Swamp Happens: The Complete Swamp Bottom Series

by Cora Kenborn

  I opened my mouth for a comeback when Zep laid on his horn for an excessively long time, shredding my last nerve. “Why did you make me call him?”

  With Kevin nestled on her lap, Savannah laughed as she lovingly held his front hooves and forced him to tap dance to the song on the radio. “I didn’t make you do anything. With the van in the shop, you know good and well we couldn’t move everything in Daddy’s truck. Bam-Bam is already in NOLA, and besides, he’s out on the boat. Zep was the only one available who had a vehicle big enough to help us move.”

  She was right. My head knew that, but the newly minted defiant side of me wanted to fight the logical side of her. After the awkwardness between us, I didn’t want Zep’s help or his initiative in setting up an apartment for us to look at today. I especially didn’t want to acknowledge his infuriating ability to stick to our agreement to ignore each other.

  “Fine,” I growled. “But someone needs to teach him how to drive. If my desk flies out of the back of his truck bed, I’m letting Kevin shit in his apartment.”

  If I hadn’t been driving, I would’ve closed my eyes. I didn’t want to think of him. I did everything not to think of him. I worked late. I went to the gym and demolished the treadmill. I’d taken up nightly drinking with Babs. I’d even allowed Mama to set me up on an innocent blind date. The guy was cordial enough, but I might as well had been out with Bam-Bam for as much chemistry as we ignited.

  Nothing worked. I spent every night reliving his mouth on me and the rush I felt as his hands and lips fought for dominance over my body. I’d never felt so alive as when we were together, and in thirteen years, I’d forgotten what that felt like. Sex with Roland had been contractual—as if he’d been closing a deal negotiated with a couple of “I do’s” and a handshake. Once we married, I resigned myself to a life of monotony, void of fire and ferocity.

  One weak moment with Zep reminded me what drove me into Roland’s predictable arms in the first place. I’d always been the one with a level-head—the one people could count on to not be irrational or impetuous. At seventeen, Zep LeBlanc took my perfect, safe, plastic snow globe world and shook the shit out of it until there was nothing left but bubbles and disorganized fake snow.

  The perfect girl didn’t fall for the bad boy. Not in my life plan. But that was what happened. I fell for him, and then he used me and threw me away.

  Predictability and monotony seemed to be the opposite of Zep, therefore it would be the opposite of what hurt me.

  Strike two, Addie. One more and you’re out.

  A Taylor Swift song came on the radio, and Savannah rolled her eyes. “Seriously, do you listen to anything else?”

  “Shut it,” I warned pointing to my purse on the floor. “Can you answer that? I’m driving.”

  Digging far deeper than she needed to, Savannah finally pulled out my phone and spoke low into it while I strained to hear. “Addie’s phone, her personal servant and much more pleasant sister speaking.”

  She blew me a kiss as I flipped her off.

  “Oh, the next exit? So soon? Oh, okay, cool.” Grabbing a pen from my purse, she balanced the phone between her ear and her shoulder while writing on her palm. “Turn right off the exit, go three miles, and then take the first left after the stoplight. Got it.”

  “Zep?” I mouthed, anxiety roiling in my stomach.

  She waved me away with a shit-eating grin. “Her? No, she hasn’t mentioned you at all. Why would she mention you, Zep?”

  I smacked her, and Kevin snorted unhappily at me, nudging my leg with his wet snout. Laughing, she smacked me back as I swerved all over the road, cursing her name with my new-found love of the F-bomb. “Josie Gereaux. Got it. Thanks, Zep. Addie’s blowing kisses at the phone. Yeah, me too, bye.”

  I smacked her again, which resulted in various honks and hand gestures from all four sides of the car. “What the hell, Sav? I’m not blowing kisses! And who the hell is Josie Gereaux?”

  Savannah just shook her head, glancing at me with that side-eyed look of hers that told me she was about to drop some serious shit on me.

  “What?” I repeated.

  “Turn off this next exit. I’ve got directions to the house we’re looking at.” She paused, chewing on her lip before patting my fingers, now curled tightly around the steering wheel. “Put some sway in those hips, big sister and stake your claim. Josie Gereaux is the rental property manager we’re meeting.”

