Page 22 of Down and Dirty

“Hey, Sheila,” he said as he passed their table. Then he greeted the others, “Candy. Fran. Dot. Beth. Wanda.”

He heard JAM mutter behind him. “Frickin’ unbelievable!”

“He’s like a chick magnet,” Sly responded.

“I’d lak ta have a few of his leftovers.” Cage sighed with exaggeration.

As if any of the SEALs had trouble getting dates!

And, yeah, he knew all of these women, but it was Sheila he knew best. They had shared an incredible night making love in the sand following a beach party a few years back after having drunk about two gallons of Dirty Gin. The most memorable image in his mind of that night was Sheila showing him her new breast implants. They had looked like bleepin’ torpedoes. God bless silicone! He wouldn’t mind picking up where they’d left off, though why he hadn’t made a move since then, he had no idea.

Well, yes, he did.

Britta.

He’d stopped calling lots of women because he’d been hung up over Britta for a long time. Maybe it was time to get back in the game.

But just then, his cell phone rang. The caller ID indicated it was his home phone.

Uh-oh! “Hello.”

“I wanna go home,” his five-year-old son screamed.

Zach held the phone away from his ear. “You don’t have to yell. Besides, you are home.”

Sammy said a really bad word, for a kid, something about mother-something dickhead, meaning him, he supposed, and he heard Madrene in the background say really bad words for an adult around a kid, something about “bloody damn spoiled rotten bratlings and fathers who tup way too many wanton ladies.” Sammy did tend to bring out the worst in people.

“I wanna go to my real home.”

“What happened this time?”

“The witch,” he started… witch being the name he reserved for Madrene, who took none of his crap, “she made me eat grass.”

“It was a salad,” Madrene yelled out.

“Spinach.” Sammy’s voice held all the disdain a five-year-old could muster.

He laughed to himself. He wasn’t too fond of spinach himself.

“And white worms.”

“Bean sprouts,” Madrene corrected.

“And she hit me just ’cause I pissed in her cat’s dish. Then she hit me ’cause I said her cat looks like a fat hairy hog. Then she hit me ’cause I tol’ her you prob’ly screwed five hundred women and didn’t even remember my mother. Then she hit me just ’cause I farted in the grocery store.”

“I did not hit you, you snotling. I just swatted your little arse with my palm.” It wasn’t like Madrene to lose her temper like this around Sammy. It must have been a particularly bad day.

“And what’s with this Scary Larry guy?” Sammy continued. “He looks like he eats little kids for breakfes’. Shiiit! What kinda father sends a scary monster to watch his kid?”

Zach had to smile. Wilson could be a little, well, scary, even to adults. The man never smiled, and he had strange grayish green eyes that sort of looked through a person, like ice.

“And I don’t need no watchin’ anyways. I can take care of myself. I been doin’ it for a long time.”

Oh, yeah! Six months is a long time. And you weren’t alone, kiddo. You were with good ol’ grandad.

He heard shuffling sounds then as Madrene took the phone from Sammy.

“You best come home now, you lustsome knave, or I will be paddling your arse, too,” she said, banging down the phone.