Page 52 of Beauty and the Bayou

“There are patients who need advocates in Louisiana, too.”

Sawyer smiled and shook his head.“So youaretryin’ to set me and Juliet up.”

“A beautiful safety-freak who will face her fears in order to help her brother and whodoesn’tneed anyone hovering over her and making sure she’s safe and sound every second?Nah, there’s nothing there that would be good for you at all.”She gave him a soft smile and then reached up and cupped his cheek.The one with the scar.“Be happy, Sawyer.For one minute, for one day, for one and a half weeks.Grab whatever you can get.”

He took a deep breath, then leaned in and kissed Ellie’s cheek.“I love you, Jelly.”

They never called her Grandma or Gram or anything like that.She had always been Ellie.Growing up in a town where they’d had two grandmas and two great-grandmas it had just become habit to call them all by their first names.But when he’d been little, he’d thought they called Ellie Jelly.The name had stuck until he was about five.

Her eyes filled with tears—also something that rarely happened—but she grinned.“Get out of here.I’m not the one who’s off by herself.”She looked around the bar with a fake sigh.“God knows, I’m never the one off by herself.”

Chuckling, Sawyer turned and headed for the kitchen—and the back door.He was heading over to Cora’s, but the fewer people who knew the smaller the chances that someone would come up with some reason to also stop over and see how things were going.

He didn’t mind letting Juliet know they liked having her around.

But he kind of wanted to do it alone.

5

Juliet wentto answer the knock on the front door of Cora’s house.

This was the first time anyone had stopped by when Cora wasn’t home.Juliet assumed that everyone in Autre knew the best place to find Cora, almost always, was at Ellie’s.Why would someone be stopping by when Cora wasn’t here?

So Juliet took a knife with her.

Sawyer Landry was on the other side of the screen when she pulled the heavy inner door open, however.

A breath of relief rushed out of her lungs and she let the hand with the knife, that she’d been hiding behind her back, relax at her side.

“Hi,” she said with a big smile.

Damn, he looked good.He had his hands braced on either side of the doorframe.A plastic bag filled with what looked like take-out boxes dangled from one thumb, his T-shirt had a streak of grease on it, and the jeans he wore had clearly had the pleasure of being molded to his hard body many times before.

“Hi.”He, of course, noticed the knife.“Everything okay?”

“I’m not used to people knocking on this door while Cora’s gone.”

“You could have just ignored it.”

“What if the person decided that meant no one was home and broke in to steal something?”she asked.

His mouth quirked up on one side.“What if it was Leo sneaking in to snag leftover food?”

“I don’t know Leo well, but he doesn’t strike me as the type to sneak,” Juliet said, also letting her mouth turn up at one corner.

Sawyer chuckled.“Fair point.What if it was Maddie coming over to get something she forgot to take to Owen’s and she’s trying not to disturb you?Trust me, shecan sneak.”

“Yeah, butshe probably knows better than to sneak in here.”

“Why’s that?”He seemed to be enjoying this.

“Because she’s smart.And I’m clearly already a little…overreactive.A girl like me wouldn’t be in a house alonewithouta weapon nearby, right?”

“Overreactive?”he repeated.“Is that what it is?”

Juliet propped a hand on her hip.“Isn’t it?”

“Wearing a life jacket when you’re afraid of water makes sense to me.”

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