Page 137 of Bone’s Choice

“You looked pretty worried.”

“Because I know the assholes who live here,” Taco shot back.

“You are one of the assholes who lives here,” I pointed out.

“Exactly.”

Taco dropped into the chair beside Rowdy.

I looked at him. “So Hazel bullied you?”

“She did not fucking bully me.”

“What’d she do?”

“Nothing.”

Rowdy answered for him. “Judged him for buying strawberry jam.”

Taco slapped a hand against the table. “What the fuck is wrong with strawberry jam?”

“Nothing.”

“That’s what I said.”

“Apparently, Prez agrees with you,” Rowdy said.

“Because I’m not an idiot.”

Taco pointed at me. “Thank you.”

“Still weird that you go to the farmers market every Saturday.”

His hand dropped.

Rowdy barked out a laugh.

“How the fuck do you know I go every Saturday?”

“Lucky guess.”

“Hazel know that?”

Taco’s eyes narrowed. “Yeah.”

I smiled.

It was stupid. All of it, but I could picture Hazel standing there giving Taco shit. I could practically hear her laughing. That laugh had stuck with me since the first day I’d seen her standing in her driveway with Ma.

So had a lot of other things.

Like what she’d looked like beneath me.

What she’d sounded like.

The feel of her hands on me.

The way she’d smiled from behind the shower curtain Wednesday morning when I’d stood there like a fucking idiot instead of leaving.