Love in Bloom (12 page)

For a moment Lily thought Tate would not respond, but then he turned and nodded.

“Take care of yourselves.”

The bell jingled above the door as it closed on the Garmans. Lily stepped out from behind the counter to move swiftly to stand before Tate.

“I’m so sorry. What I said earlier was thoughtless and presumptuous.”

He squeezed his eyes closed as if pained. For an instant she felt torn between the impulse to run and hide and the need to somehow comfort him. The latter won out; it wasn’t even really much of a contest. Without giving herself time to think too much, she stepped up and wrapped her arms around him. This was her
acting,
just as she’d asked God to help her do. She would not be too reticent to comfort a friend just because he was a man whom she found attractive, especially not when she had hurt him.

Seconds ticked by as his hands drifted up to settle at her waist and his head bowed.

“It’s not your fault,” he whispered.

She shook her head, feeling her hair ripple across her back and shoulders. “I didn’t think before I spoke. I just assumed—”

“Shhh.” He inched closer, saying, “It’s understandable, and of course I celebrate my daughter’s birthday, but you’re sweet to worry about my feelings.”

Smiling, she looked up—straight into his warm brown eyes. And, oh, my, those dimples. She didn’t know who moved, if she did or he did, but somehow their lips met.

Lightly, gently. It might have been a kiss between friends, a simple, almost meaningless gesture, but it wasn’t. The earth did not move. Worlds did not collide. Reality did not shatter. Yet, in that soft, sweet, ephemeral instant, everything changed.

What had not been before suddenly was, and Lily thought with shuddering wonder,
I did this. I set this in motion when I put my arms around him.

After a moment Tate stepped back. Lily hadn’t decided where to look or what to say when the bell tinkled over the door. She whirled around to find Coraline there.

“Hello, you two,” she said, tilting her head to one side.

Lily smiled brightly, perhaps too brightly, and moved back behind the counter. “H-hi. How are you today?”

“Well. Thank you.” Coraline carefully moved forward and placed her pocketbook on the counter as if negotiating a tricky maneuver. “I’d like to pick up something to cheer a friend who’s feeling poorly.”

“Aw, th-that’s sweet,” Lily stammered.

Tate jerked forward as if she’d poked him. Lily felt like biting her tongue. She would have to remind him that he’d described her as “sweet”—just before they’d kissed.

“I’ll be going now,” he said quickly, “since you’ve already hired someone.”

“I’m sorry about Mr. Wilbur,” she told Tate, fighting the impulse to follow him to the door.

“What about Kenneth?” Coraline wanted to know, sounding concerned.

Tate waved a hand. “Uh, Lily’s going to buy some potted plants from him.”

“I’ve hired Sherie Taylor to work here in the shop,” Lily explained softly.

“Ah. I see,” Coraline said, nodding. “I suppose she is a better match, but the potted plants are something for Kenneth, and everyone can’t be hired.”

“The Wilburs still have it mighty tough,” Tate pointed out, “but I understand.” He said the last to Lily, who smiled gratefully.

“I’ll pray for the Wilburs,” she offered, and Tate went out, waving a farewell.

Lily watched until his tall form disappeared from sight, quite forgetting that Coraline was there until she met that older lady’s clear blue gaze.

“Oh, um, something to cheer an ailing friend, you said?”

“Daisies, I think. She has a fondness for daisies.”

Lily got busy looking for an appropriate container, but while she was doing that, Coraline was looking at her. “Want to tell me about it?”

“About what?” Lily’s fingers trembled over a selection of glass vases. She was no good at nonchalance.

“About whatever I interrupted when I came in just now.”

Shrugging as casually as she could, Lily said, “You didn’t interrupt. It was all over when you came in.” She winced inwardly as that last came out.

“What was over, may I ask?”

Choosing a tall, sunny yellow vase with a fluted edge, Lily slowly turned to face the kind woman who had so quickly become a friend. “The kiss,” she confessed, her cheeks heating. Coraline’s eyes widened. “It was just a tiny kiss,” Lily hastened to explain. “Barely a kiss at all, really.”

Coraline straightened and a smile slowly spread across her face. “My dear,” she said, “that’s the best news I’ve had in a long while.”

“It is?” Surprised but pleased, Lily smiled.

“Oh, my, yes. It’s about time that boy started to fully live again. Now,” she said, “if only you can get him to go to church.”

“What do you mean?” Lily asked.

