Page 45 of Crazy Rich Cajuns

“Your mom.”

Bennett pulled back.“Oh really?”

“We had a…nice…talk,” Kennedy said.“At least, I think we both know where the other stands.”

Now see,thiswas what he’d expect from Kennedy.Even without black nail polish on, she wasn’t a pushover.Not even with Maria Baxter.

“Did you exert yourself with my mom, Kennedy?”he asked with a little smile.

“What do you think?”

He thought that Kennedy would always be honest and true to herself.And it made him want her even more.

“Should we get back over there for dinner?”she asked.

He sighed.

“You have to face this, Bennett.Make a decision and stand by it.Make them listen.”

That was the problem.In the past, he hadn’t been as firm as he should have been.Because he’d been wavering in his own mind.Saying absolutely no to all future opportunities was difficult, for some reason.

But, whether she wanted to be his excuse or not, Kennedy was making it a lot easier for him to look in this new direction with more confidence.Enthusiasm had never been a problem.He’d wanted the bayou since the first time he’d set foot on that dock.Confidence about it being the right decision had been harder to come by.

The woman in his arms was making him more and more sure.

“Okay, dinner,” he said, slipping her hand into his.“And I should tell you about the seating arrangement.”

“Oh, your mom already did.”

“Of course she did,” Bennett said with a sigh.

“I’m fine,” she said.“Honestly.It will be okay.I can talk to your aunt and uncle on the far end of the table while you let the governor kiss up to you before disappointing him.”

Bennett lifted her hand to his lips and gave it a quick kiss.

“But your mom did ask me for one thing I’m not sure I can do,” she said.

“What’s that?”

“To not be a distraction,” she said.

“You’re going totryto be a distraction?”he asked.‘That’s not gonna be hard.”

She gave him a mischievous grin.“I totally want you to be distracted thinking about how to get enough chocolate out of that fountain and into a container that we can take behind the gazebo for the blow job that’s going to be sticky and sweet and that will make you definitely take me upstairs and straight into that shower with all the nozzles.”

Bennett sucked breath in through his nose.“You’re a cruel and wonderful woman.”

“I’m comfortable with that assessment,” she told him.

He took her back to the party, proud of himself for not taking the detour around behind the gazebo on the way.Though the reason was less his self-control and more that he didn’t have that container of chocolate yet.

7

“You don’t knowabout the buried treasure?”Kennedy looked back and forth between the little girl and the little boy seated across from her at the dinner table.They were the grandkids of Maria Baxter’s brother.She looked at Teddy Benoit.“You haven’t passed down the stories?”

Teddy shrugged.“I’ll admit we’ve gotten away from it a bit.Bein’ away from the bayou means this stuff doesn’t come up as much.”

Kennedy shook her head, looking at the kids, Jaxon and Adeline.“Well, I’m gonna fix some of that right here and now.You wanna know about the pirates?”

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