Chapter 4: The Paddle

I'd had the whole drive home to think of a lie.

It came out.

"Lise's," I said. "Her walk-in died. We moved two hundred pounds of boudin into the church freezer by flashlight."

I held up my hands.

My fingers were still stained red from picking.

"Want to smell them? It's mostly pork."

Luc looked at me.

I looked back and yawned.

"You could've called," he said.

"My phone died at the blessing. You'd know that if you'd stood next to me instead of next to your sister-in-law."

That was a risk.

I watched it land.

His face didn't move, but his thumb pressed down on the back of his phone.

"Mireille's handling the press for the anniversary," he said. "I need her close."

"I know, babe. I'm just tired."

I climbed the stairs, stopped beside him and kissed the top of his head, the way I'd done a thousand times.

His hair smelled like cinnamon.

"Night," I said.

"Night, Jo."

I brushed my teeth for five minutes and lay on my side of the bed with my eyes open until he came up.

He fell asleep in ten minutes.

He always does.

On Sunday Luc went golfing in Lafayette.

He goes every Sunday.

This Sunday Mireille's car was gone too.

I didn't go to Mass.

I went into his study.

Luc keeps his desk locked, and he keeps the key in the toe of his left church shoe, because he thinks nobody on earth would put a hand in there.

I've been polishing his shoes for seven years.

The folder was in the bottom drawer, under the tax returns.

It was thin and it was gray, and on the front someone had typed "Project Pointe."

Most of it was numbers.

One page wasn't.

Under the words "Primary Asset," in bold, it said: "Proprietary pepper cultivar, continuous seed line since 1898. Exclusive genetic rights."

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