“I’ll have kids someday,” Mike assured their sister.
Funny how he said I’ll have kids and not we will have kids.
Zach dislodged his arm from his sister and nodded toward the bikes to Mike. “Do you still have it?”
Mike removed his sunglasses from the front of his shirt and pushed them onto his nose. “If there is one thing I don’t let stunt doubles do, it’s my bike shots.”
Like old times, Zach and Mike jumped on the backs of the bikes and skidded out of the drive and down the old trails they knew better than the backs of their hands.
“It’s called the ‘OR’ game,” Judy told them as they sat around a campfire two days into their vacation. Sawyer and Janice had turned in, and Hannah was up in the loft with a sleeping Eli and Susie, texting her friends.
The rest of them sat under a blanket of stars while sparks from the fire drifted into the sky. Their red cups had been full for a couple of hours and none of them could claim sobriety.
Zach had to admit, watching his baby sister tip back the margaritas felt strange, but he had to remind himself that she wasn’t a kid anymore.
“I remember that game,” Karen said from across the fire. “Played it in college all the time.”
Judy pointed her cup in Karen’s direction. “There is only one rule. You have to answer the question honestly…I’ll start…Rena, margaritas or martinis?”
“That’s easy. Margaritas.” Rena sipped her beverage and looked at Karen. “Karen, Coke or Pepsi?”
“Coke. Michael…the McLaren or the Ferrari?” Karen asked.
Mike shifted in his seat. “Oh, that’s hard. I have to go with my first love and say Ferrari.”
“I don’t know, Mike, that McLaren is an orgasm on wheels,” Zach told his brother.
“You have to drive the Ferrari next time you visit,” Mike told him. “OK, Joe…explore outer space or the deep ocean?”
Joe lifted his glossy eyes to the sky. “I’d be all over what’s up there.”
The questions kept rounding between them, most innocent until Karen decided it was time to up the stakes. “OK, Judy…hot college guys or hot college professors?”
Judy’s smile made Zach think maybe she’d attempted both. “Professors.”
Zach closed his eyes and tried not to picture his sister with an older man.
Joe nudged Mike’s arm. “All right Mike…kissing Marilyn Cohen or kissing Jennifer Ashton?”
Everyone in the group knew that Mike had the opportunity to kiss both women as they’d costarred in his films.
“Jennifer.”
“Really?” Joe asked. “I think Marilyn is more beautiful.”
Mike laughed. “She is…but Marilyn and I are friends. When I kissed her, her husband, Tom, was on set.”
Karen giggled. “Well let me know the next time you have to kiss her and I’ll come by and kiss Tom, make the whole ordeal even.”
“Tom is so hot!” Judy fanned herself while Mike and Joe shook their heads. “Karen,” Judy said. “Brazilian wax or total leg wax?”
The image of Karen having anything waxed shot Zach’s temperature to the sky. Good thing it was dark and no one would notice how Judy’s question affected him.
“What’s a Brazilian?” Rena asked.
Mike started to laugh. “It’s wrong on many levels that my baby sister knows something that my older sister doesn’t.”
Judy puffed out her chest. “That damn college education is sneaking in. A Brazilian is when a woman has all her hoochie hair removed.”
Rena blushed scarlet and giggled into her cup. “Sounds painful.”
“It is,” both Karen and Judy said at the same time.
Zach was equally mortified that his sister knew this…and turned on that Karen did as well. He poured straight tequila into his cup and took a swig while he waited for Karen’s answer.
“Well?” Mike nudged his wife.
Karen blushed. “I have to go with Brazilian, but for the record…it’s only because there’s more torture with a leg wax.”
“Yeah, sure,” Mike said, laughing.
Zach smiled into his cup and barely heard his name being called by Karen. “Zach…a hooker in Las Vegas, or a hooker in Bangkok?”
Joe and Mike tossed their heads back and Judy high fived Karen. “Good question,” Judy said.
Zach squeezed his eyes shut and tried to picture either one.
“What’s the matter…I think I’d go with the foreign woman,” Joe said.
Rena swatted his arm. “Eweh.”
Zach lifted a hand in the air. “No, wait…I’m thinking that Las Vegas has plenty of twenty-dollar tricks, where Bangkok probably gives ’em away for five bucks…I think there would be more chances of disease in Bangkok. I have to go with Las Vegas.”
Karen met Zach’s gaze across the fire and held. This little game of get to know you was more than he thought it would be. Seemed Karen might not be the complete saint after all.
“What about you, Mike…which would you pick?” Judy asked.
“I’m with Zach. I’d stick with Vegas.”
Karen fluttered her gaze away, and kept the questions going. “OK, Judy…broad shoulders or tight butts?”
Once again, Zach had to close his eyes.
“Oh, that’s hard…” Apparently, his baby sister had a preference for big shoulders. Zach just hoped that no one asked her about penis size or he’d have to excuse himself.
Chapter Seventeen
“No, Tony…he isn’t doing anything that might land him in the hospital.”
Karen stood several yards from the cabin where the cell reception was the best for talking. Seemed texting up in the mountains proved a better source of communication than actual phone conversations.
“I know he’s gotta be off-roading up there.”
“Nothing he doesn’t do when he’s shooting a movie.”
“Production starts in two weeks, Karen. Keep him whole.”
Karen shook her head. What she really wanted to tell Michael’s manager was that there was more to life than a production schedule. She’d not seen Michael smile as much as she had since they arrived in Hilton. Up here with the clean air and family memories, he was more at ease than ever.
Even after their divorce, she’d encourage him to visit his family as often as possible. They were good for him on many levels.