“Why don’t you use any ball except that green one?”
“Because it’s the right weight for me.”
“Can I try it?”
His brows lifted. “You want to play with my ball?”
Her cheeks flushed. “I want to see if I can knock down more pins with the green ball,” she said carefully.
“It’s heavier than the one you’ve been using,” he warned.
“You don’t think I can handle your ball?” she said, tossing his innuendo back at him.
He handed it to her. “You’re welcome to try.”
She did—and though she didn’t move the ball with much speed, she did manage to knock down six pins. And then she went back to the pink ball.
Andrew didn’t comment on her choice. Although he enjoyed the flirtatious banter, he wasn’t sure that either of them was ready to follow where a continuation of the conversation might lead.
As the final score was noted, he caught Rachel stifling a yawn. “Sorry,” she apologized. “I didn’t realize how late it was.”
“Did I keep you out past your curfew?” he teased.
She shook her head. “No curfew, but I do have to be at the shop for my flower delivery in the morning.”
“What time?”
“Seven.”
He winced. “I’m sorry.”
“I’m not,” she told him. “I had a good time tonight.”
“Well, let’s turn in those snazzy shoes and get you home.”
“You don’t have to take me home,” she protested. “I can call a cab.”
“It’s almost midnight—I’m not sending you home in a cab.”
“I don’t want you to go out of your way.” She slipped on her own footwear and picked up the bowling shoes to return them to Grover.
“I won’t know if it’s out of my way if you won’t tell me where you live,” he said logically.
“Two-twelve Parkside, just past Queen Street.”
He nodded. “I know the area.”
They chatted amicably on the drive back to her apartment. When he approached the building, she suggested that he could just drop her off in front. Instead, he parked in an empty spot designated for visitors and walked her to the door.
He didn’t follow her into the building, because that might seem too pushy—and too much like a date. Instead, he waited until she’d unlocked the exterior door and said, “Well, I guess I’ll see you around.”
“Thanks. For a few hours, I actually managed to forget that it was Valentine’s Day.” Then she impulsively touched her lips to his cheek.
He stood on the step as she went inside and realized that, for the few hours that he’d been with Rachel, he’d forgotten a lot of things—including that holidays without his daughter usually left him feeling sad and lonely and alone. Because he’d felt none of those things with Rachel tonight.
Now he needed to decide whether or not that was a good thing.
* * *
Morning came early, but Rachel didn’t mind. More than three years after Buds & Blooms had first opened, she still experienced a thrill every time she unlocked the doors, and she still felt like a kid in a candy shop when a delivery of flowers arrived. Today’s delivery would be a big one to replenish the stock sold the day before. She was cataloging and sorting various blooms and an assortment of greenery when Holly wandered in at eight—a full two hours before she was scheduled.
Her friend immediately started to prioritize the day’s orders then began to gather the necessary containers and flowers.
Rachel let her get organized before she said, “I have to admit that your early arrival today has me wondering about your date last night.”
Holly cut a block of floral foam, stuffed it into a decorative watering can. “It was a disaster.”
They worked in silence for a few minutes, until Rachel couldn’t take it anymore. “You have to give me more information than that,” she protested.
“He made me dinner at his place, with candles and music and wine, and then he asked me to marry him.” Her friend cut the stems of a trio of candy-pink gerberas. “Usually I can read guys pretty well, but I did not see that one coming.”
Rachel’s gaze shifted to Holly’s bare left hand. “You turned him down.”
“I’m not ready to get married.” Holly pushed the stems into the floral foam, then added some pale pink carnations. “And even if I was, I’m not planning to marry someone like Shane.”
“So why do you keep dating guys like Shane?”
Her friend sighed. “Because I know I’m not in any danger of falling in love with guys like Shane.”
“Too bad Shane didn’t know that.” And though she knew her friend had done the right thing by turning down his proposal, Rachel couldn’t help but feel sorry for the guy.
“But he should have,” Holly insisted. “I mean, who proposes marriage to a woman who has carefully avoided any use of the
L-
word?”
