Page 49 of Bone’s Choice
Hazel raised her eyebrow. “Your family?”
“Club family.”
She nodded. “How long?”
“Grave Prowlers started doing it before I was born.”
“Seriously?” she asked.
“Virginia chapter started the business back in the eighties. The club expanded later. Wisconsin eventually started making our own. I became Prez a few years back,” I said proudly.
“And people actually order custom coffins?” she asked.
“More than you’d think.”
“What makes one custom?”
“Anything somebody wants. Wood. Finish. Interior. Carving. Handles. We’ve done logos, military insignias, family crests.”
“That’s kind of cool.”
“Yeah.”
“Morbid,” she muttered, “but cool.”
“Also yeah,” I chuckled.
“Do you make them?”
“I just said we did, babe.”
She shook her head. “No, I mean you, personally making the caskets.”
“Yeah.”
That seemed to surprise her. “You actually build caskets?”
“I know how.”
“Why does that surprise you?” Ma asked.
Hazel glanced at her. “I don’t know.”
I rested my forearms on the table. “What’d you think I did all day?”
Her eyes moved over me. Slowly. Definitely intentionally this time. “Should I answer that with your mother sitting here?”
Ma choked on her water.
I stared at Hazel and she smiled sweetly.
Fuck, I liked her. That realization came fast enough that I immediately pushed it away.
Attracted. I was attracted to her.
Different thing. Very fucking different.
“What about you?” I asked.
