Mack chuckled. “The girls like it.”
Dog slid the bottle back at Crystal. “Pick another, shorty.”
She laughed and handed him the cherry.
He grimaced and looked at Mack. “Bet this is gonna taste like cough syrup.”
“Yum,” Mack muttered, sarcastically and watched as Red Dog poured himself and Crystal another shot.
“Dog, the way you drink, you’re going to shorten your life by ten years,” Crystal advised, picking up the shot.
“That’s okay. I just want to live long enough to ride the scooter shopping cart at Walmart.”
Mack spit his drink out, laughing. “Sorry. I just had a visual of you trying to get your giant-ass body in the scooter.”
Crystal giggled, practically snorting her shot out her nose.
“Speaking of Walmart, does anyone else get road rage pushing a cart through that place? Or is it just me?” Mack asked.
Dog looked over at him. “That’s ‘cause you don’t know when to go. The best time is the middle of the night.”
“Is that right?”
“Yup. That’s when you see all the best outfits. Just the other night I yelled at some guy, ‘Hey, dipshit! Shoes do not turn pajamas into pants.’”
Mack chuckled. His phone went off and he pulled it out, looked at the screen and put it to his ear. “Hey, baby.”
Crystal rinsed out her shot glass and then picked up her dishrag and moved around the end of the bar. Red Dog caught her around the waist as she moved past him and pulled her against his side. Then he put her in a headlock and rubbed his knuckles on her head, giving her a classic ‘nuggie’ like big-brothers had tormented kid-sisters with for ages. “Come here, you little spitfire.”
She shoved against him and teased back, “Let me go, you big brute.”
He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her in for a bear hug. “You know I kid, baby-girl. I love you like a sister.”
When he released her, she bumped him with her hip. “I know it, Dog. I love you, too. Isn’t it time you went home to your wife?”
Dog was married to a classic Asian beauty with a petite figure, gorgeous face and long, silky dark hair that hung to her waist. The kind of girl most men could only fantasize about. She was also very intelligent and almost as much of a smartass as Crystal. The two of them made quite a striking pair, Red Dog with his big Viking warrior looks complete with long reddish-golden hair and beard, and Mary the petite china-doll.
He winked at her. “Yes, ma’am.”
Mack tossed the phone on the bar top with an angry clatter, huffing a string of curses.
Dog grinned and murmured before tossing back another shot, “If our ol’ ladies could hear the next five seconds after we hit end on a call, we’d never get any pussy.”
Crystal rolled her eyes at Dog and looked over at Mack. “Everything okay?”
“What do women say when they actually are fine? Jesus Christ. Women.”
Red Dog grinned. “Yeah, they like to get inside your head and rearrange the furniture.”
Crystal shook her head at Dog and asked Mack, “Trouble in paradise?”
“She called me a stubborn ass! I’m not stubborn. My way is just always better.”
“You know, Mack, some things just go perfectly together, like ‘I told you so’ and sleeping on the couch,” Crystal informed him with a grin.
“Fuck.”
“You finally figuring out that being right isn’t nearly as important as knowing when to shut up?” Dog grinned over at Mack.