My response came out before I could stop it. “Do you promise?”
The second the words left my mouth, my brain caught up with what I’d just said.
Oh God.
Ohno.
That was … that was flirting. I’d just flirted. Out loud.
My face went hot. I should backtrack. Laugh it off. Apologize. Say literally anything to make this less?—
Holly’s cheeks flushed deep pink, and her tongue darted out to wet her bottom lip. “Luke Byron.” She tilted her head, studying me with an expression I couldn’t quite read. “Did you just flirt with me?”
“I—” My throat had gone completely dry. I swallowed hard, feeling the heat creep up my neck to settle in my cheeks. “Maybe? Was that … did I …”
“Because if you did,” she continued, her smile widening. “I’d be into it.”
My brain short-circuited.
She’d be into it.
Into me flirting with her.
Intome.
“Oh,” I said intelligently. “That’s good?”
“Was that a question or a statement?” Her eyes sparkled with amusement.
“Statement. Definitely a statement.” I swallowed hard. “That’s good. Really good.”
She laughed—a real laugh this time, not nervous or flustered, but genuinely delighted. The sound threatened to wreck my composure.
“Well then.” She looked down at her notebook, then back up at me, still smiling. “I guess we should probably talk about flowers now.”
She nudged a stool toward me with her foot, the legs scraping across the worn floor. “Sit. Talk to me about these arrangements.”
I sat.
Of course I sat.
And for once in my life, I didn’t even think about running away.
four
. . .
Holly
I’d loadedmy SUV that morning with everything I would need to set up for the Candlelight Walk—everything except the actual flowers, which I wouldn’t deliver until the day before the event. Garland bases, wire, foam bricks, ribbon in shades of cream and forest green, and about a hundred brass candle holders I’d been collecting from estate sales, antique shops, and thrift stores for years. My plan was to be in and out in thirty minutes, tops. Professional. Efficient. Definitely not swoony.
I pulled up to Luke’s house just after two, my tires crunching over the oyster shell driveway. The house looked beautiful in the weak December sunlight, the white clapboard almost glowing against the gray sky. Smoke curled from one of the chimneys.
He was home.
My stomach did a stupid little flip that I immediately ignored.
We’d had two conversations. But it was the one back at my workshop—where I’d basically told him I’d be into it if he flirted with me—that haunted me now. God, what had I been thinking? I’d replayed that moment about five hundred times since then, alternating between mortification and a giddy feeling I hadn’t experienced since high school.
