Echoes in the Bayou

by Dukes, Ursula

  "That conniving bitch set her up," Ava exclaimed to them both.

  "Yes but it looked like she wasn’t counting on John killing her," Magnus said.

  "Regardless of whether she knew that he was going to kill her or not, I bet she was more than happy when she found out. It had solved all her problems."

  For Ava, reading the diaries was like being addicted to drugs, she couldn’t get enough. Although she was almost finished with Celeste's, she found Amelia's to be much more informative. Celeste's diary read like the love sick young woman that she was but Amelia wrote down everything, especially her severe hatred and disdain towards Celeste. And while she read it she felt every insult and hurtful thing that Amelia had written. It was like regressing back to that time. She found it fascinating that here she was in the twenty-first century reading about her supposedly reincarnated self in the nineteenth century. It had all seemed so surreal; she was no longer scared or fearful of Celeste like she had been when she first found out about her. Now she felt compelled to reunite Celeste with Will, it was the least she could do, considering that the poor girl had suffered such a horrible death.

  The more she told them about the diaries, the more Magnus had to write about. "This is going to be a best seller I can feel it," Ava said to him. She was reading over his shoulder.

  "You think so? I think so too." He playfully grabbed her and sat her on his lap.

  "I know you're going to become even more famous and forget all about me," she frowned.

  He got serious then and took her face into his hands. "Ava, that will never happen," he said and took control of her mouth, possessing her. "Get back to work," she teased and left him sitting at his desk, hard as a rock.

  He thought it quite amazing that he had developed such strong feelings for Ava over such a short amount of time. He remembered when he was dating Jeanette and how he was never able to say the words, I love you to her. And that she never really seemed to get upset that he couldn’t. Instead he'd told her that he was quite fond of her and that he could see himself being with her, hell he'd proposed. Like a jack ass, he scolded himself. He told himself that he was allowed one stupid mistake and that looking back on it, he was incredibly lucky that she'd broken it off. Buying this plantation saved him from a life of misery, of that he was sure.

  There was also something else that he was sure of, he was in love with Ava and he was going to tell her tonight, after their dinner guest's leave. His agent Steve was coming by for dinner and he was bringing his wife Kelly. It was the first time Ava was to meet his agent and she had been busy planning everything to perfection. She polished the silver, planned the menu and even went so far as to iron the table linens. "I want everything to be perfect," she told him as they got ready for their dinner.

  "And it will be Ava; you've gone above and beyond. He's just an agent for goodness sake, he should be taking us to dinner," he joked.

  Ava smiled at him. "It's nice to have people over for dinner," she told him.

  "People that we like," she winked at him. He knew that she was referring to the unexpected visit of Gavin and Melanie.

  "Yes, that was one visit I wouldn’t wish for ever again," she sighed.

  "Now zip me up lover."

  Magnus gave her a boyish frown, although she looked absolutely gorgeous in her Ralph Lauren pink strapless dinner dress, he'd much rather see her out of it.

  "Everything's all ready," he whispered in her ear and slipped his hands underneath the short dress.

  "What's say we have some fun before our guests arrive?" He said. He was running his hands around her round butt and it felt good. She let out a soft moan before coming to her senses.

  She playfully slapped his hand away. "Magnus DuPonte, you keep your hands where I can see them and zip me up." She couldn’t help but laugh. Had they not been expecting their guests at any minute, she would have gladly obliged.

  Magnus felt completely helpless as he tried hard to converse with their dinner guests. It wasn't because he was at a loss for words, it was because Ava was by his side and whenever she was near, all of the thoughts in his mind that did not pertain to her seemed to fly right out the window. Even his agent Steve remarked at how quiet he was. "Are you sure you're feeling alright?" Steve asked him.

  "Oh I am feeling fine, just fine," Magnus replied. He wore a puerile grin on his face as he stared at Ava.

  "Ohhh, enough said Magnus, enough said," his agent winked and patted him on the back.

