Page 24 of Rise
Malcolm coughed too, though his was clearly for show. A beat later, she peered back over her shoulder and caught him mouthingoh my godlike a curse and a prayer all in one.
Beck finally turned back toward her, his eyes meeting hers.
There was something in his gaze that felt grounding. Not expectant, not even curious, justthere—like he was used to waiting for people to come to their own conclusions. Like he wasn’t in a rush for her to say the thing she was still trying to name.
“You want a coffee?” she asked, not yet ready to say goodbye to him. “On the house.”
His shoulders loosened just a bit. “That’d be good. Thanks.”
Hazel turned, and the second her back was to him, Iris mouthedwhat is happeningwith such dramatic flair that Malcolm had to pretend to choke on his drink just to cover his laughter.
Hazel bit back a laugh of her own and moved behind the counter with slow, deliberate motions, pouring the coffee into one of the dark ceramic mugs she’d been mentally setting aside for Beck all week. The weight of it felt grounding in her hand. She set it on the counter in front of him, just slightly turned, the thumbprint ridge facing outward. It was an unspoken offer: hold it how you like, stay if you want.
He reached for it without hesitation, fingers curling around the warmth like he knew exactly how it would feel.
Iris let out a low noise from behind Hazel, something softer than a groan.
“Look at the hands.Look at the hands.”
“I’m looking,” Malcolm whispered back, voice heavy. “I’vebeenlooking.”
Hazel hadn’t looked— hadn’t eventhoughtto— but now her eyes were drawn there of their own accord, as if summoned. His hands moved with quiet certainty, the kind that came from years of knowing how to fix things, how to carry weight without complaint. His knuckles were rough, faintly scarred, dusted with calluses and remnants of work that never quite scrubbed away. The veins along the back of his hand shifted as he moved, subtle and steady, like something elemental. They were big, too, impossibly so, and the sight of them around something so delicate sent a hot, startled flutter straight to the pit of her stomach.
Beck took a sip from his coffee and nodded once, oblivious to the show of near insanity happening a few feet behind Hazel. Oblivious to the way hishandshad begun to heat her body from the inside out.
“You make a mean cup of coffee.”
Hazel arched a brow at him, letting out a low chuckle threaded with disbelief.
“It’s only black,” she said, tilting her head slightly to one side.
He glanced at her, expression still unreadable in that gentle way of his, but she could have sworn she saw a flicker of warmth in his dark eyes. “Still.”
And just like that, something shifted in the air, so small it could’ve been missed. A thread tightening between them. The space between his hand on the mug and hers on the counter felt charged, like a linedrawn in heat. She was grateful for the subject change, grateful for the excuse to laugh, to pretend her skin wasn’t buzzing and her thoughts hadn’t gone slippery with a sudden and unexpectedwant.She leaned into the humour like a lifeline, trying not to think about the way her body was reacting to the nearness of his.
In the silence that had stretched there, Beck had turned his head toward the bell. “Let me know if it’s too loud.”
Hazel shook her head, her eyes following his. “No. It’s… it’s just right.”
And for a moment, they simply stood there, sunlight warming the space between them, the bell overhead catching the light like a promise.
Neither of them moved, not until Iris cleared her throatveryloudly.
“So,” she said as she stepped forward and rounded the side of the front counter, her eyes focused on Beck. Her free hand dragged along the white stone of the countertop and Hazel’s eyes were drawn to the movement, to the cracked lilac polish affixed to her fingernails. “You install bells for all the women you buy sticky buns from, or…?”
Hazel blinked, mortified. Her stomach bottomed out and she turned fully towards her friend, mouth slightly agape.“Iris.”
Beck, to his credit, only lifted his mug in her direction, lips curved just slightly at the edges.
And then, perfectly deadpan, he said, “Nope. Just the one.” And walked over to the corner table that Hazel had silently namedhislike he hadn’t just set the entire bakery on fire with one sentence.
She didn’t know what that made her feel, not exactly. It wasn’t embarrassment, not really, not the flush she’d expect from it, and not the sting of being teased. It was warmer than that, deeper. Like someone had struck a tuning fork just beneath her ribs and left it humming there, low and impossible to ignore.
She didn’t know if it was that same heated attraction from earlier or simply the way he said it: casual, certain, as if it were fact. As ifshewere fact.
It left her slightly unmoored, breath caught in the space between laugh and breathless.
Hazel was still staring at the place he’d stood moments earlier when Malcolm leaned over and whispered, “Well. That’s that, then.”
