Rebel Without a Cake Read online

  The kitchen was empty but I found coffee and bread for toast. After wolfing down a slice (or two), I made a couple of calls. First, I left Ox a message that I wouldn’t be in that morning and then I tried Sullivan’s number again. I didn’t expect to reach him, but he answered and apologized for being unable to help. I had just enough time to tell him not to worry about me before he had to go. After we hung up, I tried to decide who to call next, but the phone rang while I was still running through the possibilities. I answered before I could think about the fact that I was in someone else’s house and using their phone. Which turned out to be a good thing.

  “You’re up!” Gabriel said when he heard my voice. “I was looking forward to waking you up myself.”

  I was so glad to hear his voice, I giggled. “You got my message?”

  “I heard it after work last night. I didn’t want to call this number and wake everyone up, so I waited. Are you okay?” He sounded far away and I picked up a strange interference on the line, but I was just thrilled that we had any connection at all.

  “A little stiff and sore, and if I never have an air bag go off around me again, I’ll die happy. Is there any chance you can come and get me? There’s no way I’m driving out of here in the Mercedes—and if by some miracle I find someone who can fix it, I won’t be on the road anytime soon.”

  “I’m nearly there,” he said. “I just stopped for gas and I’m about to get back on the road.”

  “You’re coming to Baie Rebelle?”

  “You said you needed help, didn’t you?”

  My eyes filled with tears. “Yeah, I did.”

  “So help is on the way. I’m maybe half an hour away, but my cell signal’s been in and out for miles, so I decided to call while I had a few bars. Is there anything I need to know to find the house?”

  I gave him directions to Aunt Margaret’s and told him what to watch for along the road that would help him find me. I hung up a few minutes later wearing a smile that stretched from ear to ear. I couldn’t expect Gabriel to tow the Mercedes back to civilization, so I got busy trying to arrange a rescue for my poor car. Unfortunately, Nettie had been right. I couldn’t find a towing service locally, and the cost of getting an actual tow truck way out to the back of beyond to haul the Mercedes to a certified mechanic was astronomical.

  I tried three different companies and did my best to negotiate a reasonable fee, but nobody was willing to budge. So when Kale Laroche showed up on the doorstep with a friend and an offer to pull the Mercedes out of the ditch for me, I accepted the help gratefully. I handed over my keys and jotted down directions to a place called Ed’s, where Kale and his friend planned to take the Mercedes. Could this Ed repair my car? I could only hope.

  After Kale and his friend left, I spent some time pretending to work on sketches for the Belle Lune Ball, but I was too antsy to sit still so I decided to look around outside. I thought I was alone, but to my surprise, I came across Tallulah digging in a flowerbed in the backyard.

  She looked up as I walked toward her and used the back of her wrist to brush the straight brown hair away from her forehead. “So. You’re awake.” I guess she wanted to make sure I’d noticed.

  “I’ve been up for a while,” I told her. “I’ve been making phone calls.”

  “Humph.” At least I think that’s what she said. It was hard to tell. She sat back on her heels and the frown on her face turned into the stony glare of a challenge. “I hope you’re not expecting breakfast.”

  What was wrong with her? I knew I wasn’t her favorite, but she seemed even more hostile than usual. I did my best not to give attitude back. “I’ve already eaten. Where is everyone else? The house seems deserted.”

  “Ladies’ Bible study,” Tallulah said. “Down at the church. They waited around for you, but you never got out of bed so they gave up.”

  If she was trying to make me feel guilty, she’d have to do better than that. My aunt Yolanda could out-guilt anyone I’d ever met. Plus, I remembered Bitty saying that Tallulah didn’t participate with the good ladies of the church, so she had no room to talk. She could try to make me feel bad, but I was determined to be gracious. “That was nice of them,” I said with a saccharine smile. “Another time, I guess.”

  She answered that with a second humph and started digging again. “Clothes fit you, I see.”

