3 Love Stories

By O'Neil De Noux

Three love stories by New Orleans writer O’Neil De Noux
Cover art by Martha Landry

“Language of the Heart”
How would you feel, if you knock on the door of the house of the girl you should have married twenty-five years ago and she answers the door and looks the same as she did all those years ago?

“Five Days Left”
Time is 1968 and a soldier ends his last love letter to his wife with an old Cajun saying, “If I have only five days to live, I’d give up three to spend the two with you. With us, Babe, It should be – If I have only five days to live, I’d give up four to spend one with you.” And the soldier does just that.

“The Stuff of Dreams”
World War II veteran Sergeant Leo Minosa has come from Wyoming to New Orleans to meet the woman whose image he painted on his B-24 bomber – Louisiana Lullaby.

• Language: English
• Publisher: O'Neil De Noux
• Release date: Feb 2, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311187055

O'Neil De Noux

O’Neil De Noux writes in many genres, primarily realistic crime fiction, strong on setting, mostly New Orleans, featuring the accurate dialogue of the streets. He also writes scintillating erotica. His publishing credits include 20 novels, nine short story collections and over 300 short stories. From contemporary to historical, De Noux uses several recurring characters in his New Orleans stories and novels: NOPD Homicide Detective John Raven Beau (21st Century); NOPD Homicide Detective LaStanza (20th Century); Private-eye Lucien Caye (1940s) and NOPD Detective Jacques Dugas (1890s). A primary theme in De Noux’s fiction is the effect of violence on victims and their families as well as the sometimes debilitating effect of violence on law enforcement officers, private-eyes and their loved ones. As a former private-eye and currently a police investigator, De Noux knows his subject well. De Noux’s stories span from mystery to mainstream, literary, suspense, thriller, science-fiction, fantasy, horror, erotica, humor, westerns, children’s fiction as well as cross-genre stories – erotic-detective, science-fiction mysteries and the like. O’Neil De Noux’s “The Heart Has Reasons” (Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine, September 2006) won the Private Eye Writers of America’s prestigious SHAMUS AWARD for BEST SHORT STORY 2007. The SHAMUS is given annually to recognize outstanding achievement in private eye fiction. In 2009, the Short Mystery Fiction Society awarded the Derringer Award for Best Novelette to another Lucien Caye story, “Too Wise” by O’Neil De Noux (which appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine’s November 2008 Issue). The Derringer Award is given annually to recognize excellence in the mystery short form. In June 2012, De Noux’s novel JOHN RAVEN BEAU was named 2011 POLICE BOOK OF THE YEAR by Police-Writers.com, a group that boasts of 1153 state and local law enforcement officials from 485 state and local law enforcement agencies who have written 2504 police books. A hyper-realistic crime story, JOHN RAVEN BEAU provides an intimate look into the beleaguered NOPD Homicide Division, a story that begins in the French Quarter and ends in a swamp, all within the city limits of America’s eternal city, a city that cannot be destroyed – New Orleans. A second Beau novel was released in 2013 – CITY OF SECRETS. Books by O’Neil De Noux (all available as eBooks and trade paperbacks). Go to www.oneildenoux.net for links.

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Cover Art Copyright 2014 Martha Landry

3 LOVE STORIES

O’Neil De Noux

Copyright 2014 O’Neil De Noux

Smashwords Edition

Language of the Heart

SHIELDING MY eyes from the bright, New Orleans summer sun, hand over brow, I climb the three steps to the front gallery of the house of the girl I should have married twenty-five years ago. The house looks the same – a narrow, wooden shotgun painted tan with green trim and a dark green door. The trim might have been brown back in 1977 when I’d walked away from the house for the last time.

I’d passed it, of course, maybe a hundred times, driving through the French Quarter, glancing at it as I cruised along narrow Dauphine Street. But I hadn’t looked closely at it in quite a while. It’s actually a Greek Revival shotgun with four rectangular Doric pillars supporting a parapet decorated with elaborate gingerbread trim. On either side of the ornate door, with its glass transom above, stand full-length windows behind louvered shutters.

I ring the doorbell and hear the ding dong echo inside. I ring the bell again and move to the side of the gallery to the banana trees next to the house. I close my eyes for a moment and see her face again – Marie Burns of dark brown hair and full, sensuous lips. She had her mother’s blue eyes and fair, Scottish complexion, although she was half Italian. Her grandfather had changed their name from Burano during World War II.

I move back and ring the bell again, let out a long sigh – relief or just nervous tension – and start back down the steps. The door opens behind me and I turn, ready to ask the occupant if they know where the Burnses live now and she’s there, right hand on the door frame, left hand on her hip. Her hair is the same, long and curled past her shoulders, those blue eyes stare into mine as a smile crosses her full lips.

I take in a deep breath. She hasn’t changed, not one iota. She’s the same as she was, a twenty-two year old wearing a red