Swamp Happens: The Complete Swamp Bottom Series

by Cora Kenborn

  I nearly collided with Kat as I came around the corner on a scene that I couldn’t have imagined in my wildest dreams. Lined up and sitting against the wall in the back dressing room were my future mother-in-law, my grandmother, my and mother. Each of them wore a wedding dress more terrible than the last and passed a bottle of vodka back and forth as Pat Benatar’s “Love Is A Battlefield” played from the speaker of a nearby iPhone.

  “Oh, pretty dress!” Mama slurred, listing to the side.

  “Dah!” Babs agreed, taking another swig of vodka.

  Jacquelyn sniffled. “You look beautiful! I can’t wait for you to marry my son. He needs someone like you so he doesn’t turn into an asshole. Just remember,” she said, pointing a finger up at me. “Love is a battlefield, and you need to make sure you don’t take his shit. Otherwise, you’ll end up letting him walk all over you until you’re drunk in a dressing room stabbing a voodoo doll and hoping it’s real.”

  I had no idea how to respond to that, but thankfully, I didn’t have to. Kat sidled up next to me and slung an arm over my shoulder. “I think our families are going to get along just fine.”

  53

  Hand On The Bible

  Adelaide

  New Orleans, Louisiana

  The minute Zep and I walked through the door of Dublanc, Savannah and Bam-Bam both jumped out of their chairs, in ready to attack mode. Savannah bounced around like a sugar wasted toddler, and Bam-Bam just wore a bored stare of a confused man.

  “Well?” Crossing the room, my sister threw her arms out and groaned, acting as if we’d inflicted the worst torture possible on them. “Did you cave?”

  The past four weeks had been torture in waiting to find out the sex of the baby. Zep had been on my heels at least every third day, asking if it were time for “the” doctor’s appointment. I had to admit that the attention was cute, so I’d distracted his enthusiasm with equally enthusiastic marathon sex. Now well into my second trimester, the apparent “honeymoon” phase of pregnancy had hit, and I’d become hornier than a porn star on Viagra. Poor Zep could barely walk these days. I’d made up for lost time by jumping him in the office, at home, in his apartment, in his truck…pretty much any time I could get him alone and halfway naked. It’d gotten to the point he’d started running from me every time I got that look in my eye.

  While my sister crawled out of her skin in anticipation, my cousin sat on my desk and propped his heavy work boots up on the back of my chair, mud flaking off the heel.

  “So, am I an aunt or an uncle?” Bam-Bam quipped, calmly picking his teeth with a silver-plated letter opener.

  With Bam-Bam looking like he was inquiring about the color of my underwear, and Savannah’s expression a matter of life or death, their polar opposite demeanors sent me into an inappropriate fit of giggles. That was until my sister lost all patience with me and her face morphed into the look of a woman about to commit homicide.

  Some people were big on waiting for the surprise of finding out the sex of the baby during delivery, Zep and I weren’t among them. So much in our bizarre relationship had been one unanswered question after another, this was one thing we wanted to have control over. However, Savannah had just spent four weeks playing the role of a party planner on crack and had threatened us within an inch of our lives that we weren’t to find out.

  In fact, her words exactly were, “If you try to look for a hot dog or hamburger bun on that screen, so help me God, I’ll gauge out all four eyes and feed them to Kevin for a midnight snack.”

  Having just come from our big twenty-two-week ultrasound, honestly, neither of us cared what we were having as long as it was healthy. The minute we saw ten fingers and ten toes, I cried, and Zep almost hugged Dr. Thor. It was the closest I’d ever seen him come to not being a complete douchebag to the man. Besides, Savannah was so excited about having the gender reveal at the baby shower we just asked Dr. Thor to write down the gender on a piece of paper and seal it in an envelope.

  Not gonna lie though. I held the envelope up to the sunlight in the truck a couple of times and tried to see through it before Zep slapped it out of my hands.

  “Bam, you’re still an uncle whether the baby is a girl or boy. You know that right?” Letting go of Zep’s hand, I crossed the office and gave him a kiss on the cheek.

