Threads of Steel (Bayou Cove) (6 page)

“I know. I keep telling myself that, but it’s hard not to be embarrassed when your personal best for the day is in triple digits.”

Doug laughed. “If you can find time to play before you leave, we’ll just hit the ball down the course and not even keep score. I’d have just as much fun. I think I’d enjoy your company one way or the other, Miss
LeFaire
. So, do you think you’ll have a few hours before you leave to get that game in?”

“I have no idea what my life will be like while I’m here, but after I meet with the doctors this morning, I’ll know more. I have the visitation tonight and the funeral tomorrow morning. I really need to get back to work, but I’d love to find time to play at least one round.”

“Do you still have my card?”

She nodded.

“Will you promise to call if you can fit me in?”

“I promise. I can assure you I’ll need a few hours to relax.”

Her calm voice and tiny smile didn’t show the rush of excitement and pleasure his words produced. How long had it been since just sitting next to a man had lifted her spirits? The men with whom she spent her free time usually were business contacts and friends of Stephen.
Male friends.
Nothing more.

That arrangement suited her just fine. Since her divorce, she’d opened her heart to one other man and that ended in a disaster. Maybe she was meant to be alone or maybe she had a knack of attracting the wrong kind of men.

Was Doug someone in that category? Was he that wrong kind of man as well? She looked at him closely as he continued to talk. Maybe he was or maybe he wasn’t. It didn’t really matter since it didn’t appear she’d have time to work in even one round of golf with him.

She attributed this euphoria she felt this morning to the magic of sitting on the edge of a
bayou in a resort where Elvis himself once enjoyed. That’s all.

Still she couldn’t deny that her day took on a more pleasant outlook the moment Doug had walked up.

“Why don’t you tell me about this lady you’re here to bury? Or would it make you sad to talk about her?”

“No, I think talking about her would be a good thing.
”

After telling him a little about Miss Ellie, her voice dropped. “She was very, very special to me.”

“I can see how much she meant to you.”

“She watched over two friends and me like she was our mother. I don’t know that we appreciated what we had in her while we were in high school, but later—later we understood.”

“That’s the way it usually is.” He took a bite of his croissant, stared out over the water. “Did you live around here?”

“Not too far. I lived in the old section of Bayou Cove, just over the bridge and into town. It was a great place to grow up. We were all pretty poor, but we were happy, I guess.”

Doug smiled, but didn’t comment.

“Mother sometimes worked here at the hotel, cleaned houses and took in sewing and ironing. There were several houses in this subdivision that were her regulars. Nothing much has changed.
A few more cars on the road maybe.”

He gave a knowing nod. “My wife and I fell in love with this area the first time I played in a tournament here when I was on leave from my regular military job.”

The mention of his wife made her flinch. She assumed he wasn’t married, especially since she saw him talking with the lady yesterday. In fact, she had even looked and saw that he didn’t wear a ring.

“We’d been living in an apartment outside of Albuquerque,” he continued, never imagining where her mind had gone. “We scraped up enough money to buy a small bungalow here a few blocks from the clubhouse. We kept the house while I toured the world with the military. Sometimes she followed me, but she mostly stayed here. We loved it.”

“I can see where this would be a wonderful place to live. Does she ever play golf with you?”

“When we first married, she did, but she’s no longer in my life.”

Anna Marie wasn’t sure what that meant. Was he divorced or had she died? When he didn’t elaborate, she didn’t push.

Anna Marie thought about her life, void of all that she’d hoped to have, and realized no matter what had happened to his wife,  her life and his were not that much different. The difference lay in the fact that she should have moved on with hers as he seemed to be.

“Deep in thought?”

His words jerked her back to the present.

“Yes, I guess I am.” She took a deep breath.

He finished his coffee,
then
looked at his watch. “I’d much rather sit out here with you, but I’ve got to meet my partners.” He stood up. “They’ll complain and talk about their ailments for the entire eighteen holes.
”

He laughed after he said it.

“But I can tell you really enjoy them, don’t you?”

He nodded. “Yes, I do. They’re hardheaded and cantankerous, but they’re my friends. I spend a lot of time with them out here.”

He smiled at her and her insides melted. She pushed her chair back to get up, but he surprised her by helping her with it.

“Thank you. It’s nice to know there are gentlemen left in this world.”

“Well, if the men in. . .” He stopped in mid sentence. “Yesterday, did I hear you tell the officers you lived in New Orleans?”

She nodded.

“Well, if the men in New Orleans don’t show you their gentlemanly traits and treat you as a lady, then they need their head examined.”

He pulled on a sun-visor. “I have to meet the old men. I hope you’re day isn’t horrible. Just keep a smile on your face.” Discreetly, he took the newspaper and tucked it under his arm again.

Her heart did an unexpected flip as he walked away.

* * *

Doug left the hotel and walked across to the clubhouse to sign in. Groups of men— some he recognized, some he didn’t— filed into the clubhouse. He had looked forward to playing in this particular tournament because of some of the well-known golfers he’d personally called to play, but for some reason, his enthusiasm waned as he walked away from the hotel.

He couldn’t get Anna Marie off his mind, and it wasn’t just because of her good looks. Any man would have a hard time forgetting her with her dark brown hair that shone in the sun and her deep blue eyes. It was a rare, beautiful combination. Yesterday as he talked with her for their few minutes before she received the news about her father, he couldn’t keep his eyes off of her. She wore little makeup even though as she’d just driven in from the city.

