Chapter 2

Tad said that they were going in through the back door, it would be better to park back there.

Lee said she really was afraid to go in that house.

Tad told her he had put his gun in his jacket pocket before they left and was a good shot.

Lee had Tad drive all the way down the alley. Most of the alley was lined on both sides with thick hedges. The same thick hedges were between the houses on both sides of where her home had been.

A new looking white convertible was parked under a steel shelter.

Tad pulled in behind it on his next trip down the alley.

They got out and walked to the back porch of the house. Lee moved a potted plant and got the key to the back door.

They both took their boots off before going inside.

Lee led Tad to her room. She found her notes where she had hidden them. Tad asked if there was any thing she wanted to take from her room.

Lee chose several items of clothing and a pair of dress boots and two pairs of shoes.

She told Tad that she better not take any thing else, it might be missed.

Tad said " I guess we need to get out of here then". Before they left Tad had Lee go to her father's desk and write down the address of the D E A in Washington.

They slipped away to Lee's new home near Jackson.

The next morning they went back to fishing, by two PM all four lines had been run and the boat was loaded with fish.

Tad sold four hundred twenty pounds of catfish at a dollar a pound. They bought bait and gas for the boat.

Tad motored up to Kate's shanty boat and shouted for her. Kate came out and greeted her favorite relative.

Tad asked Kate if she would mind getting him a six month supply of birth control pills.

Kate said she would not mind at all.

Tad gave her two hundred dollars.

Kate said " They don't cost that much darling, I think only one of these hundred dollar bills will be enough".

Tad told Kate that all over the cost of the pills was hers.

Kate asked " Who do you want me to kill for you honey".

Tad said he would let her know later and started the boat engine.

Lee said " Thank you Tad, sex will be much better with out condoms".

That night after they had dinner Lee and Tad drafted a letter to the Director of the D E A in Washington.

Lee wrote a cover letter stating that the enclosed was from the diary of the Deputy Director of the south eastern division of the D E A, Mister David Fitsgerald in Mobile Alabama.

The next two weeks went by with Tad and Lee in total bliss. The weather and fishing was good and the loving was even better.

Tad noticed a headline on a news paper in a dispenser in front of the grocery store as they were shopping for food. That head line had read that the Local Director the Drug Enforcement Agency had been killed while making a drug bust. None of the drug dealers had lived as they were all armed and had resisted being arrested. During the shoot out. David Fitsgerald the Deputy Director of the south eastern district of the D E A was killed in the line of duty.

Tad bought the paper and Lee read the article when they got home.

Tad said that the government had apparently cleaned up it's house and disposed of seven dealers and one of their own dirty agents in the process.

Tad told Lee she could go home now if she wanted to.

Lee asked if she could stay with Tad, she really did not want to go back to the kind of life she had lived before.

Tad asked if Lee would like to let her mother know that she was alright.

Lee said she would but she did not want to tell her where she was.

Tad had a phone in the house boat but did not want Lee to use it to call her mother. They drove to Mount Vernon, nearly to Mobile for Lee to make her call.

When Lee had her mother on the phone she told her mother she had read in the paper that her step father was dead. Lee told her mother she was sad because of that. Lee told her that she had moved to a place she really liked and would keep in touch. Lee hung up the phone and asked Tad if he would take her home now.

In August they enrolled at the University Of South Alabama on a scholarship provided by the Bureau Of Indian Affairs. Tad rented a small apartment near the campus in Mobile. Both Lee and Tad had valid driver's licensee to prove they were twenty one years of age.

Lee called her mother soon after they moved into their apartment, Lee invited her to dinner Saturday night.

Lee's mother accepted her invitation and was there promptly at five Saturday afternoon.

Lee introduced Tad Yates to her mother and told her that she was now Lee Yates.

Lee's mother assumed that she had just been told that her daughter and Tad were married. Lee and her mother went in the kitchen and Lee finished preparing their meal. Lee's mother asked if she was happy. Lee told her she was very happy.

Lee's mother, Libby, short for Elisabeth, wanted to know what she was doing now. Lee told Libby that she and Tad were full time college students now.

Libby asked if they needed money. Lee told her they were fine for money.

Libby asked Lee if she wanted the car her step father had bought for her as a present for her sixteenth birthday.

