Page 19 of The Holy Grail

Malcom has a cat

As Jules approached Malcom’s house for their second official date, she noticed a cat sitting on the welcome mat in front of the door, meowing loudly.

In the glow of the porch light, she could see the cat was a tortoiseshell, with a beautiful kaleidoscope pattern of colors in its fur—black, brown, orange, gold, cream, and white.

As Jules ascended the stairs, the cat stopped meowing long enough to turn and see who was coming.

“Are you lost?” Jules asked, bending to pet the cat, who gazed up with bright yellow eyes before rubbing her face against Jules’ hand. “You’re a pretty one, aren’t you?”

The door opened, and immediately the cat deserted Jules and dashed into the house. Surprised, Jules straightened, but before she could comment on the cat, Malcom was ushering her inside.

“Come on in, it’s freezing out there,” he said.

After quickly closing the door behind her, he pulled her in for a kiss, which he’d intended to be more of a greeting than anything else.

However, as soon as he pressed his lips against her softer and slightly colder ones, it turned into more than just a simple greeting, and became an exploration, instead.

His hands found their way into her hair, gently holding her in place so he could deepen the kiss and reacquaint himself with Jules’ unique, sweet taste.

He hadn’t seen her in almost a week, and it had felt like forever.

When he was on the verge of dragging her to his couch, he stopped, even though it almost hurt to do so.

This passion for another person had been missing from his life for so long, he now wanted to immerse himself in it, and to hell with dinner.

“There,” he said, with a quick cough, when he finally drew away from her, “now you’re all warmed up. ”

“I’ll say,” she agreed, slightly breathless.

His manners kicking into gear, he helped her remove her coat and hang it up, discreetly admiring her in her flowing, knee-length skirt with a bold poppy pattern on it, and a fitted cream-colored shirt and matching short cardigan.

On her feet were a pair of moss-green, suede boots that should have clashed with her outfit, but somehow added the perfect touch.

“You really don’t look like an accountant. ”

“And you don’t look like a lawyer,” she returned, noting he was wearing the same outfit he’d worn for their first date. “You know, you should have bought that shirt in every color.”

Malcom accepted her teasing with ease. “I should have, but honestly, I thought there was a possibility you weren’t going to go out with me more than once, so I just got the one shirt.”

“Are you serious? After I groveled to get you to go out with me in the first place, you thought I’d give up after one date?”

He shrugged. “You could have easily decided I wasn’t your cup of tea. Women change their minds, right?”

“Yes, we do,” she agreed. “And I’ve changed my mind about waiting a few months to go shopping for clothes. We’re going to knock that out next week.”

“Oh, we are?”

“We are. Put it on your calendar.”

He took her hand and led her down to the kitchen, the faint sound of her heels clicking on the hardwood floors.

As he had on their first dinner date, he got her settled at the island (this time with a glass of water), and then set a bowl of kibble down on the floor, which was immediately pounced on by the cat.

Pointing, she said, “I didn’t know you had a cat. ”

His expression turned a little sheepish. “I’m not sure I do, to be honest.”

“What do you mean, you’re not sure?”

“Well, one morning when I was getting my paper off the front porch—”

“Wait. You still get the paper delivered? Like an actual, printed paper?”

“Yes. I read actual printed books, too.”

She hid a smile. “Oh, that’s right.”

“Anyway, one morning, while I was getting my paper, there was a cat on my porch, and he seemed hungry, so I fed him a can of tuna. A few days later, he appeared again, so I fed him another can. Then the next time I saw him, he just ran into my house before I could stop him and sort of made himself at home. He stayed for a couple of days, then left for a week, then came back and I fed him again … and now he lets me know when he wants to go out and meows like hell when he wants back in.”

“How long has this been going on?”

“A couple of months.”

“A couple of months?”

“Yes, but like I said, he leaves, sometimes for a week, so it doesn’t really feel like he’s my cat. Plus, when he’s here, I’m not even sure if he likes me or not.”

“Well, first of all, it’s a ‘she’, and second of all, she is your cat, since she keeps coming back to you. That’s an indication she likes you, or at the very least, tolerates you.”

“How do you know it’s a she?”

“Because torties are usually always female.”

“Torties?”

