The NOLA Heart Novels (Complete Series)

by Maria Luis

  In a single glance, she gathered that this man, however light his grasp was on her arm, was not a soft man. Not a gentle man.

  Not the sort of man Anna should ever consider dating.

  Tell that to your knees, darling.

  His cool gaze found her mouth, hovered, before lifting again. “You good?”

  No. No, she was not good.

  She felt . . . Well, she didn’t know what she felt exactly. Lust, maybe. It’d been so long that she’d felt anything of the sort that the sensation was as foreign to her as the large hand cupping her upper arm.

  “Ma’am?” he asked, that smoky baritone of his peppered with blatant annoyance. “I’m going to count to three, and if you don’t answer—”

  “I’m good!” Anna exclaimed, desperately hoping that her center of calm and overall badassery returned sometime in the next half-century. She stepped back, out of his grip, only to find that her back slammed up against the shelves and jostled the jars.

  Crash!

  “Jesus,” he grunted, wrapping a hand around her arm again.

  He tugged her to the left, away from the shattered glass, but Anna (in addition to being a horrible cook) wasn’t the best dance partner in the world and she moved to the right. Her shoulder powered into his chest, the abrupt contact sending him back on his heels and into a display of wicker baskets filled with tea bags.

  Crash! Crash!

  Anna watched in horror as he went down like a felled log. The display buckled under his weight.

  And the string of expletives he let loose should have been outlawed in all of the Lower 48, amended, and then outlawed all over again.

  “Oh, my God.” Her purse landed on the ground with an audible thump as she bent to help him. “I am so sorry.”

  The toe of her boot connected with his thigh, and she stood corrected. His fluidity with vulgarity should have been outlawed in Alaska and Hawaii, too.

  “How can I help?” Her hands fluttered around his shoulders, finding purchase on the hard balls of muscle before just as quickly letting go. Anna had raised a son all on her own. She’d dealt with the wriggly digging for worm stages and the weekly visits to the doctor for sprained ankles, but she had never toppled over a grown man.

  To be fair, you haven’t really had a man. Not except for him, and he who-shall-not-be-named didn’t count.

  Well, there was that.

  Between gritted teeth, Mr. Green Eyes muttered, “Cane.”

  Anna didn’t ask questions. Her gaze landed on the cane in question and she picked it up by the rubber grip. Acute embarrassment slid through her the minute she caught a glimpse of his face.

  He looked ready to murder her.

  She didn’t blame him.

  “I really am sorry,” she said, passing over the cane and stepping back. “I didn’t mean to”—she waved her hand at the broken wicker baskets—“wreck everything in sight.”

  All she’d wanted was the secret essential oil that her customer had claimed men found irresistible on a woman. Despite her tendencies to talk business at all the inappropriate times, Anna was a romantic at heart.

  She’d wanted to believe that love could be as easy as a blend of specific oils.

  Instead she’d crippled a hot guy and made an utter fool of herself.

  Reason number 3,578 that single is a good look on you.

  Anna swallowed past the lump in her throat. He still hadn’t straightened from his makeshift nest of tea bags, crumpled wicker baskets, and the growing scent of patchouli.

  “Can I help?”

  The hard look he gave her spoke volumes. Anna hid her red face by bending to grab her purse off the ground. Looking like a tomato was the curse of being a natural blonde. She’d only had thirty-two years to acquaint herself with that irrefutable truth.

  “Okay,” she said slowly, “money.” She dug into her purse to rifle around for her wallet. “How much are you thinking? One hundred? Two?”

  “Don’t worry about it,” he told her, planting the end of the cane on the ground. Anna almost offered to help, but she recognized the same stubbornness in him that ran through her blood. He didn’t want her help. And he definitely didn’t want her pity.

  Curiosity, always the cat killer, spiked as she clutched her wallet in both hands to resist from reaching out to touch him.

  “I really am sorry.”

  “I know.”

  “Are you sure that I can’t—”

  “Ma’am,” he barked sharply like a drill sergeant, “you’re hovering.”

