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“I can’t say I’m happy about it,” Hayden muttered, but Natalie laughed.
“You used to be so much fun,” she said, her fingers lacing with her wife’s. As if taunting Hayden with it. “You need to ease up.”
“You need to back off,” I said, my gut burning with anger. “Or are you still obsessed with Hayden?”
“Excuse me?” Natalie blinked in offense and her wife’s jaw dropped.
“You must still be obsessed if you came this far to flaunt your lovely wife,” I pointed out, the acid on my tongue white-hot. “Take it from me, it’s pretty pathetic. If you’ve moved on, then act like it.”
Natalie opened her mouth, a babble of curses and retorts tripping over each other. I didn’t care to hear any of it.
I wrapped a hand around Hayden’s wrist. “Let’s go.”
I turned on my heel and stalked off, Hayden’s hand firmly gripped in my own.
“The nerve!” I huffed, my face hot with indignation. “I can’t believe she’d just flaunt her wife like that and c- wait.”
I skidded to a halt, forcing Hayden to stop as well.
She looked at me, her expression blank.
“I have an idea,” I said, the pain in her eyes twisting something in my chest. “Will you come with me?”
She only nodded, and it bugged me. We set off, back toward the store, but my mind was filled with questions.
How much had Natalie hurt Hayden for her to react that way? To shut down so completely? I didn’t dare ask any of the questions that chased themselves around my head.
I unlocked the gates and shouldered the door open, the chill of the night doing nothing to cool the heat of my skin.
“Come in,” I said, my voice gentler. Hayden obeyed, sidling past me and waiting as I locked up again behind us. “Just a sec.”
I fumbled against the wall for the light switches, flipping them one by one until the store was bathed in a warm light.
“What are you doing?” Hayden finally asked, and I frowned.
“Distracting you.” I shrugged. “Obviously.”
“Are you going to make me do stock take?”
“Ah, so you’re making jokes again.” I smiled, leading her into the kitchen area behind Blanca’s workstation. “That means you have an appetite.”
“An appetite?”
“Yeah, I don’t know about you but I’m starving,” I said, flipping the stove plates on and fishing around for the ingredients I needed. “Unless you’d rather not eat?”
She was quiet for a moment and I took that as her acquiescence. I laid out the pans and ingredients on the counter between us, mentally running through the list in my head.
“You’re going to cook?” Hayden asked slowly. “For me?”
“Us,” I corrected, my cheeks warm. “I’m hungry, and Mom taught me that if I’m gonna cook, I should cook for everyone around me.”
“How,” Hayden paused, picking at her fingernails. “How is she?”
“Mom?” I asked, busying myself with preparing the vegetables. “I was supposed to go and visit her today, but June asked me to come in during lunch to help a customer out with a custom drum set. When I called Dad, he said she was doing okay.”
I dragged in a deep breath, measuring out a cup of water and tossing it into the pot. “But I don’t know how true that is.”
“What do you mean?”