“It’s short for ‘tortoiseshell’,” she clarified. “It refers to the colors and pattern of their fur, which is linked to their gender, which is almost always female. And if it happens to be male, I think they’re sterile.”

“How do you know all that?”

“My friend Paige has had cats—she currently has three—and always shares cat knowledge with me, whether I ask for it or not. So, what’s your cat’s name?”

“Um … Don Corleone.” At her amused grin, he quickly defended his name choice. “Look, I didn’t know he was a she at the time, and he—I mean she—is a stone cold killer, so it made sense, right?”

“Are you implying females can’t be stone cold killers? Because that would be sexist.”

He simply looked at her, like he was trying to figure out the best answer to get himself out of this pickle.

“Because who does all the hunting in a pride?” Jules asked. “The lionesses , that’s who, while the head lion lays around, dumb, fat, and happy, waiting for the next time he needs to give his balls a workout.”

Malcom choked out a laugh. “You’re right. I was being sexist, and I do apologize.”

“Thank you. Now then, we need to come up with a better name for your cat.”

“I like the name Don Corleone. Plus, I’m used to it and so is he. I mean, she’s used to it. ”

“All right,” Jules acquiesced. “So, how about we just change the spelling from D-O-N to D-A-W-N?”

He looked at her like she was a genius. “You mean call her Dawn Corleone?”

“Exactly.”

“Okay.” He came around the island to kiss her, lingering for several moments because the feel of her lips under his was becoming something he really enjoyed. “I love that.”

When Malcom went back to starting dinner, she got up and wandered over to his vinyl collection. He called out to her, telling her to put something on, so she started looking through the albums, only to stop after a few moments to say, “This is really … eclectic.”

“I know. There’s a little bit of everything in there.”

“I can see that.” She flipped through several more albums. “Have you ever thought about alphabetizing these?”

“Once. Then I realized how much work it was going to be and decided against it.”

“But what if you want to listen to something specific? Say, like—” she broke off to pluck an album from the row and hold it up so he could see it was Van Halen’s Diver Down , “—this one?”

“Then I usually spend a minute or two looking for it, and if I don’t find it, I pick something else.”

Shaking her head, Jules put the album back and continued going though the collection until she came across an album that made her eyebrows rise in amusement. “Talk to me about this,” she said, lifting up Donna Summer’s Bad Girls for him to see.

“What?” Malcom blinked at her. “She’s a completely underrated singer. Are you aware she had fourteen top-ten singles, and four of those went to number one?”

“No. I wasn’t aware of that.”

“She also sold more than one hundred million records worldwide and was known as the ‘Queen of Disco’ … and rightly so.”

“You seem to know a lot about her.”

“I … might have had a crush on her at one point.”

Jules carefully took the album out of the record sleeve and put it on the turntable. As she gently set the needle down, a little bit of crackling noise filled the air before the first notes of “Hot Stuff” began playing.

Jules headed back to where Malcom was assembling all the ingredients necessary for the promised dinner of chicken and waffles and sort of hovered, partly because she wanted to be near him and smell him some more, but also to make him as aware of her as possible, since it wouldn’t be fair for her to be the only one experiencing hyper-awareness.

So she shadowed him, sticking close as he did his thing, sometimes watching with her chin perched on his shoulder and a hand on his hip, as he measured and mixed the breading for the chicken.

She started to see signs she was affecting him—a slight flush creeping along his skin, the tensing of his muscles, and the shallow cadence of his breathing—so she began doubling down by getting closer and moving her hand to the back of his neck, where she played with his hair.

Under her fingers it was wavy and a little coarse.

“Paprika?” she murmured in his ear, as if she was blown away by the inclusion of the spice. “Is that the secret ingredient?”

He turned slightly, just enough to see her mouth, lips slightly parted, less than an inch away.

“Yes. Very few people know about it,” he murmured back, then took her mouth in a long, soft kiss that he drew out until she was needing more.

When he drew back, she blinked at him, sure every filthy thought she was having was written on her face.

“Can you do me a favor?” he asked, his voice little more than a caress.

She glanced down in the vicinity of his groin, and even though his shirt was untucked and provided camouflage, she could tell there was definitely some activity going on. “Of course,” she agreed, hoping the favor was related to what was in his jeans, because she’d totally—

“Would you get the waffle maker out for me?”