“Here he is now,” Mavis says, a big smile on her face. I turn toward the direction she’s facing and immediately sputter choke on my wine. I set down my wine glass and cover my face with my napkin, trying to block the cough, and wipe the spittle off my chin at the same time. Because, unless I’m mistaken, Mavis’ gentleman caller is about fifty years her junior; sauntering toward us, looking hot as hell. I’m not sure I really knew what that term meant before now, but after seeing it in action, I can safely say that a saunter is damn sexy.
Ordinarily, his style of dress would be inappropriate, but this is California, the land where people pay a lot of money to look a little messy. Dirty jeans, tight white t-shirt, dusty cowboy boots. Dark brown hair sticking up slightly on top, scruffy face, brown bedroom eyes.
Shit. How do I look?
I glance down quickly to make sure there’s nothing on my dress.
Stop that, Lexie. He’s not here for you. That’s bubbe’s date you’re lusting over.
“You okay, darlin’?” I hear the deep voice right before I feel the large hand start to gently pat my upper back. You know how they say someone has golden pipes? Or a tenor as smooth as satin? That was this, only better. Way better. And with a touch of a twang.
I nod and wipe at my eyes before looking back up.
Chapter 11
Cole
Mavis looks up from the table and smiles big when she sees me approaching. She says something to her granddaughter, who in turn looks up sharply and immediately chokes on whatever she’s drinking. I do what any good Texan would and rush to her aid. I mean, I’m no doctor, but I can pat a back just as well as anyone else. And maneuver a Heimlich or two.
“You okay, darlin’?” I ask, my hand on her bare back. Her dress is one of those where the entire thing is held up by a knot at the back of her neck. She nods but has yet to look up or speak, instead continuing to dab at her eyes.
She waves her hand back in my direction and clears her throat. “I’m fine, thank you.” She lowers her napkin back to her lap and tilts her head back and peeks up through those long dark lashes with her big blue eyes. Paired with her pale creamy skin and lush red lips, well, color me thunderstruck.
A spark zips through my entire body making me feel more alive, more animated, and somehow more at peace than I ever have before. Combined with a clarity like no other helping me to see a future so very clearly with this bewitching creature. Holding hands, kissing, long weekends in bed, holidays, marriage, kids, grandkids, all of it. The whole nine yards. I can’t help but smile at her. Her eyes widen, her lips part, and all I want to do is lean down and give her a kiss and get this relationship started.
Because, if I’m not mistaken, I have just been struck by my lightning bolt.
“Well, I’ll be damned if you aren’t an angel sent from heaven to be certain,” I whisper, not looking away from her. I can’t, I am sucked in deeper than a bear in the tar pit.
She doesn’t say anything. “You okay, darlin’? Still got a little ribbit in the downslide? Let me get you some water, clear that right up.” I pick up her glass of water and hand it to her. She takes a small sip and sets it back down. “Name’s Cole Mason and I must say it is a right pleasure to meet you.”
“Uh . . . okay.” She looks at me curiously, as though she’s trying to figure something out. Hopefully it’s whether or not she wants to have dinner with me tomorrow night, since that’s the next thing I really want to ask her.
“Ah, Cole, you’ve arrived. And such a mensch you are, so caring. It makes my heart happy to see you. Come. Come. Sit. Sit.” I shake my head to get my bearings back after having my world rocked by this woman. Then walk to Mavis’ side of the table to give her a kiss on the cheek.
“Well, Miss Mavis, if you aren’t just prettier than a peach in June today.”
“Oh, you. Speaking such shtuss. Nonsense. But still, so good, for a boychik.”
I smile big and wink, delighted to see her blush a little bit.
“Excuse me,” the granddaughter interjects.
I situate myself in my seat and turn toward her, ready to give her my full and undivided attention. As well as anything else in the world that she may want.
“Yes, ma’am. Anything I can do for you, I most surely will,” I assure her, putting my best foot forward, ready to impress her in any way I can, until I figure out which ways work best.
“Who are you?” she asks.
“Oh bubala, Betn mekhile. I apologize. This is the friend I spoke of, Cole Mason.” Mavis reaches over and covers my hand with hers. “And this, this is my sheyne bubala, Lexie Harrington. She is Karyere meydl, makes the wine like my gelibteh. Alev ha-sholem.”
