But old habits die hard, and I file the information away.
Elena starts building the arrangement with sure, steady hands. She hums along with the music. ”Silver Bells” is playing and I find myself relaxing despite every instinct that tells me I shouldn’t be here. That this is a distraction I can’t afford. Men like me don’t get to stand in flower shops and watch beautiful women create art.
“You know what I love about flowers?” she says suddenly, breaking the comfortable silence. “They’re honest. A rose is always a rose. It doesn’t pretend to be something it’s not. It just is. Beautiful, temporary and real.”
She looks up at me then, and there’s something in her gaze that makes me think she’s not just talking about flowers.
“People should be more like that,” she continues. “Honest. Real. The world would be a better place, don’t you think?”
I think about my world, where honesty gets you killed and being “real” is a luxury no one can afford. Where I wear expensive suits like armor and keep my face carefully blank because showing emotion is weakness.
“Perhaps,” I say carefully.
She studies me for a long moment, her head tilted to one side. I have the uncomfortable sensation she’s seeing right through me, past the expensive clothes and the cold mask, down to something I keep locked away.
“You’re dangerous,” she says finally, and my entire body goes tense. “Aren’t you?”
Every muscle in my body coils, ready to move. My hand twitches toward the gun holstered at my side, hidden beneath my coat. Does she know? Has someone talked? Is this a setup?
But then she laughs, a warm, musical sound that eases some of the tension in my shoulders.
“Not like that. I mean you’re dangerous to someone’s heart. I bet you leave a trail of broken hearts everywhere you go.” Sheshakes her head, returning to her arrangement. “Those intense, mysterious types always do.”
Relief and something else, something warm and unexpected, floods through me.
She thinks I’m a heartbreaker. If only she knew how laughable that is. I haven’t had a relationship in years, haven’t wanted one. My world doesn’t allow for softness, for connection. The women who pass through my life know the score, one night, maybe two if they’re lucky, and then nothing. No strings. No complications.
No flowers.
“I think you have the wrong idea about me,” I say.
“Do I?” She positions a piece of pine with the precision of a surgeon. “You walked in here looking like you wanted to murder someone, wearing a suit that probably costs more than my rent, and you’re buying flowers for your mother. Classic reformed bad boy behavior.”
“I’m not reformed.”
The words come out harsher than I intended, and she looks up, startled. But then her expression softens into something that looks almost like understanding.
“No,” she says quietly. “I don’t suppose you are.”
The moment stretches between us, loaded with something I can’t quite name. Outside, the December sky is darkening, and the fairy lights strung throughout the shop glow warmer in response. Elena’s face is shadowed and golden by turns, and I wonder what it would be like to trace the curve of her cheekbone with my thumb, to see if her skin is as soft as it looks.
I shouldn’t be thinking these things.
I definitely shouldn’t be feeling this pull toward her, this magnetic attraction that makes me want to stay in this flower shop forever, breathing in pine and cinnamon.
My phone vibrates in my pocket. Once. Twice. Three times.
Marco’s emergency signal.
Fuck.
I pull it out, glancing at the screen. The message is brief:Greco spotted. Two blocks east. Three men.
Sergio Greco. Underboss of the Russo family, the bastard who ordered the hit on my warehouse. Who’s been systematically trying to provoke me into an all-out war.
And he’s two blocks away from this flower shop. From Elena.
I look up and find her watching me, a small frown creasing her forehead.
