The truth, though? I’m hoping the same exact thing.
I won’t say that to Hazel. I completely respect her need to take things slowly. Trust doesn’t come easily for her, though I’m hoping I’m on the right path toward earning it. She trusted me with a key, after all.
So help me God, I won’t let her down.
As I trudge up the stairs, the back of my neck starts to tingle. I’m chalking it up to how odd it is walking these halls without Hazel here. Part of me still feels like I don’t belong.
Rounding the corner into the nursery, I freeze. “Hazel.” My heart goes splat in my chest. “What are you doing here?”
She sits stiffly in the rocking chair, gripping a pink and white teddy bear. She’s eerily pale and too still as she stares at the wall.
When her gaze snaps to mine, there’s ice in her eyes. “Where were you yesterday morning?”
My blood becomes Jello. Time slows to a crawl, and I know she found out where I was. “I can explain.”
“We had an agreement!” Her eyes blaze with fury. “You promised you’d cut off all contact with criminals. And where, pray tell, do criminals hang out?”
I freeze like a creature caught in the lethal sweep of headlights. “Uh?—”
“Oh, I know this one!” Sarcastic Hazel is utterly terrifying. “Prison! Criminals hang out in prison.”
“I can explain.” Except I can’t. Not without betraying Noah and others.
“I don’t fucking care what your explanation is, Luke. You promised—no criminal contact. Remember that?”
“Yes.” My voice sounds scratchy and weak. “Yes, I remember.”
“Not only did you go back on your word, you lied to me about it—lied about where you were yesterday.”
“I did go to Salem and try on baby slings.” It’s the wrong thing to say. I see that in the clench of her jaw. “Okay, yes, you’re completely right. I should have told you I went to see Enzo.”
“Enzo,” she spits. “Don’t you mean El Matador?”
“Okay. Okay, wow.” How does she know this?
“I researched,” she says. “Asked the guards about Enzo Rodrigues Silva. He’s known as The Killer, Luke. This isn’t some guy who got jailed on a parking violation. He has an actual fucking nickname.”
“He does.” The fact that she’s cursed this many times in her no-cursing nursery tells me to tread carefully. “But it’s not what you think. His father was a bullfighter, but Enzo’s a pacifist. A vegetarian. He literally wouldn’t kill a fly in the commissary, so the other inmates started calling him that to be ironic.”
“Oh, well then let’s just have him over for dinner.” Her voice flames with fury. “Better yet, we’ll take our sweet baby girls to see him in prison. Let him dandle our newborns on his knee.”
I would honestly trust him to do that, but saying so won’t help me. “I’m sorry.”
“Why were you there?”
“I went to visit my old friend.” I need to be careful here. I’ve signed an ironclad NDA. “Enzo got transferred recently, and I wanted to make sure he settled in okay.”
“How nice,” she snaps. “And how did you happen to learn this?”
I may not be the smartest person in the room, but I see the trap. “A friend.”
“So another lie.” Her grip on the teddy bear tightens. “You said you’re not in contact with anyone on the inside. Anyone with criminal connections.”
There’s nothing I can say that will help. I keep my mouth shut, praying this isn’t as bad as it seems.
“Does your friend have a criminal record?”
There’s no right answer, not even the truth. “Yes.”
