The Pepper in the Gumbo (Men of Cane River #1)(38)

“You probably feel like you can do that sort of thing because you’re…” Alice was having trouble finding words.

“Rich? Famous?”

“From out of town! But I have to live here. People talk.” She put her hands to her face, feeling her cheeks burning. She felt sick at the thought of what Eric would tell people now.

He sighed, examining his knuckles. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think it through.”

“Obviously,” she said, letting the word stretch into the space between them.

Paul shifted his feet, eyes downcast. He really did seem as if he regretted punching Eric and it certainly had happened faster than she could imagine. Maybe he was under as much stress as she was. She certainly wanted to punch Eric herself. Paul seemed calm and collected on the outside, but inside he might just be as hot-headed as she was.

Alice felt a laugh rise in her throat. She tried to keep her face straight, but the memory of Eric’s expression as he went down to the floor had her giggling.

Paul looked up. “I’m afraid to ask.”

Alice covered her mouth, snickering. “I’m not a violent person,” she started to say.

“But you enjoyed that a little bit?”

She nodded, laughing. “Eric is one of those people who’d gripe with a ham under each arm. He is never happy.” Then her smile faded away. For the second time in less than twenty-four hours, her resolution to avoid Paul Olivier had been broken. “Did you need something? Is everything all right with the apartment?”

“Fine, everything’s fine,” he said. “I always sleep to blaring zydeco music.”

“Me, too. Must be a Natchitoches thing.”

“As for why I’m standing in your shop, I woke up and smelled the most amazing breakfast somewhere very close. Maple bacon, eggs, maybe some hash browns. Definitely good coffee. So I went looking. I’ve been up and down the block and can’t find the café. So, if you could just point me in the right direction, I’ll be on my way.”

“Oh,” she said. “I’m afraid you just described my breakfast.”

Paul gave her a quick scan from head to toe. “All of that? You must be a runner. Nobody can eat like that and stay so―”

Alice waited. It had been a long time since anyone complimented her appearance. She shouldn’t have cared, but she really wanted to know what came after the “so.”

His neck slowly turned redder and redder, and when the color reached his cheeks, she couldn’t hold back a smile. “That’s the nicest thing anybody has said about me for a long time.”

“That you must be a runner?”

“No, that they got out of bed and looked all over the block for my cooking.” She was teasing him and he knew it. The real compliment was the approving look and the longer pause. She thought of how Eric had never mentioned her appearance unless it was to suggest she straighten her hair or wear a little more make up because it fit his idea of a professional woman. Eric always talked about cholesterol, and salt intake, and how she should get a gym membership because working at a desk in a bookstore would shorten her lifespan.

“I didn’t know the apartment came with olfactory torture.”

“Wait until Monday. Gumbo simmers all day in a crock pot while I work. I can smell it through the vents.”

“My mama always made gumbo on wash day, too,” he said, his lips tugging up.

Alice nodded in surprise. Mrs. Perrault called Monday wash day, a tradition from back when the woman spent the day doing laundry and needed a meal that could simmer while they worked.

He grinned, and she stood there, thinking of how good it felt to share a joke with him.

His eyes dropped to her necklace. “Can I ask you something?”

She paused. Paul already knew more about her than most people. She nodded.

“What are the rings about?”

Alice quickly tucked her necklace back in place under her shirt. “My parents’ wedding rings,” she said. She drew in a shaky breath. Eric had never asked that. How had she been so blind? That relationship had gone on about six months too long. “Sorry. You asked about breakfast. Two blocks east is Babet’s Diner. Great pancakes, grits, and eggs. Biscuits are better before ten or after four when she makes another batch,” she said.

He nodded, looking as if he wanted to ask another question. “Thanks. I’ll head right over. And that’s a great Heinlein series. Starship Troopers is my favorite.”

Alice was grateful she didn’t have to explain why her parents’ rings were around her neck and not on their fingers. She picked up one of the books, looking at the mass market 1950’s cover. “I’ve never read them. I’m not really into science fiction.”

He’d turned toward the door, but came back and took the book from her hands. “These are in great condition, too. Starship Troopers was originally published as a serial called ‘Starship Soldier’ in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science. The interstellar war between the Terran Federation, which is Earth, and the Arachnids, which are called ‘The Bugs,’ was actually Heinlein’s way of defending his views on production of nuclear weapons.”

“Okay. I never knew that.” Alice stared down at the stack of paperbacks. She wasn’t really sure what an interstellar war had to do with the nuclear arms race. Probably one of those things that people read into a book when the author had no intention of ever having written it.