Safe Passage (9 page)

"Thanks." Gen smiled. She plucked the flowers out of Jules' hands. "Thanks for these too."

"You're welcome." Jules was moving toward Gen, not realizing how close she was getting. Gen went to put her arms around Jules and Jules had already gripped her hips.

Jake walked over briskly and grabbed the stargazer lilies from Gen's hand. "I'll just take care of these, you know the girl-on-girl really doesn't do much for me." He walked quickly into the kitchen.

Jules moved one hand to cup Gen's cheek, and she bent down. Their lips met and Jules sighed into the kiss. She'd been dying to do this for days and she hadn't been alone with Gen when they weren't at work. Jules buried her hand in Gen's silky blond hair, something her fingers been aching to do since she'd met the woman on the first teacher in-service day in August. The kiss deepened and Gen scraped her short nails across the nape of Jules' neck. Then, she pulled back. "Jules, if we don't stop we're going to miss dinner, and give Jake a show he really doesn't want."

Jules nodded, then the words actually sunk in and she backed up just enough so she could think more clearly. "Sorry."

"Oh, please, don't be sorry."

"Good, 'cause I'm really, really not." Jules gave Gen a half smile and raised her eyebrows.

Gen laughed and looked over her shoulder. "Jake, we're heading out, take care of Belle, please."

"No problem, girls. Have fun."

Gen led Jules to the door, but Jules opened it for her and Gen smiled. They walked out to Jules' car and Jules opened the passenger side door for Gen. "You know, I love all the chivalry, right? But I don't expect it."

"I know, but I expect it of myself, if that makes sense."

Gen kissed her cheek then got in the car. "It does."

Jules shut the door and walked over to her side of the car, took of her jacket, placed it in the back seat, and got in. She plugged her iPod into the aux jack and started a playlist for background music.

"So, now will you tell me where we're going?"

"Nope."

"Tease."

"Takes one to know one," Jules shot back.

"Oh, I promise, I will follow through eventually."

Jules eyes widened and she gripped the steering wheel until her knuckles were white. "Gen, I do want to get us there in one piece."

Gen laughed. "And there would be?"

"Gen, you'll find out in ten minutes."

"Fine, fine." Gen sat back in the seat watching Jules drive.

"So, how long have you been living with Jake?"

"Since I moved back here, so about two years."

"He's a character."

"He is. Sorry for the surprise of him opening the door. I thought I'd told you about him."

"Nope, but it's fine."

"Okay."

Jules pulled up to the front of the restaurant and Gen grinned at the sign.

"This is a great surprise."

"Glad you like it."

The valets opened their doors and Jules walked around to the passenger side and Gen took her arm as they walked into the restaurant. Lakeside Sushi had walls of windows that overlooked Lake Pontchartrain. Jules walked over to the maitre d' and said, "reservations for Delacroix."

"This way, Ms. Delacroix. How's your father?"

"He's doing great. Too busy, but he loves it."

"I'm sure he does."

After they were seated, Jules glanced over at Gen who was looking out the window. Gen turned toward her. "How did you get these reservations; you only asked me out on Tuesday. Weren't they booked?"

"Having a family in the restaurant business in New Orleans is kind of like being in the mob. We are all connected," Jules said, doing a terrible Marlon Brando impersonation.

Gen laughed. "Okay, well, works for me."

They ordered their drinks and looked over the menu. A waiter came back and made some recommendations and they ordered.

Gen looked over at Jules and smiled. "So, this is our third date, right?"

"I was debating that earlier, I wasn't sure."

"Well, you made me a fancy dinner, that should definitely count." Gen took a sip of her wine and leaned forward as she talked.

"Okay, but does you bringing me breakfast the next morning count?"

"No, because there were students present."

Jules laughed. "Ah, of course, the no students rule. Got it."

"Right, but then I brought you take out."

"Okay, yeah, very casual date number two."

"Yep, and now you're taking me to a great dinner."

Jules nodded and grinned across the table. "Yeah, I guess if you count it that way, then it is our third date."

"Good. We don't have to have any first date weirdness."

