Once Upon a Christmas (16 page)

S
he glanced up as he entered the parlor. Theo Galliano looked every bit the gentleman in his gray wool suit, crisp white shirt and red patterned tie, with his hair shiny and combed, and a soft smile of resolve and restraint on his face. Elise smiled at him, her heart bursting like a tree ornament that had fallen and shattered.

He saw her the minute he entered the parlor. Elise Melancon looked every bit the lady her
grand-mère
had taught her to be. She was wearing a green velvet sleeveless dress that favored a wide cummerbund nipped at her waist and a flowing full skirt that accented her pretty shape. She had on the pearls he’d become so familiar with. She sent him a smile full of hope and determination.

Theo hesitated as everyone began to find their seats. This was the moment he’d both anticipated and dreaded.

“Theo, where is Maggie?” Betty Jean called down the table. “We don’t want to start without her.”

Theo cleared his throat and sent up a prayer for
courage. “Maggie won’t be coming, Mrs. Melancon. She sends her regrets.”

“Oh, my.”

He couldn’t be sure, but he thought Miss Betty Jean was actually relieved. So was he. But he’d be even more relieved when he’d had his say and was out of here.

“I need to tell y’all something,” he said, waiting as everyone got seated.

“You don’t need to make a toast,” Cissie said, rolling her eyes at this obvious breach of etiquette.

“It’s no toast, I guarantee,” Theo told her, his voice sounding decidedly more Cajun than cultured, and sounding far more calm than he actually felt. “It’s a confession.”

He centered his gaze on Elise. “May I?”

“Go ahead, Theo,” Betty Jean said, almost as if she were cheering him on.

He stood at the end of the table, his eyes on Elise. “You know that Maggie and I broke up over two weeks ago. I believe the only reason she wanted to come here tonight, really, was so she could see this great house and tell everyone she’d been here. Or at least that’s what she told me last time we talked.”

There was an audible gasp among the adults and a rushed whispering among the curious children scattered at various tables throughout the room and adjoining kitchen.

“What do you mean?” Elise asked, rising up out of her chair. “I thought—”

“I know what you thought,” Theo said, his heart thrash
ing with all the force of a mad alligator. “You thought helping me would bring Maggie back. I thought that, too, at first. But I’ve come to see I no longer love Maggie.”

“You let me think that I was doing all of this for Maggie, for you and Maggie,” Elise said, the tone of her voice showing her hurt and confusion, and maybe a trace of hope.

“
Oui,
I wanted to tease you a bit,” Theo said, letting the hurtful look she threw him settle like a much-deserved slap on his face. “And then, I stopped wanting to tease you. I only wanted to impress
you,
Elise. Only you.”

“Oh, good grief,” Cissie said, her hands slapping on the table, the lacy cuffs of her white silk blouse fluttering. “This is ridiculous. And totally unacceptable.”

“Let the man talk,” Betty Jean said, holding up a hand for all to remain quiet.

Cissie sputtered and spewed, but she shut up.

“I only wanted to be with you,” Theo admitted, the relief of it lightening his burden as he held Elise’s gaze. “I like being around you.”

“That is nonsense,” Cissie shouted, looking toward her husband for support. “Darling, tell him it’s nonsense.”

“Let the man speak,” Quincy responded, a curious light in his eyes as he watched his daughter.

“I find that…I find that I love you,” Theo said, wondering where his plan for a fast exit had gone wrong. “I find that I fell in love with you, Elise. But I know that you can never return that love. I know that we aren’t right for each other, at all—”

“You’re as right as rain,” Betty Jean said, her sharp gaze moving from her granddaughter to Theo.

“Grand-mère!”
Elise said, looking in shock at Betty Jean. “You said you hired me for the job because I always run men off. You said there would be no chance that I’d fall for Theo.”

“So I was wrong,” her grandmother said with a dainty shrug. “It happens.”

The expression on Elise’s face changed so quickly, it reminded Theo of shadows moving across the swamp. She went from shocked and confused to understanding and amazed, all with the blinking of her beautiful eyes.
“Grand-mère?”

“Yes, Boo?”

“Did you set me up?”

“Yes, darling, I surely did.”

Cissie stood up. “What in the world are you talking about?”

Betty Jean stood, too, holding her water glass up in a salute. “A fine plan it was, too, if I do say so myself.”

“What is going on?” Cissie said again, her voicing shrilling with each word.

