Page 7 of Rainstorm

Much to my father’s chagrin, my mother adored Zephyr, her only nephew, just as much as she did my four older sisters. My cousin was renowned for being a charmer, a woman whisperer if you will.

So of course my mother and sisters were more than happy to have him staying for a while.

And of course, they were all spoiling him rotten.

And of course, he was making the most of it.

I chose a new seafood restaurant located close to my house in Santa Monica, as I’d been there with some of my coworkers, and had found the food really good, plus they kept a well-stocked bar. If I had to hear whatever Zeph’s news was, I wasn’t doing it without a decent brew in hand.

The restaurant was packed but the hostess magically found us a table beside the large windows, overlooking the ocean across the street.

“Sandra will be here in a couple minutes to take your order,” she said before walking away, leaving the menus on the yellow tablecloth in front of us.

I noticed Zephyr admiring the sway of her hips, as he let out a low whistle. Granted she was a beautiful woman, but at that moment my interest was focused on the food rather than a piece of ass.

“So, I’m ready to hear your news,” I told him after taking a long sip of my cold beer.

“I’m joining the Navy,” my cousin proudly announced.

Da fuck?

“You what?” I asked, almost choking. Did I hear him right? Jeez.

“I’m joining the Navy. I received orders to be in Rhode Island on Sunday evening to start twelve weeks of Officer Candidate School.”

“You have to be shitting me, Zephyr.”

“I’m deadly serious, Chase,” he assured me, looking me in the eye, his face solemn, his habitual joking manner gone.

“I sincerely hope you are. Signing up to the forces isn’t a fucking children’s game.”

After taking a long breath he started explaining. “I know that and I’m looking for a future, bro. I have a degree now and I want to put it to good use. A friend of mine from college talked a lot about it; he planted the seed I guess.” He shrugged.

I felt relieved; this wasn’t so bad after all. It was about time my cousin grew up, and there was no better place than the forces to give him some direction. Maybe he was finally getting serious as he claimed.

“Well, I wish you all the best in your new career, Zeph.” I smiled.

“Thanks, ‘mano. That means a lot to me.” He smiled back.

Then the waitress came to take our orders, and we changed the subject as my cousin told me about my older sister Celeste’s new pet.

A donkey.

Yup, a fucking donkey was ruling the orchard, and I wasn’t talking about the foreman my father hired a few months earlier.

“I’m not sure where she found the damn animal, but now it’s like the king of the grove,” he laughed. “Your father named it Hew Haw, and I swear that stinky donkey thinks it’s a dog, man.”

While we waited for the food to arrive, jesting a little, laughing a lot, my cousin suddenly muted, as he stared at something that had caught his attention.

“See over there, bro? Sweet Jesus, angels are falling from Heaven. Fuck, what a shame I’m leaving tonight. Oh, by the way, you are driving me to the airport, right?” Typically it seemed I was being given little choice in the matter.

I turned to see who’d caught my cousin’s attention, but while he focused on the blonde woman in cute cowboy boots, I only had eyes for the black haired beauty walking behind her.

He was right. Sweet Jesus, an angel had fallen from Heaven.

This girl was a goddess; an exotic little package. Glorious black hair running down her back, and with eyes so beautiful I couldn’t even begin to describe them. I needed more light to study her in detail, because I was pretty sure she’d stolen all the sunshine around her, turning the—until now—vibrant restaurant into a dimmed place. The chattering noise that had filled the place suddenly muted.

She was dressed in a sexy, and at the same time, demure way, in jeans and a white top. Leaving it all to the imagination ignited something inside me.

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