Jules took a sip of her drink, an aromatic creation by Lakeside Sushi's celebritender that combined Gin with some cucumber, lime, and sage. "Okay."

"So, you know that Jake is going to be hassling me about one of your brothers, right."

"Well, you can tell him they are both straight and married."

"He'll be crushed."

"We'll have to find him the strength to go on."

The waiter arrived with their rolls and they each took a few bites of sushi and then Gen swallowed. "So, have you figured out where Evie is buried?"

Jules shook her head slowly. "I have no idea. I mean, after Katrina she could have been washed away in the flooding."

"You think so?"

"I don't know, Gen, I mean, a lot of people were disinterred by the floods."

"But your aunt wrote the letter after Katrina."

"Yeah, so, either she wanted me to find her body, or it was found and she re-buried her."

"How would you know?"

"I'm not sure. I mean, she had to have hired …" Jules trailed off as she thought back to the time right after Katrina. She'd called her Auntie a lot from her Master's program at Georgia Tech.

Gen waited for a minute or so. "Jules, I get that you wander off into your head but you're killing me here. She'd have hired what?"

Jules started at Gen's voice but then nodded. "Auntie backed a charity after Katrina, and their whole goal was to identify and rebury bodies that were washed up from the flooding. She brought down anthropologists and forensic artists to help."

"You think she did all that to find Evie?"

"Maybe."

"So she found Evie, and did what, reburied her?"

"She must have, Gen."

"But where?"

Jules shrugged. "No idea."

"Jules, as much as I want to help you figure all this out, and I do, I don't want this letter to be the only thing we have together."

"Me neither. Let's table the whole Evie-slash-Auntie thing tonight and just be two women on a date."

"Okay."

Jules finished her drink and looked across the table. "So, how long were you in France?"

"How did you know that?"

She grinned. "I took a guess."

"I did two years there."

"Where?"

"Paris."

"I've never been. I always wanted to go though."

"It's amazing. I mean, obviously it's amazing—it's Paris. I missed being here when I was there but now, I miss being there, a lot."

"What was your favorite place?"

"There was a café where I used to study on the Seine. It was so quintessentially Parisian, that I think I might have liked it better than the Louvre." Gen's expression became distant and Jules could tell that she was picturing the place in her mind.

Jules laughed. "Dad goes periodically, he'd love to hear about the best spots from an insider."

"Jules, are you asking me to meet your parents?"

The color drained from Jules face. "What, no, um, I mean, maybe, but not yet. I don't know."

Gen laughed. "Relax, Jules, just teasing you."

"Funny," Jules replied dryly.

"I thought so."

Jules popped another bite of sushi in her mouth and watched Gen as she chewed and swallowed the piece of the roll she'd just eaten. Jules couldn't keep her eyes from the motions of the long graceful neck. When she went to take another piece, Jules was distracted by her tiny hands and how adroit they were with the chopsticks. Jules was self-conscious about her own hands, so large and calloused from rowing. She didn't know how long she'd been cataloguing all of Gen's features when she looked up and met her hazel eyes.

"You still with me?"

"Yes, definitely. Sorry, I'm here."

"Well, I guess as long as the distraction was me, we're okay."

Jules laughed. "Oh yes, you were most certainly the distraction."

Gen smiled warmly a light blush rising on her cheeks. "Okay, then. So, I'm racking my brain for things to ask you that I don't know yet. Okay, what was your most embarrassing moment?"

"Really?"

"Yes."

"Gen, I embarrass myself on a daily basis."

"Good, then you should definitely be able to come up with something to say."

Jules snorted. "Okay, well the first one that comes to mind happened my sophomore year at Tulane. My car was in the shop and I needed some groceries. Laundry day was long past so I grabbed a pair of my roommate's cargo shorts, because she'd just done her laundry. I walked to a store about a block from campus, bought the stuff I needed and walked back carrying about four bags and a case of soda."

"I'm not seeing the embarrassment."

"Oh, wait for it, cher. I'm crossing the street back to campus and I realize something very serious. Becs was a few sizes bigger than I was and her shorts are falling off. I can't set my stuff down to fix the problem as I'm in a crosswalk that has already turned red. I'm trying to run to the other side of the street before the worst happens."

