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“I’ll come with you,” I offered. Anthony and Beckett joined us too.

As we went to the kitchen, Isabeau asked, “Are you going to see Grace again?”

The honest answer was “Fuck, yes.” But Isabeau didn’t have to know everything.

“Not sure. We didn’t discuss any more meetings with Felicia and Gaston. The next step is going to be to make an offer. Although, I need more information regarding the actual cost of the renovations they’re planning. We’ve seen and talked a lot but haven’t discussed any numbers.”

Isabeau looked over her shoulder as we went into the kitchen. “Well, if you do see Grace, could you tell her about our fragrance shop?”

“Why on earth would he do that?” Anthony asked.

“Rumor has it that the poor girl hasn’t dated since her divorce. We could give her a nudge by making one of our special lilac perfumes for her. I found her story very endearing. And if we can help her find the right one, then why not?”

I was absolutelynotgoing to tell Grace about their shop at all. I didn’t want her to have a perfume, especially not one with lilac. Not that I truly believed my grandmothers when they said it had special powers to bring people together, but why risk it?

“I’ll see if I can find a way to put that in the conversation,” I said.

Was the look in Isabeau’s eyes triumphant, or did it just seem like that to me?

Anthony whistled, and Beckett clapped my shoulder. “Dude, you should consider yourself lucky that she’s not offering to make a lilac perfume foryou. You know, to attract ‘the right one,’” he mimicked Isabeau, who instantly bristled.

“Oh, you three, just keep mocking us,” she replied.

“We’re not mocking, Isabeau,” Anthony said, but Beckett tilted his head.

“I was. Sorry, I just can’t take that story seriously.” He chuckled.

“Lilac doesn’t work on men,” Isabeau explained.

“Yes, we only use it in women’s fragrances,” Celine added as she put jambalaya in bowls.

“Well, now we’re relieved,” Beckett said in a sarcastic tone. My youngest brothers couldn’t read Isabeau and Celine as well as the rest of us. I wanted to warn them that all three of us were in trouble.

“We have something else for men,” Isabeau said.

Fuck, I knew it.

“And what is that?” Anthony asked, and he at least had the good sense to sound a bit terrified. Maybe he could read Isabeau’s intentions better than I thought, but it was too little, too late. “You know what? Never mind. We don’t wear colognes anyway.”

“No, you don’t,” Isabeau said sweetly. “But you do get all those soaps from us all the time.”

I could practically feel my brothers panicking next to me. I was panicking a bit too. Yeah, that was the power of Isabeau LeBlanc and Celine Broussard. The three of us were grown-ass men, CEOs of our respective branches. Yet our grandmothers had the power to make us cower.

“What?” Beckett asked sharply. “You would tell us if you put something in them, wouldn’t you?”

“Why would we?” Celine replied. “After all, those things don’t work,” she continued, mocking my brother. It was too funny.

“Fucking hell,” Anthony groaned.

“Now, boys, let’s take the jambalaya and the rice with beans to the living room,” Isabeau ordered, effectively ending the conversation.

I exchanged a glance with my brothers, but neither said anything. Our grandmothers could be joking, of course, but I was going to thoroughly check my soaps once I got home.

Chapter Sixteen

Zachary

By the time I left with Anthony and Beckett, it was about nine o’clock.