“Our daughter is in love,” Elise’s father told his stunned wife, a knowing grin splitting his face.

“That’s impossible,” Cissie said, throwing her linen napkin down in a huff. “That just can’t be. Elise, tell your father this is just plan silly.”

Elise wasn’t listening to her mother.

But Cissie saw very clearly what everyone else in the room had already figured out. “Oh, my,” she said, plopping back down to stare at her plate. “Oh, my. It’s just not possible.”

Theo’s eyes never left Elise’s face, even though there seemed to be a flutter of activity all around them. He watched as she glanced first at her grandmother, then her mother, then finally back at him. “It’s very possible, Mother. I am in love. I’m in love with Theo.”

“No, you are not,” Cissie said, her words bordering on hysteria.

“Yes, she is,” Betty Jean said, grinning from ear to ear. “Let’s eat.”

Reginald appeared out of nowhere, a wide, joyful grin on his aged face. “We have a feast. I think I’ve outdone myself this time. Hope everyone’s hungry.”

“I couldn’t possibly eat a bite,” Cissie said. But when her husband gave a slight inclination of his head, she sat up in her chair. “Pass the rolls.”

“We need to say grace,” Betty Jean said, tears forming in her eyes as she looked from Elise standing at one end of the table to Theo at the other end. “We have so much to be thankful for. Such a joyous holiday.”

As everyone settled down and closed their eyes, Elise motioned to Theo. He hurriedly followed her out into the hallway and watched as she grabbed a black velvet wrapper from a nearby hall tree. Together, they rushed out the front doors, the frigid night hitting them full force.

He caught up with her underneath a granddaddy live oak, tugging at her wrap until he had her turned and into his arms. “I do love you,” he said, his words echoing out into the starlit night.

She gave him that famous pout. “Is that why you kept quiet about everything?”

“No, I kept quiet because I’m a bad, bad boy who wanted to irritate a good girl.”

“It worked.”

“Think we could make it work for the next fifty years or so?”

She leaned her head against the wool of his jacket. “I had decided to let you go.”

“Funny, I’d decided the very same thing about you.”

“We’re supposed to be all wrong for each other.”

“I know. That’s what I keep telling myself.”

She looked back up at him, then, her pout turning into a smile. “
Mamere
tricked both of us.”

“That she surely did. What a smart woman.”

“She’s always been so wise.”

“
Oui,
too smart for the likes of me.”

“What are we going to do?”

“Well, since we so rudely skipped out on the blessing, I’d say first we send up a prayer.”

She smiled at that. “Thank You, Lord, for allowing me to find this man.”

“Amen, and ditto for me with this woman.”

“What now?”

He held her close then pulled her wrap around her shivering body. “We are going to do the right thing,
chère.
We are going to spend the rest of our lives together, here on this bayou, in a home we’ll build together. We’re going to try and salvage what is left of this land. And our children will have a solid heritage.”

“Children?”

“
Oui,
how many do you want?”

“Enough to run Melancon Oil and Gas, of course.”

He turned serious then. “Do you believe we can make this work—I mean me and you—and your mother, and my family living off the land, and your family living in this big, old house?”

“I believe we can do anything as long as we trust in God and listen to my
grand-mère.
”

“I can live with that.”

“Me, too.”

He leaned close, nuzzling at her pearl earrings. “What would a gentleman do in this situation,
chère?
”

She reached a hand up to touch his face. “Oh, you mean in a situation where he withheld the truth, teased his manners coach, disrupted a dinner party, caused a girl’s mother to practically swoon, and made the whole family sit up and take notice?”

“Something like that?”

“He’d sneak his future wife out underneath a great oak tree and kiss her silly.”

Theo laughed and swung her around in his arms. “Then you can consider me a gentleman. Your Cajun gentleman.”

And with that, he kissed the woman he loved.

While the Christmas bonfire burned brightly beneath a perfect bayou moon.

’Twas the Week Before Christmas

1. Why did Elise feel obligated to come home for Christmas? Do you believe family traditions are important and should be honored?
   
2. Do you believe people from two different worlds can live happily with each other? Why was it so important to Betty Jean that Elise get to know Theo?
   
3. What did Elise learn about family and commitment from Theo? How did his family mirror her own, even though they were worlds apart?
   
4. Did this story help you to realize that we stereotype some people? How did Betty Jean help Theo to make his dreams come true? What lessons did they both learn from this experience?