by Chant, Zoe
He hoped that when she got comfortable enough, she would choose not to sleep there at all.
When she came downstairs, he had a fire leaping in the fireplace, and two waiting wineglasses. They clinked them together and he sampled it. The wine rolled like liquid gold over his tongue. He wasn’t going to tell her what he paid for Chateau Ausone St. Emilion wine; he had lived too many years stretching every penny, and remembered what it had felt like when he first began dealing with the rich and successful.
“Oh,” she exclaimed, eyes widening. “This is really good.”
“It’s my favorite,” he said.
She glanced at the fire, then moved to one of the hassocks near the hearth.
He moved to the other one. “Sorry about the chill,” he said. “The house is empty most of the time.”
“This will warm me up.” She lifted the wine glass to the fire, which lit the rich burgundy liquid to a ruby glow.
They were alone together at last. He had schooled himself to wait, to give her time, not to push . . . but there she was, gazing at him over the rim of her glass, her cheeks a little flushed as the fire leaped.
The glow of the wine warmed him more than the fire, or maybe it was that look in her eyes. He didn’t know who moved first; her crystal goblet rang as she set it on the table and next thing he knew they sat before the fire, tangled in a deep, wine-flavored kiss.
Her fingers slid to the buttons on his shirt; his hands roamed her body, then tugged at her blouse, and they commenced undressing each other, one piece of clothing at a time as the fire leaped brighter, matching the warmth they generated between them.
He stretched out on the rug and she climbed on top of him, eyes bright with passion.
She rode him like she rode her bike, hard and magnificent; he came in long waves, then reached down to finish her off, and she toppled onto the rug next to him as they caught their breath.
Then, blissed out with afterglow and exhaustion, they scooped up their clothes and he led the way upstairs. He hoped she would follow him to his bedroom and the king size bed there. At first he thought she might, as she hesitated, then she whispered good night to the floor and shut herself in the guest room.
It was a long while before he fell asleep.
***
When Shelley woke up, she felt like Cinderella. On the one hand, the bed was like sleeping on a cloud, and the guest bathroom had its own Jacuzzi, but on the other hand she didn’t like feeling like Cinderella.
But she wasn’t. She was going to be paid—he’d said in the ride up the mountain that he would be having their respective agents talk. This was going to be a great item on her resume whatever happened. Yeah. If she thought of it as work, she felt okay.
The work’s OK, but the benefits are amazing!
She laughed, then got up, her body still faintly throbbing with afterglow. She indulged in the Jacuzzi, and when she went downstairs, dressed in her riding clothes, she walked into the heavenly aroma of seasoned sausage, baked wheat, and melted cheese.
“Good morning,” Mick greeted her, and indicated a breakfast nook off the kitchen, with a panoramic view of evergreen forest and distant mountains. “Do you like blinchiki stuffed with sausage and cheese?”
“I’ve never had it, but it sounds tasty.”
“My grandmother helped me survive my film school years by making enormous batches of Russian peasant food and freezing it. She still insists on doing it, though she turned ninety last year and I’ve been able to afford to eat out for the past ten years. I think she’s convinced that people in L.A. don’t eat real food.”
Shelley had to laugh. “Has she ever been to L.A.?”
He shook his head. “They would never admit it, but they’re getting pretty frail. Grandfather is nearly 95. I go up there to visit them. Anyway, if you don’t like it, don’t feel obliged. There are great breakfast places in town.”
One crispy bite of perfectly baked pancake stuffed with sharp, melted cheese and sausage, and she knew that he had not microwaved the food. He’d risen early enough to put it in the oven.
“It’s delicious,” she said sincerely.
“And filling. Coffee?”
“Please.”
“Take anything in it?”
“No.”
“Good. I can’t stand seeing people ruin the taste of fresh ground Kona.”
The coffee was as delicious as the blinchiki. “What other things does she make?”