“May he rest in peace,” Lexie says, automatically.
“It is an honor to meet you, ma’am,” I say to Lexie, debating whether I should go all out and kiss her hand. Before I can grab it, she’s waving it in the air while she talks.
“Wait a minute, she gets Miss Mavis, but I’m ma’am?” she says to me. Then turns to Mavis and says, “No offense, bubbe.”
“Meh.” Mavis waves her hand in the air.
I face Lexie. “Well, I mean no offense. That right there, Miss Lexie, is me showing respect where respect is due.”
“Mavis should be getting the respect. Not me. Err . . . I mean . . . I guess I should too.” She pauses, looking confused. Then shakes her head and continues, “Well anyway, don’t call me that. It’s just Lexie. No miss and definitely no ma’am. For God’s sake, next you’ll be calling me an old maid.”
“Bubalah, you have beybiz and then no alteh moid!” Mavis dramatically raises both hands in the air to emphasize her point.
“Clearly there will be no more martinis for you, bubbe,” Lexie says to Mavis. “You become a yenta, and your little friend here doesn’t need to know all about my life.”
Lexie’s word choice has me laughing out loud. Not once in my adult life have I been described as little. “Darlin’, I’m six feet four inches tall, weighin’ in at two hundred sixty pounds of mostly muscle. So, I gotta say, you callin’ me little is a bit like sayin’ an alligator is a lizard, don’t you think?”
“And now I’m darling?” Lexie asks. “Seriously? Can you not remember and use a name like normal people?”
“Bubala,” Mavis says in a scolding tone.
“She’s got gumption that’s for sure, Miss Mavis,” I say with a smile. Realizing I like it when Lexie gets her hackles up.
“Oh my, Cole,” Mavis says. “It is true, yes. Oh, I kvell. My bubala, so beautiful, but also so smart and successful too.”
“My hat’s off to you, Miss Mavis,” I say.
“Okay, can we talk about something else, please?” Lexie asks, her voice clipped. “Tell me how you two met?” Mavis reaches for her martini and takes a drink, watching us, leaving me to answer. Before I can, the server comes to take our order. Mavis puts hers in, obviously having already decided. But Lexie seems indecisive, flipping back and forth between two pages in the menu.
I look at the server and try to buy a little time. “I’ll tell you, ma’am. I'm so hungry I could eat the north end of a south-bound bull. So, I’m hoping maybe you’ve got something delicious in your specials to fill up a big guy like me?” I emphasize the word big, just for Lexie, then wink at the server and smile. She smiles back.
“Pfft.” Lexie makes a noise that is somewhere between a snort and a cough.
“You okay there, darlin’?” I ask her. “That chest tickle coming back from earlier?” Her grip on the menu tightens, and her knuckles start to whiten.
“You got any hot tea with lemon back there you could bring out here, ma’am? Maybe a little shot of Jack to go with it?” I ask our server. Then turn back to Lexie to let her know, “My pappy always said that’s the best thing for a frog in your throat.”
I feel Lexie’s glare before I see it. “I don’t have a frog or a ribbit or a tickle in my throat and I don’t need any tea. Thank you.” She puts her menu down and faces o
ff with the server. “Can we just hear the specials, please?”
As it ends up, Lexie and I both order from the specials’ menu. Her the grilled halibut with some kind of fancy sounding white wine, and me the surf and turf for two with a Jack and Coke.
“Oy vey, so long you take to order. A woman grows old waiting. You turn me to a skeyne, bubala,” Mavis says.
“Well, if this one hadn’t been interrupting everything with ridiculous requests for tea.” Lexie gestures at me with her thumb. “It would have gone much faster.”
I hold my hands up. “I was just tryin’ to help, darlin’.”
“Bubala, such the rude words from your mouth,” Mavis scolds.
Lexie looks sharply at Mavis, and then down at her glass of wine, twirling the liquid slightly. “I’m sorry, bubbe. I don’t mean to be rude.”
She looks to me, then puts her hand on my shoulder. A touch that I feel clear down to my dick. “I’m sorry, Cole. That was not a nice thing to say.”
I clear my throat, then say, “Don’t you fret none, darlin’, it’s already forgotten.”
