My uncle’s mouth forms an O. “You got me one of those?” The wonder in his voice is more childlike than I’ve ever heard. But I know him. He loves ham. He loves bacon. He loves pork roast, pork chops, pork butt, and pork cracklins. He loves pork of every kind, and with a sugar-glazed ham, Iris Adams just won him over for life.
Iris grabs the biggest and heaviest-looking of the bundles from the basket. “I’ll just put this in the fridge.”
“You told her that was your favorite?” I accuse, low-voiced.
Nonc scowls at me. “No,” and then in an even lower voice, “Va brasser dan tes chaudières.” Go stir your own pot. Judging by the smirks on Ramon and Sally’s faces, they don’t need much of a translation. But I can’t see Iris’s expression because she has her head in the refrigerator.
“You told me to get the ham and pepper jack poboy from Olde Tyme Grocery the other night when I’d skipped lunch,” she says, shifting things around in Nonc’s fridge. “You said that was the best.”
“Huh,” Nonc utters, wearing a look of realization. “I did say that. Can’t believe you remembered.”
Iris straightens up, closes the fridge door, and beams sweetly at my uncle. “Of course, I remembered, Mr. Hebert.”
I’m sorry, but nobody is that sweet. She’s got to be playing a part.
Right?
She waves toward the basket. “You can open the rest later. There’s more food, but nothing else that needs to be refrigerated.” Then she turns to me, still wearing the smile meant for Nonc, and the force of her gaze hits me like an electric current. “You ready? We should probably get started.”
I swallow, slow to respond. “Yeah,” I say finally. “Let’s go.”
She nods and slips through the kitchen’s swinging door, headed to the parlor. Sally and Ramon follow her, but before the PA can exit, I stop him.
“Hold up.”
With his hand on the door, he stops. “Yeah?”
I can feel Nonc’s eyes on me, but I don’t care. “Is she for real?”
The PA frowns. “Huh?”
My impatience flairs. “What’s she like when she’s not on?”
His frown turns into a glower. I’d bet money if I looked at my uncle, I’d find the same expression in his face. “Iris? She’s never on.” He spits out the word like it’s rotten fruit and pushes past the swinging door.
Chapter Nine
IRIS
“I don’t like that guy,” Ramon mutters when he joins us in the front studio.
“Me either,” Sally whispers. “And I think he’s the first person I’ve met in Louisiana who’s unfriendly.”
I want to point out that she didn’t meet the gross guy with the bike last night, but I don’t dare bring that up in front of Ramon. I told Sally about it after we got back to the house, but Ramon is still in the dark and it’s going to stay that way.
Still, my best friend likes everyone. I guess it comes with the territory if you’re a preschool teacher. That is, she likes everyone except for Moira, so the fact that she doesn’t like Beau Landry is a pretty serious black mark as far as I’m concerned.
But looking at him is like breathing nitrous oxide. Pain goes away, and I have the urge to giggle. Yeah, he’s that good looking. Even when he’s scowling.
Maybe even especially when he’s scowling.
He’s all broody-bearded-hotness.
It’s only when he opens his mouth and says something mean that I cool off. Hopefully, he’ll do plenty of talking during our lesson because I don’t need to be thinking of his sexy beard and those dark eyes and his too pretty mouth. I’m already going to be a spaz and a half.
God, I hope I don’t break him too.
I still feel so bad about Mr. Hebert. I couldn’t sleep, so I placed as many online orders for his gift basket as I could, and Sally and Ramon picked them up while we filmed this morning. But I wanted to wrap everything myself, which is what I did with my lunch hour. A good thing, because who needs an hour to drink a green smoothie with whey powder?
The only problem was that ham smelled so damn good.
But I wrapped that up first and put it in the trailer’s fridge before Moira could spot it and start lecturing about salted meats and sugar-induced cravings.
Beau Landry comes in while I’m thinking about sweet and salty meats.
Nothing sweet about him, I remind myself.
I brace for what is sure to be a stressful and torturous ninety minutes.