  Julian only accused her of that, oh, every other day. “I want to help.”

  “You’ve said.” Twisting his big body onto all fours, he dragged the cane beneath him for leverage. Sweat beaded his brow and a grimace flattened the lines of his full mouth as he came to his feet. He drew in a heavy, shuttered breath. “You find everything you were looking for?”

  Before Anna had the chance to respond, her cell phone began to vibrate in her purse. “Oh, crap,” she whispered as she stared at Julian’s name flashing across the screen. She was late. Again. Her gaze flicked up to the man’s stoic features, and she blurted, “I have to go.”

  He didn’t even bother to hide his relief.

  He pointedly swung his gaze toward the front door, then turned back to her. “Come visit us again soon,” he murmured, not at all sounding like he meant it.

  Anna couldn’t help herself. She folded her arms over her chest and said, “How much did it pain you to say that?”

  “Honestly?”

  She nodded.

  “I’m about two minutes away from throwing you out of here.”

  Anna paused to digest the insult. It was a good one. It really, really was. But she could do better.

  Still holding her wallet in her hand, she unzipped it and pulled out a couple of twenties she kept in there for emergency situations.

  In her book, “emergency situations” constituted everything from Ben & Jerry runs to buying new socks for Julian when his toes began playing hide-and-seek.

  “I already told you the money isn’t necessary,” Mr. Green Eyes said with a stern set to his mouth.

  Anna folded the bills in half, and then folded them in half again. She looked up, their gazes clashing as she boldly stuffed the money into the front pocket of his jeans. “Consider it a thank-you for allowing me to let myself out. I’m more than capable of doing so without you going all caveman on me.”

  And then she did just that.

  And, somehow, she found the strength to not look back at the hottest guy she could remember meeting in years.

  3

  By the time Anna pulled her car into the school parking lot across town, she’d come to a single conclusion:

  Like many women out there, she suffered from Mr. Darcy Syndrome. Thanks to Hollywood and Matthew MacFayden (Anna was a lone wolf and preferred 2005 Pride & Prejudice), it was the strong, silent, and sexy types that revved her engine.

  Not that her engine had been revved in a while.

  But considering that her first dabbling into dating a modern-day Mr. Darcy had resulted in Julian and no father to share her baby boy’s first steps or the first diaper change, Anna figured she’d learned her lesson.

  The fact that her knees were still wobbly from the encounter at Herbal Heaven proved her wrong.

  Anna groaned. She needed to put Mr. Green Eyes behind her for good and focus on meeting a nice guy who wanted to be a part of her son’s life. A nice guy who maybe wore glasses and didn’t spend all day with his butt on the sofa watching ESPN.

  Number one priority: her ideal match was a guy without a hidden past.

  Been there, done that, bought the T-shirt for a lifelong reminder of her bad decisions.

  Really, she didn’t feel as though she were asking for too much.

  She caught sight of Julian’s lanky form standing by the school’s chain-link fence, and Anna pulled the car up alongside him. The passenger side door cranked open, and his body collapsed on the leath
er seat, his knees bending like chicken wings up against his chest.

  Jules fumbled for the seat adjuster and sent the seat cranking back. With a scowl, he muttered, “Shaelyn does this on purpose, doesn’t she?”

  Anna directed the car out of the lot. “Only out of love, Jules.”

  When Shaelyn had moved back to New Orleans a year ago, she and Anna might as well have been strangers. Anna was a year older, which felt like no time at all today. But, while growing up, that year had been an impenetrable gap. Anna was partly to blame. Back then, she’d been too focused on friends, cheerleading, and new boyfriends to give too much thought to her short, bubbly cousin trailing behind her. It hadn’t helped that Anna and Shaelyn had gone to different schools all their lives.

  And now—well, now Shaelyn was part owner of Anna’s prized boutique and the two cousins had never been closer. The same went for Jules, who adored Shaelyn and her boyfriend, Brady, to pieces.

