Page 37 of Sweet Home Louisiana

Kennedy excused herself, leaving the guys alone.

“Don’t ever touch Maddie again,” Owen told the other man without preamble.

Brody’s eyebrows rose.“Excuse me?”

“Maddie Allain is off-limits.”

“Oh, really?”

Owen moved in closer to the other man.“I’m serious.You touch her again, I’ll break every bone in your hand.Your jerking off hand.”

Brody frowned.“What the hell, man?”

“Just leave her alone.”

“Okay, fine, fuck.”

“Good.”Owen turned away.Then he pivoted back.“And tell your brother, too.”Byron worked with Brody and was better looking than his younger brother.

“Holy shit.”

Yeah so Brody and Byron were going to think he was nuts.

And he didn’t care at all.

Which was exactly how everything had started before.

Three days later,Maddie clipped a green band on the wrist of the last guy for Josh’s next tour as Kennedy worked on checking in the group for Sawyer’s boat.

Typically, Kennedy handled all aspects of getting the tour groups checked in and organized, but Maddie had started helping after a few days of observing.The faster they got people out of line in the main office area, the more time they had to spend browsing souvenirs and snacks.Their sales in the little gift shop had gone up by fifteen percent simply by having Kennedy taking the payments while Maddie supervised signing the consent forms and fastened wristbands onto people.

And directing them into the gift shop, of course.Especially the families with kids.Hey, it was simple business economics.She’d reorganized the shop so that the shelves with the things like the toy tackle boxes, stuffed alligators, and swamp flashlights were at eye level for the average six-year-old, while the little Louisiana history books and real fishing lures were up higher for the adults.The alligator cookies were also a big hit, and it didn’t hurt that she’d figured out a way to draw the kids’ attention to the display.All it took were a couple of aquariums filled with real fish, a couple of frogs, and two turtles.

“Okay, head out that door,” she said pointing.“That will take you through the gift shop.The restrooms are on the right and the dock is to your left.You can wait on the benches for your captain.”

The group with the green wristbands moved off and she turned to the group that needed yellow wristbands.

She clipped four bands on and explained how the day-long and weekend fishing trips worked to a guy and his brother who were already interested in coming back.Then she looked for the next wrist.

But the last two for Owen’s group were hanging back, pretending to look over the map they held, while watching the two fishermen.As soon as the men exited, they moved up to the counter.

“Ladies,” Kennedy greeted.“Names?”

“I’m Lacey and this is Natalie,” the very pretty, twenty-something blonde said.

“Great, I’ve got you right here,” Kennedy said.

“Well, we were wondering…” Lacey glanced at Natalie.“Is there a chance that we could split up and I could go on Owen’s tour and Natalie could go on Josh’s?”

Kennedy shook her head.“We’ve got you booked with Sawyer.Is there a problem?”

Maddie moved in behind the counter, curious about the request.

“Well, we were down here Christmas before last,” Lacey said.“We went out on Owen’s tour and then…” Again she glanced at her friend.“We invited Owen and Josh up to New Orleans to party.They brought their friend Tommy and we had a ton of fun.”

She giggled and Maddie’s eyebrows rose.Fun, huh?She could only imagine.But she didn’t want to.At all.Tommy was her brother.Josh was practically a brother.And Owen was…Owen.And the main reason she wanted to slap this girl.

“So we were hoping to see them again and hang out,” Lacey said.

---