Sweet Talking Man

So Leif had broken the engagement three weeks before the first wedding shower. This time he’d not written a Dear John letter and bolted. He’d learned his lesson at the hands of his second former fiancée’s brother and found the balls to pull Marcie out of a gown fitting to tell her he wasn’t going to marry her.

She’d thrown a trash can at him.

That particular action had scared the hell out of the coffee-shop patrons sitting outside enjoying a sweltering day on Magazine Street. The trash can had spilled nasty old coffee on his new trainers, but he hadn’t had time to worry about that. Marcie picked up the nearest plate and hurled it at him, screaming “asshole” over and over. The poor man who didn’t get to finish the bagel that rolled into the street didn’t shout in outrage—he just slunk in the opposite direction.

Leif couldn’t blame him.

He also couldn’t make Marcie listen to reason. She was like a wounded rhino—nothing but a tranquilizer dart would calm her down. She had to burn herself out, and Leif didn’t intend to stick around for the show. Eventually, Marcie would figure out that his ending their relationship would save her greater heartache down the road.

Guess she hadn’t internalized the last words he’d spoken—someday you’ll thank me.

Unless the cake was a belated thank-you gift.

Immediately after the trash-can throwing, Leif had resigned from the art department at Delgado Community College and packed up the small garage apartment he’d rented in the Garden District. Then he’d left New Orleans much the same way he’d entered it—running from a woman.

Yeah, he’d made a bad habit of getting engaged to girls who, on the surface, seemed perfect but underneath weren’t what he needed. The broken engagement prior to Marcie had occurred three weeks before the wedding. He hadn’t wanted to hurt Jenna—she was as sweet as the buttercream frosting he’d just washed off. Her father and brother, however, weren’t as nice. Leif felt lucky to still be walking after they’d caught up with him in Beaumont.

So Leif had regrets...lots of them. He’d escaped the wedding noose three times and regretted hurting the bystanders. But most of all, he hated that his fear of commitment had dragged three innocent women through the mire with him. Hadn’t been fair to them, but he comforted himself with the thought he’d done the right thing.

Leif’s feet couldn’t be nailed down. He wasn’t the kind of guy who stuck...and stayed. Even though he wanted to be someone who belonged somewhere...and to someone.

Arriving in Magnolia Bend had been an accident of fate, but even if he hadn’t gotten lucky with the position as art teacher at St. George’s, he would have come to the town that held the answer to the biggest mystery in his life.

So the time to uncover his past was here. This place held the secrets about why his mother had run...and it held the secret of who Leif’s father was.

Here he began, and here he would hopefully find the answer to the questions that had pricked at him for years. Then maybe he could stop avoiding the ties that bound and find a good spot to settle down.

The doorbell sounded and he grabbed a linen drying towel and hurriedly scrubbed the remaining moisture from his body. Sliding on the hatachigi pants he’d abandoned on the bathroom floor, Leif hurried toward the foyer. The darkening sky had thrown his living area into gloom. Flicking the porch light switch, he opened the door to find Birdie standing on the stoop. Cool air swooshed in, so he grabbed the Patagonia pullover from the nearby hook and tugged it on.

“Birdie,” he said, peering out to see Abigail standing once again at the mailbox. Obviously the two had given him some recovery time before resuming whatever mission they were on. Something about drawing. Maybe Abigail wanted her daughter to have private lessons.

“Hey,” the girl said, shifting nervously in her Converse high-tops. “Mom made me come back to apologize.”

“For...?”

“Uh, two things. First...” She glanced at her mother. Abigail gave her an encouraging nod. “I shouldn’t have said that woman smushing cake in your face was awesome.”

Leif couldn’t stop the laugh. Right after Birdie had declared the awesomeness of Marcie’s actions, Abigail had hustled her daughter away with a quick farewell. She’d nearly dragged Birdie toward the adjacent access walk to the Laurel Woods Bed-and-Breakfast. “Well, it wasn’t awesome for me, but I can understand from your vantage point.”

