Читать книгу Bad Boys Southern Style - JoAnn Ross - Страница 8

Seven months after her grand opening, thanks, in part, to Savannah’s tourism trade, business was booming. Enough so that Roxi had even been able to hire a part-time employee, a descendent of a long line of voodoo practitioners who moonlighted as the lead singer in the Papa Legba Voodoo Priestesses.

Named for the most powerful of all the voodoo spirits, who, along with all his other responsibilities was in charge of all things erotic and sexual, the pop group was starting to generate crossover appeal, which Roxi attributed in large part to Jaira Guidnard’s mile-long legs, poreless dark chocolate skin, and a body that caused males from eight to eighty to trip over their tongues.

“Do you believe this?” Jaira asked ten minutes after a busload of Swedish tourists had descended on the shop, located on the city’s colorful Riverwalk. “It’s like a damn Viking invasion.”

“They’re also paying our rent for the next three months,” Roxi said. “Not to mention your salary.”

“Well, there is that,” Jaira agreed. “And some of them are actually kind of cute if you go for the hunky blond Scandinavian type.”

She flashed a blindingly bright smile at one of the Vikings, who immediately walked into a display of pewter wind chimes hanging from the ceiling.

The temperature and humidity outside the shop was approaching the nineties; the constant opening and closing of the door, as customers left with their packages to make room for others to enter, was putting a strain on the hundred-year-old building’s air conditioner, making it nearly as hot inside. Her hot pink Hex Appeal tank top was beginning to stick to Roxi’s body and her hair felt like a thick dark curtain hanging down her back.

While Jaira went over to model jewelry and flirt with a trio of bedazzled males ostensibly shopping for their mothers back home—if, in fact, Swedish mothers actually wore chandelier garnet and seashell earrings—Roxi wrapped up a voodoo doll for a tall, stunningly voluptuous woman her own age who easily could’ve been a member of the Swedish Bikini Team.

Interestingly, none of the Vikings who were swarming around Jaira seemed to be paying any attention to her, which Roxi took as validation that blondes didn’t always have all the fun.

As the blonde left the store with two more members of the team, all sporting fuchsia Hex Appeal baseball caps with its signature witch logo, the phone rang.

“Bonjour, Hex Appeal,” she answered, tossing in a bit of her native Cajun French, which customers seemed to enjoy. “Love spells for the sexy sorceress.”

The laugh on the other end of the phone was rich and familiar. “It’s me,” Emma Broussard said.

“I know. I recognized the number on the caller I.D., but wanted to try out my new branding line. You’re the first person to hear it. So, chère, what do you think?”

“I like it better than the one you’ve been using.”

“I do, too,” Roxi agreed. “I decided this morning that more people would rather be sexy than sassy.”

The revelation had come from last night’s hot, hot dream. The one that had her waking up with her hands between her legs. And still, dammit, unsatisfied.

“How’s the creature from the deep lagoon?”

“Should I be offended that you insist on calling my unborn child a creature?”

“Hey.” Roxi shrugged and grinned. “You should’ve known you were taking a risk when you sent me that sonogram.” Her voice, and her mood, turned suddenly serious. “You and the baby are okay, aren’t you?”

“Of course. I’ve never been better. After I started drinking that ginger peach tea you sent me, my morning sickness disappeared.”

“That’s what it’s supposed to do.” Ha! She might not be a card-carrying member of a coven, but thanks to growing up with a Cajun traiteur for a grandmother, Roxi definitely knew her herbal remedies. “So, what’s up?”

“I have a favor to ask.”

“Anything.”

While they now lived a continent apart, there wasn’t anything Roxi wouldn’t do for her best friend. And she knew the feeling worked both ways. Plus, she figured she owed Emma for having let her choose her own maid of honor dress instead of sticking her in pink taffeta. Or worse yet, the southern belle, Gone with the Wind fantasy that continued to be a popular wedding theme south of the Mason-Dixon line.

“Well, actually, it’s more a favor for Gabriel.”

“Better yet. Tell me you’ve grown tired of the sexiest man alive and want me to take him off your hands.”

“Thanks for the offer, but I believe I’ll keep him a while longer,” Emma said, proving her talent for understatement.

Roxi figured Michelle Kwan would be doing triple toe loops in hell before Emma wanted out of the marriage she’d been dreaming about since seventh grade, when she’d taken to writing Mrs. Gabriel Broussard all over her notebook.

“Funny how you can grow up with someone and not realize what a selfish bitch she is,” Roxi teased. “So if you’re not ready to recycle the drop-dead sexy father of the lagoon creature, what do you need?”

“It’s about the Morganna, Mistress of the Night movie.”

“Coincidentally, I was just talking with a local witch about that yesterday afternoon.”

“Given your tone, can I deduce it wasn’t a very flattering conversation?”

Emma might not be a witch, but her intuition was usually right on the mark. Including when she’d tried to break off her engagement to the dickhead. Unfortunately, her mother had laid the guilt trip of all time on her, so Emma had caved.

Bygones, Roxi reminded herself. Besides, not only had Emma overcome the collapse of a marriage that should have been declared dead at the altar, she’d emerged from the rubble a strong, bold, kick-butt heroine who could hold her own with Xena the Warrior Princess or Lara Croft, or even Morganna, any day. And in doing so, had won herself a sexy, caring man who openly adored her.

“Let’s just say there’s a bit of local concern about Morganna’s Wiccan legitimacy.”

“Would you be surprised to hear that Gabriel agrees with those detractors?”

“Really?” A faint sound, like that made when Clarence, the angel, finally earned his wings in It’s a Wonderful Life, chimed in the back of Roxi’s mind.

