake identity. It
was a triple ego-whammy. “We received the building permit in the usual way,
going through all the regular channels.”

            Alice’s
face was pink but her voice was steady. “Impossible. Everything has to be passed
by the board. I never saw any plans for that store.”

            “Not
everything goes by the board. Believe me, my lawyers looked at the city bylaws
very carefully.” His gaze dropped to the portfolio she still held in her hands.
“You’re not going to sell me that, are you?”

            Alice
narrowed her eyes. “If I didn’t, that would be spiteful,” she said. “But will you
think you’ve bought me off like everyone else in this city if I do? Because I
don’t have a price. Not even one this high,” she said, holding up the Arthur Rackham
illustrations.

            He
opened his mouth to respond, but she went on. “I do have a question, though.”

            “Go
ahead.” It couldn’t get much worse. He had nothing to fear.

            “The
realtor you’re meeting. Is she June LaTraye?”

            He
frowned. Maybe Alice was going to warn him off the woman. There were crooks in
every city, every profession. “Yes. We’re supposed to meet in about ten
minutes. There’s an apartment in the historic… district…” Paul’s voice faded
away.

            They
stared at each other for a moment. “Listen,” Alice said, coming around the
counter toward him. “You don’t have to buy this portfolio. And you should
probably find another place to rent while you’re here. The Judge Porter House
is a very nice bed and breakfast with full suites and it’s right down the block.
I wish you the best of luck.”

            Paul
said nothing. The last few hours had been some of the strangest of his life,
but he hadn’t gotten where he was in the world by ignoring his intuition. Over
and over he’d made decisions that weren’t completely explainable, especially to
his board of directors or to Andy. They’d learned to trust him and everything
had always come out for the better. He didn’t take her hand.

            “I’d
like to buy the portfolio. And I’d like to see the apartment,” he said simply.

            Relief,
confusion, and something else flashed over her face. “If you’re sure…”

            “I
am,” he said. “I have no interest in trying to avoid a constant rotation of
nosy tourists or sleeping in a canopy princess bed for a month.”

             “I
won’t promise to stop fighting your store.”

            “You
should give me a chance to change your mind. Maybe you just haven’t found your
inner tech-loving geek. ”

             His
chest tightened when she let out a soft laugh. She was more than pretty when
she laughed. She was beautiful.

            “I’m
fairly certain I don’t have one. Even if I didn’t believe your company is
changing society for the worse, your store just doesn’t fit here, especially in
the historic district.”

            Paul
said nothing aloud.
Challenge accepted, Miss Alice Augustine.
Her words seemed
to echo every time a resident of Natchitoches had told him that he was
unwelcome, every single spoken and unspoken slight. He hadn’t listened. He’d
worked hard, devoted everything he had to proving them wrong.

            “It’s
like I died and went to heaven. You’re going to live upstairs? Right above the
store? Are you going to have parties? Will they have cosplay?” Charlie put both
hands to her face and let out a little shriek.

            “Maybe.”
He couldn’t help smiling at this girl’s enthusiasm. He was just a guy who owned
a gaming company and this sort of excitement never got old. He turned to Alice
who had moved back around the counter and was wrapping up the portfolio in
tissue, and placing it in a larger box.

            Charlie
leaned in, chewing her lip. “Listen, I know everybody must ask you stuff like
this, but I’ve been on the new Ultimate Voyager game you created for, like, two
weeks. I got that expansion pass and I got some awesome gear and weapons, but I
can’t get past the Planet of the Wolf Army. I’m just stuck in this forever cycle
of injuries and recuperation, and I’m wasting all my time in that little canyon
near the jump station. At this rate, I’m never gonna become Legend.”

            Paul
wanted to laugh at Alice’s expression. He was torn between outright laughter
and wishing Charlie would leave this topic for another time. Alice’s aversion
to technology wouldn’t lessen when people wandered around speaking the language
of game culture. But he’d never been able to resist a gamer in trouble.

            “There’s
a cheat. Use a broadsword on the first Wolf soldier. Nobody follows him if you
do.” He nodded at her protest. “It’s true. If you’d tried every weapon, you’d
have been able to get out.” He held a finger to his lips. “And don’t tell
anyone I told you that or I’ll deny everything.”

            Charlie
was grinning hugely, bouncing on the toes of her shoes. “Man, this is awesome.
Do you wanna play sometime? My name’s UltimateStarCrossed. You can friend me
and we can go on a raid sometime. I have a group I join every night for about
three hours. They’d be so stoked if you dropped in.” Her cheeks went pink.

            Paul
cleared his throat. He always hated this, when someone wanted to know his
username. If he gave it out to everyone, then he’d never actually get to play. It
would be all messages and friend requests. But he kept an alternate character
in almost every game and that’s the name he’d use if he ever played with
Charlie. He’d always looked young and his love of T-shirts and jeans probably
made him seem even younger. He was used to teen adulation at gaming expos and
he was well aware that Charlie might not think he was too old for her, even
though he was long out of college and sliding toward thirty.

            “Sure,
I’ll friend you when I get set up here. I always like to meet new groups of
players.” He hoped his emphasis on “groups” would erase any assumptions on her
part. He turned to Alice. “There are two apartments above this building, right?
Is the other empty also? Maybe I could rent that side for my CTO who came with
me. We’re good friends but maybe he’d like his own space.”

            Alice
looked up, her mouth open a bit. She seemed confused. “No, it’s―”

            “Miss
Alice lives on that side. You guys are gonna see each other all the time,”
Charlie said gleefully.

            “Oh,”
Paul said and tried to keep his face neutral. He should have known. He’d
already said that she lived close by when he was being his jerky self earlier.
And now he knew for certain the apartment was going to be as low tech as she
could get away with and still be up to code. They would share a wall, this
woman with the dark eyes and throaty laugh. The one who thought he was
destroying society with his frivolous company. The one who had already grabbed
his heart and squeezed it so hard he wasn’t sure if he’d known her for a day or
for a year.

            Her
gaze locked on his. A small smile touched her lips, as if she were daring him
to back out now. It was silliness to think being next door neighbors would even
matter. He desperately wanted to prove to her, and the rest of the Natchitoches
elite, that he belonged here as much as she did. But staying within feet of
each other might be last the drop of awkward to fill the bucket of bad feelings,
spilling over into hate.

            He
held her gaze until she started wrapping up the box once more. As she reached
for a larger box, he saw the bookshelf behind her. It was the picture she’d
sent, with the colorful mysteries, the big science fiction with the dragon, the
worn copy of Austen’s
Emma
and the
collector’s edition of
Wind in the Willows
.
And next to it was the little leather volume that he had on his own shelf. He
felt the room tilt, as if the axis had shifted, and he looked back at this
beautiful woman who sent personal bookshelf pictures to anonymous book-loving
men. He thought of how the emails had made him laugh, made him feel as if he’d
made a real connection with someone new for the first time in years.