“Look after my girl?” she asked, knowing she didn’t have to ask it, and she was beautiful, young in a way she’d never get old, but she was still a mother. So she asked it.
“You got my promise,” he answered.
She grinned, gave his biceps a squeeze and turned, calling, “Rod, baby, we gotta get this show on the road.”
Not letting her out of his neck hold, Rod swung Jussy around.
“Right there, beautiful, two secs,” he replied, bending back to Jussy, taking two seconds, and then in their huddle, their faces still close, Rod started walking Deke’s gypsy back to her man.
They arrived and broke off after turning into each other and having a long hug.
Rembrandt stuck a hand out to Deke.
“Good pancakes. Good friends. Cool dude. Glad to know you, man,” he said.
Deke took his hand, both got firm before they let go and he said, “Same. Though you’re on pancake duty next time.”
“Deal,” Rod said. Claiming his wife and pulling her close, he invited, “You two should think of comin’ to Malibu for Christmas.”
“Beach at Christmas sounds good, but I work winters so I got good weather off,” Deke told him, doing that also claiming Jussy. “That happens, Jussy can go out. I’ll meet you there day before Christmas Eve, but I’ll have to get back day after Christmas.”
“Not to invite ourselves after a surprise visit, but I’m thinking Jussy’ll wanna be in her new pad at the holidays,” Joss put in, looking up at her husband. “And it’ll be a white one.”
“You’re welcome here anytime,” Jussy said. “You know it. Except when you show no notice.” She grinned. “But once I get over being pissed, you’re welcome then too.”
Mother and daughter shared smiles. Rod and Deke shared looks. Then mother and daughter separated from their men to fall into each other’s arms for a hug that lasted a fuckuva lot longer than Jussy and Rod’s did.
Deke stepped away. So did Rod.
They gave them time.
The women took that time.
Then they moved out of each other’s arms with soft faces, warm looks, and low murmurings that Deke didn’t try to hear because it was none of his business.
Rod opened Joss’s door and she moved there. Jussy came to Deke. He slid an arm around her shoulders.
Joss threw her daughter a kiss, Deke a smile and got in.
Rod gave Deke a hand to forehead salute, shifted his hand in devil’s horns and stuck his tongue all the way out at Jussy, making her giggle, all this as he rounded the hood.
Joss waved at them all the way down the lane and Deke knew she did because Jussy pulled him to the center of that lane, making him walk with her, following the car on slow feet, watching and waving back.
When the SUV turned right on Ponderosa Road and they lost sight of it in the pines, they stopped.
“Right, Mr. T down. Mom down. Mav down. You just have Lace, Dana, and when you deem it time, Bianca to go,” she declared.
He looked down at her.
She was looking up at him and still talking.
“And in case you already hadn’t noticed, which you being you, I’m sure you have, the tough ones are done. Lace will definitely try to get you drunk and pry out your innermost secrets, but she’ll see you make me happy so she’ll be totally down with you. Dana will fuss over you like she’s your mother when she’s only a year older than you. And Bianca will like you on sight, but warning, she’s now tied to a cartel member so if you ever hurt me, with her revenge streak, shit could get nasty.”
Deke started chuckling and he did it curling her into him.
He stopped doing it halfway through the kiss he gave her.
When he pulled away, she took an arm from around him and started stroking his beard.
“Roddy wants me recording,” she told him quietly.
Deke’s arms tightened. “Yeah?”
She gave him a big grin. “Says I’m denying the history of rock ‘n’ roll their next generation of Lonesome.”
Deke knew Rembrandt wasn’t wrong.
But he said nothing because that had to be entirely Jussy’s decision.
She didn’t go there when she went on.
“I’m gonna offer Mav staying here for a week or so. Until I got him a firm gig to go back to in LA. Just, you know, see if I can give him what he needs to get to know for certain what he’s got from me so when he gets back to his mom, he’s got that down deep.”
Deke had a feeling she’d done that countless times before but he just said, “Cool with me.”
She tipped her head and her gaze went intense. “You sure?”
“Babe, he’s your brother. He’s in a situation. And you wanna look after him. I’m sure. He starts playin’ you, I sense that, we’ll have another conversation. But now, I don’t sense that. So yeah. I’ll repeat. I’m sure.”
Her eyes lit, she rolled up on her toes and slid her hand from beard to the back of his head to pull him down to her.
They kissed again.
After they were done, she murmured, “I need to start dinner.”
“Jussy, we had a late lunch,” he replied. “And it’s not even four o’clock.”
“I still need to start dinner,” she returned.
Her repetition of that was suddenly intriguing.
So he tilted his head. “What’s for dinner?”
That’s when her face lit.
“Prime rib sandwiches.”
Deke burst out laughing, doing it turning her, curling an arm around her shoulders, and he put her in a neck hold that was a lot like Rod’s and still totally different.