Chapter 6 Hazel
HAZEL
The aroma of thyme and rosemary hangs in the air and heat from the fire warms my cheeks, making them glow hot, but it’s the presence of Marcus next to me that makes my skin burn.
We cooked dinner together in his cabin, a chicken stew which he garnished with herbs from his own garden.
It turns out he’s an excellent cook, which doesn’t surprise me.
The man’s creative and good with his hands.
My body shivers when I think about what those big, creative hands would feel like on my body.
His cabin is sparse but tastefully furnished. A coffee table carved from a single hunk of wood sits by the blazing fire. We eat cross-legged on the rug, needing to be close to the fire to warm us up.
There’s no hint of a woman here, and I’m dying to ask him about his status. The woman at the studio told me he was unmarried, but I want to be sure. But it’s hard to casually ask if he has a girlfriend without being completely obvious about why I want to know.
Because I like him.
“So, you’re telling me that your family is cursed and something bad is going to happen on Valentine’s Day, but it wasn’t always a bad curse because it’s also your birthday?”
I hide my face in my hands. It sounds even more ridicules said out loud by a practical mountain man. But he pushed me about my birthday, and so I told him everything except for the bit about Mom and the bills.
“Something like that.”
I peek at him through my fingers, waiting for the laughter, but Marcus nods solemnly. “Sounds reasonable.”
He’s teasing me, and I grab the cushion behind my back and swipe him with it.
“You know it’s only a day, right? And it has no power if you don’t give it any.”
I tilt my head, thinking about his words. They make sense. They make so much sense. But telling my heart that, or my mother, just doesn’t work. Thinking of Mom makes my chest hurt, so I change the subject.
“How about you? Why do you hate Valentine’s Day?”
He raises his eyebrows in surprise. “How do you know I hate Valentine’s Day?”
“Got ya!”
He throws the cushion back at me, and I dodge it laughing. “It was a guess. Your nose does this little wrinkle every time I mention it.”
He looks half impressed and half indignant. “Does not.”
“Valentine’s Day.” He has a momentary look of disgust on his face. “See!”
His eyes go wide, bewildered. “Son of a… Am I that transparent?”
“No. I’m ultra-observant. Part of what makes me good at my job.”
I’m proud of my ability to read people. I have a high degree of empathy, and that makes me both excellent at telling a human interest story and terrible at actually getting the story, it turns out.
He shakes his head, looking at me with new respect, which makes me feel all kinds of warm inside. I want to impress this man; I want to so badly.
“You could read palms with that skill.”
He’s avoided the question. He hasn’t told me why he hates Valentine’s Day, but I’m not going to push. It’s one more mystery in the line of mysteries about Marcus Wild.
It’s cozy here on the couch. We’ve talked all night, avoiding the topics of his military life, his artwork, and my mother expertly. It’s like a dance we’re doing around each other.
But it’s a dance I like. I wish this moment could be frozen forever and kept in a snow globe in my memory. Just two people sitting on a couch, talking and laughing.
But I have a job to do, and I need to keep pushing.
“You promised you’d show me your artwork.”
He nods. “I did. Come on.”
We shrug on our coats, and I follow him into the darkness to the workshop behind his cabin.
The workshop smells like wood resin and beeswax with a hint of oil, like a condensed forest, earthy and comforting. Which is exactly how Marcus smells when you get as close to him as I did on the zip-lining platform.
He flicks on the lights and the space comes into sharp focus, making me catch my breath.
The walls are lined with large chunks of wood, stored and ready for carving. There’s a long work bench and carvings in various states sitting among piles of sawdust. His tools are left out on the bench, ready to be picked up at a moment’s notice.
On the left are finished pieces waiting to be varnished. There are a variety of lifelike animals, including a slinking fox with its ears back, the muscles of its legs so realistic I expect it to move at any moment. An owl in flight stares at me with wide eyes.
But it’s the people that capture my attention, the carved torsos, upper bodies, and faces of men in military uniforms. The one currently on the work bench has an arm swinging in motion, clasping a rifle as the head turns, the face an expression of grim resignation at whatever it sees approaching.
In another one, a man covers his face with his hands. The eye peering between his fingers is wide with horror.
They’re beautiful and devastating all at once. My spine tingles and for a moment I’m transported to the dessert, to whatever modern battlefield these depict. I can almost smell the fear, taste the blood, and hear the screams.
“Marcus...” My eyes turn to him, and there are tears in them. “Are these…?”
I don’t even need to ask. He nods. “Yup.” His voice is clipped, holding the pain inside. “All from memory.”