Gen was trying and failing to contain her laughter behind her hand.

Jules continued her story. "So, I made it about two thirds of the way through when the cargo shorts fall down around my ankles. All the cars waiting for me to get the hell out of the street, the heavy pedestrian traffic, the men's crew out for a run, and a large tour group of potential students and their families all got to see my Ninja Turtle underwear."

Gen couldn't even pretend to contain her laughter anymore. "Ninja Turtles?"

"They were a gag gift and, as I said earlier, laundry day had come and gone. But we're not to the worst part. In trying to get out of the street my own shorts tripped me up. I fell, head over tit into the road, dropped all the groceries, broke the eggs, sent sodas all over the street, and had a very unattractive road rash. I also ruined Becs' shorts and had to buy her a new pair. The capper, of course, was that for the remaining two and a half years, everyone called me Donatello."

When Gen finally got her laughter under control she took a deep breath. "Why Donatello and not one of the other ones?"

"Donatello was the nerdy one," Jules explained without missing a beat.

"I thought athletes weren't supposed to be clumsy. Don't you have like super control over your body?"

"There is a very good reason I compete in a sport that is done sitting down," Jules replied with mock seriousness. Then she fixed Gen with a predatory smile, her blue eyes darkening. "Okay, Genevieve, I showed you mine, now you show me yours."

Genevieve shivered at the look in Jules eyes. But then the words sunk in and she shook her head. "No, no need to do that."

"Fair is fair, Gen." Jules popped another piece of sushi in her mouth and sat back, waiting.

"Okay. So, this happened when I was in Paris. A group of us decided to go down to the Riviera my first summer there. So we are picnicking along the shore and we stay there well into the night, drinking wine and enjoying the night. I got very, very drunk. There wasn't a convenient bathroom to where we were, but there was a very dense stand of trees that I decided I could use as the situation was dire from all the wine. So, while I'm in the trees, I feel something brush against my ankle. In my wine addled, Louisiana brain, I thought it had to be a water moccasin. I run out of the woods screaming like I'm being murdered and I'm actually holding my shorts because I was afraid I'd pee on them. But the thing around my leg won't go away, it stays wrapped there and I can't shake it off despite my doing some insane dance to try to shake it free."

"What was it?"

"My thong, it had gotten caught in my sock."

Jules laughed for a solid minute. "And your friends?"

"Were all French and didn't understand why I was running around naked from the waist down screaming my shoes were wet."

"Wait, you didn't say snake?" Jules laugher was still escaping while she was trying to keep it in.

Gen shook her head, and silent laughter made her shoulders shake. "No, I was very specific: moccasin d'eau. I thought I might need antivenin. They seemed to think I'd peed on my shoes and wanted to shake it off."

"Oh, Gen, that's awesome."

"Thanks."

Their waiter returned. "Desert?"

"I'm stuffed," Gen said.

"Yeah, I am too, actually. We'll take the check."

"It's on the owner tonight, Ms. Delacroix."

Jules nodded, the muscle in her jaw tensing slightly. "Tell him thank you."

"I will."

Jules drained her water glass. "You want to walk a bit before we head back?"

"Sure."

Jules dropped cash on the table for the waiter and walked out with Gen, her hand finding the small of the other woman's back. The walked out of the restaurant and down around the side to watch the lights glinting off Lake Pontchartrain. Gen shivered slightly and Jules put her coat on Gen's shoulders.

"Still cold?" Jules asked.

"A little."

Jules wrapped her arms around Gen from behind, and Gen put her hands over Jules arms, holding her in place.

"Jules."

"Hmmm?"

"You really had to wear cashmere, didn't you?"

"Why?"

"I can't stop touching you."

"I am not complaining."

"Do you have something else planned? I don't want to go home just yet."

"Well ..."

"Yes?"

"I made a torte, but ..."

"Jules, how easy do you think I am?"

"Well, you did live in France."

Gen slapped her arm lightly.

"I'm kidding Gen. No expectations, just desert."

"Take me back to your place."