Chapter Thirteen
Xander
The second I reached the confectionery, I realized that I could’ve gotten the whole family here to help and we would still be here for hours. It wasn’t just a branch that fell off—the whole tree sort of disintegrated. I knew for a fact that the place had an inspection a few months ago, inside and out, so this was a little alarming. There were huge tire tracks, probably from the firefighters. A window was smashed in too. At least the roof was untouched.
Normally, all I’d think about was the financial impact in a situation like this. But oddly enough, my only concern was for Bailey and how I could help her. Thank God she was physically okay.
I walked inside to a cacophony of sounds. Everyone was inside the storage room, cleaning: Bailey, Avery, and two guys.
“Hello,” I called to announce my presence.
Bailey immediately straightened up. “Xander!”
Avery spun around too. They both looked exhausted.
“I’m here to help out,” I told them. “Beckett will be here soon. Possibly Anthony and Zachary too.”
I turned to the two guys, who looked really young. They seemed to be in their early twenties. “I’m Xander LeBlanc.”
“Hi, sir. Such an honor to meet you,” one of them said. “I’d shake your hand, but I’m covered in dust and debris.”
“Don’t worry about it. What do you need me to do?” I asked.
“We have a lot of shelves here, and the branch fell right through the window, completely smashing them,” Bailey explained.
“We’re trying to gauge which shelves we can reuse,” the second guy said.
“And if any of the big boxes have intact praline boxes inside,” Avery added. Now that she mentioned them, I noticed five huge carton boxes under the window. “But first we need to clean this out properly.”
“Do you know how to clean?” Bailey asked. It was such an honest question that I couldn’t help but burst out laughing.
“As a matter of fact, I do.”
“Then I’m going to bring another broom for you.”
“I’ll come with you and get it.”
Avery turned to the guys. “Let’s continue where we left off.”
Bailey stepped in front of me, walking toward the back.
“Bailey,” I said, grabbing her arm and slightly turning her around. “Are you okay? You seem on edge.”
She slumped her shoulders. “It’s just been a long day. But we’ll be done soon.” She was starting to shake lightly. “I’m just a bit tired. If we don’t finish today...”
“Bailey.” I cupped her face with both hands, tilting her head up. “We will finish—”
“Because I have a lot of deliveries tomorrow.”
“I can have someone else do the deliveries,” I assured her.
“But that’s the thing. I actually like doing the deliveries. People expect me to be in some places.”
She was working herself into a frenzy again, so I tilted her head up even more and leaned closer. “If you don’t stop, I’ll kiss you.”
She blinked and started to laugh. “Why would you do that?
“To take your mind off it.”
She smiled. “Oh, you’re good. It really would. I mean, look at this. Simply mentioning it made me forget about everything for a split second.”
“Listen to me. We’ll figure out the details, okay? If we don’t manage to finish the cleanup tonight, you and Avery don’t have to coordinate everything on your own.”
“But we’ve always done that. I know it’s part of the Orleans Conglomerate, but it just never mattered before.”
“This is an emergency, so things are different.”
“We’ve had emergencies in the past.” Her tone was playful, as were her eyes.
“But I didn’t know about it.” Then I growled, leaning closer. “I didn’t know you.”
“Hm. So, you’d be doing this as a special favor?” she murmured, looking at my lips.
“I just don’t want to see you out of sorts,” I admitted.
She swallowed hard. I nearly kissed her, but then my brothers’ unmistakable voices filtered in.
“Hi,” Beckett said. “I’m Beckett. This is Anthony and Zachary. We’re Xander’s brothers.”
I took in a deep breath and stepped back. What is wrong with me?
“We’re going to need more brooms,” I said.
“Let’s go to the supply room.”
She seemed more at ease as we got the brooms and other cleaning supplies. Her shoulders were no longer up to her ears, and her frown wasn’t as deep. I’d made progress. And yet all I wanted was to take her home and make sure she was okay.
But first things first: we had to clean up.
