It lasted only a short moment and then it was gone. Celia stepped back and regarded her for a moment. “How was the flight in?” she asked her.
Chase took a deep breath and commanded herself to articulate coherently. “It was ... uh ... you know ... fun.”
“Yes,” she said, nodding. “It is fun to fly in Jake’s plane. I used to be afraid of flying—I still am a little bit, to be honest—but it has grown on me over the years, especially flying with Jake in this plane.”
“I ... I love flying,” Chase managed to blurt. “I never did it before until I met Uncle Jake.” She flushed. “Flying that is. I still haven’t ... uh ... done ... uh...” She realized what she had been about to say at the last second and snapped her jaw shut. She took a deep breath again. “Never mind. I’m babbling.”
Celia patted her on the shoulder affectionately. “That’s okay,” she said. “I’m flattered that you like me so much that I can reduce you to babbling. But don’t worry. I’m just an ordinary person like everyone else.”
“I really love your music!” Grace told her.
“Thank you,” Celia said.
“And I found out on the way here that Chase has fairly deep appreciation for music,” Uncle Jake told her.
“Oh yeah?” Celia asked.
Uncle Jake nodded. “We heard the debut of Home on the way here. She liked it and correctly interpreted the lyrics. And she does not like the song Ironic because most of what Alanis is talking about there is not, in fact, ironic.”
Celia smiled, delighted. “I’ll take an endorsement like that to one of our projects any day of the week.”
Jake had the FBO services pump his tanks half full and then they immediately left for the return flight to SLO. Celia sat in the copilot’s seat—her always preferred location when flying with Jake—and Chase sat immediately behind Jake, where she could see and talk to Celia with ease. And talk she did. She quickly recovered her voice and spent most of the flight jabbering to Celia, asking her a thousand questions about her childhood in Venezuela, her time with La Diferencia, and her recent years as a mega-star. Jake, who listened to the conversation but contributed nothing, noted that Chase had enough tact not to bring up Greg Oldfellow or the allegations that Celia dallied with her pilot out on the road. This reinforced his already strong opinion that his recently discovered niece was actually a pretty good kid.
They came in to land just past 11:30 AM and Jake parked the airplane in his rented hangar. Chase insisted on carrying Celia’s guitar case for her while Jake carried her travel bag.
“How is Teach doing?” Celia asked as they made the hike back to the GA terminal. They had not seen Celia in more than a week now.
“Looking forward to seeing you again,” Jake said with a little smile.
Celia returned the smile. “I’m looking forward to seeing her as well.”
The little inflection that each of them put on the word seeing was no accident. Both knew exactly what they meant by it. Since that day nearly two weeks ago when the three of them had a session of steamy, erotic threesome sex at Celia’s Malibu house, they had gotten together one more time for more of the same. This had also been in Malibu, after the last KVA meeting prior to the debut of Home. It had been just as good and the three of them continued not to feel regrets, shame, or any other negative emotion associated with what they were doing except for a bit of guilt that they were not feeling any regrets or shame or other negative emotions. All in all, the three of them remained very enthusiastic about the new dynamic they had brought to life and looked forward to future endeavors.
Perhaps even tonight, Jake thought now as he saw the little sparkle in Celia’s eye. This was a realistic hope. Though Laura the Prude had reigned supreme when the two of them had stayed at the Best house in Pocatello, Laura the extremely horny second trimester Nymph was still firmly in command while the Bests were staying with them. She had to hold a pillow against her mouth every time she came, but she was certainly not being prudish.
They threw the luggage and the guitar into the back of Jake’s BMW and then climbed in, Chase in the back, Jake behind the wheel. They drove back to the house on the cliff and introduced Celia to the rest of the Best clan. All were pleased to meet her, particularly the males. Grace, however, had a hard time even meeting her eyes, let alone speaking to her. She managed to shake her hand briefly, but that was the extent of their first contact.
Dinner that night was New York steaks that Elsa had procured from a high-end butcher shop in San Luis Obispo near the historic mission. While she prepared a large garden salad, sauteed mushrooms, and made her famous garlic mashed potatoes, Jake went out on the deck and fired up the large charcoal grill that sat next to the more convenient gas grill. Joey and Brian followed him out there. While waiting for the coals to burn down so he could grill the steaks, Jake drank a few bottles of his favorite beer—Foghorn India Pale Ale from the Lighthouse Brewing Company in Coos Bay—while the two generations of Bests drank their favorite beer—Budweiser from the can. They had tried the Lighthouse Ale that Jake offered them on their first night—genuinely curious about what “hoity-toity beer” would taste like—but had been hard pressed to even finish their bottles before they became warm. “It’s too strong,” Joey had proclaimed. “Too heavy,” had been Brian’s opinion. And so, Elsa had picked up a few cases of the red and white cans for the houseguests. She knew that if the Bests did not drink it all before they left, the excess would sit in the bottom of the pantry until their next visit.
The Best males were impressed with Jake’s skill on the grill. No slouches with a charcoal grill themselves, they found it quite down-to-Earth that Little Bit’s highfalutin husband—who had most of his actual housework and other chores done for him by a live-in housekeeper—actually knew had to perform a manly skill like cooking a steak on the old Weber. And when they tasted their steaks at the dinner table, their opinion of him shot up a few more notches. The steaks were juicy, grilled perfectly, and had a smooth, exquisite texture unlike anything they had ever tasted before. Naturally (though perhaps a little reluctantly), they attributed this to Jake’s touch with the coals and the spatula and not the fact that they were eating expensive, restaurant-quality meat instead of the cheap cuts from the local Walmart meat counter, which was what they were used to.
After dinner, while Elsa cleaned up (Jake was paying her an extra three hundred dollars a day for the duration of the visit, though none of the Bests knew this), everyone else went out to the cliff to watch the sunset instead of breaking up into gender groups as was the Best family tradition. Chase and Grace donned their modest one-piece swimsuits and climbed into the hot tub to watch it from there. Joey, Sarah, Brian, and Julie all gave the cognac Jake offered a try, dutifully drinking it as directed. They then switched back to Budweiser in the can. Joey and Brian did, however, legitimately enjoy the Cuban cigars that Jake produced for them. They were, however, quite scandalized when Celia fired one up as well and sat in their circle, smoking with them and drinking her cognac just like one of the boys.
Hollywood people, Joey thought, resisting the urge to shake his head. He hoped that Grace was not being too influenced by the Mexican singer she worshiped.
And that night, after everyone had gone to bed, Celia, fresh out of the shower and wearing a long t-shirt and nothing else, crept out of the smallest of the guest rooms and slinked down the main hall to the master suite. She slipped inside, where her hosts were eagerly waiting for her, both of them naked and freshly showered themselves, the only light in the room that coming from a series of candles that had been lit. She slipped out of the t-shirt, climbed into their bed, and the three of them spent the next hour putting their bodies, fingers, lips, tongues, and genitals together in as many ways as they could think of. Celia was particularly fascinated by and drawn to Laura’s pregnant belly, which seemed to be getting a little bigger by the day now. She touched it and rubbed it and kissed it frequently. And they found a novel way to keep the entire house from knowing their business when Laura came. When it happened under Celia’s tongue, Jake would put his member in her mouth. And when it happened under Jake’s member, Celia would plant her wet vagina on her mouth.