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Grayson seemed satisfied by that because he shrugged and kept exploring. Next stop, the kitchen. He opened the pantry, then turned to me with a sigh. “You didn’t borrow any food?”
“No, goofball. We’ll go to the store and buy some. You hungry?”
“I’m always hungry.”
“Don’t I know it.”
I stepped back to the door and held it open for him, then locked it behind me. We made our way down the sunlit balcony to the stairs. Our apartment was one of six that sat on top of various businesses that lined Main Street, and our door faced the parking lot in the back. Directly below us was a flower shop, and the sweet smell filled my nose the second we hit the stairs.
“What’s that smell?” Grayson asked, his face tipped up to the sun as he inhaled.
“Flowers.”
He looked around the parking lot with a quirked brow. “I don’t see any flowers.”
I pointed to the back door of the shop. “In there. It’s a flower shop.”
“Why do you need to buy flowers from a shop when they grow out of the ground?”
“I’ll take you in there sometime and the florist can tell you.” Putting an arm around his shoulder, I led him toward Jo, where she stood talking on the phone.
“Mom, I’ll call you later,” she said, waving at us and holding up a finger. “Okay, love you, too. Bye.”
Jo ended the call and beamed down at Grayson. “So, how is it?”
“It’s great,” he replied. “But Dad took the room with the bathroom.”
“Mean ole Dad.” Jo stuck her tongue out at me.
I pointed to her bag. “Be nice or I won’t take your bag up for you.”
“Ha, it weighs like a hundred pounds. I couldn’t get it up those stairs if I tried.”
I rolled my eyes. “Good thing you got that overweight fee waived thanks to me traveling on orders.”
“Yeah, good thing,” she said.
I hooked a thumb over my shoulder. “I’ll take it up real quick, then I figured we’d go get some provisions.”
“Sounds good to me,” she replied, bending down to talk to Grayson. She launched into telling him all the stuff his grandma wanted him to know from their call. Our folks lived about two-and-a-half hours away when I was stationed in San Diego—empty-nesters in Palm Springs. I wouldn’t be surprised if they packed up their house and bought an RV so they could follow us around wherever the Marine Corps sent us. They hated the idea of not getting to see Gray for months at a time.
I made quick work of Jo’s bag of bricks, then returned to the parking lot. The three of us set off, meandering around to the front of the building on Main Street. According to the walking directions on my phone, there was a small market about two blocks away. I figured we could get a couple of necessities there before we made a bigger grocery trip later. We’d just flown in, and I was beat.
When I looked up, my breath caught in my throat.Minutes? I’d only been in town for minutes. Was it too much to ask that I’d have a chance to grab a shower and shave before I ran into the woman whose heart I’d shattered three years before? Of course it was too much to ask. This was Bluffton. What had I expected?
She still hadn’t seen me. She was talking to whoever she was walking with, and they were headed straight for us. Maybe I could just turn around…nope. Never mind. Spotted. And by the looks of it, time hadn’t made a dent in the wounds I’d caused. Squaring my shoulders, I kept walking, Grayson’s hand in mind feeling like the only thing anchoring me to the sidewalk as Layla approached.
Here goes nothing.
* * *
