My Favorite Souvenir(81)

Hazel looked over at the dumpster. Her adorable nose wrinkled. “Do you think we can get out of here now?”

? ? ?

“So, how’s your hotel?” I asked my father, who sat across from me.

We’d met my parents at Homer’s, a restaurant I’d taken them to last year when they’d visited.

“Good. I’m happy because they get my sports stations. Your mother’s happy because she found two things to complain about already.”

My mother had been looking down at the menu. She took off her reading glasses. “The bottled water in the room was opened. Who knows what someone could have put in there. The world is a crazy place these days. And the blinds didn’t close all the way. Your father makes me out to be some sort of complainer, but really I’m not. I’m just—”

My father spoke over her, finishing her sentence. “Particular. We know, Marianne. You’re just particular, not a complainer.”

I chuckled. My parents never changed.

Leaning over to Hazel, I asked, “What are you going to order?”

“I can’t decide. So many things look good.”

My eyes dropped to her lips. “I know what I want.”

Her eyes sparkled, and she turned back to her menu to hide her smirk.

“What about you, Mrs. Duncan?” Hazel asked. “What are you going to get?”

My mother leaned forward and wrinkled her nose. “I was thinking of getting the fish, but there’s a weird smell in here. It’s faint, but I caught it while we were huddled in the corner waiting for our table. Smells like maybe the mackerel went bad.”

I put down the menu and folded my hands. “Oh, no. That’s just Hazel. She smells like dead fish.”

Hazel’s eyes widened. “What?”

I shrugged. “You don’t smell it?”

“I smelled something earlier. A few times, actually. But I’d figured the smell was stuck in my nose. You think I smell?”

I leaned to her and sniffed twice. “Yep. Dead mackerel.” I smiled at my mother. “Good guess, Mom.”

My mother looked horrified, while I found the entire thing amusing as hell. Hazel was fun to screw with.

She quietly lifted her sweater and took a big whiff. Her eyes grew as wide as saucers as she realized the smell really was coming from her.

Completely freaked out, she tried to explain to my parents. “I…I don’t usually smell like fish. We went to the fish market earlier today. This sweater is a synthetic blend, and I guess it picked up some of the smell when I was sitting next to the fish dumpster.”

My mother’s brows lifted. “You sat next to the fish dumpster?”

I could barely contain my smile. This shit was getting even funnier by the minute.

“Yes. I did,” Hazel said. “Your son thought it would be a good place to have our coffee.”

Deciding I should probably help Hazel out, I leaned across the table to my mom and nodded. “We were talking about sex.”

My mother blinked a few times, pursed her lips, and picked the menu back up. I looked over at my dad, but he just chuckled and hid his face behind his menu.

Hazel, on the other hand, wasn’t too amused. “Thank you for telling me I smelled.”

I shrugged. “Doesn’t bother me any.”

“Well, it bothers me!”

I leaned close and lifted my head in the air showing her my neck. “How about me? Do I smell?”

She sniffed. “You smell fine.”

I smiled. “Yeah, I thought it was just you.”

Hazel glared at me, but eventually she gave in and started to laugh. “I’m going to kill you later,” she whispered.

I winked. “I look forward to it.”

After that, my mom and Hazel got into a long discussion about whether the expense of truffle oil was worth it or not, and then Hazel mentioned she had a pet rabbit, and my mother lit up like I’d never seen her before. Apparently Mom had had a pet rabbit when she was a little girl, something I’d never known. The two of them exchanged half a dozen stories, and my mother told my father she wanted to get a pet rabbit when she got home so she could walk it on a leash, too. All in all, by the time the check came, my mom had really taken a shine to my girl.

“How long are you in town for, sweetheart?” she asked Hazel.

“Just a few days.”

“And then what?”

Hazel and I looked at each other, and our faces fell. Without knowing it, my mother had just asked the magic question. And then what?

“We haven’t figured that out yet, Mrs. Duncan.”

My mom reached across the table and patted Hazel’s hand. “I have a good feeling about you and my son, Hazel, and please, call me Marianne.”

“Thank you, Marianne.”





Chapter 27




* * *



Hazel



I couldn’t believe my final day in Seattle had arrived. The thought of leaving Matteo made me sick, but I needed to go home to Connecticut and face the music—whatever that even meant at this point. I’d been avoiding giving Brady any specifics as to my whereabouts. This obviously couldn’t continue forever.

While spending the past few days together had only solidified my bond with Matteo, neither of us had broached the subject of how the hell we were going to handle Brady or what would happen in general after I returned to Connecticut. We didn’t want to waste this precious time talking about the inevitable conflict looming.