Free Day Dreamer by Jill Marie Landis Page B

stuffed full. He held it out to the woman.
    “This is for Juliette. It should be enough to last her a good many years. The house has been paid for. Alex would have wanted me to see to her future and that of the children. Perhaps she could buy a small business, a millinery—”
    “But monsieur!”
    Cordero seemed as uncomfortable in this house of tears as Celine. He took a step toward the door.
    “Tell her I have gone back to St. Stephen but that—”
    Madam Latrobe shook her head back and forth and began to weep, sobbing openly, her shoulders shuddering. “My Juliette is dead, monsieur. I thought you knew.”
    Cordero appeared so devastated by the news that Celine was tempted to reach out and take his hand.
    “How? When?” It was all he could manage. His eyes shimmered suspiciously. Celine looked away.
    “She hanged herself four days ago. We buried her yesterday. I sent word to Monsieur Moreau …”
    Cordero’s expression iced. “The bastard did not tell me or I would have come sooner.”
    When Madam Latrobe suddenly appeared on the verge of collapse, Cordero surprised Celine by leading the woman to a nearby table. He pulled out a chair and gently helped her to sit. Celine hurried to a side room which housed a small kitchen. She poured a glass of water from a delicate china pitcher and carried it back into the sitting room.
    She and Cordero exchanged a quick glance over the woman’s head as Celine set the water on the table beside her.
    “What about the children?” Cordero asked. His color had faded to an ashen hue.
    Madam Latrobe continued to wipe away tears but could not stem the flow. “They are as one would expect of two little lambs who have lost both their father and mother in a little over two weeks.”
    “May I see them?”
    She nodded and tried to rise, but her legs would not hold her.
    “I’ll get them,” Celine volunteered, anxious to afford Cordero and Madam Latrobe some privacy. Following the soft, tormented sound of crying, she walked to the back of the house and paused in the doorway to one of the bedrooms. A girl, who was maybe ten years old, was comforting a little boy with a headful of glossy black curls. He was lying with his face buried in her lap, crying as if his broken heart would never mend. The lovely girl looked up and noticed Celine hovering there.
    “Can you come with me? Cordero Moreau has come to see you,” Celine said softly. She was taken aback by the resemblance to Cord that she saw in the little boy’s face when he stopped sobbing long enough to look up at her.
    “Uncle is here?” he said, brightening.
    Celine nodded. Swiping at his tears with the back of his hand, the child scooted off the bed and darted past her as he ran to the sitting room. The girl stood up, straightened her skirt and tossed her long, dark curls over her shoulder. Her haughty movements belied the deep shadows of grief dwelling in her eyes. If Celine didn’t know better, she would have thought the beautiful girl standing before her was pure French Creole and not of mixed blood. As did the boy, the girl had the Moreau look about her.
    “I’m Celine,” she told the girl.
    “I’m Liliane Moreau. My brother is Alan.”
    “Your uncle wishes to see you,” Celine said. At least, she told himself, Alex Moreau had acknowledged his two bastard children by his mistress.
    She followed Liliane back to the sitting room, where she found Cordero hunkered down with the boy who was resting against his knee. He cradled the child against him, smoothing back Alan’s tousled hair. Her first impressions of Cordero had not prepared her for the sight, and she had to admit to herself that she was deeply moved.
    “Perhaps someday you can come to see me, but your
grand-mère
needs you much more right now,” Cordero was saying.
    “That’s right,
cher
,” Madam Latrobe said softly. “You are the man of the house.”
    Cordero noticed Liliane beside Celine and reached out for her. She moved into his embrace and he