Chapter 5
Zephyr
Iwent to BBH offices on the Riverwalk reluctantly.
I didn”t want to get involved with the business side of being a Doucet, but I couldn”t say no to my brother. Blaze was now, for all practical purposes, the patriarch of the Doucet family. In any case, I”d do anything my brother and sister asked of me—no questions asked. I may do it by grumbling a shit ton, but I”d do it.
What was exacerbating my bad mood was the look that had crossed Grace”s face when I called her Gracie. She”d looked terrified for a moment there, and I hated to have caused it. I could see she liked it when I called her Little Tempest…maybe a little too much, but not Gracie. She shut right down. I wanted to pull her into a hug and tell her I”d kill all her monsters.
I was protective of the people I cared about. And no one was more surprised than me that I had such feelings for Grace.
At the masquerade ball, we”d both felt the zing. I wanted to get her under me, which wasn”t novel…I liked to get a lot of women under me, but this was somehow different. I liked sex and had a lot of it. Usually, I didn”t care who the woman was as long as she looked good and had a tight ass, stacked tits, and knew how to give head. I was simple like that.
Grace wasn”t stacked. Her ass was…firm but not ”I work out five hours a day” tight. The way she kissed me. The way she came…it all spoke volumes of her inexperience. I doubted she was proficient in the art of blow jobs. And, yet, I wanted inside her and felt protective toward her. It was new, this feeling—but I wasn”t one who ran from how I felt. That was Blaze. Gaia liked to suppress. I reveled in my emotions when they were positive. I enjoyed the hell out of them. When they were negative, I accepted them and let them flow through me. I didn”t fight how I felt. It was something I”d learned from Angela. She had such courage despite the crap life had thrown her way. She made no excuses and owned all her flaws, all her emotions, and who she was.
When I got to Rome”s office, I spent a lot of time signing papers.
”You sure you”re okay with this?” I asked him for the hundredth time.
Rome leaned back in his chair. ”Why wouldn”t I be?”
”You”re selling away your shares to Blaze and now me. You”re going to go from owning sixty percent of the business to half that.”
Rome had sold Blaze twenty percent and me ten.
”I also gave ten percent to Gaia,” he reminded me.
”And you don”t care?”
”Je m”en fiche.” I don”t give a damn. ”Y”all are family, oui?”
Rome and I were the closest friends, he was sometimes more of a brother to me than Blaze. I loved him as I did my siblings, as I did Angela.
”You”ve changed,” I told him.
”Oui?”
”Come on, cher. Never known you to not give a damn about money.”
He grinned. ”I got money.”
”I know. But you always wanted more.”
”I got the love of my life; I got everything I could ever want, even if I had no money.” It should”ve sounded sappy, but it didn”t. It was real. Gaia and Rome had always been soulmates and after a decade of being apart, they”d found each other again. I”d never seen either of them happier.
”But,” he continued, ”I am also running a very successful VC company and an almost clean logistics one, so…I”m the most content motherfucker I know.”
Rome was still a partner at his tech venture capital company ICeR while he ran BBH as CEO and President.
”Merdé, Rome, you sound like a fuckin” romantic,” I mocked.
”Yeah? Can you tell Gaia? She says I”m not romantic enough.”
”No, she does not,” I countered.
My sister had always loved Rome and didn”t have one bad thing to say about him. They were the couple that didn”t fight; maybe she pushed back once in a while because Rome could be a dominating asshole—but he just had to call her Calla Lily, and she melted. She had the same power over him.
Now, my brother Blaze and his future wife, Nick, could have some seriously loud fights, followed by, as he indicated, fabulous makeup sex. Again, not something I needed to picture.
The two men I loved the most in my life were so fucking content that it made my teeth hurt. I was happy for them. Ridiculously so. I searched within myself to see if I wanted what they had and realized I didn”t. I had never fallen in love. Ever. I didn”t want to either. Relationships were hard, and I didn”t care to do that kind of heavy lifting. I liked my life the way it was. I loved my life the way it was, except for this BBH nonsense.
Blaze came into Rome”s office with Henri and looked like a thundercloud.
”He signed the papers?” he demanded.
”Oui.” Rome looked at my brother intently. ”All okay?”
Henri slumped down on one of the chairs while Blaze walked up to the bar in Rome”s office. He poured himself a shot of whiskey and downed it.
”Anyone want to fill us in on why you both look like someone snatched the last crawfish outta your boil?” I looked from Blaze to Henri.
