"We'll order plain ribbon until we find another supplier willing to personalize it."
Not ideal. Not our normal standard. But it would work. Then I looked toward the display shelves filled with our custom vases. There were still plenty left.
"We'll use what's already in stock until we find someone else who can bring our designs to life."
I would handle this one problem at a time. In the end, we would get things back on track. We had to. I headed back into the office and practically collapsed into my chair. The moment I sat down, my phone chimed.
I froze. For several seconds, I simply stared at it. I didn't want to pick it up. Every notification this week had brought another problem. Slowly, I reached for it. The message was from our Florida branch.
Natalie:Blossom, we've had three companies refuse to work with us today. They won't tell us why. Do you know what's going on?
Damn it. Before I could even respond, another message appeared.
Callie:Deliveries aren't coming. One of them even claimed I hadn’t put in the order, and I know I did. This feels wrong. Is something going on with our suppliers?
"What the hell? It was happening in Tennessee too."
Another notification immediately followed. It was April, from our South Carolina store. I opened it.
April:We're going to have to cancel two weddings. We can't get the flowers we ordered. No one has them. Not even other local shops. They’re complaining, too, because they’re unable to get the flowers. Is something going on?
The phone slipped from my hand and landed with a thud on my desk. I closed my eyes and prayed my head stopped pounding. What was going on? This wasn’t some simple bad luck or a bad fucking week.
Someone was making sure we didn’t have the things we needed to run our business properly. It was almost time for me to leave town. Now, it seemed I would have to stay to help put out these fires someone had lit under us. There was only one person I could think of who could've done this.
Rome Cattaneo.
But surely he wouldn’t do some shit like this simply because I rejected him. Could he know the truth I’d tried so desperately to hide? Could he know about The Circuit and that we were responsible for what happened to his cousin?
No.
That couldn’t be it. He wouldn’t have resorted to petty shit like this if he’d known that. He would’ve hit us with something much bigger, deadlier. Even so, there was no one else who’d want to hurt the shop.
I spent the rest of the day talking to managers at different branches, trying to figure this shit out. We couldn’t cancel our events. We had to show up for our brides. We also had to swallow our pride and let them know what was going on.
Some had to change their flower choices, which left brides pissed off and led to people complaining about us on social media. Our online rating dropped dramatically, and our reputation was in shambles.
Social media was a blessing. It could help a business thrive. But it could also tank one in hours. And right now, everything my family had worked so hard to build was being ruined, and I wasn’t entirely sure why.
I didn’t have an answer for my staff. Not a definitive answer anyway. But I had my suspicions. By the time I finally closed the flower shop for the evening, I felt defeated in a way I’d never felt before.
Branches were looking to me for answers, even though I was probably the problem. Once in my cottage, I locked the frontdoor, activated the alarm, and then stood there for a moment, staring off into space.
I was exhausted. Beyond exhausted. I could feel the tiredness in every part of me. I knew my staff could too. Kelly and Dayana had spent the entire day helping me rearrange orders, contact brides, and search for new suppliers.
We'd solved what we could and apologized profusely to everyone we spoke to. I’d never been cursed out so many times in my life. I’d had to grin and bear it because the fault lay with us.
The things we didn’t get to, would have to wait until tomorrow. That’s if tomorrow didn't bring another disaster. Moving away from the wall, I slowly made my way to my bedroom, feeling like a zombie as I navigated in the dark.
I dropped my purse onto my bed and placed my phone beside it. I wandered into the bathroom, turning on the light as I moved to stare at myself in the mirror. I hardly recognized the woman staring back at me.
The circles beneath my eyes looked darker than usual. My shoulders sagged. But it was my expression that said it all. I was emotionally and physically exhausted. And I looked defeated.
I reached for the hem of my shirt and slowly pulled it over my head before stepping out of the rest of my clothes. Leaving them in a pile on the floor, I turned on the shower and waited for the water to warm.
A few minutes later, I stepped beneath the spray. The hot water washed over me, loosening muscles and easing a little of the tension in my body. It was amazing how much damage stress could cause you.
It affected all aspects of your life: your physical body, your mental health, and even your spirit suffered when you were stressed. Stress was a silent killer that many people ignored.
