Blue Bayou

Chapter One The moon hung full and low and bloodred over the bayou as Jack Callahan sat out on the gallerie of the crumbling plantation house, working on a bottle of whiskey that wasn't working on him. It had been a sweltering day, and even at midnight the air, which smelled of damp brick and night-blooming jasmine, dripped with moisture.The old swing squeaked as he slowly swayed; an alligator glided silently across water the color of burgundy wine, its eyes gleaming in the dark like yellow headlights.A mist that wasn't quite rain began to fall as he watched the storm gather out over the Gulf and thought back to the night when Beau Soleil had resembled a huge white wedding cake. A night when music floated on the sultry summer air, fairy lights strung through the limbs of the chinaberry trees twinkled like fireflies, and white candles anchored in fake water lilies glowed invitingly on the smooth turquoise surface of the pool water.White jacketed waiters had circulated with trays of mint juleps and flutes of French champagne while belles in tulle and taffeta danced magnolia-scented nights away. The girls had been mouthwateringly pretty in airy flowered dresses that showed off their tanned shoulders and long slender legs. And Danielle Dupree had outshone them all.Danielle. He lifted the bottle to his lips; flames slid down his throat. You'd think, after all these years, he'd be immune to the closest thing Blue Bayou had ever had to a princess. But the memory of that night created a rush of molten heat hotter than any the Jack Daniel's could stoke. He'd known, of course, that he had no business wanting her."Never have been any good at taking your own counsel, you," he muttered, slipping back into the Cajun patois he'd spoken growing up among his mother's people.Celibacy was not an easy virtue at any age. For a testosterone-driven eighteen-year-old kid coming off nine long months banished to a last-chance, hard-time military-styled lockup for delinquents, it was damn near impossible. Especially when the girl in question had recklessly, for that brief, shining time, wanted him, too.Those crazy days and hot nights were, as his daddy used to say, yesterday's ball score. He might not have ended up on Angola's death row, like Judge Dupree had warned, but he'd definitely gone to hell like so many in Blue Bayou had predicted."Gone to hell and lived to remember it."He was no longer viewed as the devil of Blue Bayou. Even The Cajun Clarion had picked up a quote from The New York Times Book Review declaring him a new generation's Joseph Wambaugh. Thanks to all those folks in Hollywood, who threw money around like confetti, he now owned the crown jewel of Louisianan antebellum homes. Not that it was much of a jewel at the moment, but he, more than most, knew outward appearances could be deceiving.During his years as an undercover drug agent, he'd become a chameleon, able to move among the movers and shakers at a Beverly Hills dinner party one night, while the next night would find him working the street scene in Tijuana, then with only a change of clothes and syntax, he'd be hanging out at the beach, listening to surfer songs and making deals and subsequent busts beneath the Huntington Beach pier.Outwardly his appearance hadn't changed all that much since his undercover days. He still tied his thick black hair in the same ponytail at the nape of his neck and the gold earring served as a daily reminder that trying to outrun your past was an exercise in futility. But even these leftovers from his former life didn't tell the entire story.A casual observer would never suspect that his mind was a seething cauldron of drug dealers, strung-out hookers chasing their next high, crooked cops, and hard-eyed kids who lost their innocence before their baby teeth.Scenes flashed through his mind like movie trailers set to fast forward: the wasted body of a GuadalRoss, JoAnn is the author of 'Blue Bayou' with ISBN 9780743436823 and ISBN 0743436822.