Coraline blinked at her. “Didn’t you know? Tate Bronson hasn’t set foot in church since the day he buried his wife.”

* * *

Her heart in her throat, Lily pushed her rolling stool away from the stainless steel worktable and stood, calling out, “Be right with you!”

Across the table from her Sherie kept working on the simple corsages that they were making for a sweet sixteen party. It had been this way for the last couple of days. Every time the bell over the door rang, Lily rushed to see who had entered the shop, hoping against hope that it would be Tate. As before, Lily disguised her disappointment with a smile.

“Hello, Chief Sheridan. How may I help you?”

Joe Sheridan stowed his mirrored sunshades in the front pocket of his blue uniform shirt and placed his hands on the counter. “I’m thinking I might cheer up my wife with some roses.”

“I’m sorry to hear she needs cheering,” Lily said, waving him over to the glass-fronted humidifier case. “What type of roses does she like?”

“Yellow ones are her favorites.”

“I have some pretty yellow ones with reddish tips.”

“Ooh, I bet she’d like those. How much?”

Lily quoted a price just above wholesale, and he knew it.

“I appreciate that, Ms. Farnsworth. What with the pay cuts and the layoffs, we’re hanging on by our fingernails. That’s the whole problem, you know. My Inez fears we’ll be moving before long, and if the department is decommissioned, we will be. The few men I’ve got left have been applying for jobs all over the state, and I can’t say as I blame them.”

“I—I had no idea,” Lily told him, choosing a dozen of the long-stemmed roses. She carried them to the counter and began wrapping them in waxy green paper.

“It’s the same at the school, you know. Things don’t turn around, the county will absorb our students, and this school will close.”

Lily looked up at that. “Truly? It’s that bad?”

“I’m afraid so.” He ran a hand over his light brown crew cut. “But we’ve got hope now, don’t we? I’ve seen more activity on Main Street this past week than I’ve seen in months.”

Nodding, Lily smiled. “Hope and prayer, Chief Sheridan,” she told him.

“A good combination,” he agreed, handing over several dollar bills as payment.

Lily made change for him, thanked him for his business and bid him farewell. She didn’t make it back to the worktable before the bell jingled again. Hurrying back the way she’d come, Lily put her smile on.

An older woman bent over a display of succulents. She wore a faded dress torn at the waist and athletic shoes with mismatched socks. Around one wrist twisted several lengths of dirty ribbon. Someone had attempted to braid her long, graying brown hair, but much of the wiry mess had escaped the plait to stick out at odd angles. She looked up and smiled, displaying empty spaces where teeth should be.

“Where do you keep the salad vegetables?” she asked brightly. “I do so like a good salad. Don’t you?”

Lily glanced around. “This is a flower shop, ma’am. We don’t carry vegetables.”

As she spoke, the woman made a beeline for the humidifier. “Don’t these look good? Yum.”

“Oh, no,” Lily exclaimed, alarmed. “These aren’t for eating.”

The woman laughed. “My son raises green ones this big!” She held up her hands six inches apart.

“Who is your son?” Lily asked, thinking that she should call the gentleman.

“John,” she answered. “No, wait. John’s my husband.” She giggled at her mistake and flitted to a display of silk flowers. “Pretty,” she murmured. “I could grow these.”

Lily went over and took the woman’s arm, steering her away from the glass shelves. “Ma’am, could you tell me your name, please?”

“My name?” The woman tapped her chin uncertainly. “Don’t you know? One of us should know.”

Lily gulped. Sherie appeared, leaned against the end of the workroom wall and calmly said, “Hello, Mrs. Wilbur.”

“Oh, hello,” the woman said. “Do I know you?”

“Yes, ma’am. I went to school with Kenneth.”

“Kenneth?”

“Your son.”

“Oh. No, I don’t think so. My son’s name is John.”

Lily shared a look with Sherie and went to the phone. Unfortunately she received a message that the number Kenneth Wilbur had given her had been disconnected. Finances were obviously even worse for the Wilburs than she’d realized. She thought about calling the police department, but no crime had been committed, after all, and it wasn’t exactly an emergency. Besides, she knew someone who could help, someone she’d been wanting to see again ever since he’d kissed her.

She went into the office and dialed Tate’s cell phone. When he answered, she quickly apprised him of the situation.

“I’m sorry to bother you, but I have an unexpected visitor at my shop, a Mrs. John Wilbur, I believe.”

“Are you telling me that she’s alone?”

“Very much so, and when I called the phone number on Kenneth’s employment application, it was disconnected.”

