He leaned over to stroke its neon-orange hair. “It’s a troll, to bring you luck.” He’d found the tiny doll in a kitschy store downtown and thought she might like it.
“Good luck. Cool.” She smiled. “Thank you.”
“Kein Problem.”
“Huh?”
“No problem.”
“Oh. You need to teach me how to speak German.”
“Then how can I say naughty things about you that you won’t understand?”
“Axel.”
“Rena.” He loved teasing her because she smiled so prettily when he did.
The waiter brought their food, and as they ate, she told him about dinner with her mother the previous week, something that had been weighing on her.
“I don’t know if telling her what I felt was wrong or right. I love my mother, but she has the worst taste in men.”
“Unlike her daughter,” he had to slip in.
She just looked at him.
“Was?”
She ignored what he’d said. “I mean, this guy Dave looked different from the slick guys she usually brings home. But he’s married.”
“You said separated.”
“It’s the same thing.”
“Is it? He’s not hiding his marriage from your mother.”
“No, he’s not. But he’s also not divorced. I wonder if he’s stringing her along.”
He speared eggs and cheese and chewed, thinking. “He could be. But your mother is her own person. She has to make her own choices,” he said, remembering Ilse’s poor decisions. “Nothing you can say or do will change her mind. Just be there to help her if she falls.”
“More likewhenshe falls, but you have a point.” She sipped her coffee, accepting the waiter’s offer to top it off, and spoke once the man had gone to a new table. “It’s so weird because my mom is smart and pretty. In all other areas of her life but her dating life, she’s amazing. But then you add a guy to the mix, and she’s a hot mess,” she said bluntly.
Axel watched her, seeing the thoughts his Rena did not say. “You worry you are like her.”
“I am.” She met his gaze, direct. “That’s why I tried to break it off with you before. I want a man to stick around, to be honest with me. I want to get married and have babies with someone I can love.” She lowered her voice. “Not a guy who’ll ditch me after sex or treat me like I don’t matter. I’m worth more than that.”
“You are worth everything,” he said quietly, hearing her inner pain, her past sorrows. “You should have a man who will protect you, help you, support you when you need it. A man who would never lay a hand on you in violence or hurt your feelings. And he should like your friends and your family.” He paused. “My mother never had any of that, and it hurt me to see her in pain.”
Rena’s eyes widened. “Is that why you don’t get along with your father?”
“Yes, and many other reasons.” Jannik Heller was an abusive and controlling asshole. “I think your mother should know what you told me.”
“I tried to tell her that already.”
“Did you?”
She paused and took another sip of coffee. “Maybe not in those words.”
“Then tell her in those words. Not the hot mess part, but that she is so amazing, you think she should have someone who treats her that way.” He reached across the table and put his hands over hers, his heart in his eyes. “She deserves to be treated like a queen.”