  “And?”

  “And she’s an old friend of Zep’s.”

  Something foreign ripped through me. Something heated and sharp.

  Jealousy.

  “Old friend, huh?” I bit out, sarcasm oozing from every pore in my body. “Well, let’s just meet this old friend, shall we?” Letting out a humorless laugh, I made a right turn so sharp Savannah let out a squeal and reached for the oh, shit handle. “This should be all kinds of fun.”

  18

  Fine Isn’t Fine

  Adelaide

  New Orleans, Louisiana

  If Josie Gereaux was an old friend, I was an Olympic pole vaulter.

  Old friend Josie had a perky rack of D cups that I was positive had paraded down a Victoria’s Secret runway at some point in their existence. With long blonde hair and bright green eyes, she looked like an All-American Barbie doll who’d been air dropped down from the heavens just to remind me that God most definitely had a sense of humor.

  “So, Adelaide? What do you think?” Josie smiled, showing off her perfectly straight teeth. As she ran her tanned hand up Zep’s bare arm, I clenched my own, causing the veins my neck to tighten and pulse around my jaw.

  I think I want you to move your hand before I twist your fingers until they pop off.

  “It’s fine,” I gritted through a fake smile.

  Savannah bowed her head beside me. “Oh shit.”

  Zep cocked his head, pinning me with a stare as if I were the most ungrateful bitch ever to grace his presence. “Fine? It’s fine? Jesus, Addie, it’s a fifteen-hundred square-foot row house right outside the French Quarter. And you can’t beat the rent.” Turning toward Josie, he gave her one of his patented side grins and winked. “Josie even got seventy-five dollars knocked off the monthly rent because we’re friends.”

  Friends.

  Judging by the google-eyes and nauseating way Josie grinned back at him, that word should be followed by “with benefits”. My stomach knotted again as a horrifying thought clouded my good sense.

  Was Josie Gereaux the reason Zep was late to my Pappy’s will reading? He was taking a “friend” home. Had it been her?

  I stole a hard glance at Josie again. She wasn’t naturally beautiful. Despite the horrid spray tan, it was obvious she’d taken great pains to perfect liquid liner cat eyes, caked on layers of pore filler, and coated her lips in plumper gloss that made her mouth look like it had just been attacked by a swarm of bees. She had to work at being perfect.

  So, how did she win over a man who seemed to value realness over store-bought beauty?

  Simple.

  Confidence.

  Josie Gereaux exuded it. She walked with a swagger of a self-assured woman who knew her worth and dangled it like a carrot in front of men drawn to self-assured go-getters.

  The complete opposite of me.

  “There’s a crack in the foundation,” I blurted out, turning away and crossing my arms over my pink T-shirt.

  But Savannah was having none of my shit and motioned around the room with an exaggerated sweep of her hand. “What crack? Addie, this place is perfect. Did you see that huge front porch? A porch, Addie!” Lifting a booted foot, she stomped it hard on the floor, causing Josie to wince. “And hardwood flooring. Hardwood, Ads. Not that shitty stained carpet I left behind. Kevin could piss on this and it’d just wipe up, no more steam cleaning.”

  “Um, Kevin? We didn’t discuss children,” Josie interjected.

  Savannah just waved her off. “No kids, it’s just my pet pig, Kevin. He’s in the car.” As Josie
opened her mouth to object, Savannah pulled me aside, lowering her voice to an irritated hiss. “Don’t blow this for us just because she’s blown him.”

  “Thanks for that.”

  “Thought you didn’t care?”

  “I don’t,” I insisted, wringing my hands at the sight of them standing together whispering. Josie now had both hands on him, and he was fucking laughing.

  Laughing.

  I was about to lose my shit, and he was cracking jokes.

  “Savannah, I can’t do this.”

  With a frown, she zeroed in on my biggest weakness. “Fresh start, Ads, remember? No Atticus, no Roland, and because you made the decision, no Zep.”

  Her words tore through me. Lowering my head, I chewed my lip and bit back tears.

