Excerpt of Siren's Call by Debbie Herbert

“Look at her…”

Snicker. “Thinks she’s somethin’…”

“Heard about her latest?”

Lily ignored the whispers and kept the corners of her
lips slightly upturned as she studied the dead fish on
display. Her insides churned as cold and slushy as the
fishes’ beds of ice.

“Miss Bosarge!” The portly seafood manager beamed behind
the counter. “What can I get ya?”

She pointed to her selection and he wrapped it in white
paper, all the while looking her up and down, a lecherous
glimmer in his eyes. He winked. “I’ll make a special deal
for you.”

The buzzing from behind grew louder.

“Disgusting.”

“Slut.”

That was going too far. Lily placed the fish in her cart
and withdrew her makeup compact. She held it up and
dabbed on a touch of lip gloss, checking out her latest
tormentors. Yep, Twyla Fae was with a couple of friends
and no doubt the ringleader. Twyla still smarted from the
time her then-boyfriend-now-husband briefly dumped her to
pursue Lily. You’d think the woman would be over
something that happened two years ago.

Lily composed the habitual all-is-well smile as she faced
Twyla. “How’s J.P. doing?” she asked with double-sugar-
fudge politeness. “I haven’t heard from him in the
longest. I really should drop by and say ‘hey’.”

Twyla paled beneath her tan but quickly recovered and
glowered. “You stay away from J.P.” She shifted the
whining toddler in her arms. “We’re a family now.”

Lily moved her cart straight at the trio. They jumped out
of the way.

“Maybe I will, maybe I won’t,” she threatened in honeyed
tones, strolling down the aisle. Never let them see you
care—her mantra since puberty, when her siren’s voice had
developed and unleashed its power over the entire male
population of Bayou La Siryna.

Lily took her time filling the cart with dozens of cans
of sardine and tuna and cases of bottled water. The usual
fare.

An explosion of green bean tins hit the floor, but she
didn’t flinch. A teenaged stock boy gathered the
spillage, so focused on Lily he made a worse mess and
cans rolled in all directions. Almost without fail, men
ran into stuff or dropped what they were doing when she
walked by. She would have helped the boy, but experience
proved it would make matters worse. He’d say something
stupid or his girlfriend would see them and get mad, or
he’d continue to bumble on or…It was always something.

The grocery store’s sliding glass doors opened, bringing
in a wave of humid Alabama air. A tanned stranger walked
in with an aura as hot and powerful as the bayou breeze.
He didn’t look around the store to get his bearings, but
immediately turned right and went to the produce
department. He had a patrician vibe, as if he were Mr.
Darcy strolling across English moors, not a local good
ole boy grocery shopping at Winn-Dixie.

Lily leaned against the cart and watched as he
efficiently grabbed a sack of potatoes and loaded it in
his cart, paying no attention to the admiring glances of
all the women. Something about the angle of his jaw and
the gleam of his long, dark hair looked familiar.

Tingles of awareness prickled her arms and legs. She had
to get closer. He drew her like a thirsty traveler to an
oasis. Is this how men felt around her? The same clawing
need for contact? It was a new experience, and Lily
wasn’t sure she liked the loss of control—no matter how
exciting the sensations.

Ignoring the dirty looks from other women, she
approached. Bettina, once an elementary school friend,
rolled her eyes and deliberately jostled against Lily.

“Fresh meat, huh?” Bettina whispered, breath whooshing
against Lily’s neck like a poisonous vapor. “Can’t you
leave one guy for the rest of us?”

Lily refused to glance at her old friend, afraid of
losing it. Bett had deserted her like all the other
jealous bitches. She lifted her chin and continued toward
the stranger, who was culling through vegetables. What to
say? The only opening line running through her brain—hey,
haven’t we met before?—was way tacky. But really, it
didn’t matter what she said. The mere sound of her voice
would be enough.

“Hello,” she purred, pulling her cart alongside Mr.
Darcy-cum-Brad Pitt.

He threw some corn in his cart without looking up. “Hi,”
he answered in a voice so clipped he might as well have
said back off.

Shock disconnected Lily’s brain from her limbs and she
stood immobile while pounding blood made her ears ring.
How odd. He acted impervious to the dulcet tones that
made other men cross-eyed. Lily stiffened her spine.
She’d bowl him over with more talking, would force him to
look into her ocean-blue eyes. That ought to do the
trick.

