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“I already applied to see if my credits would transfer. They do. I just need to sign the paperwork and it would be done.”
“I mean… I could go to Oklahoma-“
I laughed. “There’s a shortage of jazz clubs in Oklahoma, Tyler. No. New Orleans works best for both of us.”
“Fuck,” he breathed. “Is this… I mean are we really thinking about this?”
“We really are.”
We were twenty years old. Well, he was twenty-one. And maybe we were too young. Maybe it was a mistake, but it just felt so right. He felt right. And the future I wanted I saw with him in it.
“I’ll call you later,” I said and with one more kiss slipped out the front door. I felt him watching me as I ran to my car. Nearly midnight. Crap.
Dad was going to be pissed.
TYLER
The night felt like honey. Thick and sweet. A little sticky. Or maybe that was just me. I watched Juliette drive away and then went back inside to the kitchen. Between the club and Juliette, I was worn out in the best possible way. Like I’d spent hours working up a sweat doing the good work I was supposed to be doing. Music and Juliette. I mean, could anything be more perfect?
It would help if her Dad liked me. But The Notorious O’Neills and the Bonne Terre Chief of Police were natural enemies. My father was a con man and my mom was a thief. I won most of my money in illegal card games in the catholic church basement and had, before Juliette came home from college a grown-ass woman, taken some pride in being a thorn in Jasper Tremblant’s side.
The fridge opened with a pop and a sigh and I pulled out a bottle of ice cold Abita.
And now I was fucking his daughter. Loving her. And thinking about moving in with her. I mean…the guy was going to hate it. And the law school thing, if Juliette was really thinking about giving it up, that seemed like bad news. But if Juliette had faith we could figure it out, so would I.
There was a knock at the door and I ran back through the hallway to open it before Juliette woke up Margot or Savannah.
“Hey, you forget your key?” I asked, pulling up the door.
But it wasn’t Juliette standing there. It was Officer Owens – not a fan of mine, as much as I wasn’t a fan of his.
And next to him was Jasper Tremblant.
“Is there a problem?” I asked, feeling something cold snake through my body.
“Son, come on out a minute, would you?” Jasper said.
See, my gut said don’t do it. But this was Juliette’s father and if things were going to be different between us didn’t I need to help that happen? Didn’t I need to trust that him showing up on my door in the middle of the night wasn’t a bad thing?
So, I stepped out of the doorway and onto the old wooden porch. “What can I-“
Owen’s right hook knocked me sideways and his fist in my stomach pushed all the air from my body. Gasping, I fell to my knees.
Jasper crouched down beside me, his knees creaking as he did it. He wasn’t a young man and rumor was his health wasn’t great. That’s why he brought Owens to do the dirty work.
“Let me tell you how this is going to go, son.”
“Stop. Fucking. Calling. Me. Son.”
I wasn’t anyone’s son.
He stood up and I got Owen’s boot across my chin. I lay, spitting blood, trying to get my breath and wondering why I’d ever allowed myself to believe this was going to end any other way.
“You ready to listen?” Chief Tremblant asked.
“Fuck you.”
“You god damn O’Neills, never know when to quit, do you?”
He stepped aside and Owens stepped in with glee on his face.
Yeah, I thought. This seemed about right.
This is what you get for dreaming.
2
Ten Years Later
TYLER
I was welcomed back to Bonne Terre the same way I’d been kicked out of it.
With a fist in the face.
“I never did like you,” Lou Brandt whispered in my ear while I spit blood into the dirt outside of St. Pat’s church. “Or your family.”
I rolled over and grinned, wincing slightly when my lip split and hot copper blood flooded my mouth. “I’ve always liked you, Lou,” I wheezed. “And your wife.”
Lou reared back, his steel-toed work boot poised for another conversation with my rib cage, but Gaetan Bourdage got a thick arm around Lou’s barrel chest. “Come on, now, Lou,” he said. Lou strained against Gaetan’s arm, his big fat head turning red and purple.
“You’re trash,” Lou snarled. “You think winning all that money changes things?”
“No, actually,” I said, checking to make sure I still had my back teeth. “It just makes me rich trash.”
“You’re a fucking cheat!” Lou cried.
