“This is nice,” Nate said. “Finally some time to ourselves.”
“I agree. Let’s go home,” Tamara said, adding, “It’s just going to be you, me, and Fifi.”
Nate started to laugh, putting an arm around Tamara, “We’re really going to have to talk about that name.”
Epilogue
Kate watched Tamara and Nate leaving the wedding reception and had to admit she was glad they were going. At least now she didn’t have to try so hard to pretend everything was okay. She was happy for them—of course she was. They were her dear friends here in America, and they were obviously meant to be together, and that was great. Love was a wonderful thing. It was her own life that was making her feel like a plant whose roots had begun to wither, leaving nothing underneath.
Kate had seen so many of her friends at Married in Malibu find love in the past few months. Not so long ago, she’d even joked to Nate that they were the only single ones left, but now he had Tamara, which meant that Kate was the only single person at Married in Malibu. Everyone around her was deeply in love, and there she was, in the background, working on her plants.
Kate had always loved plants. They weren’t complicated. They didn’t ask anything of anyone. As a child, Kate hadn’t had a lot of family around. Only her grandmother had been there to give love freely. Hers had been a closed-off existence, and somewhere along the line, it had gotten to the point where plants were just… easier. Give them your time, your effort, and your love, and they rewarded you. Nurture them, and they bloomed. Feed them, and they grew. People were more complicated. She’d given as much as she could to the people around her when she was growing up, but it had never made a difference. Her parents had always been too busy with their own lives to pay any real attention to hers.
Now she was standing in the middle of a party full of people, but she might as well have been standing in an empty room. That said everything that needed to be said. She could have struck up a conversation with someone, but her friends were all with the people they cared about, or else they were far too busy keeping the party running smoothly. Kate didn’t want to barge in, and she certainly didn’t want to try talking to perfect strangers.
She wasn’t a hermit, not by a long shot. She had friends. She had a life. But talking to strangers would have meant opening up to them, and that was something Kate didn’t do. She’d learned to be cautious. The less you talked about yourself, the less of a problem it was when it turned out that they didn’t care. She’d had relationships before, of course. It was just… they tended not to last very long, especially when they reached the point of getting more serious.
So today, she’d turned down a couple of offers to dance, the way she normally shut guys down whenever they asked her out on dates or wanted her number. All of that entailed getting to know people, and usually it was easier to skip it. Except right now, that tactic didn’t seem to be making her any happier. Maybe she should try to have fun for once?
“You’re looking a little lost,” a man said, having come close without Kate noticing. “Or maybe you’re in need of a dance partner.”
She turned, and she might have told him to go away if he hadn’t been quite so handsome. He was sandy-haired, perfectly groomed, with blue eyes that seemed to see straight to her very core. As he waited for a reply, his piercing gaze took in every detail—of Kate, the room, and the situation. There was a slight quirk of his lip that suggested he probably thought he was the smartest guy in the room. It was a slightly disconcerting experience to get quite so much out of someone’s appearance.
“I’m not lost,” Kate assured him. “I work here.”
“And does that mean that you’re not allowed to dance?” he countered. He held out a hand. “I’m Mitchell Macauley. My friends call me Mitch.”
“Katherine Bryson.” She took his hand, and he effortlessly pulled her close. “My friends call me Kate.”
“It’s good to meet you, Kate,” he said.
Instinctively, Kate wanted to pull back from the cockiness of his approach. But she didn’t. After all, she’d just told herself that maybe this would be a good moment to open up and have fun. And if she was going to do that… Well, this was exactly the kind of too-handsome, too-sure-of-himself guy Kate would normally have avoided. In other words, he provided the perfect opportunity to take a risk.
Within seconds, he had her out on the dance floor. And just as quickly, she had to admit, dancing with him was fun. Dancing was fun in general. It was just that it didn’t happen all that often. If she did go out to a club, she had to go with friends like Tamara, who was admittedly a lot of fun but not someone she could slow-dance with, or if she was out on her own, there would always be someone trying to hit on her. Men always assumed that she couldn’t just be there for the music and the atmosphere.
Mitch knew how to dance. There was something about his confidence and directness that translated into a kind of fearlessness on the dance floor. He didn’t seem to care if people were watching, or maybe he liked that they were. Kate was less comfortable with the attention because she was so rarely on the receiving end when there were others around. Somehow, though, Mitch’s presence made the whole thing feel okay. Better than okay. In fact, there wasn’t anywhere else Kate would rather have been.
“If you’re Kate Bryson,” Mitch said, “then that means you did the flowers for the wedding.” He obviously caught Kate’s look. “I looked over Married in Malibu’s website before I came. I wanted to see what I was getting myself into.”
“You’re not a fan of weddings?” Kate asked.
“I’m a fan of this wedding,” Mitch said. “The flowers are particularly beautiful.”
“That was smooth,” Kate said with a smile.
“I’m generally smoother,” Mitch assured her.
Kate wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not. He really was the kind of guy she’d have normally avoided like the plague, but there was something about Mitch that made Kate feel like doing anything but running away.
“What’s it like, producing the flowers for so many amazing weddings?” Mitch asked.
“It’s wonderful,” Kate assured him. It was what she usually said when people asked her, because it was and because it was really all that they wanted to hear. They wanted to have a vague idea that her job was great, that everyone involved in producing their wedding loved doing it. They didn’t want to hear all the details.
“But what does ‘wonderful’ mean?” Mitch insisted. “I’ve never had the chance to talk to someone who does what you do. I’d like to know.”
Kate had never had anyone say that to her before. They’d always taken her assurance at face value. They’d never been interested before. Given that, she suddenly found it was easy to start talking.
“Are you sure you want to know more?” Kate asked.