“Are you from around here?” she asked.

“No.” He pushed away and started down the dairy aisle,
his back to her.

What the hell? Lily froze again as she tried to grasp the
foreign concept of being snubbed by the opposite sex. It
really kind of sucked. Snickering noises from all around
sent heat rushing to the back of her neck.

“About time she had a comeuppance,” Bettina said with a
loud snort.

Lily faced her directly. “What’s your problem?” she
snapped. “What have I ever done to you?”

Bettina’s lips curled. “You really don’t get it, do you?
How about stealing Johnny Adams in junior high? And then
Tommy Beckham in high school?”

It’s not my fault, she wanted to scream. But they would
never understand. Their dislike and mistrust ran as deep
as the Gulf waters, their tears and anger as salty and
bitter as the sea that encompassed the bayou. Forget
them.

Lily shoved away in a huff, turning her attention once
again to the handsome stranger’s retreating figure. Her
fingers gripped the cart handle until her knuckles were
white as sea foam against her already pale skin. She
lifted her chin. Nobody ignored her. Envied, yes. Lusted,
of course. Later left humiliated and angry at her
inevitable rebuff, check. But never this total lack of
interest.

Lily hurried toward the mystery man. “Hey, you. Wait a
minute.”

He slackened his pace but didn’t stop as she drew close.

“Have we met before?” She’d thought so at first, but she
must be wrong. This brutal disregard would have been
memorable.

The man turned so slowly, Lily had a sense of
inevitability as the seconds wound down into a series of
freeze-frames. One: broad shoulders flexing under a dove-
gray T-shirt. Two: a profile of a strong chin and deep
facial planes. Three: a lock of obsidian hair falling
across high, prominent cheekbones.

It wasn’t a tan after all; his skin was the shade of
light cinnamon from Native American heritage. Leaf-green
eyes lit upon her, so shot through with a golden
starburst they were startling in their brightness. Not a
speck of recognition sparked in them, though.

But, oh, Lily knew those eyes. “Nash,” she breathed.
“Nashoba Bowman.”

He frowned slightly. “Do I know you?”

She swallowed down the burn at the back of her throat.
Not only was he immune to her siren’s voice and
unaffected by her physical beauty, but also he didn’t
even remember her. A riptide of humiliation washed over
Lily. Only years of hiding her emotions kept her from
betraying hurt. She licked her parched lips. “You used to
spend summers here with your grandfather when you were
little.”

Nash stared long and hard, the brightness of his pupils
deepened to a darker hue as the seconds—minutes?—sped by.

He had to remember. She held up her right hand and
twirled her wrist. His gaze shifted to the colorful
beaded bracelet he’d given her when they were children.
“Friends forever,” he’d said when he’d tied it on her
wrist. Lily willed him to recall those long-ago walks on
the shore, the jaunts in the woods, the picnics and bike
rides and…A glimmer of warmth lit his face.

“Lily?”

“Yes,” she whooshed in an exhale of relief.

He gave her the once-over, a slow appraisal that left her
hot and breathless. His dilated pupils and smoldering
aura suggested he might not be as indifferent to her as
he tried to act. Or it might be wishful thinking on her
part.

Did Nash also remember that chaste, sweet kiss they’d
once shared as curious twelve year olds?

His eyes met hers again, blazing green and gold. Yet the
stoic, expressionless face more resembled Nash’s
inscrutable grandfather than the kid she used to know.
The heat from his skin and a faint, familiar scent drew
her closer, strong as the full moon’s pull on the tide.
The same odd compulsion to approach Nash now drove her to
touch him. Lily dropped her gaze and rested her pale hand
against his bronzed forearm, admiring the contrast of
fair and dark. Her gaze swept lower, noting that no gold
band adorned his fingers.

Nash’s skin was hot as the Southern sun and his muscles
rumbled and flickered under her touch, like thunder over
deep waters. His jaw tightened at the brazen contact, but
he didn’t pull away. His fingers curled tightly on his
cart. Indifferent, my ass. Lily closed her eyes and
inhaled, using her heightened senses to identify Nash’s
enticing scent—a woodsy, sandalwood base with wisps of
pine and cedar and perhaps a touch of oak moss. He
smelled like the backwoods they used to roam together.

Bet his kiss was anything but chaste now.