“Really. He just finished reading the most recent script and is concerned the movie could come off looking like a comic book.”

“Which isn’t all that surprising, since it is a comic book,” Roxi said, conveniently forgetting her earlier correction when Martha had called it that.

“True. But what a lot of people don’t know is that The Last Pirate began as a superhero comic book type version of Jean Lafitte’s life. It was only when Gabriel insisted that Sloan Hawthorne expand the concept that it became the movie everyone saw.”

Everyone being the definitive word. Earnings for the film depiction of the Louisiana pirate’s life had topped even Depp’s Pirates of the Caribbean.

“Good for Gabe. So, what’s the favor?”

“Gabriel thought it might be a good idea to get a witch’s input on the script. And you just happen to be the only witch we know. Which is handy, because I remember you enjoying those Morganna comics.”

“Actually, they’re graphic novels, but yeah, I did enjoy them.” And, as Emma well knew, she’d devoured them like chocolate pralines. “So, what do you want me to do? Read the script—”

“Oh, absolutely, we’d appreciate that! But rather than have Gabriel pass your opinions secondhand to Sloan, which can always result in miscommunication problems, we felt perhaps you should meet with him directly.”

That niggling little chime sounded again. Louder, and a bit more insistent this time.

“I’d love to help you out, chère. Right now’s a busy tourist season and I only just hired a part-timer helper, so it may take me a couple days to arrange things, but I’ll check the flights and—”

“Oh, we wouldn’t want you to have to go to all the trouble of coming here,” Emma said quickly. Too quickly. The chime was now an alarm bell. “As it happens, he’s coming to you.”

Make that a damn siren. Like the civil defense one Paul Rigaud kept insisting on testing once a month back home in Blue Bayou.

“You’re kidding. Some wunderkind movie screenwriter is flying all the way to Savannah just to get the opinion of a woman he’s never met?”

“Sloan’s directing the film along with writing the screenplay. He’s also very hands on, which is why he’s insisted scouting out shooting locations himself. He’d originally planned to shoot in New Orleans and out in the bayou, but then he lost a lot of the sites to Katrina.”

“I can identify with that.”

“Having grown up in Savannah, he knows the city well and thought it’d provide a lot of local color.”

“It does have that,” Roxi agreed.

“I can’t wait to visit and see it all for myself. Anyway, given the lucky coincidence that you just happen to be living there, as well, Gabriel and I were hoping you’d be willing to meet with him.”

“You wouldn’t be trying to fix me up with this Hawthorne guy, would you?”

“Why would I want to do that?” Emma countered. “When we both know you’re more than capable of getting any man you want?”

It did not escape Roxi’s notice that Emma hadn’t answered her question directly.

“Even if that were true, which it isn’t, how about the fact that now that you’re so happy in your little oceanside love nest, you’ve fallen prey to the dreaded MWS disease?”

“MWS?”

“Married Women Syndrome. Being perfectly content in your gilded institution of marriage, you now want to lock up every other woman in there with you.”

“Don’t be silly.” The answering laugh was merry and bright. And, Roxi thought darkly, fake. Emma never had been able to tell a lie. “I seem to recall you telling me that you never went for a man with the entire package. That you just went out with men with a below-the-belt package.”

“Yeah, I vaguely remember saying something like that.”

She’d been lecturing about the need to separate emotions from sex. A warning that had come too late for Emma, who’d already fallen head over heart in love with Gabriel. Which had been a very good thing, given how well things had turned out.

“Well, if you truly meant it, then you definitely won’t be at all interested in Sloan. Because the man defines a complete package.”

“If he’s such a paragon of perfection, why hasn’t some woman snatched him up?”

“Perhaps because from what I’ve witnessed in the few months I’ve known him, he’s every bit as commitment-phobic as you are. Which, by the way, blows any theory about me wanting to play matchmaker between the two of you right out of the water.”

Unless, Roxi considered, she was using reverse psychology.

Which was crazy. There wasn’t anyone in the world as straightforward as Emma Quinn Broussard.

Emma pressed her case when Roxi didn’t immediately respond. “We really need your input, Roxie. Gabriel doesn’t want to back out of the project, especially since he and Sloan have a verbal agreement, and he’s always felt strongly about keeping his word, but—”

“Okay.” Roxi threw up her hands, both literally and figuratively. “When’s this full package paragon due to arrive in Savannah?”

“Tomorrow evening.” Unlike her husband, Emma Broussard was no actor. Which explained why she couldn’t quite keep the satisfaction from her tone. “He’s staying at the Swansea House,” she said, again a bit too quickly. “I told him I’d ask if you’d be willing to meet him for dinner.”

“So now you’re his social secretary?”

“No. I merely felt uncomfortable giving out your number without checking with you first,” Emma said mildly.

“I’m sorry.” Roxi blew out a breath. “It’s just been a crazed morning.” After a frustratingly restless night.

“Well then, a lovely dinner with an attractive, interesting man sounds like just what you need.”

Actually, if her reaction to that dream was any indication, what she needed was to get fucked, but since an elderly Swedish tourist was approaching the counter with a silver Viking dragon brooch in hand, Roxi kept that thought to herself.

Besides, as always, the quintessentially practical Emma had a point. The past few months, with her life in such flux, Roxi hadn’t taken time to actually relax and enjoy herself. The Swansea House boasted one of the best restaurants not just in Savannah, but in the entire Lowcountry region. An expensive dinner on someone else’s dime sounded more than a little appealing.

And if the evening ended in one of those antique four-poster beds the inn used in its advertising campaign, so much the better.