“And these fishermen came to you?” she inquired skeptically. “The Swamp Solicitor?” She saw him bristle at that appellation. Heck, she would have thought he relished the nickname. “Don’t get your nose out of joint. I apologize if I was offensive, but you must admit you’ve gone out of your way to earn a reputation for being a loose legal cannon on some occasions.”
“Some apology!” He was leaning against the wall, his long legs crossed at the ankles, gazing at her with amusement.
She exhaled with disgust. Talking with Luc LeDeux was like talking to flypaper—always had been; you never knew what was going to stick. “If a nutball, born-to-lose legal case comes up in Louisiana, you’re sure to be handling it… in your own slightly underhanded, not-quite-legal, not-quite-illegal manner.”
“Hey, why don’t you say what you really think, Sylv?” His eyes continually swept Sylvie’s body as he talked.
“Why me?” she asked.
“I need someone totally disassociated from the oil companies or the government. Someone whose opinion can be trusted.”
“And you trust me?”
He hesitated, then nodded. “I think you’d castrate me with a spoon if I blew in your ear, but on a nonpersonal level, yeah, I suspect you’re honest to the bone.”
She refused to succumb to that faint praise, even though it did strike an unexpected spark of pleasure in her. “Bottom line, buster. You’re nuts if you think I’m going to get involved in a dispute with the government, Cypress Oil, a bunch of Cajun fishermen, and your”—she shuddered—”father.” She stooped down, her behind deliberately pointing in the opposite direction from Luc, and began to pick up her papers.
When she stood, he was still standing there. Obviously, the jerk couldn’t take a hint. She turned her back on him, and began to tuck the papers into folders inside her open briefcase.
“Hey, these are great,” Luc commented idly.
She decided to ignore him, even though he was probably observing her lab rats. I refuse to let him ruin my wonderful day. I refuse to let him ruin my wonderful day. I refuse—
“Are they Jelly Bellies?”
—to let him ruin… What?… What did he say? Eek! Chills erupted over Sylvie’s skin. “Wh-what?” she squeaked out, spinning on her heel.
Oh, my God!
Luc was tossing jelly beans up into the air, one at a time, like peanuts, and catching them in his mouth. She looked quickly at the petri dish at the other end of the table. It was only half full.
Oh, my God!
The bayou bad boy had just scarfed down a double dose of her love potion jelly beans.
“Sylv?” Luc asked with concern. “Your face is turning purple. You having a fit, or something?”
Her scream was probably heard all the way to Lake Pontchartrain.
Luc hit the side of his head with the heel of his hand—one, two, three times—to clear the ringing.
“You ate my jelly beans,” she said accusingly. “Without even asking.”
‘Well, ex-cuuuuse my poor manners. I’m just a clumsy ol’ swamp rat. We don’t have no hoity-toity Emily Post down on the bayou to teach us low-down Cajuns proper etiquette.”
“You fool! You idiot! You crude, rude, stupid oaf!”
“Boy, talk about overreacting! It’s not as if I stole your car… or your virginity.”
“Aaarrgh!” She was yanking at her own hair.
Sylvie Fontaine always had been a high-strung holier-than-thou paragon, Luc knew, just like the other cold-blooded Ice Breaux broads in her family. Maybe all those years of suppressing emotions had caused her to snap. Weren’t there rumors that some of her ancestors had dabbled in voodoo? She sure was acting crazy. “Don’t get your knickers in a twist, darlin’,” he said with as much compassion as he could muster. “I’ll pay you for the lousy candy… wh-what?”
Sylvie was approaching him with clawed hands.
He backed up slightly, hitting a utility sink. Hey, compassion only went so far. Sylvie was beginning to look like Bette Davis in Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? Right down to the bulging eyeballs. Even her hair, which had been tucked into a neat, single braid down her back, was coming undone. With strength he never would have suspected she had, Sylvie shoved him around and forward so that he bent over the sink.