Page 12 of Fated to the Alpha

“I know that, and it wouldn’t be about breaking my word to you.” Shane lifted his tool bag. “I need the work because I need the money. You know, to pay back Dominic.”

Kimberly glared at the tool bag, the embodiment of why Shane was here, darkening the door of her floral sanctuary. “Sure. Convenient excuse.”

Shane rolled his eyes. “If this is going to bother you, then maybe you should just call your boss and have someone else fill in. I can wait in the truck while—”

“No one else is available today. Margarett is at her grandson’s birthday party, Helen had a hair appointment, and Jessica’s taking care of a sick kid. I’m stuck with you.”

Kimberly could tell she had wounded him with that last comment. She always hated to see that pain in his eyes, the pain that he didn’t let anyone else see, the pain that he trusted her to erase whenever they were together. Now, she was the one to cause it.

“Then let’s just get this over with.”

The drop of his voice and the rigid set of his jaw made Kimberly want to crawl into a hole. It was the same feeling she had when he turned away from her on Thursday night to disappear into the woods. Regret for being too harsh, for not being more forgiving, for not feeling the warm fuzzy things that come with reuniting with an old friend. But Shane wasn’t really a friend anymore. How could he be?

A feeling of defeat slithered through Kimberly’s guts as she led Shane toward the register counter and the rolltop desk.

“Here?” he asked, gesturing to the desk.

“Yep.”

“So, we have to move all this?”

“Yep.”

And with that, they began grabbing up the display items and transferring them to the counter. Kimberly tried not to think about how close Shane was to her. It was the closest he’d been in ten years. Her mind trailed back to that memory. The anguish, the misery, the teenage angst of wanting to stomp her feet and scream that it wasn’t fair. But there was no time to throw a fit. Not that her father would have let her. Still wrapped in blood-stained bandages, he ordered Kimberly and her mom about the house, deciding what they could take and what they couldn’t. A flurry of throwing clothes in suitcases, retrieving old boxes from the garage and attic to stow away their valuables, silent tears, and secreted fearful looks. At the time, they didn’t know where they would go, what they would do, or what would happen if they didn’t leave Warrington fast enough.

All the while, Kimberly thought of Shane. What did he think of her? What was he doing? Would he show up on their doorstep at any moment to give them the relieving news that they could stay? Kimberly constantly peered out the front windows, looking for any sign of her boyfriend’s truck in the driveway. When she wasn’t watching the street or sorting through what she’d take with her into the unknown, Kimberly checked her phone for any messages.

In the end, there was no word. No sign of Shane. Absolutely nothing, even when they passed the Warrington town sign on their way to God only knew where. What she wouldn’t have given to be this close to him on that day, to hold him one last time.

“What?”

Kimberly jumped and realized she had been staring at Shane, a felt bar lined with dazzling beaded bracelets between her hands. And for an untold number of seconds, he had been staring right back at her. She had forgotten just how beautiful his eyes were. It was less about the color and more about the gentleness in his gaze, the softness in its depth that he seemed to always reserve just for her. Those eyes were the closest she had come to home in ten years.

Her cheeks went hot as she quickly turned and put the jewelry rack away. “Nothing.”

Kimberly kept her eyes down the rest of the time as she rushed to finish. But, in true ironic style, Kimberly did the one thing she always warned against in the florist world. Never rush. If you rush, you make mistakes. And she made one. Well … almost.

She had snatched up several of the wooden quote plaques to stack them and save herself the trips. But she stacked a small one under too many large plaques, and it began to lean.

Kimberly let out a tiny shriek as she noticed too late that they were about to fall to the tile floor. Shane spun and must have seen her distress. In a mere second, they went from being a few feet apart to sharing air. His hands braced the plaques in place. One of her hands had somehow landed on top of his.

She couldn’t breathe. They didn’t move. Kimberly could feel the tension in his strong hand, and how hers trembled while his was stone steady. It wasn’t fair that her world seemed to crack under the pressure, and he acted like he didn’t even care. In a single beat of terrible, soul-crushing thought, Kimberly wondered if he ever cared.

“You got it?”

She nodded silently, and their hands separated so Kimberly could take the plaques to the counter.

They cleared the desk, and with Kimberly on one side and Shane on the other, they moved it away from the wall and in front of one of the big picture windows. With the desk facing the window, it’d be a great spot to show off the gift displays, and she could figure out a way to decorate the bland backside of the desk so it wouldn’t be an eyesore from the inside.

With a less than even voice, Kimberly explained to Shane what she wanted for the rack; three shelves with space for at least five flower buckets on each row, and the bases tilted just a little so customers could easily pull out the flowers. She brought out a bucket for him to get the measurements.

For those few minutes as she explained her vision, Shane never looked up at her. He just scribbled the dimensions on a little notepad and made a rough sketch of what she described.

“Okay,” he said. “I think I’ve got it. I’ll need to run to get the lumber, but I can be back in about an hour to get started. Where can I do the cutting and assembly?”

Kimberly leaned against the counter and hugged her middle. “There’s a gravel parking lot behind the store.”

Shane nodded, picked up his tool bag, and turned to go.