Her mother’s serene face crinkled with concern. “What?”
Janet cleared her throat. “Never mind.” She turned for the door.
“Wait.” Her father grabbed her wrist. “Is this about Michael?”
Tears suddenly blossomed into her eyes. “No. Yes,” she said, quickly wiping away the escapee tears.
Her father released her hand. “Does he want you to move?”
Even though she didn’t want to think about him, the look on his face when she’d told him she didn’t trust him passed into her mind. “Never mind.”
“Sweetie?” Her mother questioned.
Janet shook her head. “I’m just being silly. Really, let’s go eat some cinnamon rolls.”
Chapter 23
Three weeks later.
Michael stared out his office window, overlooking the busy street below. People in suits rushed here and there. A hot dog vendor offered food. Some tourists mixed in, looking at the stars on Hollywood Blvd.
His mind flashed to her.
He’d been careful not to let his mind wander, but what could he say? It had always wandered to her. Even before going to Snow Valley, she’d been there at the edges. All the memories and the way he felt alive when he was with her were the specter of his life.
The difference now was that it wasn’t a memory from ten years ago. Lots of times he’d been able to tell himself that it wasn’t real. He told himself he couldn’t have loved someone like that.
Now he knew it was real.
He stared at the flowers across the room that Veronica had put there. A client sent them over as a thank you for helping them save their business. Normally, Michael wouldn’t have given them a second thought.
Too bad there was no more normal for him. He went to the flowers, a bouquet of large sunflowers, red carnations, and green leafy things that he didn’t know. They were perfectly packaged in a pretty parcel. Lightly, he reached out and touched a carnation, leaning forward and breathing in deeply. He waited for the sweet scent, but all he got was something faint. It was almost like wanting to see the Eiffel Tower in person and watching a documentary on television instead. After pulling back and then trying again, he laughed. It was a rip-roaring laugh at him and the fact that he had even walked over to smell the flowers at all. To top it all off, they didn’t even smell.
Maybe it was the packaging or something. He didn’t know, but another laugh came out of him, and he slapped his leg, emotion bubbling up his chest into his throat. For a second it felt like it might strangle him. “Oh my gosh.” He wiped at the sides of his eyes. “Flowers don’t smell without her.” Ridiculous, that was what he was being. He shook his head and thought of coming upon her in the garden that morning. He remembered watching her as she weeded row after row. Her hair had fallen across her face as she hunched over and methodically focused. He saw the way she’d wiped her hands on his shirt and then had the gall to look at him like she dared him to do something about it. Anger surged in him, and he stood, biting his lip harder than he meant to. She made him feel alive. She made him feel alive, but the problem was…she didn’t want him.
A soft knock sounded at the door. “Captain, can I come in?”
He turned and went back to his desk, pushing all the anger aside. “Yes, Veronica. Go ahead and come in.”
The short brunette with make up so thick it looked like it could be peeled off and tall, heels clicked toward him, holding out a piece of paper. “I need your signature to approve the McStay deal.”
His thoughts jumbled, and he had to force himself to focus on the deal Veronica spoke of. “Oh, right.”
She put the paper down, and he scrawled his signature. Even if he’d lost his focus for the past few days, he trusted Veronica explicitly. “Thanks for staying on top of that.”
Veronica took the paper back and hesitated.
He met her eyes. “Is there something else?”
She pushed her lips out and narrowed her eyes. “You’ve been extremely agitated and distracted since your trip to Snow Valley.”
Normally, people didn’t talk to him this way. That was part of the reason he liked having Veronica. She wasn’t afraid to speak her mind, but at this precise moment, he didn’t appreciate it. He sat back in his chair and crossed his arms. “Your input in regards to my behavior is not part of your job.”
She held her position but didn’t speak for several seconds. When she did speak, there was an uncharacteristic hesitation in her demeanor. “Listen, you’ve got the staff talking. You haven’t had your head in the game.”
“I’ve got the staff talking?” This was news to him.
She put her hand up. “Listen.”
Controlled anger coiled inside of him. Someone was going to be fired today. “Talk.”
Veronica seemed to be measuring him for a second. Then she pulled another paper out and put it on the table.
“What is this?”
