A wistful smile curved her mouth. It was almost ten months since she had seen them. How much would they have grown? Impatience filled her, barely contained. But they would be reunited as soon as Tante could secure passage to New Orleans.

New Orleans was pleasant this time of year, before the summer heat grew brutal. They were staying at the elegant St. Louis Hotel in the heart of the carré de la ville. The small hotel situated at the intersection of Royal and St. Louis Street was very comfortable, a welcome change from the hardships she had so recently endured.

Yet she was not as relaxed as she might have been. An undercurrent of apprehension threaded her mood. Steve was more attentive than he had ever been, their love stronger than she had ever thought possible, yet she was strangely uneasy.

“You’ll be fine once the children are safely with us,” Steve had said when she mentioned her foreboding to him. “All that’s happened in the last months is making you so nervous, Ginny.”

“Yes, I’m sure you’re right,” she’d murmured, but the anxiety did not dissipate.

Sonya echoed her concerns over lunch at Antoine’s the next day, her normally placid face creased in a slight frown as she regarded her stepdaughter.

“It’s so far for the children to be traveling, Ginny. I do hope your aunt exercises extreme caution with them.”

“I’m certain she will, Sonya.” Ginny’s white china coffee cup trimmed in gold clattered slightly as she replaced it in the matching saucer. The coffee was strong and hot, much too hot to be drinking when it was so warm outside. A lovely breeze wafted in through open shutters, doors flung wide to admit cooler air, but not even the huge fans that whirred overhead could keep the heat at bay. Insects droned fitfully despite the precautions of fly traps and netting. “Tante Celine is quite accustomed to handling the children.”

Sonya nodded. “It’s probably fortunate that I never had any children of my own. I’m afraid I would be far too protective of them.”

It was an indirect reprimand, a reminder that Ginny had been away from her children too often and for too long. Her mouth tightened slightly, and she wished she had not agreed to meet her stepmother for lunch. It was obvious that Sonya was in one of her contentious moods.

“Since you feel that way, it probably is best that you were never able to have children. More coffee?”

Blue eyes narrowed slightly as Sonya shook her head. “No, it is much too warm for coffee. When will you be returning to Mexico, my dear? I don’t understand why you insist upon living in such an uncivilized, brutal country when you could stay in Louisiana, or even Texas.”