He would get every single bit of blackmail Charles had on Sylvie and find a way to bury it all so there wasn’t even the possibility of someone coming after her again. It was the least he could give her.
Of course, Charles was resourceful. So were his other relatives, and that was precisely why he had to consider that staying married to him might not be good for Sylvie. She deserved a family that she could be proud of, that she could trust. It was always war with the Darois family.
He shut his phone off because the last thing he needed was to have to read his cousin’s self-satisfied reply.
Was Sylvie holding Lady and cursing his name? He had to make sure the dog got her medications. He would work something out. Despite what his mother had said, he did have his own money. It wasn’t the Darois fortune, but he would be comfortable.
Financially. Emotionally it would take a long time to recover. If he ever did. He would go to Dallas. New Orleans was far too close.
He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, thinking he might be able to catch her scent.
Instead he heard the sound of the hardwoods creak and realized he wasn’t alone.
Adrenaline flooded his system and he opened his eyes in time to see a man coming at him with a baseball bat.
His awful day wasn’t done.
chapter twelve
Rene felt his eyes widen as he realized who was on the other side of that bat. He’d been ready to fight, but he couldn’t punch this particular attacker. “Dre! It’s me.”
His best friend in the world stopped and managed not to take his head off. Andre Martine wasn’t wearing a shirt, his lean body covered only in a white towel wound around his waist. He frowned, one brow cocking and his surprise obvious. “Rene? Rene, what the hell are you doing here? How did you get in?”
The bat dropped and Andre breathed an obvious sigh of relief as he moved in, giving Rene a wholly masculine, pound-on-the-back hug.
“Sylvie keeps a key in the front flower bed in case of emergencies.” She’d explained that her next-door neighbor was elderly and sometimes needed to borrow things. But Rene had a far better question. “What are you doing here? I heard you were somewhere in Asia. No one’s heard from you in six damn weeks, brother. Your mother is worried.”
When Marcelle had come over for supper two nights before, she’d been beside herself because Andre hadn’t called in six weeks. She’d been almost ready to fly to Asia herself. He’d gotten to participate in calling Andre’s ancestors to watch over him.
It had been a fun night. Soon Marcelle would likely be cursing him.
Dre pulled back, a half smile on his face. “Yes, and that’s why I’m here instead of there. It’s also why I didn’t call. I swear my momma can tell when something’s gone wrong just from the sound of my voice.”
He looked past his own misery. Dre was close to his whole family. What was he trying to hide? “Gone wrong?”
Dre winced and turned. There was a bandage across his left shoulder blade. “Yeah, I might have gotten shot. Is the bandage on okay? It’s hard to deal with myself.”
It looked secure. “It’s fine. How on earth did you end up getting shot?”
“The reporter I was working with was doing a story on rebels on the border of Myanmar, and we got caught in some crossfire. It wasn’t too bad. We were pulling out at the time, but I realized I left a lens behind. Brand-new one. Hadn’t even used it yet. So I sneak back in, and that’s when it happens. Now, I managed to get away even though I had a bullet lodged in my back, and the best part of all? Didn’t drop that lens,” Dre explained.
Rene felt his heart threaten to stop. “You were in a war zone and went back for the lens?”
“Oh, yeah. You know I don’t like to leave any part of Agnes behind.” Dre nodded like it was perfectly reasonable for a man to name his camera and treat it like his favorite girlfriend. The camera and the equipment that went with it were Andre’s prized possessions. “I am not Mr. Moneybags like you. I have to protect my moneymakers. Anyway, I made it back to our transport and spent a couple of nights in a hospital in Thailand. It’s almost healed up now, but do you have any idea what my mother will do if she finds out I took a bullet?”
He could imagine Marcelle would be upset, but he wasn’t sure how Dre intended to keep that from her. “She’s going to find out.”
One of Dre’s shoulders shrugged. “Probably, but it’s way better to show her a scar than a wound. A couple more days here and I won’t need the bandage, and I’ll show up on Momma’s doorstep and do all the chores she’ll have for me with a smile.”
Dre was forgetting his past. “And then she’ll know something’s wrong.”
Dre pointed his way. “Good call, brother. You’re right. I’ll complain and she’ll think everything’s normal. Do you know where Sylvie is? Talk about things not being normal. There’s no food in her fridge, and everything was dark when I got here. She usually leaves a couple of lights on. Has she finally moved into city hall?”
Rene had thought he’d been through the worst part of his day. He stood there, his brain completely blank and the stress of what he’d gone through threatening to overwhelm him. The minute he thought the word stress, guilt rose up like a snake rattling and hissing. He wasn’t supposed to get stressed. He was supposed to work better under stress, like some engine designed never to fail.
“Rene? Hey, you okay?”
He had to confess and get it all over with. “Sylvie’s at Darois House, which I’m going to lose next week. She’s there because I married her to trick my aunt into voting for me because I’m one board vote away from losing my job and any real influence I have over the company my father placed in my hands. But it’s all right because we’ve got a plan for an annulment.”
Dre stared at him. “I’m sorry. What?”
Rene ignored the question, preferring to get it all out in one long wave. “I’m here in my wife’s parish-provided house because, as my mother pointed out today, I don’t actually own anything, and every bit of money I have comes from her sufferance. Sylvie thinks I’m an asshole, and she’s right since if I’d been smart enough to know what would happen, I wouldn’t have dragged her into my nightmare. If I’d admitted how much I love her, I would have let her go sooner. I’m here tonight because I didn’t have anywhere else to go, and I figured this was the last place she would look for me.”
Dre stared at him for a long time and then turned and walked toward what looked to be the kitchen. “We’re going to need booze for this conversation. I might not have brought food with me. I’ll admit that I was going to let my sister cook, but she never has good booze so I picked up a bottle of duty-free whiskey. And the last time I was here, I hid my Xbox in Sylvie’s guest room closet because I didn’t trust Momma not to throw it out. Maybe we can drink and shoot things, and you can tell me how you married my sister and lost all your money. Damn, man. I was counting on you to be my moneybags brother-in-law someday. You know when you think about it, this loss is really about me.”