Biting hard into the side of my tongue, I hefted the box higher, buried my protest deeper, and followed Daisy. Mrs. Shelton directed me to her dining room, the table long enough to easily seat twenty, though I didn’t count the exact number of chairs.
Carefully depositing the box on the floor, I peeled off the tape and unpackaged her arrangement, unable to hold back a smile of pride when I saw the bright, full blooms. All healthy. All perfect. All grown in our greenhouses.
“On the table?” I confirmed, waiting for her nod before lifting the flowers by their vase.
This wasn’t your average arrangement. Our largest option was close to twenty-five pounds of a dozen varieties of flowers, prearranged in a thirty-inch crystal vase that required two hands to hold. It wasn’t to suggest a sentiment but to make a statement, and damn, did it do exactly that in the middle of her dining table.
I stepped back to admire the final product when Mrs. Shelton’s voice bounced off the room’s high ceilings.
“So when are you due, dear?”
“Just after Thanksgiving.”
“Oh, lovely. What a wonderful time to welcome in a new addition. You and Mr. Hamilton must be so excited.”
Like magnets colliding, my stare crashed into Daisy’s, and all my muscles tensed. I wondered what she was thinking, if she was imagining how I would’ve reacted to news about her pregnancy if we were married—if her baby were mine. Maybe that would explain the bright red splotching her cheeks.
Or maybe it was simply embarrassment that she’d encouraged Mrs. Shelton’s assumption to go this far and couldn’t turn back now. That would better explain why her head jerked away.
“Yes, we are,” she answered and turned her back to me.
I was sorely tempted to interrupt and claim I needed Daze’s help at the van, but what kind of man needed help from a pregnant woman on her wedding day?
Locking my jaw, I gathered up the garbage and headed back outside. The best thing I could do for Daisy right now was get this delivery over with as quickly as possible.
By the timewe walked out of the house, sweat sheened my brow, and my chest heaved. For anyone considering working out in formal wear, zero out of ten, do not recommend.
Somehow, miraculously, Daisy had steered the conversation toward Mrs. Shelton’s dinner party plans, and the woman, like most people in her position, was only too happy to talk about herself. I’d like to think I was happy to have saved the customer relationship since, as we were leaving, Mrs. Shelton swore she was going to be ordering more arrangements this coming week, but the relief was heavily mitigated by what the delivery had cost me.
“I’m sorry,” I said as soon as I started the van and cranked on the AC. Ridiculous since it was fall, but cool wasn’t cold enough right now.
“Don’t apologize. I asked to go with you. I went up to the door first.”
And you let her think it was our wedding day,but I kept that to myself as I started to pull down the drive.
“I know, but I should’ve thought…” That her pregnancy wasn’t the only thing one would notice about Daisy today.
“It’s really fine,” Daisy said, though her flushed cheeks told a different story. “When she saw you coming over, she just assumed that you…that we…”
Were getting married.
“Yeah.” My voice cracked, the thought burning through my chest like it had dipped my broken heart in vinegar. Clearing my throat, I continued, “You were right, though. It was better not to correct her given the circumstances.”
“It was nice, you know. To have a fiancé for a few minutes who hadn’t jilted me on our wedding day.”
“Still no word?” I asked because nothing else I had to say about her real fiancé would’ve helped the situation.
She checked her phone, and what killed me wasn’t the blank screen but how she desperately tried to hide the ripple of pain it sent through her. Like every time she checked, it ripped the wound back open.
Goddammit, Todd.Where are you? What the hell are you doing?
“I’m going to fix this, Daze.”
“It’s not yours to fix,” she said. “You’re not responsible for him, Max.”
But I was. I was responsible when it came to her. I should’ve seen the signs. I never should’ve left him alone in the hotel this morning.
If you hadn’t, you would’ve resigned Daisy to marrying a man who wanted to abandon her,a small voice in the darkest corner of my mind whispered.