  His face flushed as he passed the pointed end the letter opener between us. “Hell, of course, I knew that. I was just seein’ if you two did.” I could see the wheels turning in his head as he narrowed his eyes and tilted his head again. “But seriously, y’all, which one am I?”

  Another giggle bubbled from my chest as I dropped my forehead against his shoulder. I loved the hell out of my cousin, but I had a feeling he wasn’t exactly clear on where babies came from. I’d loan him my pregnancy bible, but that’d probably leave him with more questions than answers, and I really didn’t have any desire to have “the talk” with a twenty-seven-year old man-child.

  “We’re gonna wait until the shower, Bam,” Zep answered for the both of us, his face beaming with pride.

  Tucking his nose in the crevice of my neck, Bam inhaled deeply and shrugged. “You smell fine to me right now.”

  I giggled. “Not that kind of shower, cuz. He means a baby shower. We’re going to announce it at the party Savannah is throwing us at the community center.”

  “Speaking of which…” Zep pulled the envelope he’d taken away from me out of his back pocket and passed it over to Savannah with a grin. “Don’t go tellin’ that fiancé of yours, now. Daddy gets to be the first to know.”

  “Hey!” Feigning shock, I smacked his arm. Laughing, Zep caught my wrist and pulled me close while kissing my temple.

  “Yeah, about that.” Savannah hedged, rolling her eyes at the ceiling and forcing innocence she didn’t possess.

  My stomach dropped. “What the hell did you do?”

  Savannah was the reason the phrase “looks can be deceiving” existed. Dressed in an innocent-looking navy blue romper, Savannah nervously fingered her tan flowered headband and leaned back on her desk. With her downright cherub face, one would think she wasn’t capable of intentionally causing destruction or instigate her own homicide.

  Wrong.

  Her smile faded as she took in my hardened expression. “I kind of forgot to reserve the community center.”

  Perfect day gone to shit.

  I really adored my sister. I adored her individuality, her spunk, her refusal to conform. But the pregzilla in me wanted to drive a spike through her temple until it popped out the other side. The dream baby shower she’d promised me, the one that was supposed to happen in less than four hours, had no venue because, as usual, my sister was a fucking fruit cake.

  This can’t be happening.

  In a daze, I lunged for her, moving across the room like an unstable Weeble-Wobble. Moments before I closed my swollen hands around her scrawny neck, Zep wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me back kicking and screaming.

  “What the hell, Sav? You had one job! My kid is gonna be naked now with no diapers. No diapers, Savannah—just bare-assed and shitting in a paper towel. Are you happy, now?” It wasn’t her fault. I was completely out of control, but my hormones didn’t give a fuck. They assured my brain that my high-pitched rant made perfect sense to everyone, and not just tone deaf dolphin.

  “I’ve got it covered,” she swore, holding her hands up and backing away. “I called around, and we’ve already moved everyone to another location.”

  “Where?”

  “Uh, Kiki’s?” she said, her voice rising in a slight question at the end.

  If panic could break a woman’s water, I’d swear mine was about to burst open in a flood of retaliation. “You mean Zep’s mom’s bar?” I growled, fire shooting from my eyes as I bit out each word.

  “Yes?” Another question hung in her voice as if she were half afraid of my response and ready to run upon hearing it.

  “You want me to announce the sex of my baby at some see
dy bar? Have you gone completely insane?”

  “Mom’s bar isn’t seedy,” Zep broke in, interrupting my plans to murder my own flesh and blood. “Come on, Addie, it’s not the end of the world.” He handed me the lemonade he’d been drinking, nodded for me to take a sip. I hated lemonade. It tasted like bitter asshole, but at the moment, I needed to fill my mouth before more shit came spilling out. Taking a sip, I glared and forced a swallow.

  “Hell yeah!” Sliding off my desk, Bam-Bam clapped his big hands together then pumped them in the air like he’d just been invited to a kegger. “Now that’s the kind of party I’m talkin’ ‘bout! Will the strippers get there before we take a shower?”

  I wasn’t the vindictive, spiteful type. A little neurotic, okay, a lot neurotic, but for the most part, I took my family in stride and laughed them off after eating a roll of antacids. However, pregnancy had made me demonic, and Savannah’s screw-up and Bam’s expectation of tassels and thongs had me ready to blow while holding the letter opener like a sword.