  “Look,” she offered in a softer voice, squeezing my hand. “I still don’t know what happened between you two during Mardi Gras because you won’t talk to me. I can’t help you if you don't talk, and if you don't talk, then you have no right to get mad at him for having fun. Shit or get off the pot, Ads. You can’t have it both ways.”

  “I know, but—”

  “In the meantime,” she finished, cutting me off mid-sentence, “if you screw this up for me, I’ll have Kevin shit in every shoe you own and hide them until they fossilize.”

  Blowing out a breath of defeat, I raised my palms in surrender and turned toward my new landlord. I tried to remember my pedigree, the one Roland had ingrained in me for nearly a decade, but for the life of me, as I stood inside a row house in the French Quarter, all I wanted to do was throw some dentures on the floor and spit at her feet.

  It’s official. I’m turning into Babs.

  “Thank you very much, Mrs. Gereaux. We’ll take the house,” I bit out, baring my teeth and feeling my nostrils flare with every word. “It will be my pleasure to pay you every month.”

  Savannah stomped my toe.

  “Ooofff.”

  “It’s Miss Gereaux.”

  Of course, it is.

  She extended her hand. “I’ll have these papers drawn up, and you both can meet me in my office at about two o’clock to sign the agreement.”

  I stepped forward and begrudgingly shook her clammy hand. “Yeah, thanks.”

  Wrapping her body around Zep like a fucking serpent, she gave him a peck on the cheek. “Will I see you later?”

  Over my dead body.

  Zep tossed a quick glance at me then gently peeled her tentacles off his neck. “I’m not sure, Jo. How about I just give you call, all right?”

  “Sure thing.” Bouncing eyes between us, Josie smiled a little too tightly. “Well then, Adelaide, Savannah, I’ll see both of you this afternoon.”

  In a gag of Coco Chanel, Josie Gereaux floated out of the front door and left the three of us standing alone in a cloud of awkward silence. The tension was so thick you could cut it with a butter knife and serve it on top of a piece of humble pie. Which is what I should have been shoving in my face, instead of the words that came out of it.

  “Well, she was nice. We’re also hiring a secretary and a dispatcher. Will we be employing your other booty calls as well?”

  “Addie!” Savannah stomped my toe again, her mouth hanging open.

  “Ouch!” Swinging around, I stomped hers right back. “Will you stop doing that? I’m wearing Jimmy Choos, damn it!”

  Before I knew what happened, Zep grabbed me by the arm and pulled me into the kitchen. “We need to have a talk.”

  “Let me go. I have nothing to say to you,” I hissed, trying in vain to plant my feet as he dragged me across the hardwood.

  “Good,” he growled, backing me against the wall, his hold tightening on my arm. “Then shut your fucking mouth, and I’ll do all the talking for once.”

  I opened my mouth to object, but the fire shooting through his eyes gave me pause, and I quickly closed it, choosing to glare at him instead.

  “I drove to Terrebonne because you asked me to. I hauled all your shit out of your office, loaded it onto two trucks, and drove back to New Orleans because you asked me to. I found you and your sister a fucking fantastic house in the French Quarter with an absurdly low rent because you asked me to.” His light blue eyes swirled with glints of the ocean as they darkened with anger. “I did all of this for you, and you acted like a full-on bitch out there. I want to know why.”

  My lip quivered. “I don’t know.”

  His eyes widened, and he leaned back as if seeing me for the first time. “What the hell do you mean, you don’t know?”

  I jerked my arm away from him. For some reason, his touch burned with the knowledge that I’d disappointed everyone yet again. “I don’t know, Zep! I don’t know why it bothers me that you’re dating her. I have no right to have an opinion on what you do. You’re a free man. You can do what you want, but damn it, do you have to do it right in front of my face when my own life is such a train wreck?”

  I wanted to be mad. I wanted to scream at him and run away. Instead, I cried. I fucking cried, and that pissed me off more than anything.

  I let out a shuttering breath as hot tears spilled down my cheeks. Some women were naturally adorable criers. They patted their cute little noses and dabbed their eyes through delicate sniffles. I wasn’t one of those women. My nose ran and my face puffed up like I’d just had an allergic reaction to being wrong.

  It was almost comical.