”Camille is still missing,” Henri declared.
”And the bitch is alive,” Blaze added. ”We see activity on her account, but we can”t see where she”s accessing it from.”
”So, she”s in hiding?” Rome wondered and shook his head when Blaze held up the bottle of whiskey.
Blaze poured himself and Henri a drink. I declined as well. It was happy hour somewhere but not in N”awlins, and my alcohol tolerance wasn”t as good as my brother”s. I was playing at Jazz Sessions tonight, and I preferred to do that sober.
”Any news from your ADA?” Blaze asked.
”I talked to Josh,” I revealed. I”d stopped by his office after my little tête-à-tête with Grace. ”ADA Carta is going to put together a task force and run point on it.”
”I don”t like this,” Henri interjected. ”I don”t know why we”re doing this. The business is clean now. The Feds have cleared us in record-fucking-time. We should focus on growing the business, and not this other nonsense.”
”Henri, someone is tryin” to kill us,” I reminded him.
He sighed. ”I just think since we cleaned up BBH, we don”t have anything to worry about. We”ve cut ties with the dubious parts of the business.”
”Alina Volkov approached Blaze a week ago, Henri. We can cut all ties with them, but I don”t think they”re ready to let go. We don”t know who else in the company could be dirty.” Henri”s reluctance surprised me. I”d have thought he”d be the one gung-ho on catching the assholes who were trying to kill the Doucets, had killed our cousin, Yves.
He ran a hand through his hair. ”Yeah, you”re right. I”m just…tired. Maybe I need to retire.”
Blaze looked at me, and I smiled. My brother had been anticipating this and was planning to become the in-house counsel for the company. Even though he hated the corporate bullshit as much as I did, his need to build the Doucet legacy and maintain it for the future superseded his hate for conference calls and meetings.
”As long as you do a proper handover and remain a consultant,” Blaze commented.
Henri chuckled. ”Well, I ain”t ready to go yet. We need to sort this shit out, and then we can see.”
The sun dipped low on the horizon, painting the sky in hues of orange and purple as Blaze and I left the BBH office building, its glass fa?ade reflecting the twilight. The Riverwalk was bustling, alive with the early evening pulse of the city waking up to its nocturnal promise.
My band was playing at Jazz Sessions, and since Nick and her partner Ash tended to come here after their shift, Blaze spent his evenings at the bar as well. He was recovering from a recent gunshot wound to the chest, which he unfortunately received while he was playing his sax on the stage at Jazz Sessions, so he did play but tired quickly.
My brother had always been larger than life, and it fucking gutted me to see him go down. I”d been so scared I”d lose him. But nothing kept Blaze Doucet down—he bounced right back up, put a ring on his girl”s finger, and was now working with Rome to save the family business.
Rome would join us later at Jazz Sessions as he had some calls to make. Since Gaia worked the bar, Rome was there most evenings, keeping his wife company—and snarling at tourists who hit on her. The locals didn”t do that shit anymore. They knew better.
”You have an idea where Camille is?” I asked Blaze.
The air was thick with the scent of life: a mix of the Mississippi”s fresh-water tinge, mingling with the rich aromas of Creole and Cajun spices that seemed to waft from every direction. Street vendors added to the olfactory tapestry, grilling and frying. The sizzling sound of seafood hitting the pan mixed with the laughter and chatter of the evening crowd, created a symphony of city life.
”I think so,” Blaze said.
”Why didn”t you say anything? You protecting her?”
Blaze snorted. ”Je déteste cette salope.” I hate that bitch. ”She wants to stay hidden. I”m gonna let her until we know for sure Grandpère was murdered. She could be lying her ass off.”
”Nick knows?”
”Yeah.”
We turned onto Charteris Street, where Jazz Sessions was, and the ambiance shifted subtly. The historical fa?ades of buildings, their intricate ironwork balconies shadowed now, spoke of ages past, standing as silent witnesses to the city”s ever-changing story.
Our bar had slowly become a gourmet jazz destination—and as one of the popular tourist sites said: A gem tucked away on Charteris, its warm glow inviting, and the soft murmur of music escaping through its open doors charming.
Jazz was my area of expertise, but the rest was all Gaia. She”d stolen Chef Maurice from Little Antoines. He served modern interpretations of Cajun/Creole cuisine. Thanks to him we were listed in all the top ten places to listen to jazz and eat in New Orleans and were even graced with the lofty Bib Gourmand status.