  When Steve and his wife Kelly arrived they were surprised to find that Magnus was no longer alone.

  "She's beautiful Magnus and so down to earth. Where did you meet her?" Asked Kelly. The moment she met Ava, she felt warmth that she found quite surprising, especially given the fact that Jeanette had been the exact opposite, very standoffish.

  Magnus managed to overcome his nervousness long enough to tell the couple all about how he and Ava met. He did however, leave out the supernatural part, he knew that his agent wouldn’t mind hearing it but his wife Kelly might get frightened.

  "So you're still thinking of selling the old place?" Steve asked as Ava walked into the room carrying a tray of after dinner drinks.

  "Actually no, I've changed my mind," he said smiling at Ava.

  "I bet you had something to do with that," Kelly grinned at Ava.

  "I might have," she grinned. "Hey Ava, how about we grab our drinks and you give me a tour? Leave these guys to their business," Kelly asked.

  "Sure thing," said Ava and led her towards the sitting room.

  While Magnus and his agent talked about his new novel and publishing dates, Ava showed Kelly around the massive house. Ava silently prayed that nothing out of the ordinary would happen while their guests were visiting. She liked Kelly and could see herself spending time with her as friends. There was naturalness about her that she liked; she didn’t seem pretentious at all. Kelly felt the same way and invited her and Magnus to stay over at their place in New Orleans for the upcoming weekend.

  "I think I can speak for Magnus too when I say, we'd like that very much," Ava smiled broadly at her new friend. It felt nice to have someone to talk to besides Magnus and Sinta. She loved talking to them both but she missed the camaraderie of a true girlfriend, she thought she'd have it forever in Melanie. We all know how that turned out, she thought to herself.

  "Great, we've got plenty of room and this time we'll show you the real New Orleans. Sounds like you only got a taste of it when you were there the last time," she frowned.

  "Well here’s to not running into anymore ex's," she held up her glass and clinked it with Ava's.

  "Parting in such sweet sorrow," Steve grinned and kissed Ava's hand. He was sorry to have to go, not only was he Magnus's agent but the two had become close friends. Steve was happy that his wife too had seemed to make a new friend. Ever since they moved to New Orleans from New York, she'd found it difficult to make friends. "It's like a different world here Steve," she'd told him shortly after they'd moved there. "I know it's a better opportunity for you but being here and not being able to make friends makes me feel so isolated."

  "I know baby, but you'll make friends, you'll see," he'd reassured her and almost four years later she finally had.

  "I can't wait for the weekend," Kelly kissed her husband on the cheek and thanked him for bringing her.

  Chapter Sixteen

  "That was a wonderful evening." Magnus sat and watched as Ava straightened up the dining room.

  "Now come and sit with me out on the porch," he held out his hand.

  Once he was seated in one of the oversized rocking chairs, he grabbed her by the waist and pulled her onto his lap. Ava let out a giggle as she nuzzled up against his neck.

  "Ava I mean it tonight was wonderful and I have you to thank for making it so."

  "It was wonderful," she grinned. "I made a new friend and got us invited to New Orleans for the weekend."

  "I promise this time we will enjoy it to its full capacity," he said to her.<
br />
  "I know we will," she took his hand in hers and they interlocked fingers.

  "Ava, I'm sure you're well aware of the fact that none of this would have happened without you. I mean my book is coming along great thanks to you and this place well, having you here makes it feel more and more like home each and every day so I thank you for that."

  She felt him tense up. "Magnus are you dumping me?" She asked. She was sitting up now but still on his lap.

  "I am doing nothing of the kind," he said rather quickly. "But there are some things about me that you need to know about," he said. He was all seriousness now.

  "Ava, you know that I used to be in the oil business right?" He questioned her.

  When she nodded her head, he continued. "Well I didn’t just work for my father, I worked with him and well… let's put it this way, I was a very shrewd business man. I mean it was dog eat dog world and still is but I did some things that I'm not too proud of."