Tate let out a long sigh. “Is she all right?”

“Confused. She came in looking for salad vegetables, and she seems to frighten easily. She didn’t recognize Sherie, though they’ve apparently known each other a long time.”

“I’ll…find someone to inform Kenneth and come as quickly as I can. Maybe she’ll know me.”

Relieved, Lily went out to see how Mrs. Wilbur was doing. The poor thing was still browsing among the flowers and murmuring about lettuce.

“Ma’am,” Lily asked, “are you hungry?”

Mrs. Wilbur turned and blinked owlishly. “Yes. Do you have vegetables?”

Lily made a decision. “No, ma’am, I’m afraid not, but we might have something else you’d like.” She glanced at Sherie then. “I have to run out for a minute. Will you be okay here?”

Sherie smiled, her eyes cutting to the wall that separated the floral shop from the bakery.

“Sure. Mrs. Wilbur and I are old friends. We’ll be in the workroom.”

Lily squeezed her employee and new friend’s shoulder then went out to prepare an impromptu tea party.

Chapter Eight

S
herie Taylor stood behind the counter when Tate pushed through the door into the florist’s shop. She closed the lid on a box of corsages and handed them to Adele Chaplet, saying, “I hope the girls enjoy the party.”

“The corsages are just beautiful,” Adele gushed. “They’re going to be thrilled.” Adele went out, smiling at Tate.

“Sweet sixteen party,” Sherie informed him. “Adele decided to give corsages as party favors.”

Tate lifted his eyebrows. “That’s a new twist. Where is she?”

Sherie pointed into the workroom, and he walked around the counter to peer around the wall. Lily sat at the stainless steel worktable next to Mrs. Wilbur. Both women held teacups in their hands, plates of half-eaten iced cakes and cookies in front of them, napkins in their laps. A vase of flowers sat in the center of a lace doily between them.

“Strawberry is my favorite,” Mrs. Wilbur was saying. “Kenneth has a strawberry wagon. Did I tell you? It’s his own design, glass sides, shelves inside, vents for directing the breeze. He turns it to catch the sun. We have strawberries nearly all year long.”

“That’s brilliant,” Lily exclaimed. “I wonder if he’d make me one to sit out in front of the shop on the sidewalk. What a pretty display it would make. I bet we could sell them to order, too.”

“He’s clever, my Kenneth,” Mrs. Wilbur said, smiling. She sounded perfectly normal, her old self. Tate watched as Lily reached over and squeezed her hand. “That boy can grow anything.”

“So I’m told. I’m going to check out his herbs very soon, I promise you. Maybe he can teach me to grow some things. I know all about flowers, but I’ve only worked with them after they were cut. It might be fun to get in on the process at the beginning.”

“Hmm, yes, flowers are lovely,” Mrs. Wilbur agreed, “but you can’t eat them.” She sipped from her teacup and set it on the table.

“Can I get you another?” Lily asked.

Dabbing her lips with a napkin, Mrs. Wilbur shook her head. “No, thank you. That was delicious.”

“I’ll tell Mr. Smith you said so.”

Tate stepped forward then, saying, “I didn’t realize Smith provided tea.”

Lily jerked around, her face lighting with a smile of such welcome that his heart turned over.

“He does,” she said. “In fact, he has a lovely selection of teas.”

Tate nodded as he ambled forward. “Mrs. Wilbur, it’s nice to see you.”

The older woman frowned, fear creeping into her gaze. “Do I know you?”

“Yes, ma’am. Tate Bronson.”

“No,” she said, pushing away from the table, suddenly agitated. “I don’t know you.”

Tate looked at Lily, who shrugged slightly and shifted a cake from her plate to Mrs. Wilbur’s, saying, “You haven’t finished your cakes, Mrs. Wilbur. Aren’t they delicious?”

Mrs. Wilbur blinked and snatched the cake from the plate as if worried Tate would steal it from her. He backed away.

Lily slid off her stool and followed him, whispering, “She’s been perfectly lucid ever since we sat down.”

“It’s the Alzheimer’s,” he told her softly. “Kenneth says it’s unpredictable.”

“Figured it was something like that.”

Kenneth came rushing into the shop then, calling out, “Mom! It’s Kenneth!”

Mrs. Wilbur wilted like a flower left too long in the sun without water. Dropping the cake, she jumped off the stool and ran into the other room, crying anxiously, “Kenneth! Kenneth!”