Chapter 11 #2
“My grandmother used to make this. Or… something close to it. When I was a kid.”
Hazel looked up, head tilting to one side. “Yeah?”
He nodded, chewing, his eyes distant like he was sifting through memories. “My mom’s mom. We’d go over on Sundays sometimes and the whole house would smell like garlic.”
“Are you Italian, then?”
“Part,” he said, setting his fork down. He reached for his glass and took a long drink of water, Hazel’s eyes unable to stray from the way his throat bobbed with the movement.
Her heart rapped incessantly against her temples, warmth pooling low in her stomach.
“But mostly Greek. My dad’s side of the family’s from this little island off the coast— still have some cousins there, I think.
We used to visit when I was really young. ”
Hazel leaned forward, her curiosity momentarily outweighing every other emotion that shifted through her, still settling. “That sounds amazing. I’ve never been anywhere, really. Not outside the east coast, anyway.”
Beck tilted his head, his brow furrowed. “No travel? Not even a vacation?”
She shook her head. “Not unless you count the week I spent in Halifax for a pastry convention once. Which I don’t.”
He smiled, just a little. “There’s a whole other world out there, Hazel. You should see it.”
And just like that, the air shifted— only slightly, but enough. Hazel’s gaze dropped to her plate. Her shoulders tensed, fingers tightening on the fork.
Beck noticed. She didn’t have to say a word, he simply saw the way her mouth pressed flat, the flicker of something heavy passing behind her eyes.
“But you’re young,” he added, voice gentle. “You’ve got plenty of time.”
Hazel gave a short, breathy laugh, not quite bitter, but close. “I don’t know,” she said. “Running the bakery makes me feel a little less young.”
There was a beat of silence. Then Beck leaned back, his chair creaking against the movement. His gaze didn’t waver from hers.
“You ever think about getting some help there?” he asked, tone casual but deliberate. “Seems like you’re doing too much for one person.”
Hazel groaned and dropped her forehead into one hand. “You’re not the first person to tell me that today.”
He chuckled, lips curving at the edges. “Take the hint, then.”
She shot him a look from beneath her lashes, lips twitching despite herself. “You can be very bossy, you know that?”
“I’ve been called worse.”
Their eyes held— just for a moment— and something unspoken passed between them, light but tethered with gravity. Hazel reached for her glass of water, taking a long sip to steady herself.
“You’re good at this,” Beck said, his voice dipping a bit lower.
She blinked. “At what? Cooking?”
He nodded. “Cooking. Hosting. Making someone feel like… like they’re allowed to be here.”
Hazel swallowed. The warmth that bloomed in her chest was slow and unexpected, and she didn’t know how to name it.
So instead she smiled and said, “Well, you are allowed to be here. And I’m glad you are.”
Beck didn’t answer. He just nodded once, eyes soft, then reached for another bite of his dinner.
They moved to the porch sometime after the dishes were done, the sun already dipping low behind the trees.
Beck had insisted on carrying the wine and glasses while Hazel slipped away to fetch a blanket, wrapping it around her shoulders as the cool evening settled in.
The air was full of soft sounds— the low hum of crickets, the occasional rustle of a breeze through the trees, the gentle creak of the new wood beneath their feet.
Hazel had her third glass of wine balanced in one hand, the other tugging the blanket closer.
She could feel the alcohol blooming in her chest now, slow and golden, melting her edges.
It made the world feel a little softer, a little kinder.
Her cheeks were warm, her tongue a little too loose.
She was leaning into Beck’s side, their bodies touching just a little, close enough that the heat of him settled against her.
They were laughing about something— Hazel couldn’t even remember what, exactly.
Something about the shape of one of the screws he’d used on the railing.
Or maybe it had been the way she’d almost dropped the jar of oregano while cooking.
It didn’t matter. What mattered was the sound of his laugh, low and quiet, like something he hadn’t meant to let slip, like it surprised even him.
She loved that sound more than she should. She wanted more of it.
“You’ve got a nice laugh, you know,” Hazel murmured, half into her wine glass, the stem cool beneath her fingers.
Beck’s mouth curved, subtle and lopsided. “Do I?”
She nodded, chin tipped toward her shoulder, like she wasn’t sure if saying it aloud would make it evaporate. “It’s rare. Feels like I’ve earned it.”
