Page 128 of Drive
Pal made a face as if he’d swallowed something bitter. “Not too good,” he murmured shaking his head. “My wife Lucille died a breast canca five years ago…Terrible.”
Pal held her gaze as he spoke, offering up the sadness in his eyes, and it was then that Rainey recognized the honesty and rawness she’d always found and admired in Jacques. His grandfather had it too. Her heart, already soft toward him,squeezed.
“Jacques told me,” she said softly. “I’m so sorry for yourloss.”
“Well,” he said, giving her a sad smile. “You have to have somethin’ first before you lose it. Me and Lucille had it good. We was married fifty-three years when she died. Das a whole lottagood.”
Rainey’s eyes bugged. “Fifty-three years?! That’s incredible,” she gushed and glanced atJacques.
He’d started a fresh pot of coffee and was cracking eggs into a skillet at the stove. She caught him peeking at his grandfather with a proud grin before his eyes found hers. He held her gaze for a moment and then licked hislips.
“I love you.”He mouthed the words silently to her, but as far as her soul was concerned, they were shouted from every corner of theearth.
Her chest quaked as she tried for breath. Maybe she was a coward, but she couldn’t respond in kind while sitting next to hisgrandfather.
“Excuse me for a second,” she whispered to the man she’d grown quite fond of, and she pushed herself up from the table. Rainey stepped behind Jacques, and laying a hand on the small of his back as he cooked, she spoke loud enough for Pal to hear. “Can I help withanything?”
Smiling at her, Jacques tilted his head toward the cabinets at his left. “You can get down some coffeemugs.”
Rainey made sure she kept her back toward Pal when she tapped Jacques on the back to get hiseyes.
“I love you, too,”she mouthed when she had hisattention.
He gave her a wry smile. “That’ll earn you an extra piece of bacon,” heteased.
Their flirty game was interrupted when the front door opened. Another old man with a heavily lined face and a friendly smile stepped into the kitchen and greeted Jacques’s grandfather, his Cajun accent just asthick.
“Mornin’, Albert. I see Jacques’s car is back.” Then he took in the two of them by the stove in the opposite corner of the kitchen and gave a double jolt of surprise.“Mais,I didn’ know you hadcompany.”
“Rainey, dis our neighba, Floyd Cloutier,” Pal provided, pointing to her with his coffeemug.
She lifted a hand in greeting. “Hello. Nice to meetyou.”
“Floyd, dat’s Rainey Reeves,” Pal said. “Dem’scourtin’.”
Floyd looked at Pal like he was Captain Obvious. “Well, I got eyes, me,” he muttered before turning to Jacques and pinning him with a stare. “She know ‘bout mawords?”
Beside her, Jacques froze in the middle of flipping a piece of bacon. “Uh, no, Floyd. I can’t say the subject’s comeup.”
“What?” Rainey frowned, looking at each man in turn. “What are you talkingabout?”
Jacques glanced from Floyd and then back to her with a cautious expression. His eyes went back to his neighbor. “I’m guessing you have something to say toher?”
The neighbor’s eyes lit with warmth, and his wrinkles made way for a smile. “Dat Ido.”
Jacques gave a resigned sigh, finished flipping the bacon, and set his spatula on the stovetop. His mouth worked before he met Rainey’s eyes. “Floyd has a…a gift,”Jacques said, caution lacing his voice, his eyeswatchful.
“A gift?” Rainey looked between Jacques and Floyd. “What kind ofgift?”
The older man ducked his head a little demurely, and Rainey couldn’t help but smile, even though Jacques’s caution made her a tadnervous.
“Well, I got dis way ‘bout me. Been like dis since I was a boy,” Floyd said, turning up his palms as if he had no explanation. “When I see a body, first t’ing, I see t’ree words dat gonna be part of dereday.”
She blinked in rapid succession. “You mean like a premonition?” Her eyes shot to Jacques. He had a psychic neighbor — an old, Cajun man, no less — and in more than twenty hours in the car and three nights in the same bed, this hadn’t comeup?
“It foolproof,” Pal noted with anod.
Rainey’s eyes went back to Floyd. “And you have words for me? Like rightnow?”