“You’ve been together almost two years—obviously he thought it was implied.”
“Except that he’s not in love with me, either. He just thought it was the next logical step in our relationship.”
“This is why I don’t date,” Rachel told her. “Because a few dates eventually lead to a relationship and one party or another ends up with a broken heart.”
“I should have come over to your place last night for the
Criminal Minds
marathon.”
“Actually, I wasn’t home last night.”
Her friend pushed the finished watering can arrangement aside. “Where were you?”
“Bowling.”
“By yourself?”
“No.” She plucked the wilted blooms out of a container and tossed them into the garbage. “With Andrew Garrett.”
Holly frowned. “Sexy White Roses Guy?”
Rachel nodded.
“The one with the wedding ring on his finger?” her friend pressed.
“He’s widowed.”
“Oh.” Holly considered for a minute. “How long?”
“Three years.”
“And he still wears the ring?”
Rachel shrugged.
Holly counted out eight white lilies. “I didn’t know you bowled.”
“I don’t.”
“So how did this come about?”
“We were both at Valentino’s for eat-in takeout, and the next thing I knew, I was wearing ugly shoes.”
“That’s probably why you don’t bowl,” Holly noted. “The shoes offend your impeccable sense of style.”
“And yet, I had a good time.”
“Because you enjoyed the game—or because you enjoyed being with Sexy White Roses Guy?”
“He is sexy,” Rachel acknowledged. “And charming and interesting and funny.”
“Uh-oh.”
She frowned. “Uh-oh—what?”
“One date and you’re falling for him already.”
“It wasn’t a date and I’m not falling for him.”
Holly didn’t look convinced. “I’m all for you finally ending your ridiculous dating hiatus, but I don’t want you getting hung up on somebody else who isn’t available.”
“I’m not hung up on him.”
“You went bowling with him—and you don’t bowl.”
Rachel sighed. “Our options were limited.”
“Did he kiss you?”
“It wasn’t a date.”
“That wouldn’t stop most guys I know from making a move,” her friend noted. “Then again, most guys I know don’t wear wedding bands—even the ones who are married.”
Rachel waited until her friend finished then she said, “Actually, I kissed him.”
“What?”
“It was a thank-you,” she explained. “An impulse.”
“Was there tongue?”
She rolled her eyes. “I touched my lips to his cheek.”
“Oh.” Holly sounded disappointed. “I’m not sure that even counts as a kiss.”
“Then I guess I didn’t kiss him.”
“When you kissed him, did you feel those little flutters in your belly?”
“Make up your mind—did I kiss him or not?”
“That depends on whether or not there were flutters.”
There had been definite flutters, and her heart had raced and her knees had gone weak. But she wasn’t prepared to admit any of that to her friend.
“Customer,” she said, when the bell over the door jangled.
“We’re not done with this conversation,” Holly warned.
But more customers kept her busy in the front of the shop so that Holly was unable to continue her interrogation. And when Rachel left work at two o’clock, she was confident that she’d kept the truth about her feelings for Andrew Garrett to herself.
Chapter Three
S
aturday afternoon, Andrew was in his home workshop assembling a sideboard when his middle brother stopped by.
Nathan walked around the piece, giving it a thorough examination. “Nice—but not your usual style.”
“It’s for Ed and Carol’s dining room.” The Wakefields were his in-laws—or maybe they were former in-laws. Andrew wasn’t sure if the death of his wife changed the relationship between himself and her parents. Either way, they were still his daughter’s grandparents.
“Don’t they know that you’re the VP of Product Research and Design for a multibillion-dollar furniture company now and not just a carpenter?”
“I’m still a carpenter,” Andrew insisted. “A fancy title doesn’t change that.”
“And a damn good one,” Nate agreed, continuing his inspection of the work. “Is this an original design?”
He nodded. “Ed wanted something special for Carol, for their fortieth anniversary.”
“When’s that?”
