Liz Talley - The Road to Bayou Bridge

Married by mistake…or by design?

As a wild teenager, Darby Dufrene tore up the roads around Bayou Bridge. However, years of serving in the navy have reformed him. Now that he’s discharged, he’s ready to settle down…just not here in Louisiana. But his “quick” visit becomes the opposite when he discovers that a long-ago, impulsive wedding he had with Renny Latioles was not annulled.

Fine. He and Renny are in perfect agreement—an uncontested divorce and he’ll be on his way. Too bad the crazy attraction that pulled them together before is just as strong, and it isn’t listening to logic. Spending time with her makes him crave more. It could be they’re still married for a reason.…

“Something about you here in my kitchen, in my space, freaks me out.”

Darby wiped his mouth and contemplated Renny. “I’m not real comfortable being here myself, but it’s got to be done.”

She cocked her head. “Why? It’s been years and we’re both different people. Is there really a need to drag up old feelings? Can’t we let it be what it was—two crazy kids looking to thumb their noses at authority then learning they weren’t as smart as they thought they were? We were both to blame for what happened, so we don’t need apologies.”

“It’s not about apologies, though I do think I owe you one. I had no idea you were injured so severely in the accident.”

“You wouldn’t have because you never bothered to come see me.”

“What are you talking about? You refused to see me.” Truth was evident in his gaze. He wasn’t jerking her chain. The surprise in his reaction was honest.

“I never refused you anything. Ever.” Renny sighed. “That was the problem.”

Dear Reader,

Homecoming stories are a particularly satisfying read; in fact, they are my favorite type of story. There’s something fulfilling about watching two people fall in love a second time around, so I couldn’t wait to get my fingers on the keyboard to write Renny and Darby’s story. After all, I’d been thinking about them from the very beginning of The Boys of Bayou Bridge series. I knew them and their past, so writing their story would be a snap, right?

Wrong. Like the Louisiana weather, Renny and Darby weren’t easy to figure out, and as each chapter unfolded, they evolved into complex creatures who kept me guessing. See? Sometimes even an author is surprised by her own story.

And what a story it is—manipulative parents, a surprise marriage and whooping cranes. Yes, whooping cranes. Not to mention a little voodoo.

So grab a mint julep, or a mint tea, and give me your best Cajun accent. It’s time to go back to Beau Soleil with its shadowed past and eccentric matriarch. It’s time for gators, fishing and a piece of Lucille’s pie…and most importantly, it’s time for Darby Dufrene to walk the road back to Bayou Bridge.

I hope you enjoy this last book in The Boys of Bayou Bridge series. I love hearing from my readers—you can drop me a line at www.liztalleybooks.comor write to me at P.O. Box 5418, Bossier City, LA 71171.

Happy reading!

Liz Talley

P.S. Look for my next book coming in December 2012!

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

From devouring the Harlequin Superromance novels on the shelf of her aunt’s used bookstore to swiping her grandmother’s medical romances, Liz Talley has always loved a good romance. So it was no surprise to anyone when she started writing a book one day while her infant napped. She soon found writing more exciting than scrubbing hardened cereal off the love seat. Underneath Liz’s baby-food-stained clothes, a dream stirred. She followed that dream, and after a foray into historical romance and a Golden Heart final, she started her first contemporary romance on the same day she met her editor. Coincidence? She prefers to call it fate.

Currently Liz lives in north Louisiana with her high-school sweetheart, two beautiful children and a passel of animals. Liz loves watching her boys play baseball, shopping for bargains and going out for lunch. When not writing contemporary romances for the Harlequin Superromance line, she can be found doing laundry, feeding kids or playing on Facebook.

For my grandmother Grace,

with her French temper, bayou roots and love of a good bargain. No doubt you’d find kinship with Bev…though you’d never admit to it.

You were a strong woman even if you

never filled up your own gas tank.

I miss you.

Contents

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

EXCERPT

CHAPTER ONE

August 2012

Naval Station, Rota, Spain

THE PAPER ACTUALLY SHOOK in Darby Dufrene’s hand—that’s how shocked he was by the document he’d discovered in a box of old papers. He’d been looking for the grief book he’d made as a small child and instead had found something that made his gut lurch against his ribs.

“Dude, come on. The driver needs to go.” Hal Severson’s voice echoed in the half-full moving truck parked below the flat Darby had shared with the rotund navy chaplain for the past several years. His roommate had waited semi-good-naturedly while Darby climbed inside to grab the book before it was shipped to Seattle, but good humor had limits.

“Just a sec,” Darby called, his eyes refusing to leave the elaborate font of the certificate he’d pulled from a clasped envelope trapped in the back of his Bayou Bridge Reveille yearbook. How in the hell had this escaped his attention? Albeit it had been buried in with some old school papers he’d tossed aside over ten years ago and vowed never to look at again, surely the state of Louisiana seal would have permeated his brain and screamed, Open me!

Yet, back then he’d been in a funk—a childish, rebellious huff of craptastic proportions. He probably hadn’t thought about much else except the pity party he’d been throwing himself.

The moving truck’s engine fired and a loud roar rumbled through the trailer, vibrating the wood floor. The driver was eager to pick up the rest of his load, presumably a navy family heading back to the States, and his patience with Darby climbing up and digging through boxes already packed was also at an end. Darby slid the certificate back into its manila envelope, tucked it into his jacket and emerged from the back end of the truck.

Hal’s red hair glinted in the sunlight spilling over the tiled roof, and his expression had evoled to exasperation. The man was hungry. Had been hungry for hours while the movers slowly packed up Darby’s personal effects and scant pieces of furniture, and no one stood between Hal and his last chance to dine in El Puerto de Santa Maria, the city near the Rota Naval Base, with his best comrade. “Let’s go already. Saucy Terese and her crustacean friends await us.”

“Not Il Caffe di Roma, Hal. I don’t want to look into that woman’s eyes and wonder if she might greet me with a filet knife.”

“You ain’t that good, brother,” Hal said in a slow Oklahoma drawl. “She’ll find someone else on which to ply her wiles when the new guy arrives.”

“You mean the new guy whose name is Angela Dillard?”

“The new JAG officer’s a girl?”

Darby smiled. “Actually she’s a woman.”