Under the Cajun Moon Read Free Page B

even then I had hoped I would never be in a position to actually prove it.
    Yet there I was ten years later, and the first thing my mother was asking of me was the last thing on earth I wanted to do.
    “What if Dad doesn’t make it? Can’t this wait?”
    “No, it can’t. Please, Chloe, just do this one thing and then you can come.”
    She rattled out my instructions. I was to go straight to Ledet’s, our family restaurant in the French Quarter, where I was to meet up with their lawyer and sign some business contracts he and my father had been working on.
    “Dad’s not selling the restaurant, is he?”
    “Goodness, no. He’s buying something. Some property. The lawyer knows what it’s all about. You just have to sign the paperwork.”
    Incredible
, I thought as the knot in my gut slowly began to shift upward toward my heart. My father was practically at death’s door, yet even in his last, desperate moments it was more important for him to know that a business matter was handled than to see his daughter’s face one last time and tell her all of the things he had never been able to say before.
    Things like
I love you
,
Chloe
, and
I’m sorry
,
Chloe
.
    Now, sitting on the couch in the hotel room and thinking of my father, I tried to remember if I had ever made it to the hospital last night. Somehow, I just knew that I had not. Frantic, I looked up at the policeman who was standing watch and asked him if he knew anything about Julian Ledet.
    “Julian Ledet, the chef? Yeah, I heard he got shot yesterday.”
    “Do you know if he’s still alive?”
    “Why do you want to know?”
    “Because I’m his daughter. I came to town so I could be with him at the hospital. They weren’t sure if he would make it through the night.”
    “Far as I know, he’s still alive,” the cop replied, eyeing me strangely. “At least I haven’t heard otherwise.”
    We were interrupted by the appearance of a man wearing a brown suit the same shade as his bowl-cut hair. Speaking with a downtown “N’Awlins” accent, he introduced himself as Detective Walters, though it came out sounding more like “Wahtus.”
    He sat down on the chair to my left, looking as though he was ready for a nice long chat. It wasn’t until that moment that I began to grasp the gravity of my situation. My father’s life was hanging in the balance at the hospital, but instead of being there with him I had woken up this morning in a strange hotel room, one with a dead man on the couch.
    Now I could only hope that the detective had come to give me an explanation, because I sure didn’t have one for him.

THREE
    F RANCE, 1719
J ACQUES
    It was time for the final beating.
    Jacques reached for the flat sheet of gold and placed it on the work surface in front of him, thrilled that after an entire month of casting, rolling, and beating, casting, rolling, and beating, over and over and over, this incredibly long and boring and tedious job was finally almost finished. That simple thought filled Jacques’ mind with a joy and relief so great he felt like shouting. Given that his presence was supposed to be a secret, though, Jacques knew he could do no such thing—nor even speak very loudly, for that matter, lest the farmer who labored in the surrounding fields hear. He kept silent but was unable to conceal a grin as he worked.
    “You’re looking mighty pleased with yourself,” Papa said softly from accross the room, pausing to sit up straight, wiggle his shoulders, and move his head from side to side in a stretching motion. Goldsmithing was hard on the back and neck.
    Jacques gestured toward the rack against the wall, its shelves bending from the weight of one hundred and ninety-five brass fleur-de-lis statuettes covered in gold leaf. Just five more and they would be finished!
    “I’m smiling because this tedious commission is finally drawing to a close. Oh, how I long to get out of this stuffy workshop and breathe somefresh air! Then it’s out of isolation