Lee told Libby she could use it some.

Libby told her to come by and get the car and any clothing and things from her bed room that she might want.

Lee said she had the afternoon free next Tuesday, would that be a good day?

Libby said that would be fine.

Lee went to the door to the living room and said " Tad, honey, the red beans need you to add the seasonings".

Lee told Tad the rice was nearly ready.

Lee told Libby that Tad was a Cajun, a Coon Ass, and liked Red Beans and Rice often. Tad came in the kitchen as she said that.

He said " You eat more of it than I do every time we make a pot full".

Lee laughed and said she had not known he had noticed. Lee kissed Tad and Tad said " Go away woman, I am trying to get just the right amount of garlic in this and you are distracting me".

Dinner was pleasant and Libby left convinced that Lee had chosen a good man for a husband.

Tuesday Lee and Libby had time to talk, Libby said she was sorry she and Lee had never been close. Libby needed Lee now that her husband was dead.

Libby said Lee was nearly her only remaining blood kin.

Libby begged Lee to let her into her life, she wanted to try to mend years of neglect if she could.

She said she was very lonely now that her husband was gone.

Lee told Libby that she and Tad were going to their home Friday after their last class, she told Libby they lived in a swamp not far from Mobile. Lee asked if she would like to spend the weekend with them on a house boat.

Libby said she would like that if there would be room for her. Lee assured her that there was plenty of room.

Libby asked Lee to run that by Tad and call her the next day if he was alright about her spending the week end with them.

When Lee spoke to Tad about Libby spending the weekend with them in the swamp Tad told Lee that was fine with him. He said he had liked her mother when they had her as their guest for dinner.

Lee called her mother the next day and told her Tad would like her to go home with them for the weekend. Lee told her to bring shorts and tops but that they usually ate Saturday nights at a restaurant owned by one of Tad's uncles.

She would need a nice dress for that.

Friday Lee picked her mother up at her home after her last class at one.

Tad had his last class at two.

They had packed that morning and Lee drove to in front of the building where Tad's last class was. She and Libby had sat in the Town Car talking until Tad joined them.

Tad had opened the door on Libby's side and they rode with Libby sitting between them.

There was mostly a friendly silence on the way to their garage near Jackson.

Libby was surprised when Lee drove them up to the garage and pushed a button on a small remote and the door opened. After Lee parked in the garage and locked up they took their luggage to the boat. When they got in the boat she was uneasy, she had never been in a boat before.

Tad unlocked the boat and got in and pushed it away from the pier. Lee started the engine and idled down toward their home.

Tad pointed to a big Gator sunning on a log. Lee pointed to a Coon in a tree watching them go by. A Beaver swam away as they approached.

A Cotton Mouth snake swam towards them, and love was not on it's mind.

There was swamp on both sides of them most of the way. Tall Cypress trees grew there with their Spanish Moss decorations. The water was black.

Libby had never been in a place like that before. When Lee steered around a bend in the channel and Libby saw their home she was amazed at its beauty.

Lee docked the boat and unlocked the door while Tad tied it up. Lee shouted down to Tad " I got to go honey". She rushed into her and Tads bath, showing Libby her room and bath as ran past it.

Libby needed to use the potty almost as bad as Lee did. Libby did not close the door she was in such a hurry.

She was sitting there with her shorts down around her ankles when Tad brought her suitcase in and put it on the bed.

Tad looked at Libby and grinned.

Libby smiled back.

Lee joined Tad in the kitchen when she was finished. Tad told her of catching her mother on the pot, they had a good laugh about that.

Tad asked Lee if she would like crayfish for supper. Lee said that if there were enough in Tads traps she would like that very much. Lee said that she could boil potatoes, carrots and corn on the cob, all from the freezer, and have them nearly cooked by the time he ran his traps and was back. Libby came in then, she said " You got your picture taken didn't you Tad"?

Tad said "That's why I was grinning".

Tad asked Libby if she wanted to go with him to run his traps. Libby asked how long they would be gone. Tad told her they should be back in one hour.

Libby decided she would go.

Tad motored slowly down the creek to where his property started. He turned into the swamp on the side of the creek toward Jackson. He passed a ' No Trespassing' sign on a tree. A short distance ahead Tad passed a sign that said " You are on private property and we shoot trespassers".

