“I’m so glad you’re here!” Paige Asher told him for the third time as he took his first bite of the gumbo.
Wow. That was good.
“Me too. It’s about time.”
“It really is.”
Paige was from Appleby and Drew had known her forever. She was quite a bit younger than him, but he knew her sister Jocelyn well.
Mitch was a great guy. Easy-going, funny, quick with a grin, and no filter when it came to giving his family a hard time. A trait that seemed to be genetic.
Drew was seated at a table toward the back of the bar and was surrounded by the Landry family and their significant others.
The table was actually one of a group of about three tables that were needed to hold all of the people that now comprised this side of Paige’s family. She and Mitch weren’t married yet, but it was clear this was where Paige was staying and that she loved these people with all her heart. And vice versa.
It was also clear that the Landry clan gathering in Ellie's bar was a daily occurrence. They’d all settled into chairs as if they had usual spots and Ellie—the owner of the establishment and the matriarch of the family—along with her husband, Leo, and her best friend, Cora, started serving up platters, plates, and bowls of food to the group without even asking what everyone wanted.
It was every bit a family dinner around their grandmother’s table—except that “grandma’s house” was a bar and the rest of the room was filled with a bunch of other people. Many apparently lived here in Autre, but some were obviously tourists.
The room was definitely not a typical grandmotherly kitchen either. The bar/restaurant was one big, rectangular building with a long, scarred wooden bar running along the length of one wall. A swinging door that led to the kitchen was the only thing that cut into the wall behind the bar. The rest of the room was filled with mismatched tables and chairs and the walls were covered in a plethora of items from posters to banners to photographs. The photos ran the gamut from old photographs of the town and bayou to pictures of people doing things like fishing, dancing, playing ball, or just grinning for the camera. Every person in the group gathered around the tables with Drew right now was represented in those photos. Multiple times. Even Paige.
Ellie’s flock was loud and rowdy, but they spent most of their time laughing. Everyone had greeted and welcomed him as Paige made the introductions one by one, but no one seemed to give much thought to minding their manners or toning things down for the dinner guest. He felt like one of the gang immediately.
He was sitting between Paige and Mitch's cousin Kennedy, the mayor of Autre. Kennedy couldn't have been more than twenty-seven or twenty-eight, if that, but she apparently ran the town. It also became fairly clear fairly quickly that she ran this group of people. As much as anyone did, anyway.
“Well, I made my decision about who's going to be Santa at Santa's Village,” Kennedy announced to the table at large.
It was miraculous that anyone could hear her over everyone else talking but it seemed that her announcement was important enough that they all immediately quieted and turned to look at her.
“We haven't even given you our pitches yet,” Zeke, one of the cousins, protested.
He sat forward in his chair quickly and the baby he held propped on his shoulder squirmed and grunted. Zeke patted the tiny back reassuringly. How a baby could sleep through all the noise in this place, Drew didn’t know, but he supposed this one, and her twin, were used to it. Jill sat next to Zeke, holding the other baby. Drew didn’t know which was which, but Paige had told him during introductions the twins were Poppy and Allie and were just a couple of months old.
Drew was grateful that he was naturally very good with names and faces. When Paige had done the introductions, most of them had stuck.
“Pitches?” Kennedy said. “All y'all had to do was tell me that you were interested. I know you all well enough to pick the best Santa.”
“No way,” Owen said. “We've been talking about this for the last three days over breakfast.”
“You’ve all been arguin’,” Ellie corrected, as she leaned in to set a basket of what looked like sweet potato fries on the table. “They’ve all got their ideas about why they’d be best, as usual,” she told Kennedy.
Kennedy rolled her eyes. “I’m sure.” Then she narrowed her eyes at Owen. “I don’t remember seeing your name on the list of potential candidates.”
“Like I needed to sign up.” Owen scoffed. “I'd be the best damn Santa ever.”
“You are not a candidate for Santa,” Kennedy informed him.
“Why not?”
“You’ve been disqualified.”
“Since when?”
“Since December 25th at 3 a.m. when I was ten.”
Owen’s eyes widened. Then narrowed. Then he gave a heavy sigh. “Why do you get to decide?”
Okay, so there was a story there. Drew looked around. Did everyone else know the story? Because he wanted to know it. With a stupid amount of curiosity considering he’d just met these people.
“Because I’m the mayor,” Kennedy said.
“This is a Boys of the Bayou Gone Wild thing, not a town thing. You shouldn’t get to decide.”
Kennedy looked at Charlie, who was in charge of marketing at Boys of the Bayou Gone Wild, then at Sawyer, who Drew knew was not just the majority owner in the company but also Kennedy’s older brother.
“Can I pick the Santa?” she asked.
Sawyer nodded. “Sure.”
“You bet,” Charlie agreed.
Owen frowned. “Seriously?” he asked Sawyer.
Sawyer shrugged. “She’s my baby sister. There’s only one woman who gets what she wants more often with me than Kennedy.” He gave Juliet, his wife, a little squeeze.
Ellie cleared her throat. “Excuse me?”
Sawyer grinned at his grandmother. “Two other women. And don’t tell my mom I said that.”
“Oh your mama knows that Kennedy’s had you wrapped around her pinky finger since she came home from the hospital, grinned at you, then spit up all over your favorite shoes,” Ellie said. She gave her oldest grandson a smile. “And you’d throw me off an airboat without a second thought if it came down to me or her.”
Sawyer didn’t deny it. No one did.
“Only because he knows I’d be jumpin’ right in after ya,” Leo told Ellie, wrapping his arms around her from behind.
“Sure,” Ellie said. “As soon as you were certain Sawyer had Miss Kennedy safe and sound.”
Kennedy gave her grandfather a dazzling smile and he winked at her from behind Ellie, where her grandma couldn’t see it.
“Yeah, well, she’s using this as revenge against me,” Owen protested.
“You deserve it,” Sawyer informed him.
“It was fifteen years ago.”
“It was seventeen years ago,” Kennedy told him.
“Not that you’re keeping track,” Owen muttered, with an eyeroll.
“Oh, I am most definitely keeping track.”
Owen slumped back in his chair. “You’re a brat.”
Kennedy’s husband, Bennett, simply snorted at that.
Kennedy leaned in, resting one arm on the table. With the other, she pointed an index finger at Owen. “I'm completely serious. I have not forgotten, nor have I forgiven, and since I have a position of some authority around here, I refuse to reward you with a chance to be Santa. Ever.”