Bonus for Worst Faking Idea - Mick's POV
Wondered what happened between Mick and Hazel at the wedding????
Here it is....
Bonus scene
Mick
I’m sitting at the bar at the wedding reception, minding my own business and getting quietly tipsy, when an absolute vision comes over and sits on the empty stool beside me.
She’s one of the bridesmaids from the wedding. Hazel.
I noticed her earlier, like every other man in the audience, and for some godforsaken reason, she wants to sit next to me.
Well, all right. It could be because the only empty chair at the bar is next to me—a pattern I’m used to given I’m a tall, unfriendly-looking guy with a buzzed head and tatts—but I’ll take the win.
Hazel’s got long brown hair the perfect length for me to fist it, big green eyes, and the absolute best legs I’ve seen in my life.
I sit up straighter on my barstool and give her a big smile, even though I’ve got a partial headache from the easy listening music that’s been piping over the speakers ever since my band stopped playing. “Can I get you a drink, pretty lady?”
She laughs.
Fine by me. If she’s laughing, at least she finds me amusing. Women have gone home with me for less.
She points to the bartender, a guy who looks like he’s never cracked a grin. “I think it’s an open bar?”
“Fair point. Can he get you a drink?”
She smiles back at me, a glimmer of interest in her eyes.
Oh, yeah, suddenly this party is getting good.
I’m not much of a man for weddings usually. My old man has been to divorce court twice since he ran out on my mother, and they get old after a while. Same hollow promises, bad food, cheap wine. Same sad suits on jackoffs like me who only own one or maybe two. But sometimes there’s an upside.
Like this woman sitting beside me.
No way I’d meet a woman like her if I stuck to my usual schedule of going to band practice, performances, and running my shitty boxing gym into the ground.
She smiles at me. “Yeah, that would be nice.”
Then she turns toward the bartender and orders a whiskey.
“Not a fan of ginger beer?” I ask, raising my eyebrows. This place we’re in is a ginger beer brewery, run by the friend of a friend.
She blushes prettily, then glances over her shoulder. “Don’t tell my cousin. She’s the one who runs this place. But I need a stiffer drink today.”
“Why’s that?” I ask, planting an elbow on the arm so I can stay right where I’m at—turned toward her.
She nods her thanks to the bartender as he delivers the whiskey. He’s suddenly all smiles in return even though he shoved a beer at me not five minutes ago.
That’s the way it goes, though.
She’s a hot-as-hell woman, and I’m the kind of guy who looks like he’s searching for trouble…even though I mostly stopped looking a while back.
She takes a long sip of the whiskey, grimacing in a way that tells me this might be the first whiskey she’s ever had. Then she sets the glass down with a clack. “I don’t want to talk about that. Tell me about yourself. You’re in that band.”
We played earlier, on account of Cormac, our bass player, is the son of the old guy who got hitched today. Her cousin Nora’s mother is the bride.
Cormac’s good people. In addition to being in the band, he’s also a regular at my boxing gym, although he likes the place the way I like it: mostly empty.
The sound gets to him; the people get to me.
I run a hand over my buzzed head. “Yeah. Garbage Fire. Like the name?”
She hesitates before saying, “Not really.”
“So you’re honest. I appreciate that.
“And your name is?”
I laugh, because wow, I’m usually better at picking up women. I’ve got a lot on my mind tonight, I guess, but that’s no excuse to flub an opportunity like this.
“I’m Mick,” I say, holding out my hand for a shake.
She takes it in her small, delicate hand, eyeing the tattooed snake dipping onto my hand from my suit jacket’s sleeve.
“Hazel.”
“Oh, I know. They announced the wedding party earlier, and I took notes.”
She shakes her head, making it clear she thinks I'm an idiot. Fine. She’s mostly right.
“You like snakes?” She gestures to my hand, now wrapped around my drink.
“Fuck no. That snake tried to end my life when I was hiking in Linville Gorge.”