  "Like what?" She asked, not sure if she wanted to hear the answer.

  He took a cleansing breath before continuing. "Ava, when I started my job in the corporate world I was fresh out of college and I thought I knew it all. I mean here I was this young guy, working side by side with my dad, making close to six figures. I had my own place, a couple of cars, and not to mention plenty of girlfriends," he said.

  "Okay…" Ava whispered.

  "What I'm about to tell you has nothing to do with women, I'm just trying to get you to understand the kind of life I had. Well anyway, let me get to the point. The life I had wasn’t as easy and simple as I thought it would be. All of a sudden I felt like I was being thrusted into this world of nothing but chaos, there were far too many meetings and power lunches. Presentations and reports, I mean I had never been around so many greedy, power hungry people in my entire life and I started to like it. I liked having that feeling of power; I wanted to impress everyone you know? Especially my parents so I kept it up as best I could until things started to get too crazy. I couldn’t deal with the insanity of it all, day after day, night after night. So on a rare night of freedom, a friend takes me out to a night club and he could tell I was tired, but I was more than tired, I was exhausted and I was stressed.

  I had the kind of stress that makes you not want to eat, sleep or do much of anything else. So this friend asks me if I want to do a hit of coke; just to take the edge of he said. Hey one hit won't hurt you, well one year later I was in rehab trying to kick the habit. And I did kick it; my parents, close friends, and Steve and Kelly were very supportive. Especially Steve considering that he was the one who offered it to me in the first place. It was while I was in rehab that I realized that I wanted to become a writer. And here I am today, thirty three years old, clean and sober and with a beautiful woman sitting in my lap, life is good Ava.

  "Magnus, Steve is the one who offered it to you and you still allowed him to be your agent?" She asked confused. "Are you sure that was the right choice?"

  Magnus nodded his head. "I know, I know, you're not supposed to have that kind of bad influence in your life when you are recovering but it wasn’t until after I got out of rehab that I signed a contract with Steve, he was the only one I trusted and at the time he had been up visiting from New York.

  He went back a few weeks after we went out and by that time I was getting my own supply. So you see, Steve wasn’t supplying me, someone else was."

  "I understand that Magnus, but he still was the one who introduced you to it," she tried to reason with him.

  "You're right Ava, he was but It was my choice to continue and It was my choice alone. I can't blame anyone but myself," he said.

  "Magnus, you had a drug problem and you beat it, did you really think that I wouldn’t understand?" She asked. She wasn’t the least bit worried though, she could see that he'd beat his addiction and by the way his life was going, he hit it out of the park.

  "I knew you'd understand Ava, I'm not a perfect man, I never have been and never will. But I want you to know that I am no longer addicted, I've been clean for five years now and I won't ever go back to that life."

  "I'm not perfect either Magnus; no one is and I appreciate you telling me that about your life, it's in the past, and that is where we should leave it. I like that you told me about it though, but I'm a bit curious as to why you're telling me now," she said as she shifted in his lap.

  It's now or never, he told himself. "Ava I wanted to tell you about my past because I want my future to include you. I love you Ava Montgomery."

  The words hit her like no other, she wasn’t expecting to hear them so soon. Alright, she told herself, maybe she was. She could tell by the way he made love to her that he was falling for her and how he came after her the night of the party.

  Magnus was unsure of what her silence meant. "Ava, please say something," he said and kept his arms wrapped around her, he just couldn’t let go.

  Ava turned to him and smiled, she cupped his face in her hands. "Magnus do you realize what you just said?" She asked. Too eager to wait for a reply she went on, "Magnus you just told me that you love me. Now correct me if I'm wrong but doesn’t that mean that part of the curse is broken?" She asked emphatically.

  "To tell you the truth I hadn’t really thought about it," he said.

  "I've been too busy wondering what your response was going to be." He looked at her inquiringly.

  Ava tossed her head back and laughed, she knew that she was taking a chance on him. Isn't he doing the same thing? She asked herself. "Magnus, a life without chances is a life not worth living," she whispered in his ear. "I love you too," she said.

  "How do you do that?" He asked of her remark. "It's like you know what I'm thinking."

  "It's a gift," she said and kissed him passionately on the lips.

  "Phew, now that that's over we can talk about the curse," he said dramatically wiping his brow.

  "Well," said Ava. "I remember you telling me that Jeanette told you that you were incapable of loving her and then I thought about what Sinta told us about the curse. But since you just told me that you loved me," she said with a gleam in her eye. "The first thing that I could think of was that the curse was slowly being lifted. I mean maybe that’s why we've had no more manifestations since the séance." Her eyes were hopeful and her body was making him hard.

  "Let's go to bed," he whispered.

  By the time the weekend had arrived, Ava was more than excited to head into New Orleans, they were to be visiting Steve and Kelly. The plan was for them to spend an evening of fun on a riverboat casino. Ava had never been and the idea of getting all dressed up for a night out on a floating casino made her quite cheerful.

  "Magnus smiled as he watched her pack, he got even more excited when he saw that she was packing a sexy red dress that she had ordered online as few days ago. He remembered that she was worried that it wouldn’t arrive in time for the weekend but it had and the shoes that she had to go with it made him ask her to model them for him.

  "Ava, how about a sneak peek?" He pleaded.

  "Patience my dear," she teased him with a kiss. "You'll get to see what I look like tomorrow night, she winked at him and finished packing.

  "I don’t think I can wait that long," he said and wrapped his hands around her waist.

  "I want you now, later, tomorrow and ever after."

  "Well when you put it that way," she said and kissed him as he laid her down on the bed and made love to her.

  "I'm so glad you could come," Kelly said and welcomed her guests into their home. The remodeled Victorian home stood only minutes away from Bourbon St. The moment they walked in, the designer in Ava came out and she marveled at the wonderfully renovated classic creole cottage. And this cottage boosted a two story guest house which was to be their accommodations for the weekend.

  "Kelly this place is great," she smiled at her new friend.

  "Just how many clients do you have Steve?" Magnus teased. "Places like this don't come cheap," he looked around at t
he open layout and designer furniture. The place had an overall feel of comfort and class.

  "I tell you buddy, moving from New York to New Orleans was the best thing we could have done right Kel?" He asked his wife.

  "It's slowly growing on me," she replied and smiled at Ava.

  "And it only took four years," he smirked. "Now, who's ready to start the weekend?" He said, while making his way behind the custom built bar and handing out glasses.

  Ava and Kelly stood giggling in the kitchen like a couple of school girls as they drank wine and prepared dinner. They had all agreed to save the night out at the casino for tomorrow, tonight they were going to enjoy a nice home cooked meal and get to know one another.

  "So… how is it living with Magnus?" Kelly asked. She was standing at the counter chopping vegetables and getting ready to sauté them.

  Ava couldn’t hide the mischievous grin. "So far, so good," she smiled broadly and took another sip of wine.

  "Okay, I'm dying to tell somebody," she beamed. "He told me that he loves me."

  Kelly stopped chopping vegetables and looked up at her new friend, she knew how hard things had been for Magnus when he was dating Jeanette. She remembered one evening when after a night out, Jeanette who had a bit too much to drink, took it upon herself to embarrass Magnus. She told Kelly and her husband that Magnus was incapable of thinking those words, let alone say them, she even went so far as to reenact his proposal. Kelly remembered feeling sorry for her friend, "he didn’t deserve that," she went on to tell Ava.

  She couldn’t believe that Magnus would allow himself to be humiliated like that and in front of his dear friends as well. What Kelly had just told her did not sound like the man whom she had been spending countless hours with. All the times they had spent reading, laughing, going for long walks, making love, oh the making love part was the best.

  "It's so strange that he would allow her to talk to him like that, but what's done is done and I think it made him all the stronger," Ava reassured her.