Bayou Angel Read online

  Praise for Sandra Hill’s Cajun Novels

  “The action is fast, and the love scenes are wonderful…Do yourself a favor and pick up this very funny book. Then write to Sandra Hill and demand sequels.”

  —All About Romance on The Love Potion

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  “If you like your romances hot and spicy and your men the same way, then you will like Tall, Dark, and Cajun...Eccentric characters, witty dialogue, humorous situations...and hot romance...[Hill] perfectly captures the bayou’s mystique and makes it come to life.”

  —RomRevToday.com on Tall, Dark, and Cajun, a USA Today bestseller and named as one of the Top 10 Romances of 2004 by Amazon and Booklist

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  “Hill will tickle readers’ funny bones yet again as she writes in her trademark sexy style. A real crowd-pleaser, guar-an-teed.”

  —Booklist (starred review, on The Cajun Cowboy)

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  “Hill’s thigh-slapping humor and thoughtful look at the endangered Louisiana bayou ecosystem turn this into an engaging read.”

  —Publishers Weekly, on The Red-Hot Cajun

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  “4 Stars! A hoot and a half! Snappy dialogue and outrageous characters keep the tempo lively and the humor infectious in this crazy adventure story. Hill is a master at taking outlandish situations and making them laugh-out-loud funny.”

  —Romantic Times BOOKreviews Magazine on Pink Jinx, a USA Today bestseller

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  “The riotous cast of characters...will keep you laughing from cover to cover...passionate encounters keep the sexual tension at a steady boil. The outlandish adventures of this wacky, wonderful family will make you wish you lived on the bayou!”

  —FreshFiction.com, on Wild Jinx, a New York Times bestseller and one of Booklist’s Top Ten Romances of 2008

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  “Hill offers fun stories with lots of local color and sexual attraction.”

  —The Houma, Louisiana “Advertiser” on So Into You (retitled Bayou Angel)

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  “With Sandra Hill you'll be laughing out loud at one moment and crying the next. But most of all you'll be smiling as her books just wrap themselves around your heart. Yes, these stories are like taking happy pills and Snow on the Bayou is one of the sweetest medicines around.”

  — FabFantasyFiction.com on Snow on the Bayou

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  ‘Sandra Hill will have readers laughing — and crying! — through the bayous of her latest Cajun novel. Thanks to her witty metaphor-galore dialogue, eclectic characters and massive pet menagerie, she’ll have her audience craving sweet tea and a trip to the south in no time.”

  — Romantic Times BOOKreviews Magazine on The Cajun Doctor

  Bayou Angel

  Cajun Series, Book 8

  Sandra Hill

  Copyright © 2009, 2017 by Sandra Hill

  Originally published as So Into You

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  eBook ISBN: 978-1-941528-47-1

  Print ISBN: 978-1-941528-48-8

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  Publisher: Parker Hayden Media

  Imprint: Sandra Hill Books

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons (living or dead), events or locations is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

  Art credits:

  Cover Design: LB Hayden

  Cover model: Innervision/DepositPhotos

  Background: Alkestida/DepositPhotos

  This book is dedicated to all those hurricane and environmental disaster survivors who struggle to regain their old lives. Tante Lulu recognized your bravery and needs in this book by establishing a new foundation. While her charity is a fictitious one, there are plenty of good ones out there.

  And this book is dedicated to my husband Robert C. Hill who has led and aided many a charitable endeavor in our region. His generous spirit inspires us all.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Tante Lulu’s Seafood Étouffée

  Reader Letter

  About the Author

  Also by Sandra Hill

  Chapter 1

  The angel was wild tonight...

  Angel Sabato stood at the edge of the dance floor like a dunce, shaking in his thousand-dollar Tres Outlaws boots as he watched the redhead shake her booty to the beat of “Wild Thing.” For an ex-nun, she sure had moves.

  Ironically, he was the one feeling wild. His hands were clammy, his heart was thumping—da dump, da dump, da dump—and, truth to tell, he was scared spitless. Tonight was going to be the night. Do-or-die time.

  It was ridiculous, really. He was thirty-four years old. He’d been around the block so many times there were probably street signs named after him. At the least, his “tread marks” were notorious. Shyness wasn’t even in his vocabulary. After all, he was the dick-for-brains who’d once bared it all for Playgirl magazine.

  Just then the redhead in question, Grace O’Brien, noticed him and smiled widely, crooking a forefinger for him to come out and join her.

  Not a chance.

  It wasn’t dancing he had on his mind.

  She said something to her partner, one of the young LeDeuxs...a freshman at LSU. Then she left the kid behind and snaked a slow, sensuous boogie toward him, her twinkling green eyes holding his the entire time, her arms held out in front of her, fingers beckoning. She must be half plastered or, more likely, in a teasing mood.

  He was not in the mood for teasing.

  “Yo, matey,” she drawled at him.