  Sometimes, Anna couldn’t help but wonder if he preferred them to her, his own mother. On those rare days when she let herself be sucked down by regret and guilt, it was a struggle to remember that she and Julian were a team.

  She glanced over at Jules, giving in to the sort of motherly affection he evaded, and ruffled his short, blond hair. “How do you feel about pizza?” she asked, reaching for her cell phone as she kept her other hand on the steering wheel. “We can pick it up on the way home and watch Survivor tonight.”

  “Mom, you do realize that there are other food groups besides pizza, right?”

  Anna feigned ignorance. “Seriously? I had no idea.”

  Ben & Jerry’s Rocky Road was her other favorite food group.

  “Greens are a thing,” Julian pointed out.

  She slid her son a look of horror. “Who are you and what have you done with Julian?”

  An unexpected blush burned the crests of his cheekbones. “I’m still Julian.”

  “Nuh-uh,” Anna said, wagging her finger at him as they slid to a stop at a red light. “You’re not getting out of this one. The last time Shaelyn tried to feed you broccoli you told me you were tortured at dinner and to never send you over to her house unfed again.”

  Clearly uncomfortable with the spotlight, Jules slid a hand through his hair.

  “Is this because of a girl?” Anna prodded, as they continued along and she pulled onto their street. “What’s her name?”

  “Mom.”

  “Don’t ruin this for me, Jules. I’ve been waiting for this conversation my entire life.”

  Jules leveled her with a disbelieving glance. “You’ve been waiting your entire life to talk about sex with me?”

  Anna’s stomach dropped all the way to her feet. “What? No!” She parallel-parked the car in between two others, and then pointed at the teenager slumped in the passenger’s seat. “No sex,” she said loudly, “You’re too young.”

  “I’m not, actually.”

  “Well, then, I’m too young for you to be having sex. No sex for you until I’m fifty. And we’re not even going to mention the word ‘sex’ again after this conversation until I hit forty-five.”

  A sly grin worked its way onto his face. “Guess I don’t have to wait too long, then. Aren’t you forty-two or something?”

  As much as Anna wanted to cry at the thought that her son didn’t know her age, she knew he was just pulling her leg. Julian Bryce was a prankster through and through, and she was so thankful that their relationship had returned mostly back to normal after . . . everything that had happened last year.

  Although she did often wish they could talk about the past—actually discuss it rather than pretend it didn’t exist.

  Soon, she told herself. Julian just wasn’t ready yet, and she understood that. And, if she were completely honest with herself, perhaps she wasn’t ready yet either.

  They both climbed out of the car from their respective sides, but as Anna started up the path that led to their 1920s Arts-&-Craftsman-style home, Julian was already heading off in the other direction.

  “Where are you off to?” she called out, hand cupped around her mouth more for effect than acoustics. “I thought we could do pizza and beer.”

  “Mom, you’re so embarrassing,” Julian said, stopping in his tracks to turn around and stare at her.

  Anna tapped her nose and then pointed at her son. “Beer was obviously a euphemism for milk.” As he’d grown older, and with no father figure in the picture to influence him, Anna had found that wit and sarcasm worked best with her son. Hugs and motherly affection only went so far.

  But sometimes, Anna desperately missed his small, wriggly body tucked up against her side for movie night. They’d kept up the Friday night tradition through the Thomas the Tank Engine days to Pixar’s best. Now, if Anna wanted to watch a movie with him, it was a scheduled affair with guts-and-gore action movies. Two popcorn bowls as opposed to one, two couches instead of a shared sectional.

  For so long, Julian had been her best friend as well as being her son. Now, he had other best friends, and Anna had Shaelyn.

  Except that Shae also had Brady, and Anna couldn’t keep her cousin all to herself just because she was lonely.

  Another sign that you should get back out there and start dating.

  Without even realizing that the words had been vocalized, she heard Julian’s response loud and clear: “Just don’t get on Tinder, Mom. They’ve got loads of creeps on there.”

  “How do you know about Tinder?” The thought of her baby boy on a dating website was enough to send Anna into an apoplectic fit. “You better not have an account.”

