“How did you meet this boyfriend?” I asked.
"We met at a mutual friend’s barbecue,” she told me, smiling as she picked up her phone and began swiping her finger over the screen. “See. He’s my screensaver.”
My heart fucking stopped beating in that moment.
Her screensaver?
She’d told me I was her screensaver.
Blossom turned the phone toward me. A picture filled the screen. A picture of my Blossom with a man who wasn’t me. I stared at the photograph. Every muscle in my body was frozen. Even the air in my lungs had turned to ice.
"What... is....his.... name?” I ground out through clenched teeth.
Her smile disappeared. "Why?"
"Name," I repeated, hands balled into fists now.
A small crease settled between her brows as her gaze narrowed on me.
"I don't think that's your business," she replied.
“Everything about you is my business, Blossom Brooks.”
“Mr. Cattaneo, you need to...”
“Where does he live?” I asked, stepping closer to the counter as she pulled her phone away and hid it somewhere behind the register.
She placed the vases on the counter one at a time, then slid my receipt and my bank card to me.
"You have your flowers and your card back." Her voice remained calm. Professional. "Thank you for shopping at Blossoms and Vines."
I stood there, staring at her. She wouldn't even look at me anymore. Her gaze was on something just past my shoulder.
“I’ll ask you one last time,” I told her. “Who is...”
“Please leave my store, Mr. Cattaneo,” she demanded, eyes returning to mine. “In the future, if you need flowers, please visit our website to make your order.”
There was no longer fear in her gaze. There was anger now. What the hell was she mad about? I was the one who was upset, who was hurting. She had no fucking right to look at me that way.
“Please,” she whispered, staring down at the counter. “Please leave my store, Mr. Cattaneo.”
I swallowed, her image swimming before me as my eyes filled with tears. Why did I have to leave? Why did she enter my world in the first fucking place if this was her plan? Why did she make me feel for her if she didn’t want to be a part of my life?
I could’ve gone my whole fucking existence never knowing this type of weakness, this type of pain. She’d forced this on me, and now she wanted me to leave. What gave her the right to pull some shit like this on me?
My heart ached further when a lone tear slid down her cheek. And now she was making me feel like the asshole when all I wastrying to do was get closer to the woman who’d approached me first.
Fuck!
I grabbed my card and slid it into my pocket. I then picked up the flowers and turned toward the door. The bell chimed overhead as I walked outside. I didn’t look back. I couldn’t. I barely remembered getting into my car.
The engine roared to life. My tires squealed as I peeled out of the parking lot. I was driving too damn fast, but I didn’t give a damn. My hands tightened around the steering wheel.
A boyfriend?
Bullshit.
Everything inside me rejected those words. The way she'd looked at me earlier, the way she'd reacted to me, the yearning in her eyes, no one who belonged to someone else would do that.