“Not until October. But I had the time now, so I figured I’d get started.”
“Mom and Dad’s fortieth is in May,” Nathan reminded him. “And Mom wants a party.”
“She always wants a party. Do you remember Maura’s first birthday? She invited sixty people.”
“It was a kick-ass first birthday,” his brother agreed.
“I can only imagine how many people she’ll invite to a fortieth wedding anniversary.”
“Apparently we’re supposed to do the inviting.”
“Huh?”
Nate nodded. “She said that proper etiquette requires the party be hosted by someone other than the anniversary couple. Preferably the couple’s children.”
“Not if she wants it done right,” Andrew noted.
“Daniel suggested we hire an event planner.”
“Not a bad idea,” he admitted. “And since it was his idea, he should look into that.”
Nate went to the mini-fridge and took out a couple of beers. He twisted the caps off both, then handed one to his brother. “Speaking of anniversaries—I stopped by last night.”
Andrew tipped the bottle to his lips. “So...today is the twenty-four-hour anniversary of your visit?”
“Okay, I guess that wasn’t a very good segue.”
“What are you trying to segue into?”
“Asking where you were last night.”
“Did we have plans that I forgot about?”
“No—but it was Valentine’s Day.”
Andrew slapped his hand to his forehead. “And I didn’t even get you a card.”
“You’re a funny guy,” Nate said, his tone devoid of amusement.
“Yes, it was Valentine’s Day,” he agreed. “And Maura was with the Wakefields and I was hungry, so I went to Valentino’s to grab a bite to eat. I ran into someone I know, so we had dinner together and then went bowling.”
“I assume this ‘someone’ you know is female?”
“Yes, she’s female. No, it wasn’t a date.”
“You’ve grieved long enough,” Nathan told him.
“I’m not still grieving,” Andrew told him. “Yeah, I still miss Nina sometimes—” which was a vast improvement over the “all the time” that he’d missed her and looked for her in the first year after her death. “But it’s not like I’ve put my life on hold.”
“It’s exactly like you’ve put your life on hold,” his brother countered. “Or is there another explanation for the fact that you haven’t had a relationship with anyone else since Nina died?”
“I’ve been on dates,” he protested, although they both knew that he’d only been out a handful of times since his wife’s death—the first being only about six months ago.
“A few first dates and not a single second date.”
He shrugged. “I haven’t met anyone that I wanted to go out with more than once.”
Even as Andrew said the words, a carousel of images played through his mind—and all of them were Rachel. Behind the counter of the flower shop, a small smile on her face as she wrapped a bouquet; in the kitchen at Valentino’s, a hint of sadness clouding her gorgeous blue eyes when she mentioned her dating hiatus; at the bowling alley, a brilliant smile illuminating her face after she’d knocked down her first pins; outside her apartment building at the end of the night, her eyes soft and warm, as her lips touched his cheek.
“What about Bridget?”
He pushed the memories of Rachel to the back of his mind. “Bridget was serious stalker material.”
“What did she do—call you the day after your date?”
“She called. She texted. She emailed. And then she showed up at the house—and I never told her where I lived.”
“Okay, that’s a little obsessive,” Nathan allowed.
“And when I made the mistake of inviting her to come inside for a drink—because I didn’t know how else to respond to her presence on my doorstep—she immediately started making decorating suggestions.”
“Well, she is an interior designer.”
“Who walked through the house until she found my bedroom and then told me the feng shui wasn’t conducive to getting naked and sweaty.”
Nate winced. “Okay—forget Bridget. Tell me about this girl you went bowling with last night—how did you meet her?”
“She works at a flower shop downtown.”
“Please don’t tell me you were in there buying flowers to take to the cemetery.”
“Okay, I won’t tell you.”
Nathan groaned. “That’s pathetic.”
“Why does it matter where I met her? We’re just...friends,” he decided, because acquaintances seemed overly vague a description for a woman who had played a starring role in the sexual dreams that plagued his sleep the previous evening. Of course, he wasn’t going to share that with his brother.