  Thankfully, before I could black out and stab everyone in the room, Zep took control, flinging open the front door and ushering them both outside. I halfway noticed him handing Savannah something out of the corner of my eye while giving her a knowing look I didn’t quite understand.

  “Sounds great you guys. Just text me the time, and I’ll make sure we’re there.” He paused, tossing me a raised eyebrow, “And that we’re sane.”

  Savannah winked at him, and without another word, my sister and cousin took off to their cars like their asses were on fire, not once looking back. I couldn’t blame them. I held the letter opener like I was about to reenact the shower scene from Psycho. I hated myself for the raging crazy person I’d become, but I had no control over it.

  Were all pregnant women like this, or was I just a special brand of lunatic? Did this mean our baby would be insane too?

  Oh God, am I going to raise an evil child?

  I couldn’t help it. My unstable emotions flipped, and the heated anger melted into inconsolable fear, causing the letter opener I held in the air to fall from my hands and clatter to the floor. My palms pressed against my eyes, smearing my eyeliner as I dissolved into hysterical tears.

  Instantly, the smell of sea salt surrounded me. Strong arms pulled me against a hard chest, and rough hands rubbed my back. “Hey, what’s going on here? It’s really not that bad. Mom’s bar isn’t ideal, but it’s not the end of the world.”

  “It’s not the bar,” I wailed, pressing my face into his crisp black button-up shirt. His rock-hard chest felt so safe, and I collapsed against him. How in fuck’s sake would I break the news to him that I was giving birth to the spawn of Satan?

  “Then, what is it?”

  I rubbed a line of snot across his shoulder. “Our kid is going be a homicidal maniac.”

  “I’m sorry, what?”

  “I’m a basket case, Zep. That can’t be good for the baby. The bible says everything I do crosses the placenta. Crazy breeds crazy, right? Oh God,” I cried, throwing my head back dramatically. “Our kid’s gonna be on America’s Most Wanted for chopping people up and putting them in freezers like human cube steak!”

  I was so busy planning the future incarceration of our child that I didn’t notice him slowly backing me up until my ass bumped against my desk. A low rumble of laughter fell from his chest as he enveloped my face in his huge hands and tilted it upward.

  “Let’s get through kindergarten before we condemn the poor kid to twenty to life, okay, baby? Besides, I think there’s enough LeBlanc blood in there to combat the felon DNA inherited from Babs.”

  A smile broke across my face, and I leaned in, his dark beard tickling my cheek. For as quickly as we could instigate a fight, Zep also knew how to diffuse my crazy just as easily. Collapsing against the desk, I allowed him to lift the back of my legs and settle me right on the top of the glass-topped wood.

  During the work week, Zep sported his usual boat wear, a worn DuBlanc T-shirt and tan cargo shorts, his hair a mess and smelling of a hard day’s work. However, today, since he’d taken the afternoon off to accompany me to the doctor, we’d both dressed nervously and meticulously in anticipation of one of the biggest moments of our lives. My stomach did a flip-flop as I trailed a gaze down his chest-hugging black button-up shirt and tight-fitting black jeans. His polished black boots completed the ensemble, making him look like a tattooed, bearded, and very dangerous Johnny Cash.

  It’s a good thing there was already a baby inside me because the look in his eyes alone would put one there.

  For me, there was only one choice in my closet, and it called to me the moment I saw it on the hanger. The fitted top resembled a stretchy black t-shirt, which worked since my boobs looked like two prizewinning watermelons at the county fair. The flared skirt began at the top of my rib cage and flared out in a swirl of baby pink chiffon. A horizontal lavender stripe wrapped around my middle, showing off my prominent baby bump. I paired it with my mama’s best pearls and black ballet flats.

  Was I hoping to influence fate a little?

  Maybe.

  It couldn’t hurt.

  Zep looked put together, handsome, yet with the edge of danger that always set my heart pounding. Tucking my nose into his neck, I inhaled and sighed. He smelled so good, and I felt like such shit that I wanted to crawl inside him and cocoon myself for the next few months, blocking out the world.