  This was the tail end of the Pirate Ball. It was being held here in Houma, Louisiana, to celebrate the successful search by Jinx, Inc., a treasure-hunting company, for Jean Lafitte’s hidden gold. Thus the silly pirate talk. Not to mention silly pirate costumes.

  He and Grace had worked on the Jinx team’s Pirate Project these past weeks. Before that they’d been professional poker players. And before that, Grace had been a nun, and he had been in the navy, then construction, and...well, a lot of things.

  She was dancing around him now, dressed in a saucy tavern-wench costume with a jagged knee-length hem, while he was in a puffy shirt tied with a red sash. Jerry Seinfeld would be so proud of me.

  When he pretended to ignore her sexy dancing, she grabbed his upper arm and attempted to tug him forward. Being about seventy-five pounds heavier at six-foot-one to her measly five-foot-five, he was pretty much immovable.

  She put her hands on her hips and glared at him. “Come out here and shake a peg leg, you randy buccaneer.”

  He had to grin at that. “Who says I’m randy?”

  “You’re always randy.”

  “And you know this...how?”

  “All the satisfied smiles I’ve seen on women exiting your revolving bedroom door the past ten years.”

  “You noticed?”

  “Stop changing the subject. I wa
nna dance.”

  “Are you blitzed?” he asked with a laugh.

  “Just a little,” she slurred.

  Luckily, the DJ changed the music to a different pace. Now Mariah Carey was urging “Touch My Body.”

  He opened his arms to Grace and adjusted her so that her arms were around his neck and his hands were linked behind her waist, just above her butt. And yes, Mariah, he had touching in mind. Touching Grace.

  “I’m flying back to Jersey early tomorrow morning. I need to talk to you,” he said into her hair, which smelled like apples, or was it peaches? Some kind of frickin’ fruit, anyway.

  “Uh-huh. I’m listening,” she replied, definitely not listening as she nuzzled her face into the crook of his neck, inadvertently pressing her belly against the crotch of his tights.

  Yeah, he was wearing XXX-sized tights. With testosterone-induced hysterical irrelevance, he mused that the guys back in his old gang in Newark would get a kick out of him in latex, unless it were of the prophylactic kind. Or was that spandex? Spandex, latex, whatever! That was beside the point. Call me crazy, but did she just lick my ear?

  Blood drained from his head and slam-dunked into sex central. For a second, he thought his knees might give out.

  “Not here,” he gurgled. “Let’s go outside for a walk, down by the bayou. Better yet, I’ll take you back to your hotel room.”

  “I already checked out. I’ll be staying with Tante Lulu from now on.” She leaned her head back to look at him. “You sound serious.”

  “I am serious, babe.” He wondered if she was aware that when she arched back like that it caused his erection to rub against her belly button, which was exposed by her low-riding wench skirt. And that was damn serious.

  “You can drive me to the cottage. Let’s go tell Tante Lulu that I’m leaving.”

  “So, you’re staying with that Cajun dingbat, huh?” he asked, arm looped over her shoulder as they walked to the other side of the hall, where Tante Lulu was chattering away to some guy in a frock coat and tricorne hat. At least he wasn’t wearing tights.

  Louise Rivard, better known as Tante Lulu, was the craziest old woman he’d ever met. But she was a noted traiteur, or folk healer, and Grace had decided to apprentice herself to the fruitcake in hopes of learning more about the healing arts. Really, Grace’s life was like a pendulum swinging from one extreme to the other. Nun to poker player to treasure hunter to healer. He couldn’t wait to see where she landed next, as long as she took him along for the ride.

  “Don’t call her a dingbat.” Grace turned slightly and swatted him on the chest, then grinned. “Even if she is a dingbat.”

  “Grace...Angel...hope y’all had a good time t’night.” Tante Lulu was dressed as a senior citizen pirate gal. A scary sight, to be sure—she was ninety years old, give or take. No one knew for sure. She eyed them suspiciously when Grace told her she would be leaving with him. Grace was oblivious to that pointed look, which took in his arm on Grace’s shoulder, but he could practically see the matchmaking wheels churning in Tante Lulu’s little brain. “That full moon t’night, she is purty enough to make a cat smooch a hound dog.”

  “Huh?” Grace said.

  “Welcome to TanteLuluville,” he muttered under his breath, then smiled.

  “Ya got a hope chest?” Tante Lulu asked Angel just before they walked away. Tante Lulu had a tradition of making hope chests for the men in her family, or male friends of the family, just before the “thunderbolt of love” hit them.

  Hah! He had news for the Louisiana love bug. That thunderbolt had done its business with him a long time ago.

  “So, what did you want to talk to me about?” Grace asked, once they were sitting in his rental car back in Tante Lulu’s cottage driveway. She didn’t seem so tipsy anymore.

  A full moon allowed him to see Grace’s face. She was concerned. For him.

  “I want you to come back with me, sweetheart.” Well, that was laying his cards on the table from the get-go.