Gaia had also made sure Jazz Sessions was one of the top bars to visit in the Quarter with innovative cocktails and the traditional shit that everyone loved. Blaze had been a silent partner since we bought the place and would continue to be so. But we owed Gaia for our success—it was going to suck when she finished business school and went to work at BBH. I knew that Rome hoped that sooner than later, she would be ready to take his job. His plan, he had told me, was to cut down on work once they had kids so he could play daddy and let his wife bring home the bacon. I”d never thought I”d see the day that Rome Decuir would want to be a house husband, but when you prioritize people you love over things like money and ego, I think you live a better life.
That was how I lived my life, which was why I”d been happy to take my money by selling my shares of BBH to my grandfather and invest a good amount of it into Jazz Sessions, and the rest was secured over a portfolio that gave me a steady income. When I had to shell money for my ten percent of BBH, it hadn”t hurt financially because, thanks to Blaze, who gave a shit about this stuff, I”d invested my trust fund and BBH sale money well.
”I”m surprised Nick isn”t dragging Camille kicking and screaming to NOPD HQ.”
”We have an agreement. She tells me stuff only if it fucks with the family—and I tell her everything. It pisses her off because she has to balance what she can and cannot reveal at work. But I told her that was her problem.”
”You”re just all heart, big brother,” I mocked.
”That”s what I think. She isn”t pleased with the setup. In any case, I”m hoping she”ll go back to the FBI, and this local stuff won”t matter,” he mentioned and surprised me.
Nick had survived horrors that no one should have while she”d been working undercover in the FBI. I couldn”t imagine why Blaze would want her to go back.
Noticing my confusion, he shrugged. ”She needs to deal with the man who hurt her. She can”t do that at NOPD. Once she”s strong enough in the head, she”ll go back and take him down.”
”And you”re okay with that?”
Blaze was an overprotective jerk. He”d tried to put someone on Nick to protect her, and if she”d ever found out, she”d have put his balls in a blender. She was a cop, and her work would always be high risk.
”She”s got to deal with the man who hurt her,” he repeated. ”That”s the only way she”ll heal completely. And she”ll be ready. I”m making sure of it.”
Relationships worked in different ways I knew. Nick and Blaze had a completely different relationship than Rome and Gaia. I wondered if I”d ever have that with anyone and if I ever did, because I wasn”t fatalistic about relationships, what my equation with this person would be like.
Grace Carta”s face flashed in my head at that moment. Not the teenager I used to know, but the sleek and elegant woman she”d become, albeit with a stick way up her ass.
Grace and I could have fun if we hooked up; I was sure of that. But it wouldn”t be more than that. She was too staid for me. I wanted to get past that shell and show her a good time—and enjoy that tight body of hers, but we were too different to ever be in a relationship. Maybe we could become friends. I”d like that, I thought. I liked her. She wasn”t my type, but she intrigued me. She could be so fucking awkward but still warm and brave.
She”d been nervous but she showed up, nevertheless, for Gaia and Rome”s party because Blaze invited her. Nick found her relatable because she wore different masks at different times like Grace—and Gaia found her endearing.
Blaze thought she was a spitfire. He liked her a lot. As did I. When she let loose, man, she was formidable and tempestuous. She was layered—an intriguing combination of kindness, gaucheness, and the ability to strike back hard. That was why I”d started to call her Little Tempest.
Initially, it pissed her off, but now I think she liked it. I definitely did. I wonder how much of a tempest she”d be in bed.
Blaze and I walked steadily; the cobblestones underfoot added a rhythmic clack to our steps, an unintentional accompaniment to the distant melodies of the Quarter. The streetlights, flickering to life, cast a soft, golden hue, guiding us and fellow night-seekers toward the promise of music, of connection.
We heard a saxophone”s wail, a piano”s melody, the steady heartbeat of a bass. It was the language of the city, spoken in notes and rhythm.
Around us, the evening unfurled in full vibrancy—windows lit up, laughter spilling out into the streets, and the clinking of glasses. The scent of brewing coffee and baked pastries mingled with the heavier, savory notes of dinner being served in nearby restaurants.
”I”m impressed that you”d let Nick do something dangerous.” It was still a shock for me that Blaze wanted her to work in organized crime at the FBI when it almost killed her the last time.
Blaze laughed gruffly. ”Let her? Fuck, Z, she does what she wants. I just want to be there for her, hold her hand, her gun…whatever she needs.”
”You love her,” I said simply.
Blaze smiled big. ”Yeah, man, and it”s fuckin” awesome.”