He got up from the breakfast nook, pulled out a freezer drawer that looked big enough to supply an army platoon, and began naming off dishes she’d never heard of before, pronounced in rolling Russian names.
“They all sound tasty,” she said.
“Well, some of them might be odd if you aren’t used to them. The smell of Shchi, which is a kind of sour cabbage soup, used to drive my roommates right out. Unfortunately it had the same effect on dates, which I didn’t understand until I climbed into the back of a cab one day, and the guy, who’d left Russia years before and still missed the motherland, addressed me in Russian and began getting weepy. Considering there were four feet of open-windowed car between us, I got a clue.”
She laughed, and they talked about adventures in food tasting, discoveries and disasters, until they cleaned their plates. She offered to rinse and stash the dishes in the dishwasher as he pulled out frozen bread to make sandwiches. “I don’t think it will be too hot. We could risk sliced meat, or stick with peanut butter, my go-to during long cutting sessions.”
“Mine, too! Peanut butter for me.”
He put together a couple of sandwiches, grabbed water bottles, then led the way down a hall to the garage, which was big enough for five cars.
Here he kept several good, sturdy trail bikes. He’d already set one up with his camera equipment. He stashed the sandwiches as Shelley chose a Yamaha she was familiar with, and they rolled out into the crisp, clean mountain air.
He explained that they weren’t even pretending to shoot in the dusty, flat land that a good deal of Route 66 lay along. The idea was to showcase her riding against a spectacular backdrop; if the network people and the money guys liked what they saw, they could write a pilot and film that in some picturesque and cheap location between Barstow and Needles.
Great. She was just as happy not to be driving out to Needles, which at this time of year often reached temperatures of 115 and above.
When they reached his first site, a plateau with a panoramic view, he gave her some time to get used to how the bike handled as he set up his equipment and fussed with his light meter. She’d wondered if she was going to see Bearzilla again, but he only became very focused. Gaze he did, but she sensed a difference in his attitude. She liked the intensity of his focus. This was still the Russian Bear, filmmaker, but she was beginning to understand his relationship with his art. It was kind of cool.
The day passed quickly, Shelley loving the wind, the air, the scenery, the bike. When they sat together on a lichen-covered rock to eat their sandwiches, she reveled in his proximity, and the easy talk that ranged from film to bikes to things to do with peanut butter, thumbs up or down.
They returned at sunset, hungry and dirty, each going to check their phones. She only had one text (Jan: How many times? When you get back you WILL TALK!), and an email from Marv the Agent (Just got a call from Volkov’s agent. See what I told you?).
Mick flicked through an unending stream of emails and texts, but clearly none were dire. Finally he looked up, smiling.
“I’m not much of a cook,” he admitted. “I suppose that’s another reason why my grandmother still sends me care packages. How about we clean up and drive into town for dinner?”
She was so ravenous by then that when they reached Idyllwild and he began enumerating the various possibilities, she said, “The closest.”
He laughed and complied, taking her to an Italian restaurant with tables set outside under the trees amid cleverly hidden radiant heat, and pretty overhead lamps. They ordered
drinks while waiting for the food. Shelley was thirsty, and gulped down her Scotch, an expensive brand she could never afford. The glow spread pleasantly through her, banishing the mild ache from a long day of riding.
“Whoa, slow down,” Mick said.
“I’m okay.” She waved a hand at the waiter, and ordered another. After a hesitation, Mick also ordered a second.
Two sips into hers, the buzz had turned into a roar, and her head felt like a balloon floating unsteadily over her shoulders. Her lips had gone numb by the time the food arrived.
I’m drunk, she thought hazily. How could I get smashed on two drinks?
She was vaguely aware of eating delicious cannoli and asparagus, but the lamps had somehow grown haloes. Then they began gently revolving. From restaurant to car, and then she stumbled on the way into the house.
“Iss cold,” she said, the distant part of her brain thinking whoa as Mick caught her against him. She giggled inanely, heat searing from where their hips bumped.
“Come on, love, up the stairs,” his low, rough voice rumbled next to her ear . . . “Here you go. Lie back. That’s right.”
Her head landed on a soft pillow, and she was vaguely aware of her pants sliding off. She reached up muzzily to catch his face as he unbuttoned her blouse. “Mmmm,” she said, because her lips didn’t seem able to work, and she giggled as her hands slid off and plopped to the bed like a couple of baseball mitts.
He pulled her blouse off, then leaned down and kissed her gently on the lips, then on the forehead. The door closed on his soft laugh, and her eyes drifted closed.
When she woke, her head pounded mercilessly. She threw back the covers and discovered herself lying in bed in her underwear. She dared to turn her head an inch, and discovered a glass of water on the nightstand.
Ugh. She forced herself to sit up and drink it all before shambling out of bed, wishing she were the zombie she felt like. Every molecule of her skin hurt. At least zombies didn’t feel pain. Did they?
By the time she came out of the shower she thought she might live after all, and she dressed with meticulous care. Ow. Ow. Ow, down the stairs to the kitchen.
Mick laid aside his cell phone, took one look, then said, “How about more water, then some coffee?”
“I’m sorry,” Shelley said, thumbing her aching eyelids. “What did they put in that Scotch? I can’t believe I got hammered on two.”
“It’s my fault.” He poured the coffee, his head cocked as he gave her a concerned look. “I should have warned you about the altitude. I’m so used to it.”
She sank onto the breakfast nook bench. “Urgh.”
“I went out and got something to go,” he said, setting the water and coffee before her, then turning away to uncover some dishes. “I figured spicy Russian peasant fare might not sit well.”
Crispy bacon, fluffy eggs, and buttered toast appeared before her. By the time Shelley had eaten that, drunk water and more of that good Kona coffee, then swallowed a couple of aspirin, the hammer had dulled to a minor throb.
“Do you want to sleep some more?” he asked.
She shook her head. “I’m good. A ride in the fresh air will kill the rest of the hangover.”
His smile broadened. “Outside is my own personal hangover cure.” He seemed about to say more, caught himself, a slight frown between his brows, then he gave her a rueful smile. “But not everyone shares it.”
She was certain he’d meant to say something else, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to hear it. Did he think she regularly got wasted? Ugh. Time for a change of subject. “What’s on the agenda for today?”
He gave her a considering look, his blue eyes narrowed, then said, “I got some terrific footage yesterday. Today it’ll be easy for you—it’s the camera’s turn for tricks. Sunbeams through dust. Splashing through a stream to catch the light. Some play with shadows. I want mystery to surround our lone rider.”
“Let’s do it.”
To her immense relief, he didn’t pester her with questions about how she felt, or are-you-sures as they went out to the garage to refill the gas tanks on their bikes.
The only concession he made to Shelley’s drunken escapade was packing them two sandwiches each, and extra water. Then they took off as an army of low cloud puffs marched across the sky. Somewhere a storm was brewing.
But the morning was still and warm in the sunlight. Shelley did as directed, easy riding along paths that he clearly knew well. Some of them were scarcely wide enough for an animal, and they took them slow. How did he know these mountains so well?
As she’d expected, the wind and the exertion burned off the last of the hangover, leaving her time to think. He’d put her to bed without touching her.
What was it Mick had said? She couldn’t remember words, just that kiss on her forehead, his sweet tone, and a little laughter. Tender. That was the word.
If he asks me I’m going to sleep in his bed, she thought as he waved her around for another slow descent down a trail strewn with granite boulders glinting in the sun. The idea of sleeping next to him—of waking up next to him—thrilled through her nerves to pool in her belly with the delicious sense of anticipation.
It felt so right.
She couldn’t help smiling when he brought her back, and he smiled at her over the camera as he set up another shot. She jammed her helmet on, he finished that shot, then he packed up the camera and they zoomed up to the wider path. They rode side by side over the slope toward a little hidden valley full of wildflowers of every hue.
They lunched beside a stream, then headed down to a little lake. The water was a deep, stunning blue, with white rock tumbled at one side. Shelley did some easy trick riding along the shore and over the rocks.
Mick gave her a searching gaze, then said, “I think that will do it. I got some great footage. How about we call it a day?”
She realized the headache had come back a little.
Mick touched the sides of his eyes. “We could both use a hot shower and some aspirin.”
“You’re on,” she agreed, and grinned at the prospect of a shower for two.
They reached the house, parked the bikes and walked inside to where they’d left their phones.
She only had a couple messages, and set hers down. She turned to ask if she should heat water for coffee, then froze when she saw him standing in the middle of the kitchen staring down at his phone, lips compressed to a white line.
“What is it?” she asked.
He glanced up, his gaze blue and bleak. “It’s my grandfather. Some kind of seizure. My grandmother insists it’s nothing. Isn’t that what everyone always says?” His accent was strong, his low voice quick and unsteady.
“What can I do?” Shelley asked.
His pained, distant focus broke and he turned her way. “Shelley, will you take the car back to L.A.? There’s a helo pad up here . . .” From the way he punched his phone it was clear to Shelley that he had the helicopter company on speed dial.
“Be glad to,” she said.
He walked toward the balcony, talking in a low, rapid voice. When he came back, he said, “I’m really sorry about this. I had a much better night planned for us.”
Heat flared; the body’s wants were simple and direct. “Rain check?” she asked.
He smiled, and kissed her hard. And she kissed him right back.
***
As the helo whopped its way over the San Gabriel Valley, Mick looked down. Southern California was never more beautiful than when seen from the sky after the sun had gone down. The complicated geometry expressed in light created a dome of incandescence.
He tried to busy his mind with figuring how to shoot it and do to justice. Anything was better than the round of useless questions he couldn’t answer, and his own regrets.
As the shadowy folds of the Angeles National Forest closed out the city lights, he opened his laptop and began a rough cut of his footage of Shelley. Already he missed Shelley; he couldn’t imagine life without his
grandparents; he should have brought Shelley to meet them. No, he shouldn’t. There could be no straight talk with a stranger around. But what if?
What if, what if. He hated that. His bear roused, uneasy and anxious, and he drew a deep breath to push him below the surface again. Keep busy.
Pulling up shots of Shelley soothed him, which soothed the bear. He worked steadily, reflecting on how much pleasure it gave him to be doing hands-on again. He liked his key production team, carefully built over the past ten years, but in getting pushed to the top, he had lost this immediacy.
He kept working until the helo spiraled down to the tiny airport near his hometown. In the sudden quiet after the engine noise, the air smelled of dust and brush and cows from the nearby dairy farms. He disembarked and thanked the pilot.
The rental car he’d ordered was waiting for him. He reached the hospital a short time later, its bright fluorescent lights and quiet a surreal world after his long flight and the fabulous day in the mountains. His anxiety mounted as he inquired at the desk, then walked down the polished linoleum that looked the same in every hospital he’d ever visited.
His grandmother glanced up when he entered; he went to her, but his gaze arrowed straight to the frail-looking old man on the bed. The heart monitor bleeped steadily, corroborating the rise and fall of the covers smoothed over his grandfather’s chest.
“Baboulia Marisia.” ‘Darling grandmother Marisia,’ he breathed as he kissed his grandmother. “How—”
At the sound of his voice, quiet as it was, his grandfather opened his eyes. “Misha.”
“Dyedushka Ivan,” Mick murmured the affectionate diminutive for ‘grandfather,’ “how are you? What happened?”
Ivan turned his pale blue eyes toward Marisia, who said, “For the past two months he’s had a swarm of what they call mini-strokes.” They were speaking in Russian, but she used the English word for mini-strokes.