  I glanced down at my ankles protruding from the pants and the shirt hanging to my knees. I hadn’t worn clothes this ill fitting since I was a kid and Aunt Yolanda took me school shopping at the thrift store. “Yes. Do I have you to thank?”

  Tallulah jerked her chin. “Frances was going to find you something from her suitcase, but I said she’s too tall for you.” She went back to digging. “Those are fine, yes?”

  I wasn’t sure she expected an answer but I gave her one anyway. After all, I wouldn’t want to seem rude. “Yes. They’re fine.”

  She flicked her eyes over me and tossed a spade full of sandy dirt at my feet. “I heard your phone call this morning. Does Liam know you’ve got another man on the side?”

  Aha! So that’s what had put her in such a cheerful mood. It would have been amusing if it hadn’t been so annoying. “You listened in on my personal phone call?”

  “I answered a call on my own phone,” Tallulah said with a sniff. She wagged a cordless handset in my face. “How was I to know you’d pick up the phone when it rang?”

  “I had no idea anyone was here,” I said. “I thought you were all out somewhere and I’d given this number to a few people.”

  Another flick of disapproving eyes. Another spade full of dirt aimed at my feet.

  “A friend of mine is on his way to drive me back to New Orleans since my car isn’t working. But thanks for jumping to conclusions.”

  Tallulah tugged off a thick gardening glove and raked her fingers through her hair. “You think you can play fast and loose with men, but you can’t. Sooner or later it’ll catch up with you.”

  Was she for real? “I appreciate your concern,” I lied, “but you really don’t have to worry. Liam knows all about Gabriel and vice versa.”

  “Men don’t like to be lied to,” Tallulah went on, as if I hadn’t said a word. “You can’t play with their feelings.”

  “I’m not,” I assured her. “And at the risk of sounding rude, it’s really none of your business.”

  “If you don’t believe me, ask Bitty. She could tell you a thing or two. Me? I got a man and settled down. One man was good enough for me.”

  I refrained from telling her that I knew that man had walked out on her, and instead I squeaked out a surprised, “Bitty?”

  Tallulah brushed dirt from her knee and dug around a bit more. “You know what she’s like. She has trouble making decisions, and she’s always been that way. She had two men dangling on a string, and in the end she lost them both.” She shook the spade at me, sending dirt flying. “You mark my words. You keep playing around the way you are, you’ll be the one who loses in the end.”

  Half a dozen hot retorts rose to my tongue, but for Bernice’s sake, I swallowed them all. Tallulah and her family had taken me in on a moment’s notice. They’d fed me, housed me, and even clothed me. I wouldn’t repay their generosity with an argument, no matter how wrong Tallulah was.

  And she was wrong, even though deep down, far beneath my outrage, I wondered if I could be making a mistake. How long would both Sullivan and Gabriel wait around for me? Should I pick one and let the other go? I didn’t think I was playing around with their affections. I’d been up front with both of them and as honest as I knew how to be. But were they really okay with the status quo or was I simply justifying my behavior?

  I heard a car door shut and my heart gave a leap. I left Tallulah to her digging and hurried back to the house. To be honest, I just wanted to escape the look in Tallulah’s eyes and the questions she’d raised. I wasn’t su
re whether I was more upset with Tallulah because she was wrong about me—or because she was right.

  * * *

  Gabriel took one look at my too-short pants and baggy plaid shirt and let out a low whistle. I’d pulled my hair into a messy bun and I had no makeup with me so my face was scrubbed clean. “Looks like I got here just in time. I had no idea you were in this much trouble.”

  I’ve looked better, but he’d also seen me looking worse, so I grabbed his arm and tugged him inside. “Not another word about the way I look. You have no idea what the past couple of days have been like.”

  He sobered and ran another look over my face, this one filled with concern. “I’m just glad you’re in one piece,” he said and leaned in for a gentle kiss.

  My heart flipped when his lips touched mine, but it didn’t flop the way it usually did. Probably because Tallulah had stirred up all those nasty feelings of guilt.