“Please don’t call me darling,” she grits out.
“You got it, sweetness,” I say, laying the southern charm on thick.
She glares at me. Again.
I wink in return.
Mavis stops a passing server and orders us another round of drinks. I’ve hardly had a swig of my first. Not like Jack and Coke is hard to drink multiples of. Besides, one barely wets the whistle, let me get to my fourth and we’ll talk.
“You were going to tell me how you and my grandmother met,” Lexie reminds me.
“That I was. Well, Miss Mavis here is a friend of my grandmother’s, Miss Barbara Barnett. Babs for short.”
“I thought you said your last name was Mason?” Lexie asks.
“It is. Mason is my mother’s married name.”
“Oh, that makes sense,” Lexie says. “Bubbe, didn’t the Barnett’s used to have property near the vineyards?”
“Still do,” I say answering for Mavis. “This is if you are talkin’ ‘bout the property I think you are. That’s actually why I’m here. I’m getting Babs and Pappy’s ranch back up and running, since Pappy passed.”
“I’m sorry for your loss,” Lexie says.
“’Preciate that. It’s been a good bout of time, but he’s still sorely missed.”
“What does the ranch do?” Lexie asks.
“Cattle mostly, with a few other things on the side.
“So modest,” Mavis preens. “Cole uses the horses to make the people happy, that is good, no?”
“I train the horses that make the people happy, Miss Mavis. For equine therapy. And I sure do think it’s a good thing, yes, ma’am.”
“That’s when you use horses as a healing mechanism in therapy, right?” Lexie takes a drink after she asks. All I see is that little pink tongue hitting the lip of the glass before her lips close around it.
“Or am I mistaken?” She looks at me, and I realize I was just staring and didn’t answer her question.
“It is, yes.”
Get it together, Cole. Don’t squash the lightning bolt. Go slow.
“She is looker, no?” Mavis looks at me, but nods toward Lexie, a calculating gleam in her eyes. “My bubala?” Mavis asks me.
“She’s stunning,” I tell Mavis, still looking at Lexie. Lexie looks down at her lap, not meeting my eyes.
The server brings our next round of drinks and tells us the food will be out soon. Lexie looks back at me and continues, “So, is it like training a service dog when you train a therapy horse. And do you have to practice equine therapy yourself to know how to do it?”
“Watch out, sweetheart, or I might think you’re interested in me if you keep askin’ me questions.”
“Hardly. I’d say I like to know who is spending time with Mavis, yes.”
“Well, I haven’t spent much time with her, but I’m sure that will change. Especially if she and Babs are together that much, and I plan to see Babs.”
“You aren’t going to take her out anywhere?”
“I . . . wasn’t planning on it, no. Am I supposed to?” I ask.
Lexie turns to Mavis, who is rapidly sucking her way through her second martini. “Are you okay with this, bubbe?”
“Of course, of course. Why should I not be?”
“Because, he’s—” Lexie’s phone rings from her purse, she holds up a finger, then reaches in her bag to grab it. “Excuse me, I have to take this. It’s Trevor, hopefully about Sasha.”
She steps away from the table, I sneak a peek at her ass as she walks away.
“She has nice tucchus, my girl.” Mavis puts her hand on my arm to get my attention. “A little small, but nice for grabbing, no?”
“Miss Mavis, you’re going to embarrass me. I’m not going to talk about Miss Lexie’s, err, your granddaughter’s behind with you.”
“Oh, you, the young are no fun. Everything is no don’t speak of that, don’t speak of this, such prudish behavior. There is no more strudel before the brisket, fershtay? Understand?”
“Uh . . . dessert before dinner?” I ask.
“The shtuping, Cole. I speak of the shtuping. You must get to the shtup, when it is good, the rest works itself out, no? Oy vey. The youth, you make my head hurt so.” She closes her eyes and shakes her head.
I look at Mavis carefully. Unless I’m mistaken, she wants me to have sex with Lexie so that Lexie doesn’t have sex with the guy who just called. I mean, I am more than happy to oblige, but it usually takes two to really shake the sheets.
“Miss Mavis, don’t you think Lexie should have a say in this?”