“So you wanted it on your body forever?”
I take a sip of my drink, thinking about that time in my life. “Yeah. Some things you’ve got to remember, even if you don’t want to.”
This seems to make her uncomfortable, so I shrug. “That’s me. I’m in a band with a shitty name, and I own a boxing gym that’s so bad no one with sense would want to go to it. But I can bench-press two-hundred-and-twenty-five pounds, so there’s that.”
Her lips curl into a smile, revealing a dimple in her cheek. “So you’re saying you could bench-press me?”
“Without breaking a sweat.” I shrug. “What do you do?”
She sighs and takes another sip of the whiskey. “I’m my mother’s assistant.”
“Oh, is she super old or something? My uncle had to quit his job to take care of my great-grandmother after her stroke. She isn’t too nice to anyone, but she’s loaded, so he figured he’d make sure he was first in line.”
She laughs again, turning the glass around on the bar as if she’s inspecting it for fingerprints. “No, nothing like that. My mom’s a lifestyle guru. She’s pretty famous.”
I sit back on my stool. I got a lot of opinions about lifestyle gurus, mainly that they’re full of shit, but I’m not about to tell this pretty lady that her mother is a huckster, especially not if she’s devoted her life to helping her.
“I see the look on your face,” she says pointedly.
“Not much I can do about how my face looks. You can blame my parents for that.”
She nudges my arm, still propped on the bar, with her knuckles. “You know you have a nice face. Every man who’s good-looking knows it.”
I have to laugh at that. “And you don’t think that’s true for women? You know every man at this wedding has been eyeing you up from the second you walked into view.”
She doesn’t deny it. She just lifts one shoulder. “There’s more to life than looks.”
“Say that to someone who’s got a janked-up face.”
She laughs almost begrudgingly, as if she holds the laughter against me. “No thanks. I don’t own a boxing gym, and I’ve never thrown a punch in my life. It wouldn’t end well for me.”
I shift, my knee brushing against hers, suddenly very aware of every last bit of space separating us, and not liking it much either. “That sounds like a challenge, Hazel with the beautiful face. I like teaching people how to throw punches.”
“So you throw punches and insult people. Sounds like quite a life.” She leans forward a bit, and a lock of her long hair tumbles down her shoulder. It smells sweet. I don’t know what they put in women’s shampoo, but good God, it makes me lose my mind.
“It has its moments,” I say. “You should try it sometime. Might do more for you than tinctures do.”
She wrinkles her nose. “See, I knew you made a face when I told you Mom’s a lifestyle guru. I’ve seen that face plenty of times, from plenty of people, but she always manages to win people around. She’s good at that.”
“Thanks to you?”
“Yeah, a bit.” She smiles. “But I don’t win people over by challenging them to fights. I have to talk them around and make them think my ideas are theirs.”
“Sounds exhausting.”
“It is.” She glances over her shoulder, then takes another sip of the drink before turning toward me more fully and clasping my forearm, the simple touch very much to my liking.
“So what do you say we get out of here, Mick with the beautiful face. I think I’d like to have some fun tonight after all, and you don’t strike me as someone who gets clingy.”
I grin at her, fully enjoying myself for the first time in, hell, I don’t even know how long. “You don’t have to tell me twice.” I get to my feet and offering her a hand-up. “You seemed really into the bench-pressing thing. Do you want me to carry you out of here?”
“Oh, I think I can walk,” she says, stepping closer to me, stopping just a few inches from my chest. “But if I’m still able to walk this well after we’re done, then I’m going to feel very put out." She hesitates before adding, "This is just for tonight.
"I don't have any problem with that," I say, fully believing it. After all, I've never had a problem with that sort of thing before.
And yet...there's a little voice in the back of my head whispering some annoying-ass thing about famous last words.
Their story is coming in an upcoming book!
But, up first, The Shirtless Chef's adventures in Apple Ridge.
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August 31, 2026
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September 3, 2026-
Sweet version: