*Probably.*
The sundress caught her eye again.
*Fine.*
She pulled it on before she could talk herself out of it, then immediately felt foolish. The neckline dipped lower than she remembered, and the way the fabric cinched at her waist felt… deliberate. Like she was advertising something.
*You're advertising that you own a nice dress,* she told herself firmly. *That's all. People wear nice dresses. It's normal.*
She grabbed a thin cardigan—not the boring one, a prettier crocheted one in soft cream—and headed downstairs before she could change her mind again.
The shop was quiet this time of evening. She'd closed an hour ago, but the scent of flowers still hung in the air—roses and lilies and the bright green smell of fresh-cut stems. It was her favorite part of owning the place, honestly. The way the fragrance clung to everything. The way she could never quite wash it off her hands.
Her mother had hated that. *You always smell like a greenhouse, darling,* she'd said, wrinkling her pert little nose. *Don't you ever want to smell a little more… feminine?*
She had bitten back the response that rose to her lips—*I don't know, Mom, what does feminine smell like? Chanel No. 5 and bad decisions?*—and changed the subject instead.
She was good at that. Changing the subject. Smoothing things over. Making herself smaller and quieter and less likely to provoke the kind of scenes her mother thrived on.
*Stop thinking about her,* she ordered herself, grabbing her keys from the hook by the door. She's not here. *She can't ruin this.*
Whatever "this" is.
The evening air hit her as she stepped outside—warm and soft, carrying the distant sound of someone's wind chimes and the smell of charcoal from a backyard barbecue. Harmony Glen felt almost dreamy at this hour, the light going golden and hazy, the shadows starting to lengthen between the old Victorian houses that lined Main Street.
She locked the shop door and started walking.
She could have driven, but the vineyard was a good twenty minutes on foot and she needed the time to think. To prepare. To rehearse, again, all the reasons why this was a bad idea and she should turn around and go home and text Thallos some excuse about a sudden headache or an emergency flower delivery.
*But the dance,* the practical part of her brain argued. *You have to learn sometime. The festival is in three weeks.*
*Three weeks.*
Three weeks to learn how to dance without maiming anyone. Three weeks to survive being in close proximity to Thallos without doing something stupid. Three weeks to figure out how she felt about the fact that she'd kissed him yesterday—really kissed him, not the brief wine-flavored brush at the vineyard but a proper, thorough, extremely memorable kiss—and had thought about almost nothing else since.
Her cheeks heated just remembering it.
The way he'd looked at her. The way he'd touched her, like she was something precious and breakable. The way he'd let her pull away without argument or guilt or the sulky wounded-pride routine she'd come to expect from men who didn't get what they wanted.
*Thank you for not pushing,* she'd said.
*I told you. I'm patient.*
Was he, though? Was anyone, really? In her experience, patience was just another word for waiting until you lower your guard. Her mother had been patient, too—patient right up until the moment she wasn't, and then the storm would break, and Marigold would spend weeks picking up the pieces.
*He's not your mother,* a smaller voice pointed out. *He hasn't done anything wrong. Maybe I could try not expecting the worst, just this once.*
She told the voice to shut up.
The Sanderson house appeared around the next bend in the road—a sprawling Queen Anne Victorian with a wraparound porch and gardens that she had always envied. The sisters had lived there for as long as anyone could remember,though no one seemed quite sure how long that actually was. Decades, certainly. Some of the older residents muttered about remembering them from their own childhoods, which was mathematically impossible unless the Sandersons aged backwards.
In Harmony Glen, she had learned, you didn't ask too many questions.
The porch was occupied tonight, as it often was in warm weather. All three sisters sat in a row of mismatched rocking chairs, each absorbed in her own activity—knitting, doing something complicated with herbs, and in the youngest's case, painting her toenails an aggressive shade of purple that matched her current hair color.
"Well, well." Ellie looked up from her herbs as Marigold approached. "Someone's dressed for an evening out."
Heat immediately rushed to her cheeks. "I'm just—it's just a walk."