  He must have sensed a difference in me because he pulled back slowly, his eyes narrowed slightly. “I didn’t hurt you, did I?”

  “Of course not. I’m just . . . ready to get out of here.” Which was true. It just wasn’t the whole truth. I waved him toward the couch and headed toward the bedroom. “Give me two minutes to grab my things. Then we can hit the road.”

  “What about your car?” he called after me.

  “A couple of local guys are towing it to a place called Ed’s. It should be safe enough there until I can figure out how to get it back to the city.” I ducked into the bedroom, stuffed my dirty clothes into a pillowcase I’d return later, and rolled up the sleeping bag. I thought about leaving a note for Miss Frankie and Bernice, but after our conversations last night, I thought it might be better to speak to them in person.

  Back in the living room, I jerked my head toward the door. “I’m ready if you are. I just need to make one stop before we leave town. It shouldn’t take long.”

  “You’re calling the shots,” Gabriel said as he followed me outside. “Where do you need to go?”

  “Ladies’ Bible study. The church is right next to the bar. You passed both on your way through town.”

  Gabriel didn’t even bat an eye.

  “I need to tell Miss Frankie that I’m leaving,” I explained. “And I’m hoping she’ll let me use her car for a few days while I’m trying to figure out what to do about mine.”

  “Gotcha.” Gabriel held the door and I quick-stepped across the front yard to his car.

  Tallulah came around the house as Gabriel and I climbed into his car. She kept her distance, but I could feel her watching us and passing judgment on every move I made.

  “Who’s that?” Gabriel asked.

  I kept the answer simple. “She’s Bernice’s cousin Tallulah.”

  “She seems to be waiting for something. Do you think you should say something to her?”

  “No, I don’t.” I knew that I sounded impatient and maybe even nervous, but the last thing I wanted was for Tallulah to share her opinions with Gabriel. Bad enough that she’d shared them with me. I buckled up and pulled down the visor. “Can we just go?”

  Gabriel started the car and took off. I watched Tallulah grow smaller and smaller in the side mirror, and then finally disappear.

  “Are you going to tell me what’s going on?” Gabriel asked as he turned onto the highway.

  “It’s nothing,” I said. “She was in a mood this morning, and so was I. It wasn’t a good combination.” I made myself more comfortable and put Tallulah out of my mind. “Thanks for coming all this way to get me. I hope it wasn’t too much trouble.”

  “No trouble at all,” he said with a grin. “I’m just glad I could help. Are you going to tell me what happened to your car?”

  I gave him the short version of the story, leaving out unnecessary details like the fact that I had been tailing Kale through some deserted swampland at the time. Gabriel tends to get overly protective of me in certain circumstances, and I already knew that tailing murder suspects was one of them.

  If he suspected that I was holding back, he gave no sign of it, and by the time I finished my story, we’d reached the Baie Rebelle Church single-wide. Bible study was breaking up, so I made arrangements with Miss Frankie to use her car, and promised to collect the mail at both their houses while they were away. A few minutes later, we were driving away from Baie Rebelle and its hidden stills and murder by toilet tank lids, and toward the real-life world of cake, feuding staff members, and babies on the way. I’d been in Baie Rebelle for just twenty-four hours, but it felt as if I’d been away for weeks.

  Twenty-seven

  I found several messages waiting for me when I walked into my office on Friday morning. Evangeline Delahunt wanted to see me on Monday to discuss the menu for the Belle Lune Ball, Edie had scheduled two wedding consults for the following week, and Simone O’Neil had left three messages for me to call her as soon as possible. Concerned about what could be so urgent, I decided to follow up on that right away.

  “Change of plans,” she said when I returned her call. “Evangeline has decided to take the ball in another direction, and I thought I should let you know before you go too far down the road we talked about at our last meeting.”

  I held back a groan. Not that I’d already done a lot of work on my ideas, but I had done a lot of thinking. I couldn’t believe that Evangeline expected me to abruptly shift gears with only a few days before my next command appearance.