  Julian waved away her worries with a flick of his hand and a teenage snort. “Um, no way. Tinder is gross.”

  Oh, thank Go—

  “Love Scope is better.”

  “Julian,” she started, in her sternest listen-to-me-now voice, “if I hear one more word about you being on a dating site I’m revoking your Xbox rights for a month.”

  His face broke out into a grin, and she just about strangled him right then and there.

  Her eye twitched. “You’re pulling my leg again, aren’t you?”

  The grin widened and he darted forward to drop a kiss on the top of her head. “Mom, for all of your business skills, you are way too gullible.”

  “Says the guy who I convinced for years that unicorns were real,” she grumbled good-naturedly, altogether too relieved to know that he wasn’t on any dating websites.

  “Unicorns are real,” he said. “We just haven’t found evidence yet.”

  It was a long-standing debate between them.

  He reached out and patted her head like she was a good dog. “Mom?” he asked, and Anna instantly went on alert.

  “Yes, baby?”

  Blue eyes dropped to her face. “I really do think you should date. You deserve someone, like how Shae has Brady.”

  And just like that, what felt suspiciously like tears stung her eyes. “We’ll see,” she murmured. She wasn’t getting her hopes up any. Over the years, she’d given dating a try time and again, and always she’d slunk back home with her dejected tail between her legs.

  An image of Mr. Green Eyes flashed in her mind’s eye, and she very quickly shoved it away. They’d barely exchanged two words. And he certainly hadn’t seemed enamored with her in the slightest.

  “You going next door?” she asked, already knowing the answer. Since the Ajax family had moved in over the summer, Julian and the eldest son, Toby, had become inseparable.

  Jules nodded. “Yeah, we’re going to go all out and play Madden until we can’t see straight anymore.”

  Anna patted his arm. “Sounds absolutely lovely,” she lied with a bright smile. “Tell Mr. Ajax hello for me.”

  A sly smile lifted Julian’s lips. “You know, Mom, Mr. Ajax is single.”

  Oh, Anna knew that already quite well. Sumner Ajax had asked her on a date the second weekend after he’d moved in with his two sons, and he routinely asked her out every few weeks. But her
fear of things not working out and living next door to the guy always shut down any thoughts she had of taking him up on the offer.

  Anna didn’t like complications.

  Julian’s father had provided enough complications to last her a lifetime.

  His was the gift that kept on giving.

  “Have a good time, Jules,” she said, walking backward to her front door so she could keep an eye on him.

  “Want me to give him your number?” he shouted, mimicking her earlier move and cupping his hand around his mouth.

  Like mother like son.

  Waving him off, she ducked into the house and then waited in front of the window until she saw him disappear into the Ajax house.

  It was time to call in the reinforcements.

  4

  “This is the best day of my life.”

  Anna caught her cousin’s gaze in the reflection of her full-length mirror. “Seriously,” she said slowly, “this day? What about the day Brady told you he loved you for the first time?”

  Shaelyn paused to consider that with a tilt of her head. “Nope, today’s the winner.”

  From Anna’s bed, the third member to their trio, Jade Harper, held up her hand. “I solemnly swear not to tell Sergeant Taylor you said that.”

  Shae snorted. “Girl, you are such a law enforcement nerd.”

  “To be fair, she does work for the NOPD,” Anna pointed out as she stuck her face close to the mirror and layered on two rounds of black mascara.

  Only a few months earlier, Jade had found herself embroiled in one of the most publicized homicide cases New Orleans had seen in recent years. She’d cracked the case and ended up in the hospital as a result—but Anna highly doubted Jade looked back on that period of her life too harshly. She’d worked the case with Nathan Danvers at her side, one of Brady’s coworkers in the NOPD’s homicide unit, and a man who loved Jade more than life itself.

  Anna had watched the whole thing go down as an outsider, and even though she had no desire to be a cop—she was just fine selling lingerie, thank you very much—she couldn’t help but feel a little envious of Danvers’ and Jade’s relationship.