“Is she coyote ugly?”
He choked on his beer. “Jeez, Nate. No. She’s not ugly at all.”
“Then what does she look like?”
He could picture her clearly: the silky brown hair that she kept tied back when she was working but had brushed out so that it hung loose to her shoulders last night; the deep blue eyes that reminded him of clear summer skies; the light dusting of freckles over the bridge of her pert nose; the tiny mole at the corner of her temptingly shaped mouth; the graceful slope of her shoulders; the unmistakably feminine curves.
But he couldn’t mention any one of those things, because he knew that if he did, his brother would somehow sense everything that he wasn’t saying. Most notably that Rachel Ellis was the first woman who had stuck in his mind—and stirred his body—in a very long time.
“She’s...attractive,” he finally said. “In a girl-next-door kind of way.”
Nathan’s brows lifted. “So if you’re really not interested, maybe you’ll introduce her to me.”
“No.” His response was immediate and unequivocal.
“Why not?”
“Because she’s...sweet.”
“I like sweet.”
“Said the wolf to Red Riding Hood,” Andrew noted drily.
His brother grinned.
“Besides, I thought you were dating some flight attendant.”
“Yeah, but since she picked up the San Francisco to Tokyo route, I hardly see her,” he admitted.
“I guess that would explain why you were alone on Valentine’s Day.”
“And most other days that end with a
y,
” Nate grumbled.
Before Andrew could respond to that, his brother’s pocket started ringing. Nate pulled out his cell phone and smiled when he saw the name on the display. Andrew started to clear up his tools while his brother answered the call.
“That was Mallory,” he said, tucking his phone away again. “She’s got four days off and is just about to get on a plane headed home.”
“I guess you’re not going to be alone tonight,” he noted.
His brother grinned. “Do you know where I can pick up some flowers?”
* * *
Maura didn’t understand why they had to go outside for recess. Mrs. Patterson, her first grade teacher, insisted that fresh air was good for them. But by the time they all got their boots and hats and coats on, recess was half-over.
Sometimes they played grounders on the climber, but today she was just hanging out on the swings with her best friend, Kristy. Not even swinging, just sitting on the cold plastic seats and waiting for the bell to ring again so they could go back inside.
“I saw Simon put a Valentine in your box on Friday.”
“He gave Valentines to everyone,” Maura said. “It’s like a rule.”
“But he gave you the biggest one,” Kristy said. “I think he likes you.”
Maura just shrugged. Kristy thought it was a big deal to know which boys liked which girls, but she didn’t really care.
“Boys give you things when they like you—especially on Valentine’s Day,” Kristy told her. “My mom’s boyfriend gave her a ring and now they’re going to get married and Greg’s going to be my new dad.”
“But you already have a dad.”
“Yeah, but my mom says he’s a deadbeat and Greg will be a better one.”
Maura frowned. It didn’t seem fair that Kristy was getting another dad when she already had one. Not that Maura wanted another dad—she already had the best dad in the world. But she thought it would be kinda cool if she could get a new mom, ’cuz the one she’d had died when Maura was little.
“And I get to be a flower girl in the wedding,” Kristy said. “But Tiffany gets to be a bridesmaid, ’cuz she’s older and ’cuz she got to be a flower girl at our mom’s last wedding. We’re gonna have matching dresses, though. Probably pink.”
Maura thought it would be fun to be in a wedding. Before Christmas, her dad had taken her out of school for a couple of days so they could go to Uncle Jack’s wedding. Her cousin, Ava, was a bridesmaid, and she got to walk down the aisle of the church just like the bride.
Knowing that Kristy was going to be in a wedding, Maura felt something curl in her belly. It was what her daddy called a green-eyed monster. She knew it wasn’t really a monster, but the bad feeling she got when she wanted what someone else had. She should be happy that Kristy was going to be in a wedding, but she wished she could be in a wedding, too.
And it really wasn’t fair that Kristy was gonna have two dads and she didn’t even have one mom.
