An excerpt from Closer To Home Chapter 7Bronagh lived in a four-bedroom modified Acadian-style house in a small town between Baton Rouge and New Orleans that sat in the middle of 41 acres of wooded land. There was a large backyard with a swimming pool that adjoined a big pasture with a barn.
Bronagh invited her family from Shaw Sound Studios as well as her children and some of their friends to a New Year’s Eve party. Marsh and Shaw rode out to Bronagh’s house Wednesday morning around 11:00 a.m., where they found Caitlyn and her busy in the kitchen. Bronagh was stirring a large pot on the stove, what would become a shrimp and corn soup for supper. Shaw pulled her away from the stove and kissed her.
“God! You smell good!”
“I missed you,” she said, wrapping her arms around his neck.
“Doesn’t look like you’ve had time to miss me.”
As usual, she had prepared an outrageous amount of food, the extent of which Shaw discovered when she asked Marsh and him to double check the stock in the small bar in the pool house. Marsh smiled at Shaw as they walked through the French doors into the back yard. They liked those kinds of household tasks that inevitably Bronagh would save for them to do.
The stainless-steel refrigerator in the pool house was full of meat and cheese trays, condiments, platters of appetizers, soft drinks, mixers, and beer. An assortment of fresh poboy buns were stacked in covered containers on the table, along with a commercial-sized chafing dish that they assumed would be full of the soup Bronagh was cooking. Marsh inventoried the hard liquor behind the small bar while Shaw walked out of the pool house to inspect the bonfire near the edge of the back yard.
“What do you think?” Caitlyn asked, standing beside him at the bonfire.
“Not too shabby. Who built it?” he asked.
“Mama.”
“She did not!”
“Yes, she did. Mama and Daddy built bonfires every year since I can remember. The only years she’s missed have been since Daddy died. Something else you’ve resurrected in Mom,” Caitlyn said.
“Unbelievable! Is there anything your mum doesn’t do well?”
“Her income taxes,” Caitlyn answered, laughing. “And she sucks at throwing a baseball.”
Shaw walked back to the house, through the French doors, and into the kitchen. He moved Bronagh backward into the edge of the countertop and leaned into her, staring into her eyes. “I’m impressed with your bonfire.” He ran his hands up her back underneath her shirt.
“What are you doing? Shaw, don’t you see I’m busy?”
“Do you have time to busy yourself with me in the bedroom? I want you.”
“Can’t you wait until later this evening?”
“I can, but I don’t want to. I’ve missed you,” he answered, then kissed her. Her response told him that she missed him, too. She pulled his long hair through her fingers and sucked the back of his neck hard.
“Come with me sweetheart,” she said, stroking his groin. “I’ll take you where you want to go.”
“Oh! Hell, yes!” he moaned.
Bronagh moved around him to the stove and turned off the heat under the soup. She took his hand and led him to her bedroom. She pushed Shaw against the closed bedroom door and unbuckled his jeans. Bronagh wedged her hands inside his pants, grasped his bare hips, and kissed his chest. She moved him to the edge of the bed where Shaw kicked off his boots and peeled away his clothes while Bronagh stripped bare.
“Oh, I missed you, baby,” she said, admiring his
****.
Shaw reached for her. “Come here!”
She climbed onto his lap and decisively loved him with a skill that far exceeded her ability to throw a baseball or even build a bonfire.