Libby asked Tad if it was alright for them to be there. Tad told her he owned a square mile of this swamp and they were on his land. Libby asked if he meant water rather than land.

Tad told her that about three hundred acres was dry. Tad told Libby that his grand father had it drilled years ago and found that it was a salt dome. Tad said that some day it would be very valuable land.

Tad ran over a dozen traps and threw back all but the monster crayfish. Tad said that it was a lie that the smaller ones had more flavor. Tad must have had ten pounds of crayfish when he finished running his traps.

He motored them back to the house boat.

Libby asked If many people lived in the swamps. Tad told her that there were a good many living the way he had until he started back to school. Tad told Libby that a person could live well off the swamps.

Back at the house boat when Tad brought in a five gallon plastic bucket nearly full of big crayfish, Lee gave him a high five and a kiss. She said they had enough to take uncle Jedi some the next night.

Libby asked who uncle Jedi was.

Lee said that " Uncle Jedi is the owner of the place we are going to dine at tomorrow night".

Lee told her mother that uncle Jedi was Tad's uncle.

Lee told her mother that Jedi had been married for seventeen years when his wife had a fatal accident. She and three others were coming back from Mobile and had a head on with an eighteen wheeler. All in the car were killed.

( That was when Danna Lee Yates had gotten killed. )

The crayfish were washed and thrown in the boiling pot of vegetables.

Four minutes later the pot was off the stove.

Tad served plates of corn, potatoes, carrots and Crawdads and poured wine.

Libby watched Lee and Tad tear the tail off and shell the hull off of that. She did that to her's.

Libby had a second helping.

After dinner Tad said he was going to call his mom and aunt Kate and invite them to have dinner at their brother's the next night. He called and talked to them. They were both going to be able to go.

They watched TV for a while and went to bed.

Near midnight Tad slipped out of Lee's embrace and trudged to the kitchen for a drink of water. Lee and Tad slept in the nude.

Libby wakened when the light was turned on in the kitchen. She was thirsty and got out of bed and went into the kitchen.

Libby was wearing a flimsy night gown. All of her body was visible.

When Libby was near Tad she saw that he was in the buff.

Libby said " I guess we are even now, you saw nearly all of me on the pot when we got here now I see all of you".

As Libby was talking Tad was taking a good look at Libby in her shear night gown. His cock started to get hard.

Libby could not take her eyes off it.

Tad told Libby if it were not for his love for her daughter he would come on to her strong.

He told Libby she was beautiful in her gown but he and Lee were in the habit of going nude when here. Tad asked her to join them that way in the morning.

Libby said " We will see".

The next morning as Lee and Tad got out of bed, Lee said " I guess we better wear clothes since mother is here". Tad said " We are going to go naked this morning just like always". Lee asked if he thought they might offend her mother.Tad said " I don't give a shit if we do, she has ignored you all these years". He reminded Lee that it was Libby that was lonely and wanted her as a friend now.

They went to the kitchen bare ass.

Libby peeped around the door to her room. She saw that they were nude and took off her gown and joined them. Libby helped Lee fix breakfast. Except for Libby looking at Tad's limp cock often, they acted as if they were dressed.

After they had eaten, Tad told Lee and Libby he thought he would take Jedi some Gator meat and run those crawdad traps he had near the garage and take him more crayfish than what they had left from last night.

Tad got dressed and told them he would be back in a couple of hours.

Tad took a rifle out of a gun cabinet and left.

Lee and Libby cleaned up the kitchen and then went to the room Libby had used and made the bed. They made up the Queen size bed Tad and Lee had slept in, and then sat on it and talked.

Libby told a lot that Lee did not know.

Libby had been sixteen only two months when she got pregnant with Lee. Lee's father was about to graduate as a senior. They drove over to Mississippi and got married. When Libby finished school that Spring she never could go back. Lee was born just before Libby's seventeenth birthday. Before Lee had been born Ken, Lee's father took a job driving a truck for a freight line in Mobile. Some times Ken would go two days without sleep. That was thought to be the cause of his death.

Ken had gone to sleep driving his pickup home after a trip to Detroit. He had run off the road and hit a big tree.

Libby was left with a year old child.