My hands go to my mouth as I begin to understand the horror he must have seen. We hear so little about modern warfare. It’s in far off countries, and we barely see the consequences. But these bring it all to life, the reality of being at war, of sending our soldiers to fight.
“How long were you in the military?”
I hold my breath, not sure if he’ll answer. But it’s not because of the story that I ask. It’s because he’s baring his soul with these effigies and I want to heal him, to soothe him, to take away some of his pain.
“Twelve years.” He turns away from the table of warriors. “Too long.”
And the rigidness of his back tells me everything I need to know. He lost friends over there. He saw death, and it wasn’t pretty or noble. It was a beast that clawed into his soul and haunts him still.
Tentatively, I put a hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry.”
He turns to face me, and his face is in shadow. “I don’t like to talk about it, Hazel.”
He’s breathing hard, and I hear all that’s unsaid.
It still haunts him.
His dark eyes search mine, and there’s a vulnerability to them that he hasn’t shown me before. Since I’ve met Marcus, apart from being a little grumpy, he comes across as light-hearted, making jokes like he’s got no cares in the world. But I don’t know anything that’s really going on inside.
My hands go to his cheeks, and I run them over his rough beard. He groans and closes his eyes, leaning into my touch.
My heart thunders in my chest. I want to ease his pain. I want to kiss it out of him, to give him some comfort and take his darkness.
When he opens his eyes, there’s fire in them. The spark is back.
His hand clasps my wrist, and the pressure makes me gasp.
“Touching me like that isn’t going to get you your story.” His voice is as raspy and ragged as the emotions on his face.
“I don’t care about the story.” In this moment it’s true. What’s happening between us is bigger than a story, bigger than my job, bigger than a bunch of unpaid bills. That stuff doesn’t matter when I’m looking into the heart and soul of this man. “I care about you.”
He groans as I say it, and conflict flashes across his face. Fear and uncertainty.
He’s been hurt.
I’m sure of it. The knowledge only makes me want him more. To ease his troubles, to show him kindness and love.
“Kiss me,” I whisper.
Conflict marches across his face, along with desire and uncertainty. The desire wins as he presses his mouth to mine.
It’s a slow kiss. A healing kiss, tender and warm. A kiss we both need so badly, a kiss that proves there’s still something good in the world.
He gives into it completely. His hands tangle in my hair, and he pulls me toward him. My hands go around his neck, and we embrace like lovers who’ve known each other for eternity rather than two days.
I lose myself in the kiss, in the sweet oblivion of his warmth.
The stillness of the workshop is broken by the ringing of my phone vibrating in my back pocket.
For a delicious moment I think of ignoring it, not wanting to break the spell. Then I think of Mom, and I pull away.
“I have to take this,” I say when I see Mom’s number flash up on the screen.
Marcus looks disappointed, but he doesn’t push.
His fingers run down my arm as we pull apart, keeping connected to me until the last minute.
“Is everything okay, Mom?”
I try to keep my voice steady and am relieved to hear Mom sounding cheerful.
“Yes, don’t panic. Just wanted to hear your voice.”
Guilt gnaws at me. I should be at home with her, not kissing a hot stranger on the mountain. Marcus is watching me, his eyes blazing with promise.
I put the phone on my chest. “I’m going to talk to my mom for a bit.”
He nods, understanding. “Of course.” He kisses me chastely on the forehead. “I might do some work in here. I’ll see you in the morning.”
I leave him in the workshop and walk quickly back to my cabin while Mom tells me about her day.
“Only five days till Valentine’s Day, Hazel. You got a date yet?”
“Mom.” I blush, and even though she can’t see me, she catches her breath. Mom is as perceptive as I am.
“You’ve met a man!” she squeals into the phone and then starts coughing.
“Mom?”
She tries to laugh it off, and I don’t let her hear how alarmed I am. I’ve got one more day here, then I’m back to New York. Back to Mom and the bills and what the hell to do about the story I can’t write.
I speak to Mom for half an hour before she gets too tired. Then I pull out my laptop and the notes I’ve been making about my trip.
Marcus has made it clear he doesn’t want to do the feature, but he’s too compelling not to write about. No matter where these words end up, I have to get them out of my head and onto the page.
An hour later, I’m stiff from sitting and I’m fighting back tears.
I don’t need to know the details of what happened to him over there. His artwork tells enough. I just hope I’ve done them justice in my description.
I grab a glass of water from the kitchen and notice the light still on in Marcus’s workshop. I’m not the only one who likes to work late into the night.
Still not knowing what I’ll do with the story, I go back to my laptop and write for another hour.