“You know what I mean. Your real home, here with me.”
She wasn’t sure it had ever really been her home.She’d lived there, yes, but it had never felt like her sanctuary. “That’s not going to happen. You guaranteed that when you slept with your secretary.”
“I know how that must have looked—”
She laughed. She couldn’t help it. What excuse was he going to come up with now? He’d just slipped and accidentally cheated?
“I deserve that,” he said quietly. “I know what I did was wrong. But I was scared. Things with us were moving so fast, what with the engagement, and then your dad … Well, you just needed me so much. It was hard on me too.”
A kernel of anger re-ignited at his words. “Oh, I’m sorry if my dad dying and my subsequent grief negatively impacted you.”
“Don’t do that,” he bit out. “You’re making me sound like an asshole.”
“I think you’re doing that just fine all by yourself.” She put the phone on speaker, tired of holding it to her ear. “What do you want from me, Tyler? I’m starting over here, I’m opening my own flower shop like I always wanted, and—”
“That’s ridiculous,” he scoffed. “You don’t have the experience for that, baby. You’ll lose a bunch of money and waste everyone’s time. Just come home, and I can take care of you.”
As Tyler’s words settled over her, a familiar panic began to squeeze at her chest, doubts rising up, telling her that Tyler was right and her plan was never goingto work. Her breathing began to grow shallow and she started to feel light-headed.
Don’t sell yourself short.
Izzy’s words suddenly flashed through April’s mind, and they stopped her panic in its tracks. She thought of her best friends’ encouragement, of Noah’s belief and support in her idea—hell, even her mom had told her to put herself out there and follow her passion. She realized with a jolt that the doubts weren’t her own; they were Tyler’s criticisms in the sound of her own voice, parroting her fears back to her before she’d even tried to take a chance on herself. Hearing him spell it out so plainly only made her more certain of her choice.
She was doing this, and she was going to do a damn good job of it.
“I’m hanging up now.” She didn’t wait for him to reply before she cut the call off. He immediately tried to call back and she declined it, half tempted just to block and delete his number and be done with it—but she’d need it at some point, once she was ready to go pack up her stuff.
A low whistle behind her made her jump but she relaxed when she turned to find Penny in the doorway. “He sounds like an ass. Sorry, I didn’t mean to eavesdrop. I was just coming over to congratulate you.”
“It’s OK.” April smiled. “Congratulate me for what?”
“For taking the plunge and starting the shop! Ethan just swung by the restaurant, told me all about yourvision for this place. It sounds amazing—I can’t wait to see what you do with it.” Penny beamed at April, green eyes sparkling in the sunlight.
“Oh, thank you! Yeah, I feel like this place could really be something special with a bit more TLC.”
“It was the same for my restaurant. You should come back for dinner, by the way. I promise the food is worth sticking around for.” Penny winked and April laughed, caught off guard. A town this small? Of course Penny knew what had happened in her restaurant the week before.
“I’ll hold you to that,” April chuckled. She suspected the problem had been with the company and not the food at all. Of course, she’d thenkissedthat company, so who knew whether her taste was worth much anyway. Quickly changing the subject to distract herself as much as Penny, April added, “Ethan seems to have a great eye for this stuff. I can’t wait to see his ideas for the space.”
“He’s the best,” Penny agreed, leaning against the doorframe and then grimacing when a spider’s web broke off on her sleeve as she moved.
“Sorry.” April laughed. “The front of the store still needs a little more cleaning up.”
“Buildings are like people, I think. Sometimes they just need a little love so they can really shine. It was the same for my restaurant.”
“You should get that printed on a shirt,” April teased. “Speaking of, did you know that Ethan andNoah are in an amateur basketball team called the B-Ball Baddies?”
By Friday, Ethan had sent April a ton of options for the flower shop, from paint samples to potential shelving designs, and even some cute vintage light fixtures that would work well with the gorgeous ceiling design. She enjoyed the late-afternoon sunshine on her face as she walked with a small spring in her step, though the wind still held a chill, and she pulled her jacket more tightly around her. The trees along Main Street were slowly coming back to life, now covered in small green buds. As spring slowly but surely crept over Magnolia Springs, everything was starting to feel more alive, and April felt like she was waking up too, revived after a long and difficult winter.
She thankfully hadn’t run into Luke all week but was keeping an eye out as she neared the shop. The memory of what had happened in the kitchen was still fresh and had annoyingly started invading her sleep as well as her waking moments—for two nights in a row now, she’d woken from dreams filled with his broad shoulders and muscular thighs, an aching need pulsing through her as the ghost of Luke’s touch faded. The whole thing was unbelievably frustrating, but April wasn’t sure what she could do except avoid any more unfortunate run-ins.
The door to the store was already unlocked, as Noah was working on some of the shelving units since hehad the afternoon off. April let the door close behind her, setting her bag on the floor and shrugging off her jacket as Noah looked up at her.
“Hey, Bug, I didn’t think you were going to be here today?” he said, wiping his hands on his jeans.
“I wasn’t going to be, but Ethan sent over some paint options and I was too excited to wait to test out the swatches.” She pulled the sample bottles out of her bag as she spoke, along with the swatch cards. “Besides, if I pick the color today, we can order it over the weekend so I can start painting next week. Plus, I’m meant to be meeting up with Emma and Iz later on for drinks, so I thought I could just hang around here and bother you until they’re ready. You could probably join if you wanted; I’m sure Emma would bedelightedto see you.” She said this with a knowing smirk, her eyes trained on Noah’s face to see if she’d get a reaction.
Annoyingly, he didn’t seem at all fazed by April’s teasing, but perhaps that was for the best—she wasn’t sure whether she’d be able to cope if Emma and Noah were actually an item. “Thanks for the offer, but I’ve got basketball practice later. I was planning to head out soon, actually, so I’ve got time to change.”