  I glanced at my cluttered desk and the few sketches I’d completed before my most recent visit to Baie Rebelle. “Can she do that?”

  “Technically? No. It’s for the board of directors to decide, but they tend to give my mother whatever she wants. And she’s decided that she wants to do something different.”

  Maybe I was getting paranoid, but I wondered if she was going in a new direction purposely to throw me off. Evangeline Delahunt seemed to delight in setting others up for failure. She’d apparently already steamrolled over Dmitri Wolff and Gâteaux. Now it was my turn.

  “What does she want to do?” I asked.

  Simone didn’t answer immediately. “It might be better if I showed you. Are you free for lunch? It would be my treat.”

  Uh-oh. Something that couldn’t be described didn’t sound good. “When and where?” I asked. The sooner I knew what Evangeline was up to, the better my chances of beating her at whatever game she was playing. We arranged to meet at Galatoire’s on Bourbon Street. A convenient choice for Simone. A lot less convenient for me, but she was the client so it was her call.

  I arrived ten minutes early, which was a good thing since the streets were crowded and it took a while to find a parking place. I hustled inside three minutes late, hot, sweaty, and frazzled. Simone was waiting for me just inside the doors looking remarkably cool and collected. She took my hands and air-kissed my cheeks, which seemed entirely normal for her but made me a bit uncomfortable, considering. Oblivious to my discomfort, she signaled the maître d’ that we were ready.

  Dozens of tables packed a long, narrow dining room. It could easily have felt crowded, especially with diners leaving their own tables to visit friends, but a bank of full-length mirrors running along the wall made the room look larger than it actually was. Rows of ceiling fans turned slowly overhead, and light from each of them reflected from the mirrors, making the whole room sparkle.

  We slipped into seats at a table for two set with crystal and silver, and I tried not to feel gauche and out of place. “It’s beautiful in here,” I said, my voice hushed.

  Surprise lit Simone’s dark eyes. “You haven’t been here before?”

  I shook my head slowly. “It’s been on my list of places to visit but it’s hard to get away from work. This is my first time here.” I’d added Galatoire’s to my culinary bucket list for several reasons, the first of which was that it was a New Orleans tradition dating back more than a century. In a
ll that time, little about the restaurant’s look and seating had changed. I knew that reservations were accepted for the second-floor dining room, but here on the first floor seating was first come, first served.

  Simone watched me take in the ambience with a smile and eventually nodded toward the menu in front of me. “Everything here is wonderful,” Simone said, “but if you’d like, I can make a few suggestions.”

  When it came to dining out, I’d long ago learned to always let someone in the know offer suggestions before making any decisions. Uncle Nestor had taught me that, and Philippe had echoed the advice when the two of us got together. Experienced servers knew what was especially good, which ingredients were fresh, and maybe more important, what to avoid on any particular night. Other diners could direct you to dishes that were consistently delicious. I’d experienced some amazing food by following my tío’s advice, and I had no doubt that Simone would steer me in the right direction.

  After some discussion, we decided on Galatoire Goute, an appetizer plate consisting of shrimp remoulade, oysters en brochette, and crabmeat maison. Simone suggested we follow that with fresh fish topped with crabmeat and shrimp and tie up the meal with café brûlot, a strong, hot coffee flavored with citrus peel, sugar, cinnamon, and cloves.

  Once our choices had been relayed to our server, Simone linked her hands together on the table and got down to business. “I’m sorry about these changes. I know this is going to make things more difficult for you. They’ve certainly thrown a monkey wrench into my plans.”

  “I may be in a better position than you are,” I said with a sympathetic smile. “You’ve been working on this for months. I’ve only had a few days.” I didn’t admit that most of my time had been spent in Baie Rebelle or that I only had a few sketches on paper, none of which had even come close to knocking my socks off, so I held out little hope that Evangeline would have been impressed. “Which part of the theme does she want to change?”