Total pages in book: 109
Estimated words: 108862 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 544(@200wpm)___ 435(@250wpm)___ 363(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 108862 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 544(@200wpm)___ 435(@250wpm)___ 363(@300wpm)
I’m ashamed to admit the proximity of our faces excited me.
And scared me a little.
It’s been a long time since a guy has stood that close to me.
In my space.
In my oxygen.
I need to get him out of my fucking head.
I’m not sure what does it exactly—the sight of the orchid, the unusual peace and quiet tonight, Diego’s annoying words—but I’m back at the laptop, and I scrap the new quote I’ve been working on tediously all night. Instead, I send Mr. Bellamy three options. First: my original premium design at the price already quoted, but I throw in extra greenery and waive my setup fee. Second option: 15% cheaper, but with smaller arrangements and fewer premium stems. Third: budget-conscious new design using seasonal flowers that still accommodate his desired color scheme at a lower cost.
Fair options. Not unreasonable.
And I’m not doing this because Diego was right. I’m doing this because the math is right.
I’m running a business.
My business.
I click send, feeling satisfied. Then close the laptop. Lean back in the chair. And let myself smile for once, despite the sleepiness in my eyes and the crick in my neck. I don’t even bother glancing out the window again before putting myself to bed at last.
Diego doesn’t rev his engine in the morning.
I sleep in until 8.
A serious luxury on a Thursday.
I enjoy a few customers today between my in-store chores of trimming stems, usual watering and upkeep, as well as arranging a pickup order for Robby who should be by around five. It’s still the morning when I wrap a cute arrangement in paper, tie with twine, then smile as I hand it to Mr. Mitch Arnold, who hopes the flowers will make Ms. Bethie Davis smile again—it’s for some reason he didn’t disclose and I wouldn’t pry out of him. After a nurse from the clinic picks out sympathy flowers for her aunt, I spend half an hour helping Mrs. Harding choose between roses or lilies for an apology she may or may not have earned after a “tiny recent disagreement” with her mother-in-law Nancy. “I promise we’re getting better,” she tells me, like I know all her business and am keeping tabs, “and argue much less often now, but thank goodness Cole and Noah came by for dinner a minute later, because I was not about to hold back.” No further questions, your Honor.
After waving goodbye to Mrs. Baker, who just stopped in for a chat on her way to Patsy’s for lunch, I slip behind the counter and wake up the computer to check my email.
No reply from Mr. Bellamy yet, which I choose to interpret as professional respect.
And not the calm before a khaki-colored storm.
I lock up the shop around 2 in the afternoon to take a break—which is obviously a joke, as I always run errands on my so-called breaks—and head toward the bank with three deposit slips and a caffeine headache.
The fastest route takes me past Whitaker Auto.
I stop in my tracks when I spot a set of muscular legs popping out from underneath a car in the main garage.
Spread apart way too far to be decent.
Inviting my eyes right in between them.
The material of his blue mechanic pants tighten on his thighs, bunching up as he works, doing all kinds of things.
His boots go one way. Then the other.
Legs never closing.
He grunts, deeply and audibly, even from all the way out here, from the street, where I can hear it like we’re sharing a bedroom.
And then suddenly we are.
His powerful legs wrapped around me.
Grunting.
In my ear.
With all his throat and all his chest.
Is he fucking that car? Or is that car fucking him?
Then he slides out from underneath, revealing himself. White drenched tank top. Smears of black grease over his chest and up his arms like war paint. And when he lifts the back of his wrist to wipe off sweat, he draws another streak right over his forehead. He doesn’t even know. It’d be almost cute if it weren’t for the dark, ferocious hunger in his eyes. Or is that just me projecting?
He turns to the street. Squints in my direction, sun in his eyes.
Diego squinting.
At me.
Fuck.
I’m already back to walking like I never stopped, saw nothing, pleading the fifth. Trip over something in the pavement. Correct myself before eating it. Walk along like that didn’t happen either.
I’m so fidgety at the bank, it’s like I just stuck my finger in a light socket. “I’m totally fine,” I assure the sweet-eyed teller. They didn’t ask me anything.
I take a different route back from the bank to my store.
For obvious reasons.
Why were his legs spread apart so much like that?
Who does that?
Now it’s all I’m thinking about.
While absentmindedly squirting water at a bushel of pansies. Way too much water. Staring right through these poor, innocent, overwatered pansies like there’s another set of hunky human legs protruding from between them.