  She frowned. “Back to your motel room?”

  “No. I mean, yeah, that would be great, but I meant, fly back to the East Coast with me in the morning. Come with me and the Jinx team to Germany for our next project.” He gulped. “Just come with me, that’s all.”

  “I don’t understand. You know I quit treasure hunting. It was never intended to be more than a one-shot deal for me. I’ve already explained why I’m staying here.” She moved closer and accidentally put a hand on his thigh.

  Big mistake, that.

  He picked her up by the waist and laid her across his lap, her head cradled over his left elbow. “This isn’t about treasure hunting, or folk healing, or any other damn profession. It’s about you and me.” He leaned down, kissed her lightly on the lips, and whispered against her gaping mouth, “I love you, Grace.”

  She squirmed into a sitting position on his lap. “I love you, too, sweetie. You’re my best friend.”

  “Dammit! That’s not what I’m talking about. I’m in love with you, have been for a long time.”

  A stunned silence was not what he was looking for here.

  “You’re kidding, right? What’s the punch line? You gonna tell some lame nun joke?” She nipped at his lower lip with her teeth as punishment.

  Angel jerked backward, though he didn’t release her from his embrace. It was true, he had been teasing Grace with nun jokes for ages, even though she hadn’t been a nun for ages, but not now. “This is not a joke, Grace.”

  She stared at him for a long moment. “Sex. All this forced celibacy while trapped out in the bayou must have turned you horny. You want to have sex with me.” Grinning, she taunted him with that last accusation.

  “No! I mean, yes. Here’s the deal: I don’t want sex for sex’s sake, as in any ol’ female would do. I want to make love with you. But that’s not all I want. C’mon,” he said, opening the car door and hauling her outside. Oh, God! I’m blowing it. What the hell is wrong with me? “Let’s walk.”

  “You’re scaring me, Angel.”

  “I’m scaring myself,” he muttered as he linked his hand with hers and led her onto Tante Lulu’s back porch facing the bayou. Once they were leaning against the rail, he raised their linked hands and kissed her knuckles.

  “Oooh, you are smooth.”

  “You have no idea.” Something occurred to him then, related to her mentioning going back to his motel room. “Would you have sex with me? Just like that?” He snapped his fingers. “Friends with benefits?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe.”

  Angel was both angry and intrigued.

  “Actually, I probably wouldn’t. Even half drunk. You and I have been friends for a long time. I wouldn’t want to do anything to ruin that.”

  He shook his head. “Not anymore.”

  She frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, friendship isn’t enough anymore. Haven’t you felt it, too, Gracie, these weeks we’ve been here in Louisiana? Those LeDeuxs are crazy as coots, but they’re a close-knit family. They would do anything for each other. And you can just see the passion between the husbands and wives. Luc and Sylvie. Remy and Rachel. René and Val. Rusty and Charmaine. John and Celine. That’s what I want.”

  “Passion?”

  “Passion, yeah, but more than that.”

  “Family?” she said with an oddly sad sigh.

  “Bingo. I want a woman to love who will love me back. And a home...a real home, not some luxury condo. And kids.”

  The more he explained himself, the stiffer she got. Then she started biting on her thumbnail, a nervous habit she’d been trying to break ever since he’d first met her. Angel sensed he was losing her bit by bit, but he didn’t know how to fix it.

  “You and I have no close family ties,” she reminded him, pulling her hand out of his grasp and walking to the other end of the porch. He followed after her. “The LeDeuxs have family out the wazoo.”

  “We can make our own family. I love you, honey. That’s wha
t people in love do.”

  “Where is all this coming from?” Her voice was shrill with panic. “You never mentioned love before.”

  “It’s been there for a long time. I just haven’t had the nerve to say anything.”

  “You? Lacking nerve?”

  He nodded. “But I had to say something now. This Amber Project—Jinx’s next job—is going to take months, maybe even a year, and it’ll be mostly on-site in Germany. We’re searching for that famous Amber Room that the Nazis supposedly dismantled and hid. Definitely Jinx’s most ambitious treasure hunt yet, and I want you to be there with me. As my wife. Doesn’t a honeymoon in Europe sound great?” His heart was racing so fast it felt as if it might explode. Deep down, he sensed he was fighting a losing battle. How could he have misread her so badly?

  “This is insane. You’ve never even kissed me...that way. You can’t ask someone to marry you without even a proper kiss.”

  That was his cue. “I thought you’d never ask.”

  When she saw his slow grin and his equally slow approach, she stuttered, “That’s not what—oh, good grief, what are you doing?”

  “About to kiss you properly.” Before she could blink, or tell him to get lost, he backed her up against the wall of the cottage, cupped her butt cheeks, raising her to just the right height on her tiptoes, spread her legs with his knees, anchored her with his belly against her belly, combed his fingers through her hair to hold her in place, then kissed her with all the love he’d been holding in for so long.