  Only Zep wasn’t laughing. He wasn’t even amused. As I squeezed my eyes closed, a rough hand swept across my cheek, wiping the tears away while the other cupped my chin. “Addie, why does it bother you so much what I do? After Mardi Gras, you specifically said you wanted to keep things professional. You said anything else would be a mistake.” The pad of his thumb brushed across my top lip, and the tears fell harder. “Those were your words.”

  I couldn’t answer. I didn’t want his comfort. I didn’t deserve it.

  “Jesus, Addie, please don’t cry.” Moving closer, he swept me into his strong arms, one palm cradling the back of my head while the other rubbed my back. “I could never stand to see you cry.”

  As he held me, it finally hit me what had prompted such a violent reaction in seeing Zep and Josie together.

  I’d been blindsided by it. Just like Roland and Brandi.

  Lifting my head from his chest, I sniffled and tried to back away, but he refused to release me. “Addie…”

  I guess we’re doing this now.

  Defensiveness crept into my chest. “When Savannah and I went to Shreveport, I walked in on my husband and his new whore setting up house. And then just now…seeing you…it just struck a nerve, all right?”

  The change in Zep’s face was instantaneous. Soft and gentle understanding shifted to a hardened glare and tightened features that ticked with rage. “That fucker did what?”

  “Don’t tell me you don’t know,” I said dryly. No way had the whole parish not traded the gossip about the shame of Shreveport.

  “He cheated on you?” He asked calmly.

  Too calmly.

  “Yes?” I answered, not sure if I was giving an answer or starting a war. “He kicked me out before Pappy’s funeral and told me he was in love,” I laughed at the memory. “And trust me, it wasn’t with me.”

  “God, Addie,” he swore, shaking his head, his hand still resting on my hip. “You deserve so much more than a shitbag like that.” His eyes darkened again as he rolled the information around in his head. “If he ever shows his face in Terrebonne or New Orleans, you’d best believe we’re gonna have us a man to man talk.”

  “It’s not your fight, Zep.”

  “No,” he agreed, squeezing my waist. “But I still consider you a friend, Addie, and I don’t take kindly to my friends being disrespected.” Sighing, he wiped away a stray tear, trailing a finger down my cheek. “Besides, he’s a moron. Trust me. He’ll wake up one morning and spend the rest of his life realizing he lost the best thing he ever had.” He shook his head, his face filled with a sadness I co
uldn’t read. “Then it’ll be too late.”

  Without another word, he released me and re-joined Savannah in the living room, leaving my heart pounding and a head full of unanswered questions.

  Life was funny.

  When I was seventeen, I thought I’d found the proverbial pot of gold at the end of my own unpredictable rainbow. Of all the women in Terrebonne Parish, Zephirin LeBlanc picked me. Me. Adelaide Dubois. Nice girl. Do-gooder. Least pep on the pep squad, and voted most likely to run her own business someday.

  And then it was gone.

  I swore I’d never let anyone hurt me like that ever again. I swore I’d never speak his name again, keeping that one special moment with him sacred—frozen in time before everything went to hell. I kept it locked away in that secret place women reserved for their first love—the one they truly never got over, no matter what they told you.

  Then my life turned inside out and upside down, and in a cruel twist of fate, my moment was ripped from its safe place and put under a microscope to dissect and re-live all over again. I’d come face to face with the past. Seeing Zep with Josie left that hole open, and my heart bled with the realization that my moment had been destroyed.

  We weren’t Zep and Addie anymore. We were Zephirin and Adelaide, and more than ever, I mourned what never had a chance.

  I wanted Zephirin and Adelaide to have what Zep and Addie should’ve never lost.

  19

  Babs In The Box

  Savannah

  Terrebonne, Louisiana

  “I can’t believe this is our last night in Terrebonne.” Addie gave me a wistful smile as she sat down. "I know we haven't been back long but it feels like home."

  We were all sitting on the porch at Babs and Pappy's house, taking a break from loading the insane amount of furniture Babs insisted on giving us. Bam-Bam and Zep had come to help us pack up the last of our stuff for our big move to New Orleans. Pope had to work, but he was meeting us at the new house in the morning to help unload.