Sweetheart Reunion

Alma pivoted and started walking. She heard him running to catch up with her. What had come over him?

His words echoed up to her. “You like bothering me, don’t you? I mean, you like making me suffer.”

“I don’t want to be a bother,” she said over her shoulder. “And I don’t have time to make anyone suffer.”

Except herself.

“You are a bother, though. You won’t go away. Always in my head, always the smell of flowers and the image of those pretty eyes of yours.”

There went her pulse, her heart, again. “I don’t want to be there—inside your head. Let me out.”

He tugged her back just as they reached the back porch of the café. “I can’t shake you.”

“So what are you going to do about it, Julien?”

He didn’t speak. But he did something, all right.

He leaned down and kissed her smack on the lips. A long, measured, meandering kiss that bubbled and churned with as many undercurrents as that big bayou. His kiss was certainly as dangerous as those ancient waters.

She pulled away long enough to whisper a plea. “Stop it, Julien.”

But he didn’t stop, even when the few customers and workers on the big porch started whistling and clapping.

Chapter Three

“How did you hear that?”

Alma glared at her cell phone then put it back to her ear.

Her sister Brenna laughed, the sound tinkling like chimes through the phone line. “Are you kidding? I still have friends in Fleur, you know. Friends with cell phones and social networks. They keep me informed. I even have a picture. Hold on.”

Alma groaned then glanced out the window of the cottage where she lived behind the restaurant. Less than two hours since Julien had pulled that stunt and already it had gone viral.

Her sister’s silky voice returned. “Okay. I sent you a copy. Look.”

“I don’t have time—” But she looked anyway. “Oh, wow.”

“Oh, wow is right,” Brenna said, giggling again. “That would look good on a romance novel cover.”

“Yeah, right. Don’t get any ideas.”

“Oh, I only have one idea,” Brenna said with a sigh. “We need a wedding in Fleur. And you and Julien have been dancing around this thing since high school. Actually, since kindergarten.”

“We’re not dancing around,” Alma retorted. “We’re just friends.”

“Friends? Sister, that shot shows you and Julien LeBlanc are so much more than friends.”

“Delete it,” Alma said. “That’s what I’m going to do right now.”

“No, you won’t,” Brenna said. “You’ll print it out and put it in that scrapbook you’ve been working on for years.”

“And how do you know about my scrapbook?”

“I have ways.”

“You are so sneaky. No wonder you’re good at your job.”

“And what does that mean?”

“Nothing,” Alma said. “Just that your imagination makes you suspect things and I guess that is a bit creative when you’re dealing with art. You can spot a fake.”

“Exactly,” Brenna said. “Julien tries to be a fake, pretending to be a bad boy and all that, but he’s still in love with you. That’s why he pretends to leave a trail of broken hearts behind him. But he’s the one with the broken heart. And now I have the picture to prove it. You know what they say about a picture?”

“Well, this one isn’t speaking a thousand words,” Alma replied. “More like, this picture is purely, truly fake.” She swallowed, then closed her eyes to the memory of Julien’s kiss. It had not felt as if he were faking at all. No, that kiss had been all too real. “He only did that to embarrass me and get me all riled up.”

“Okay, keep telling yourself that,” Brenna said. “I think you are riled up, but in a good way.”

“And what about you?” Alma asked, anxious to get off the subject of that kiss and the way it had made her feel. “When are you going to have that big Baton Rouge wedding you keep dreaming about?”

Her sister went silent. And that wasn’t like Brenna.

“Bree?”

“Not a good subject right now.” Alma heard a sigh. “Keep the picture, Alma. You’ll regret it if you delete it. I gotta go. Hope to see you in a few weeks.”

The connection ended and Alma was left standing there, staring at a picture of Julien LeBlanc kissing her.

“I should delete it,” she said, mumbling and muttering as she went around locking doors and preparing to go to bed.

But she didn’t.

She got in her grandmother’s old brass bed laced with mosquito netting and stared at the picture for a long time.

Then she turned out the lights and tried to go to sleep.

But the face of a dark-haired charmer kept popping into her mind. And the memory of that kiss kept her tossing and turning well into the wee hours.

Why did Julien want to be back in her life?

* * *

Julien wasn’t the first one in the door at the Fleur Bakery and Café the next morning. He waited until almost lunchtime, not wanting to appear anxious.

Except that he couldn’t wait to see Alma again. She’d kissed him back last night, and for the first time in a long time he had real hope in his heart. Since the night she’d walked out of his life, Julien had longed for a way to win Alma back. But pride and her aloof nature had held him back.

Then Sunday after church, he’d watched his maman with his cousin’s new baby. Watched and seen the tears forming in his sweet mother’s eyes. She missed her husband. Julien’s daddy had died from a heart attack just last fall. They all missed him. When his mother Virginia had glanced up and caught him staring at her and the child, she’d said something that had stayed with Julien.

“Don’t squander time with your pride, Julien. You don’t have to look so sad. You could have a baby yourself if you stop being so mule-headed. Alma would make a good mother.”