She had not finished school, the only jobs open to her were being a waitress or working in a fast food joint. She had tried that and was still looking for any thing that paid better.

She had landed a job at the State Docks. The job paid just the minimum but she had health insurance benefits.

She told Lee that after her father's death she had a hard time making ends meet. She had a job at the state docks. It did not pay enough for her to afford rent and child care and leave much for food and other things. Libby had met Lee's step father there, he was there often as a customs agent checking shipments.

Three years after Lee's father was killed Libby had married David Fitsgerald.

He was transferred to the Drug Enforcement Agency a year later.

Libby said David did not want her to work after they were married. Libby had stayed at home in that big old house he inherited from an aunt.

Libby had loved being a mother, she spent a lot of time with Lee. Lee had learned to read when she was four and Libby had started her into math at that time.

When Lee had entered the first grade she was able to pass the tests for a fifth grade student. She and David were told that their child needed to attend an advanced learning school.

Libby said that one of the most respected ones in the nation was right there in Mobile.

David insisted that they send Lee off to school. He was made South Eastern Director a few months before and he wanted Libby free to travel with him.

Libby had pleaded with David to let her keep Lee at home but got only a firm " NO".

David had enrolled Lee in that Academy in Virginia. Libby had been heart broken.

Libby begged Lee to let her back into her life. Libby said she was nearly thirty four years old and probably would never marry again.

Lee told her mother that she still had a young woman's figure and her face was still beautiful, she might find her another man yet.

Tad parked the boat at the floating pier and took two dead alligators out of it and dressed them. After packing all of that meat in a cooler with ice, he came in and told Lee he had better than fifty pounds of additional crawdads to take to Jedi.

Tad decided they would go in to town in the car. His ladies would not mess up their hair that way and all that stuff would not have to be carried from the boat.

At five thirty Tad called Aunt Kate and his mother and told them they were about to leave.

Tad trolled up the creek and locked the boat to the pier. Lee and Tad carried four large coolers to the car.

Tad's dates looked like centerfold candidates.

Tad picked up his mother and aunt and drove up and parked near the door of The Jedi.

A new waiter met them as they went in. Tad told the waiter that they always used the private dining room next to Jedi's office. Tad took drink orders when the waiter went to bring menus.

Lee's mother said she would drink a Vodka Tonic, Tad's mother had the same, aunt Kate had Rum and coke.

When the waiter came back Tad ordered for the ladies and then ordered Bourbon with ice and water on the side for himself and white wine for Lee.

The waiter asked if he could see Tad and Lee's ID.

Lee took her drivers licensee out and handed it across the table to him.The waiter said Thanks mam I thought you might be younger than twenty one.

Tad handed him his. The waiter apologized and told Tad he looked younger than twenty one.

Tad asked the waiter to order the drinks and tell Jedi two of his sisters were here.

As the waiter handed Lee's ID back Libby asked if she could see it. Lee looked at Tad and when he nodded she let her mother have it.

Libby noticed that.

Libby looked at it and said " That is real is it not". Lee said it was and was issued by the State Of Alabama.

Libby said it is noted on the back that you are a Choctaw Indian.

Lee told her that was how she was able to go to college. Libby said " I don't think I want to hear any more of this".

The waiter brought their drinks and right after he left Jedi came in.

He said I am graced with the two most beautiful sisters in the world and our newest member of the family and the most beautiful of all. Lee grinned at Jedi and told Libby that Jedi was so full of it some spilled out occasionally.

Jedi kissed Kate on both of her cheeks, Noreen, Tad's mother on both cheeks Libby full on her mouth, and Lee on her cheeks.

Jedi asked if some one would tell him who this vision of beauty was and where she came from. Kate told Jedi she was Elisabeth Fitsgerald from Mobile a recent widow and Lee's mother.

Jedi told them he could not tell which was the most beautiful.

Tad gave Jedi the keys to the Lincoln and told him that there was about eighty pounds of live crayfish and probably over a hundred in dressed Gator meat in the trunk all for him.

Jedi said " You are making my day".

Jedi told them he would be back soon and excused himself.

Kate said " He likes you Libby, he can have any woman in the state but has shown no interest in any one since his wife died. He is my brother and a very good catch if you could get him.