“No! She is sad, from the dog. Sasha. The schmo, he will fix Sasha, and my bubala will be happy. She thinks there is love. Feh! There is no love.” Her face is scrunched in disgust, she grabs her martini and finishes the remainder in one large drink. “She drives me to drink, that one. Oy vey iz mir.
“That call, that is the schmuck calling about Sasha. My Lexie gets the mishegas in her head with this goy, the dog doctor.” Mavis makes twirls her finger at the side of her head, making the sign of crazy. “He is such a putz. She will be the fool yet again. A yutz unless you step in. So, step in you must.”
“Okay, one thing at a time. What happened to Sasha?” I ask Mavis.
Lexie returns to the table at the same moment I’m asking, and answers for Mavis. “Sasha was pummeled by a horse earlier today. That was the vet giving me an update before he left for the night.”
“I’m so sorry,” I say to Lexie. “Sasha is your dog? Is she going to be okay?”
“She’s one of my dogs, and yes, she’ll be okay. I have seven special needs dogs that I’ve rescued over the years. Sasha has been with me the longest.”
My eyes widen. Seven dogs seem like a lot. She seems to read my thoughts and responds in kind.
“I know, it’s a lot. Think what you will, but I love these dogs and I will keep rescuing any that need a home.” She lifts her chin as though challenging me to disagree before continuing. “I’ve got room for them. They are pack animals by nature, so they need to have the other dogs around. And unless unusual things happen, like today, it’s not that much more money or effort to care for seven dogs versus three or four.”
“So, what happened, how did she get pummeled by a horse. Get in the corral?”
“No, Sasha and I were walking the vineyards and we came across a horse who vaulted the fence, snuck in and was chewing on my vines. It also broke some trellising, part of a row of vines, and my dog. I love all animals, but if I find that horse, well . . . I don’t know what I’ll do, but it won’t be good.”
I feel sick to my stomach suddenly. I’ve got a younger wild thing I brought from Texas that I plan to be training. Memory serves me right, that one has a penchant for wandering.
And fruit.
The server brings our food and the table talk quiets for a minute as we eat and get lost in our own thoughts. I’m ho
ping beyond hope that it’s not my horse that hurt Lexie’s dog, but I have a sneaking suspicion it is. I’m also hoping that she doesn’t put two and two together and figure it out. Otherwise all the shtuping that Miss Mavis and I have planned for Lexie is never going to happen.
“Cole, tell us please, how you make the people happy with the horses? Danke.” Mavis requests once I’ve cleared my plate. Lexie looks up sharply, she’s barely touched her food.
“Ohmigod. You have horses?” Lexie confirms.
I nod in response.
“Can any of them jump six feet?
I nod again because apparently, I’ve gone mute.
“Are any of those brown with a black mane?”
I don’t want to nod again, so instead I plead with my eyes for her not to be angry. Though I have no idea how that would happen. I would be upset if I were her.
She wipes her mouth, pushes back her chair, and stands abruptly. “Let’s go, bubbe.”
“I’ve not had my cake,” Mavis says.
“I’m not eating with the dog injurer,” Lexie says. “I don’t care if he is your friend.”
“Oy vey. There goes the shtuping.”
“Ohmigod, bubbe! This man hurt Sasha and all you can think about is sleeping with him? He’s half your age!” Lexie clenches her fists at her sides, then turns to me. “And you, you should be ashamed of yourself! Taking advantage of a woman old enough to be your grandmother! I don’t know what kind of game you think you’re playing, but you aren’t getting anything from her. Especially not a shtup!”
“Oy vey iz mir. Not me, bubala. Maybe if I were a young maydl, sure, but today, like this, feh. No. No. Cole, he will be shtuping you!”
The restaurant quiets. Unlike Lexie, Mavis’ voice got louder the longer she spoke. I turn to see the bulk of the main floor of the restaurant looking at us. Lexie turns a bright shade of red. Whether from embarrassment or anger though I’m unclear.
She takes her purse from the back of her chair, then pushes the chair in. “Mister Mason, I’m sure you can find it in your conscience to pay for dinner at this point. Mavis, if I am taking you home, I’m leaving now.” And with that she turns and leaves the restaurant.
Love Unforgettable: Love in San Soloman - Book Three Page 6