“Fancy seeing you already here, brother,” Zachary said. He looked between me and Bailey, and I knew he’d already figured it out. My brother was intuitive that way. “Avery already instructed us on cleaning this place as well as possible.”
“We’ll do our very best,” Beckett added.
“It’s not my strong suit,” Anthony confessed. “But as my brother pointed out, we LeBlancs always give our best.”
Zachary looked at the two of them. “When you clean, steer clear of any shards or sharp edges.”
I was glad he was here. Zachary was really good in emergencies.
Once everyone had a designated task, we jumped into the fray. Thankfully, with all of us helping, we finished much quicker than I’d thought.
“Zachary, you’ve got mad organizational skills,” Avery said a few hours later, once the room looked decent again.
“Thanks. The joke in the family is that when there’s an emergency, everyone wants me in charge.”
“That’s something we always say to each other. I didn’t know you actually knew,” I told him.
“Unlike you, brother,” Beckett cut in, “the rest of us don’t keep secrets from one another. We say exactly what we think.”
Beckett and Anthony always marched to the beat of their own drum.
“Your kitchen and ovens are untouched, right?” Beckett asked, slipping into business mode as he addressed Bailey and Avery.
“I believe so,” Bailey replied.
“Well, if not, we can always try and accommodate everything in our bakeries,” Beckett went on. “My team can contact you tomorrow.”
That gave me an idea. Beckett was running the bakeries section of the Orleans Conglomerate. They could take over the praline business too. I would have to actually run some numbers before I brought the idea to my brother, though. But it had merits.
“Thanks for the offer, but I don’t think it’s necessary,” Bailey told him.
“It’s best if we just call it a night, don’t you think?” Avery said.
“I think that’s a good idea,” Bailey agreed. “Guys, how can we thank you?”
“I want pralines,” Anthony said. Zachary and Beckett nodded too.
Bailey grabbed boxes from the untouched shelves, handing one to each of them.
Anthony immediately ate two. “I always forget how good these are.” Then he pointed at me and said, “Don’t you dare shut this down. I don’t want LeBlanc & Broussard pralines to stop existing.”
The mood instantly changed. Anthony usually had the best sense of humor, but clearly he was exhausted. He looked once around the room and cleared his throat. “I saw this joke going differently. I take it back.”
“Yeah, that’s not going to work,” Beckett replied. Uncharacteristically for him, he sounded a bit pissed.
“We’re all tired,” Zachary concluded. “I think it’s best that we leave before someone makes things even more awkward.” He looked pointedly at Anthony. Whenever Zachary was present, he read the room and took care of things. Most of the time, I didn’t even have to pull out the big brother card.
“All right, everyone, let’s move,” I said.
As we all prepared to leave the building, Avery told Bailey, “I’ll drop you off.” Glancing at me, she added, “We came with one car today.”
“I’ll take Bailey home,” I said without further ado.
Both sisters looked at me in unison.
“You will?” Bailey asked in wonder. Thankfully, my brothers were far enough away that they couldn’t hear the conversation.
Avery just laughed and said, “Hey, it’s your call. But your house really is out of my way.” Clearly she was fighting laughter.
Even though I had no idea where Avery lived, even I knew that was a poor excuse.
“Riiight.” Now Bailey was openly laughing. “And I’m sure it’s totally on Xander’s way.”
“I’ll take care of Bailey.” I put an arm around her shoulders.
Avery seemed to relax, and she smiled at us. “Have a good evening. And thanks a lot for coming here with your brothers.”
Once everyone left, Bailey locked up, and I led her to my car.
After we got in, I asked, “Are you hungry?”
“You didn’t see me stuffing my face with pralines when we were working?”
“No. When did you even do that?”
She winked. “I can be sneaky if I want.”
“But you didn’t have to be.”
She shrugged. “Are you hungry?”
“No, I’m good.”
“How was your evening with Bella?”
“You really want to talk about that?”
