she said. “That could be. Sorry I bothered you. Joe and Ellie won’t be back from Italy for weeks, anyway. Forget it. It’s no big deal.” Except that she felt she could choke, and wished her brother and his wife weren’t so far away.
Yes, it was a big deal. He could feel that it, whatever it was, could be a very big deal. “I’ve got a clumsy mouth, you know that? When it comes to your old man, I’d gladly help Joe feed him to a gator.”
The suspicious sheen on her light hazel eyes turned his stomach. If she cried, he was a goner.
“I want to hear what you came to say and you aren’t leavin’ till you tell me,” he said in a hurry.
Jilly met those black eyes of his and he made a valiant attempt to give her a reassuring smile. “Okay,” she said. “No, it isn’t okay. It’s going to sound stupid. Forget it.”
He put his mouth by her ear. “Listen to me carefully. You and I will stand right here until you come clean.” He was starting to get a really nasty feeling that this could chew up some time and prayed Nat would take longer than expected to arrive.
“You know there’s a live-in staff at Edwards Place?” she said.
“Only because you told me. I haven’t been invited to tea yet.”
She looked at him sideways. “There’s a new man who came from New Orleans a couple of days ago. I think he’s a bodyguard.”
He didn’t know how he felt about that—if he felt anything at all. “Edith and that woman who came with her are pretty much alone. Could be they feel safer with a man watching out for them.”
“When this one arrived—he came in on the chop-per—I think Edith was as surprised as I was. That he was there, I mean. She knew him, even though they didn’t say much to each other. He just went to a room as if he knew it was going to be there, and moved in.” There was no reason to mention that Edith’s daughter-in-law, Laura Preston, threw a tantrum at the sight of the man.
“Mr. Preston flew in, too,” Jilly went on. “I was glad to meet him finally.”
“Is that right?” All of Guy’s nightmares were coming true. The so-called happy family wanted to draw Jilly in, to change her.
“Yes. He’s a nice man. He couldn’t have been kinder to me. He said he hoped I’d let him think of me as the daughter he never had.”
“Did he?” Guy had turned ice cold. Goose bumps shot up his arms. “Is he staying at the house now?”
“He had to go back to New Orleans, but he said he’ll be spending a lot of time here. I can’t get used to the idea of someone having a helicopter pad in their garden.” She held out her left arm to show him a thick gold bracelet with a diamond clasp. “I feel funny about it, but he gave me this. He gave one each to Edith and Laura, too.”
Guy felt his nostrils flare. Every alarm bell went off. What could this guy possibly want from Jilly?
“Very nice,” he said. “But the bodyguard stayed?”
“Yes. Daddy Preston went back alone.”
Had he misheard her? “What did you call him?”
She reddened. “That’s what everyone calls him. At least, Edith and Laura do.”
“So you call him what? Daddy?”
“No. I wouldn’t be comfortable—even though he did ask me to. I call him Mr. Preston.”
If he had the right, he’d tell Jilly to stay away from that place. He didn’t have the right and wasn’t likely to. “You were talking about the new bodyguard. Did he seem threatening to you?”
“No-o. Not at first.”
He gripped both of her arms. “Explain that.”
“I think I was followed back to my place last night. It was getting dark but when I got out of my car in the driveway, a car drove by slowly.”
“And you believe this was the same man who just moved into Edwards Place?”
She hadn’t been able to see his face, just that he was big. “I don’t think so. But the car had those black windows.”
If he showed any sign of the sudden panic he felt, she’d be terrified. “That doesn’t mean it had anything to do with you, then.”
“When I was inside, I went upstairs and looked out of a window. A man was standing close to a tree at the corner, watching my house. I could have missed him if he hadn’t drawn on a cigarette.”
Guy set his back teeth. “He didn’t have to be looking at your house—and he didn’t have to have come from the car you saw being driven past.”
“No. Except I just knew he was looking at my place and I could see the back of the car around the corner.”
Guy put his hands on his hips and expanded his lungs. He felt an artificial calm in the air as if the world was about to split wide open and nothing but filth would pour out.
He wanted Edith Preston, and anyone remotely attached to her, out of Toussaint, preferably yesterday.
“You were right in the first place,” Jilly said. “I’m over-reacting. I need to head back into town.”
And without a word of reassurance from me, ass that I am. “I’ll walk you to your car. Good-lookin’ mutt running loose up there. I’ll call the pound.”
Jilly stopped so suddenly, he’d taken two steps before he halted and looked at her. “What is it?”
“You call the pound on that dog and I’ll never speak to you again.”
Shee-it. “It’s lost, Jilly. Kindest thing to do—”
“Is have it picked up and gassed? Oh, no, sir, not that sweet-natured pooch. Look at that trusting face. He’s just what you need to take your mind off yourself now and then.”
Guy felt a bit wild. “I need that trampy dog?”
“You surely do, Mr. Gautreaux.” She clapped her hands at the hound. “Here, boy. Here, boy. Come and meet Guy.”
“Damn it, Jilly, don’t do that. I can’t have a dog.”
“Sure you can. What else do you have in that miserable shotgun house of yours? Not furniture, that’s for sure.”
“I like—whoa.” The dog arrived, bypassed Jilly as if he’d never seen her, now or before, and landed against Guy’s middle. His long tongue lolled out of his mouth, he slobbered, and looked for all the world like he was grinning.
Guy patted the dog’s head and said, “Down, boy,” which the critter did. He sat beside the man as if he was giving an obedience demonstration.
“Look at that, he—”
“Never mind the dog. I’ll see he’s taken care of. Let’s go sit at a picnic table. I want you to tell me what you really need from me. And you can kick me if I put my foot in my mouth.”
She blinked. He was trying to reach out to her. Jilly couldn’t find the words she really wanted to say. “The first thing you need to do when you adopt a dog is to get him looked at by a vet. He’ll need all of his shots, and—”
Guy’s pinched-up expression stopped Jilly. “I said, forget the dog.” He took off toward the back lawn.
Jilly followed him. She surreptitiously patted her thigh and the big pup gamboled past her to lope along at Guy’s heel. Guy walked easily, his big shoulders and arms swinging.
“I’ll get us a cold drink,” Guy called back.
Something about him suggested he was in a hurry. “Not for me, thanks,” Jilly said, although her mouth felt like sandpaper.
They