  Actually, screw that. I wanted him to crawl inside me.

  “Zep, we have a little time,” I hinted, my voice heavy as I reached for his belt.

  “Now? Are you serious, Addie?” Tipping his head back, he glanced at the clock above the door and back to my knowing smile.

  “Come on, no one is here,” I coaxed, drawing a leg up to his hip, my dress slipping up my thigh. “Why? Are you scared?”

  Men were so easy. In the short time it took for Zep’s eyes to dart from the bare skin of my thigh and back to my face, he’d batted my hand away and tore his belt off, undoing the button and pulling the zipper down. I reclined back on my elbows, my heart pacing a wicked beat at the way the baby blue in his eyes darkened to an indecent indigo.

  “Dubois, you have no fucking idea what the hell you do to me.” Slipping a hand underneath my skirt, he wrapped his fingers around my panties and pulled them down my legs. With a tortured groan, he balanced over me, making sure to brace his weight on his hands. The moment he grabbed the base of his shaft and traced it up and down my entrance in teasing strokes, I lost my mind.

  “Zep!” I begged breathlessly.

  That cocky smirk that drove me insane stretched across his face as he positioned himself for what I knew would be explosive sex. Exhaling heavily, he licked his lips just before shifting his hips and thrusting the thick head of his cock inside.

  Then he froze.

  I popped my head up and stared into his widened and horrified eyes. “What’s wrong?”

  “I, uh…” he stammered, swallowing hard. “It’s just, after seeing the baby… It has a face, Addie—ears, a nose, eyes that could be blinded. I can’t… I mean, do you think it’s possible to give it brain damage?”

  You’ve got to be kidding me.

  I laughed at first, and then it hit me. Jesus, was he right? The baby was the size of a coconut. I never considered the possibility, but was it big enough to feel Zep’s dick? Could he actually poke the baby in the head? The pregnancy bible said babies’ skulls have soft spots. What if we had sex, and he hit the baby and knocked it stupid?

  Oh God, what if me being horny made my baby dumb?

  My hand flew to my mouth. “Oh shit!”

  “Didn’t you ask the doctor about this?”

  Rolling my eyes, I shoved my hand in front of his face and moved my fingers inches apart. “Oh, sure. ‘Hey doc, while you have your face in my vagina, could you tell me if this would be big enough to bounce the baby around like a cue ball?’”

  “This big? Are you kidding me?” Apparently, I wounded
his fragile male ego, because Zep grabbed my fingers and jerked them about seven additional inches apart. “My shit’s at least this big, and you know it.”

  Seriously? This was what everything had come to? Our baby was about to have brain damage because I was a whore, and Zep had a dick complex?

  “What do we do?” Zep whispered in my ear, his cock still hard as stone inside me.

  I only had one solution. “Get the bible.”

  “Addie, we’ve fucked like rabbits for the last month. I’m pretty sure everything we’ve done up until now has gone against the Bible.”

  I slapped his chest. “Not that bible! This one.” Toeing the drawer of my desk, I dragged it open to reveal my revered pregnancy bible.

  “Do you have one of these everywhere?”

  “Are you really going to judge me while your dick is shoved inside me?” I snapped.

  Pursing his lips, Zep, grabbed the book, his tattooed hands thumbing through the pages. “Where do I look?”

  “Find the chapter on sex during late pregnancy. Just make sure it’s safe.”

  If anyone had walked in, the scene would either be the makings of a sitcom or a fetish porno. Zep was buried balls deep inside me, both of us bent over my desk with my dress hiked up around my waist and his pants around his ankles. The whole scenario was a lot more Savvy than me, and if I stopped to think about it, I’d probably kick my own ass over it. However, I was too impatient and way too horny to care.

  “Well?” I asked, tapping his lower back with my heel.

  Scanning the page, he finally tossed the book behind him and entwined our hands, pinning them beside my head. “It says the baby can’t feel a damn thing,” he said, burying his beard in the hollow of my neck. “But you? Oh, baby, you’re a totally different story.”

  “Maybe this was a bad idea.” I panted, hating every word. “It’s getting late. We should just go to the bar shower.”