This morning with her baseball cap, jogging suit and no makeup, she reminded him of the typical girl-next-door.

He chuckled.

He didn’t need to get involved with any out-of-town girl, especially a girl-next-door type who faced a truckload of problems.

“Hey, Doug, ready to get your ass beat?”

Doug stepped on the sidewalk and shook the hand of a golfer he’d played with many times.

“Oh, I’m ready to play, but don’t count on beating my team today. These old men on my team live and die this game. You have a tough job in front of you if you plan to beat us.”

They shook hands and exchanged a few comments. He moved on, greeting several other men before he got to the desk to sign in.

As he made his way to his golf cart, he glanced in the direction of the hotel hoping to see Anna Marie. She faced a horrible day, first at the hospital, then at the funeral home tonight. He knew it was none of his business. She was a stranger who had not asked for his help, but for some reason he wished he could be by her side.

In spite of her brilliant smile, he sensed sadness in her life that came from more than just the situation she found herself in now.

His teammates called out to him from the golf cart barn. He nodded to them and lifted his hand as he headed to his car to get his clubs. He pulled the bag out of the back of his SUV, but couldn’t keep from looking toward the hotel once more.

He wondered what would go through Anna Marie’s mind as she dressed to go to the hospital where she would talk with the doctors about her father. How would she feel when she agreed to take him off life-support?

Then would she have the courage to walk into the town’s funeral home, knowing that everyone knew it was her father who put Miss Ellie there?

He didn’t know Anna Marie, but he had a feeling she’d dealt with this kind of adversity before. He knew what it was like to live with grief, and he sensed it wasn’t something foreign to the lady from New Orleans.

CHAPTER
4

“Go back inside, Samantha,” Nancy yelled out the window of her van. “I told you, you can’t go to Susan’s tonight. Help your brothers with their homework then you can talk on the phone unless your dad needs you to help with Little Harry.”

Nancy turned to back out the drive.

“Mo-
om
,” whined fifteen-year-old Samantha as she held open the screen door. “That’s not fair. I told her I would come over.”

“Not tonight, Samantha.” Nancy rolled up her window and backed out on the street. When she was sure her daughter was inside, she headed to the funeral home.

“Fair?” she said to herself. “The girl has no idea how unfair life can be.”

Turning off her small subdivision road onto the main street, she didn’t know whether to cry or scream. Her life was the pits. Well, not really. She had four beautiful kids and had married one of the best looking guys in high school.

“Well, next to Ronnie, he was the best looking,” she said as she pulled up to a stop light. When the man in the car next to her looked at her and smiled, she realized she was talking to herself. She smiled back,
then
stared straight ahead at the light.

“I’m losing it,” she said out loud when the light changed. “I’m an absolute basket case.”

Then she thought about Anna Marie, whose life wasn’t perfect by any means, but, man, what would she give to be in her shoes just for a few days
.
Quiet time at home alone.
A clean house with things lying exactly where you left them.
Dinner out if you didn’t feel like cooking.

She groaned.

That life was so foreign to her that it was hard to even imagine.

“Suck it up, girl. Just suck it up.”

She turned the corner to the funeral home and looked at her white blouse to make sure Little Harry hadn’t smeared his supper on her. At that she giggled. Anna Marie would probably have on a silk designer blouse with her crocodile shoes or carrying some kind of designer purse. She looked over at her
Walmart
bag.

Jealous
?
“Well, maybe a little,” she said as she pulled the old van into a parking space.

* * *

The evening drive to the funeral home didn’t take long enough for Anna Marie. It stood in the center of the oldest part of Bayou Cove, not far from where she used to live. Its tall white columns, wide front porch, and ceiling-to-floor windows stood as majestic today as they did in the early Nineteenth Century when the antebellum home was built.

She found a parking spot on one of the side streets, but didn’t get out. Instead she sat and looked at the building with a steady crowd of people leaving and going in.

Anna Marie had attended many funerals here, from distant relations to close family ties. Her mother’s service had been held in one of the smaller side rooms, saving the larger room for the city’s more prominent citizens. Her heart squeezed thinking about her mother
.

“Oh, Mom, I miss you so much and need you.
”

Her thoughts turned to the last years of her mother’s life. After Anna Marie had divorced Ronnie, finished her degree, then moved to New Orleans, she and her mother had become very
close. Only then did she have enough money to allow her mother to quit work and enjoy life. Her health was starting to decline, but by taking her to doctors in New Orleans, Anna Marie felt sure she’d given her a few extra years of life.

Good years that she finally deserved.

Her mother loved to spend time in the big city. Because Anna Marie lived in a Creole Cottage on Dauphine Street, her mother could stroll through the better parts of town or take the streetcar to the French Market to shop or rest in the open café with beignets and coffee. Sometimes she would simply ride along the St. Charles streetcar line, making the complete round
.

“I just love the clanging it makes going down the avenue. When I ride, I can forget about the present and pretend I’m in the 1940’s when I grew up here as a child.”

When her mother was happy, it made Anna Marie happy.

Those had been the best years for the two of them, years that Anna Marie would treasure forever
.

“Oh, Mom, what would you say to me if you were here? I talked to Dad today, or at least I talked while he lay there connected to the tubes. I told him about you and me and how our lives fared after he left.”