Page 104 of The Holiday Hate-Off
She makes a sweet sound and turns over, tucking her legs in. And the cat appears out of nowhere, in the way only felines can, and jumps onto the bed, nestling into her body.
Lucky bastard.
I go to leave and she mumbles, “Enzo?”
“Yes?” I ask, turning, my heart rate speeding up.
“Don’t draw a mustache on my face while I’m asleep.”
I smile to myself, because I’d forgotten my threat to retaliate with the marker. Who could remember a thing like that after what happened between us in Hidden Italy?
“We’ll see,” I say ominously, and with that, I leave the room.
A manlike Hudson would settle onto the couch, pull that fuzzy, colorful blanket over him, and call it a night.
But Lucy’s held a monopoly over my mind for days, andnow that I’m here in her home, I want to learn about her. I’d like to knoweverything.
So after I take care of my big problem in the bathroom—something else Hudson wouldn’t do—I give myself a tour of the cottage.
It’s cute, cozy, and full of bright colors, all of which I was expecting, but there are a few things I couldn’t have foreseen. Namely, a collection of vintage salt and pepper shakers in the kitchen—enough to furnish dozens of diners—fifty cans of tinned sardines in the cabinet, an enormous oil painting of the cat she says isn’t hers, and in the living area, a wooden hutch housing a collection of taxidermied animals.
I scratch my head in stupefied disbelief as I study the squirrels, the walleyed rabbit that looks like it was scraped off the road, and a fox that resembles a chihuahua.
Did she…make these?
The thought doesn’t cohere at all with the Lucy I’ve been getting to know. It’s absolutely insane to think that she’d want to keep them, let alone make them herself, but here they are, sitting in a cupboard in her house.
Maybe she rents the place furnished?
Jesus Christ, I hope so. I mean, surely she must. She probably doesn’t even know about this cabinet of curiosities.
Or…maybe the collections belonged to her mother? People can be sentimental about some strange shit—Nonna still has the chicken bone that nearly killed Nonno, and would have if my father, in a rare act of heroism, hadn’t given him the hug of life.
I sit on the couch, my mind tripping over the closet of horrors, the sardines, and even that bed with the heart-shaped headboard. But my thoughts keep returning to Lucy, sleepy and pretty in her bed, telling me that she doesn’t want to be alone. Lucy, revealing what happened to her mother.
Lucy, who’s had as much fun with the hate-off as I have.
Presuming all this crap is hers, they’re pretty harmless eccentricities. I mean, lots of people like sardines, right? My grandmother eats them several times a week. Maybe they can bond over their love of disgusting canned fish.
Oh, what the fuck am I thinking? I shouldn’twantthem to bond. The goal was and always has been to fix the problem with Hidden Italy, get my mojo back, and leave.
Sighing, I lean back on the velveteen couch, my gaze catching on a framed poster I hadn’t noticed before. It’s forCats. Not the musical, but the CGI-packed live-action movie.
I don’t know…maybe she only likes it because she has a thing for cats? Lots of people like cats. Truth be told, I myself like cats.
I fall into a fitful sleep—and wake up with a start to the cat licking my face with its sandpaper tongue. My heart hammers as I take a second to orient myself.
Judging from the light that’s barely starting to seep through the windows, it’s early morning.
I pet the cat, then get to my feet and stretch, my back feeling the strain of spending all night on a couch too small for me.
“Lucy?” I call out.
She doesn’t answer, so I pour a glass of water for her in the kitchen—fuck, the glasses areCats-themed too—and bring it to the bedroom to check on her.
The bed is empty, the covers rumpled. But the shower is running in the en suite bathroom. My gaze shoots to the door of the bathroom just as it opens and Lucy walks out…completely naked, her glorious hair gathered in a knot at the back of her neck.
She sees me and shrieks, her hands lifting to her breasts, hiding those pink nipples, then shifting down between her legs. But she does it with both of her arms, and it squeezes her breasts together, and oh God…