He chuckled again, slower this time, and she felt it in her chest like the flicker of a match. “Well, yours is contagious. Let’s just blame it on that.”
“I was starting to worry you only communicated in nods.”
He grinned— actually grinned now— and tried to hide it behind his glass, but she saw it anyway.
It reminded her of the picture she’d seen the night before.
This smile was different, sure, but it held the same flicker of joy that she’d so rarely seen from him in her months in Bar Harbor.
From this angle, the overhead porch light caught on a faint dimple in his left cheek, one she’d never seen before. Her gaze honed in on it, captivated.
“I communicate in other ways too.”
“Oh yeah?” she asked, tipping her head, letting the wine lull her into boldness. “Like what? Morse code?”
“Tools. Wood. Duct tape,” he said evenly, without so much as a twitch of a smile. His deadpan delivery sent a flicker of amusement through her system, a quiet laugh slipping past her lips.
“How romantic,” she teased, leaning more heavily into his side, her shoulder nudging his.
Beck remained steady and upright, offering her only a shrug and an amused, sideways glance. “Fix a woman’s porch—“
”—And she feeds you chicken parmesan and lets you drink her wine,“ she finished, the smile tugging at her lips betraying how warm she felt just from looking at him. “Dangerous precedent to set.”
“I like to live on the edge.”
“Reckless,” she said, her gaze catching his now, the word heavier than it should’ve been. She could taste the wine on her tongue, heavy and floral, and her lips suddenly felt too dry.
His eyes didn’t move from hers. “You have no idea.”
Something inside her fluttered, sharp and molten, like heat rising too fast in a pot you forgot you’d left on the stove. Her breath hitched, but she smiled through it, tucking the moment away like a secret.
“I’m starting to think you’re a little cocky, Oliver Beckett.”
His name in her mouth seemed to land between them like something deliberate. He tilted his head, those dark eyes of his gleaming in the dim porch light that hung above them. “Maybe, but I’ve earned it, don’t you think?”
Hazel laughed again, quieter this time, the sound trailing as she let her gaze drift.
The soft curl of his hair around his ears.
The warm shadow of stubble along his jaw.
The silvered scar at the bridge of his nose she hadn’t noticed until the kitchen lights had caught it while he washed dishes beside her, silent and steady.
Everything about him felt like a memory she hadn’t lived yet.
Somehow, at some point, the space between them had collapsed. Her shoulder brushed his when she shifted, barely a touch, but enough to feel the warmth radiating off him. He didn’t move away and neither did she.
“Are you ever going to tell me why you keep showing up when I need something?” she asked, the words spilling past her lips before she could stop them.
Beck blinked, slow, his expression betraying that she’d caught him off guard. “Because you keep needing things.”
“That’s not an answer.”
A pause stretched long between them, interrupted only by the creak of the wind against the eaves.
“Maybe I just like being around you,” he admitted at last, his voice rough around the edges. Like saying the words cost him something. “This stuff—“ he gestured toward the railing, the newly rebuilt porch, ”—is just a good excuse.”
Hazel’s fingers tightened slightly around the stem of her glass.
Her pulse beat a little faster in her throat and she hated how obvious it felt.
With Beck this close, and two glasses of wine behind her, she had to believe he could read her now, as clear as day.
Her cheeks were tinged with pink and her heart was racing within her chest, thudding in her temples so loud she could hardly hear herself think.
“You’re allowed to say that, you know,” she whispered, tilting her head to one side as she peered over at him. “You’re allowed to just… say it. That you like being around me.”
Beck looked at her then, really looked. And something in her face must’ve done it, must’ve stirred something under the surface, because his expression shifted and softened, like an exhale. “Yeah,” he agreed, nodding. “I guess I am.”
Silence settled between them again, but this time it didn’t feel empty. It felt like waiting, like permission.
And then, slow and unthinking, her breath a shaky tether in her chest, Hazel leaned in.
Her eyes fluttered shut. She felt the nearness of him, the quiet pull of heat and gravity.
This was it, this was the moment where the two of them finally crossed over the threshold, leaving the uncertainly of what is this behind.
But his hand landed on her knee, gentle but firm. A stop.
Her eyes opened instantly. She froze, her face inches from his, the breath still caught behind her ribs.
Beck’s gaze was fixed to her lips, his dark eyes wide, his shoulders leaning back. Not far, but enough.