“Yes, please. Just take my mind off everything.”
I grinned at her. “I still have a better idea about how to do that.”
“Yeah, but you can’t kiss and drive, okay? So start with a story about your beignet date.”
On the drive to her house, I told her about my conversation with Bella—leaving out the part where she asked me if I wanted to move in with someone. But I did tell her about Bella’s question about Scarlett.
“Oh, that sweet girl,” Bailey said as we neared her house. “It must be hard to have such a strange relationship with your own mom. I can’t imagine.”
“You’re close to yours?” I asked.
“Yes, very. She and Dad were always there for us. They worked a lot, but we didn’t feel abandoned in any way, or like they didn’t care about us.”
She’d picked that up about Sarah from the little I’d told her. It still bugged me how nonchalant she was about her own daughter. At least it was good to know I wasn’t being overly judgmental when it came to her.
“I can’t believe we’re here already,” Bailey said.
“Yep. Your Uber driver got you here as fast as possible.” When I turned off the engine, I got out of the car at the same time as she did and walked with her to her front door.
“Want to come in?” she asked.
I swallowed hard.
Every fiber of my being wanted to go inside with her. I’d been obsessing about it for the past few hours, but I knew it wasn’t a good idea.
“Not smart.”
“Oh, right.” She laughed nervously, turning around. “My bad, sorry. I’ll just go in.”
“Bailey.”
She stopped in the act of jutting the key into her door. I put a hand on her waist—I fucking needed the contact—and brought my mouth to her ear. “It’s not because I don’t want to.”
“Isn’t it?” she whispered.
“No. All I want to do is...” I pressed my fingers into her waist, leaning my forehead against the side of her head. “It’s you. Being alone with you.”
I exhaled sharply, taking a step back. She turned to face me, licking her lips.
With a growl, I kissed her. Fucking hell, how I needed her lips. She sighed in surprise but opened up instantly. Then I couldn’t hold back. I needed to explore her so fucking much. I wanted to make her moan right here on her front porch. I deepened the kiss, moving her until her back was flat against the entrance door. I felt both her hands on my chest, then moving upward until they finally rested on my shoulders. She hummed, and I drank up every sound, every reaction. I pulled her even closer, resting my hands on her hips. She whimpered when I pressed her against the zipper of my pants. I was semihard, and she could feel it.
Groaning, I took a step back. “You taste delicious.”
Bailey covered her mouth with her hand, giggling. “This was unexpected.” On a sigh, she added, “Xander, look, I know what I said yesterday, but I’m... God, I’m so confused.”
Confused . I didn’t like the sound of that. I didn’t want to take advantage of her.
“And now with the Christmas season going on,” she continued, “I have so much to do.”
That gave me an idea. Thanksgiving was coming soon, and after that, the Réveillon dinners started.
“I have a proposition for you.”
She interlaced her hands, looking at me apprehensively. “Yes?”
“Let’s go to a Réveillon dinner.”
“Ohhh, I haven’t been to one in years. Our parents took us when I was in high school.”
“Then that’s settled. I’ll make arrangements.”
“But why?”
“So we can discuss everything that’s confusing you.”
Of course I couldn’t keep my distance, so I took two steps toward her.
“You think that needs an entire dinner?” she asked.
“Yes. We can debate every point very thoroughly,” I pointed out.
Her eyes widened a bit. “Okay. I’ll make a list of everything that confuses me.”
I frowned. “There are so many things, you need a list?”
She looked down at her feet and then back up. “I’m not sure.”
“Then think of everything because I want you to be damn sure.”
She shuddered. “Will it be at LeBlanc & Broussard?”
“No. I like to support the family business when I can, but there are too many eyes and ears there.”
She threw her head back, laughing, and then straightened up. “With all your brothers owning half the Quarter, I don’t think any place is safe.”
“I’ll find something,” I assured her.
“Okay, then, I’ll wait for your text.”
“Sure. Enjoy Thanksgiving.”
“And you,” she replied.