“Yeah. She was pretty mad at you.”

Leif lifted a shoulder. “Eh, I deserved it.”

“You did?”

From her post Abigail cleared her throat. Loudly.

Annoyance shadowed Birdie’s eyes. “And the second thing I’m sorry for is spying on you.”

“Huh?”

Birdie turned and called to her mother. “There. I told him. Are you happy?”

Abigail gave her daughter the “watch it, missy” look mothers had been giving from the beginning of time.

Leif braced his hands on the door frame, drawing Birdie’s attention. “You’ve been spying on me? Why?”

Birdie swallowed, shifting restlessly before tilting herself closer to him. “It was last month. I accidently spied on you when I climbed a tree...for, uh, some sketching.” She inclined her head toward her mother and dropped her voice to a whisper. “That’s how I get away from her. She stresses me out.”

He could see that. His observation of the buttoned-up Abigail had given him the impression someone needed to release a pressure valve inside the woman. Glancing at her now in her navy sweater, her mouth pressed into a serious line, he figured it was tough to have a mom who carried a label maker and a thick accordion binder of forms, calendars and sanitizing wipes. “Okay. Apology accepted.”

The girl leaned even closer, so that he could smell the apple scent of her shampoo. Her gaze pleaded with him. “I didn’t tell my mom you were naked. Please don’t tell her.”

Whoa.

Leif sucked in air. Dear God. He’d never considered that while swimming his daily laps, someone would see him clad in his birthday suit. His privacy fence topped out at eight feet and he usually did laps in the cloak of darkness. It had grown colder the past few weeks so he’d started swimming at the rec center, but last month he’d been in his pool. “Jeez, Birdie, that’s, uh, not cool.”

The girl rocked back on her heels, tears sheening her eyes. “I didn’t mean to, okay? I didn’t really see anything. Much.”

“Okay, don’t cry. The human body isn’t something to be ashamed of so let’s not make this something skeevy.”

“You’re not mad?”

“No, but you need to tell your mom at some point. Keeping a secret like this isn’t a good idea.” He nearly choked on the last thought. He’d kept a big secret from everyone in the town. He was the son of Calliope—a woman they thought murdered someone. He was also the son of some guy who still lived in Magnolia Bend. He just needed to find out who that guy was.

“She’ll make it into something bad.”

Leif looked at Abigail, who had given up the aggravation and now appeared concerned about the quiet conversation her daughter was having with him. “Curiosity about the opposite sex is natural, Birdie. Not bad. It’s how we’re made. But the deal is I’m a teacher at your school. Things like this can get complicated.”

Birdie squinted her eyes, obviously seeing it from his point of view for the first time. But then her expression grew pleading again. “It was an accident. I won’t do it again, and we don’t have to tell anyone you were naked. This is all my fault. Not yours. I’m the pervert.”

“Is everything okay?” Abigail called.

Leif raised a hand and gave her a flashbulb smile before directing his regard to her child. “Don’t say that. You did what any eleven-year-old would do.”

“I’m twelve.”

“Okay, but even so, you don’t have to be ashamed of being curious. I accept your apology, and I will make sure next time I pull on a suit, okay?”

Birdie nodded, diamond teardrops clinging to her long lashes. “I’m really sorry.”

“Okay. We’ve put this behind us. And you do realize that in some art classes, students sketch unclothed bodies. Artists see things differently, right?”

“Of course,” Birdie said with a nod before easing off his porch. “Thank you, Mr. Lively.”

Leif smiled, even while inside his gut clenched. He would have to tell Abigail about the “secret” he now shared with Birdie. But that would be hard. He could envision Abigail overreacting to her daughter acting on natural curiosity. She’d make it something it wasn’t. Abigail Orgeron wasn’t a helicopter mom—she was a tank who sat on her daughter. Poor kid. Birdie tried to escape someone who wanted control over every aspect of life.

Shove a lump of coal up Abigail’s ass and he’d have a diamond in a week.