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LUKE
BOOK ONE OF THE CALLAHAN BROTHERS TRILOGY
An Excerpt
Maddie Kincaid was in trouble. Again.
Trouble caused by a man. Again.
Maybe she should reconsider the convent idea after all.
"There's the sign, Oscar," she said to the fat goldfish swimming in the clear glass fishbowl belted into the minivan's passenger seat to her right. "The Caddo Bayou Marina. We made it."
The goldfish didn't answer, although the way her world had changed in the last twenty-four hours, Maddie wouldn't have been surprised if Oscar had leapt from the water and belted out "The Yellow Rose of Texas."
Approaching the marina entrance, Maddie gently applied the brakes and flicked her left-turn indicator. Since beginning this long, meandering trip to southwestern Louisiana fourteen hours ago, she'd taken extra care to obey all traffic laws.
It wouldn't do to get pulled over by the highway patrol, not when she had four million dollars' worth of an illegal substance stacked between her dry cleaning and a new sponge mop.
Gravel crunched beneath the minivan's tires as she drove across the lot and claimed a spot between a Dodge pickup and a Chevy Suburban. After shifting into park, she took a deep, calming breath and twisted the ignition key. The engine sputtered and then died. In the sudden quiet, Maddie let out a soft, semi-hysterical laugh.Better it than me.
She sat without moving for a full minute. Her mouth was dry, her pulse rapid. She needed to use the facilities. "Okay," she murmured. "We made it. We handled the crisis. Got here in one piece. We did good. Now we'll have help."
Help. From the DEA. "I must be out of my ever-lovin' mind."
Maddie opened her car door and stepped outside. The summer morning air was hot, heavy, and thick with moisture. She glanced toward the boat slips, then back at the marina's ship store and restaurant. "I'll be right back," she said to Oscar as she grabbed her purse before shutting the door. Then, noting the heat and imagining boiled goldfish, she reconsidered. Moments later, fishbowl cradled in one arm, purse hanging from the other, she headed for the store and its bathroom.
As she walked toward the building, movement at the gas dock out on the water caught her notice. Three pontoon boats filled with people dressed in swim trunks and brightly colored clothing motored slowly away from the dock.Must be one of the swamp tours she'd seen advertised on a billboard on the way in, Maddie surmised. Her gaze drifted over the crowd before it snagged on the man standing at the stern of the trailing boat as he stripped off a sweat-stained T-shirt and tossed it away. He lifted his arm above his head to take a minnow bucket off a hook, and Maddie sucked in a breath.
My, oh my, oh my.
She may be tired, scared, hungry, thirsty, and ready to wet her pants, but abs like those deserved a second look—even if she had sworn off studly men forever.
He wore a battered straw cowboy hat, low-riding Hawaiian-print swim trunks, and grungy deck shoes. Sunglasses hung from a cord around his neck, and a sheen of sweat glistened on hisdeeply tanned skin. His body looked lean and hard, with long legs and shoulders as broad as the Mississippi.
Yum
Her appreciative gaze lingered until a good look at his face made her forget about his form. Even from a distance, she could see devastation etched in his expression. Empathy melted through her. Poor man. She wondered what had happened to him.
Then, as if he tangibly felt her gaze, he jerked his stare away from the minnow bucket dangling from his hand and met her gaze head-on. His eyes narrowed, his jaw hardened. He straightened, squared his shoulders, and widened his stance, his aggressive posture a challenge to her for catching him in a private moment.
Whoa.Maddie gave a tentative smile and took a step back.In another moment, he'd be baring his teeth like a wolf, she thought.
A wolf in low-riding swim trunks.
"Oh, for crying out loud," she muttered, deliberately turning away, shifting the fishbowl from one arm to the other. What was wrong with her, ogling a bayou boy when she should be looking over her shoulder for drug-dealing killers? Had she totally lost her mind?
Yes, she was afraid so. This was what an overload of stress and lack of sleep did to a girl.
Dismissing the party barges, Maddie redirected her attention toward the ship store. The place appeared deserted. In fact, other than the pontoon boats now disappearing from view, the only signs of life around the entire marina were a pair of big black grackles pecking at the ground near a lidded metal Dumpster.
Cautious in ways she'd never been before, Maddie slowed her steps and took a second look around.
On the murky water of the bayou, dozens of boats floated beneath the shelter of covered docks. Both the gas pump on the water and the one near the cement launch ramp remained unmanned. She spied an open tackle box and two fishing poles propped against a silver propane tank, but the fishermen themselves were nowhere to be found.
Curious. On a Saturday morning, she'd expect the marina to be bustling, especially on a warm, windless day. Apprehensive now, Maddie advanced toward the ship store's door.
A handwritten sign was taped to the glass at eye level. "Closed for funeral," she read aloud. "Reopen at 1:00 p.m."