* * *
Rachel flipped the page on the calendar when she opened up the shop Saturday morning. It was March 1st—two weeks after Valentine’s Day. And in that time, she hadn’t seen or heard from Andrew Garrett again. Which wasn’t at all unusual. In fact, if he stuck to his usual pattern, she wouldn’t see him again until August.
So while it wasn’t surprising that he hadn’t come by the shop, it was disappointing. She’d thought—hoped—that the time they’d spent together on Valentine’s Day might have meant something to him. Because it had meant something to her. The fact that he hadn’t made any effort to contact her since suggested otherwise.
She’d tried to put the events of that evening out of her mind as completely as he’d apparently done. But sometimes her thoughts would wander and she’d remember the surprising camaraderie they’d shared for a few hours—and the even more surprising tug of attraction.
There was something about the man that really appealed to her—and turned on parts of her that had been turned off for a very long time. Unfortunately, the attraction she felt was obviously one-sided. As Holly had pointed out, date or no date, if a guy was interested, he made a move. Andrew hadn’t made a move—he hadn’t even responded to her move.
If, that is, kissing a guy on the cheek could be considered a move and not just an impulse to express her gratitude for a fun evening. And maybe, subconsciously, she’d also been testing the waters a little.
The combination of his enticing masculine scent and the faint shadow of stubble on his jaw had been as intoxicating as the wine she’d enjoyed with her dinner. And when her lips had brushed his raspy cheek, she’d felt the tingles all the way down to her toes.
Sixteen months was a long time to go without dating—and everything else it entailed. The brief contact had her suddenly yearning for that everything else, and tempted her to dive right in. Andrew, on the other hand, had given no indication that he even wanted to get his feet wet.
She tried to put him out of her mind. It was ridiculous to spend so much time thinking about a man she barely knew. A man who, as Holly had pointed out, was probably still in love with and grieving for his deceased wife. Unfortunately that knowledge didn’t change the fact that, two weeks after their Valentine’s Day non-date, she hadn’t stopped thinking about him.
On the plus side, two weeks after Holly’s Valentine’s Day breakup, she wasn’t yet dating anyone new, so she and Rachel were hanging out more often. In fact, today Trish was coming in at lunch to manage the shop so they could head to Raleigh to catch an afternoon basketball game. But first they had to finish up the last of the centerpieces for Holly’s grandmother’s ninetieth birthday party the following day.
They were on the last one—Rachel cutting and Holly arranging—when Holly’s phone chimed to indicate a text message. She frowned at the screen.
“Problem?” Rachel asked.
“I don’t know—it’s a cryptic bunch of letters and numbers from Gary.”
Gary was Holly’s brother, currently in England to finish up a Master’s Degree at the London School of Economics. “Letters and numbers?”
“‘BA5521 15:40 can u pick up?’” As she read the message out loud, Holly’s eyes widened. “Ohmygod. It’s flight information.”
“He’s coming home for your grandmother’s birthday party,” Rachel guessed.
Her friend’s eyes filled with tears as she typed a reply. “He didn’t come home for Christmas. I haven’t seen him since August.”
Rachel passed her a tissue. “You’ll see him this afternoon.”
“I’ll see him this afternoon.” Her lips curved in anticipation of the reunion, then her smile slipped. “Oh, Rachel, I’m sorry.”
She shook her head. “Don’t you dare apologize.”
“But you already bought the tickets.”
“So I’ll find someone else to go with me—or I won’t. It’s not a big deal.”
“Are you sure? Because I could ask one of my cousins to—”
“I’m sure,” Rachel interjected. “Your brother coming home is a big deal—you need to be there.”
Holly nodded her thanks.
Rachel started transferring the finished centerpieces to the fridge while her friend swept the cuttings from the table. When the front door chimed, Rachel’s hands were full of flowers and Trish wasn’t in yet, so Holly went to the front of the shop to assist the customer. Thirty seconds later, she was back again and nudging her business partner toward the showroom.