“These are the numbers for that land in Snow Valley.”
Surprise knocked the anger out of him, and he sat up abruptly. “What?”
Veronica grinned. “All those calls you’ve been avoiding from your father, guess who he talked to?”
Disbelief made him shake his head. He scoffed. He hadn’t been avoiding his father as much as he’d been avoiding Snow Valley in general.
She pointed to the sheet. “Those are the numbers. You could buy it.”
He flat out laughed. “I could buy it.” He shook his head and smacked the table. He whipped out his cell phone. “Excuse me, Veronica. I need to call the genius in charge of master minding this deal.” He pressed his father’s number and shooed her out.
Her heels clicked as she left, but she didn’t shut his door all the way.
“Hello?” His father answered quickly.
Michael could hear the sound of wind and someone hollering in the background. “What are you doing?”
“Michael.” His father sounded extremely pleased. “Heck, son, we’re doing some branding. Just got a whole herd of cows I purchased. They’d be perfect for your new land, by the way.”
This about undid him. “Dad, I don’t know why you won’t quit. Veronica told me you’ve been talking numbers with her. You’ve got to stop.”
His father didn’t speak for a second, and he heard a door shut. “Okay, I’m sitting in my truck. Listen, you need to buy this land.”
“First of all, there’s no reason for me to buy the land. Second, buying land in Montana is no way to grow my business here in L.A.”
“If you would have taken my calls I would have told you something pretty important.”
Michael rolled his eyes. “Okay.”
“I have all the money from your mother’s settlement. I never spent it. I saved it for you. It feels like I saved it for this.”
All of the air went out of him. His heart pounded, and goose bumps rushed up his arms. “You what?”
A laugh echoed through the phone. “You left too fast, so I didn’t get a chance to tell you. I didn’t know if you would be offended, but I had this dream the other night that I can’t get out of my head.”
Michael was confused. “What are you talking about?”
His dad paused. “Son, I had this dream that you and Janet and Lacy came over to the ranch, and the strange thing was…” He broke off.
“Dad.”
“The strange thing was that you were carrying one of those bulky baby carriers, and you and Janet walked through the door. You were arguing about something, and then we were all laughing, and I was holding the most precious baby boy you have ever seen.”
The inside of Michael’s chest squeezed, and Michael could barely pull in a breath.
“Michael.”
He recovered. “You can’t say things like that dad.” But now all Michael could think about was the exact dream he was telling his father to forget.
“I know, son. I know. I just…you left so fast.”
Michael hadn’t told him much. He didn’t know how. He could
n’t explain. So he’d left. He’d done the one thing he knew how to do, and he’d gone back to his old life in California. He’d thrown himself back into the business, but the stupid thing was…none of it felt right anymore. Without her, it felt wrong.
“Are ya there, son?”
“Dad.”
“Yes.”
He sighed. “Janet said she couldn’t trust me. She told me to go because she can’t trust me…” It made his blood boil thinking about it. How crazy it was.
“Son.”
“Yes.”
“How long did it take me to earn back your trust?”
Michael had not been expecting that question. He was speechless.
After a few moments of silence, Michael’s dad said. “Do you want my advice?”
Michael stood, looking out the window of his big city office and at all the people below. He’d been miserable the past few weeks. Every part of him was humbled at this moment. “I would love your advice, dad.”
“Show her she can trust you.”
Michael’s thoughts got jumbled. “How?”
He laughed. “I don’t know, son. That is for you to find out.”
There was silence between them for a few seconds.
“Look, son, I’m going to have to let you go.”
No longer hesitating, Michael made a decision. “I’m going to buy it. With my money. The money from mom…is yours.”
“No…wait, you’re buying it?”
Michael nodded, the decision soaking into him and flooding him with reassurance. “Tell Janet’s father I’ll be there tomorrow, but ask him not to tell Janet, yet.”
“Yee-haw!” A truck door slammed, and his father yelled. “C’mon, Roy, we got some negotiating to do!”
For some reason his father’s excitement made him laugh.
“I got the money, son…”
“No,” he said, knowing this was crazy. “I want to buy it, but I’d appreciate you being the broker.”
“You can bet on it.”
All possibilities flooded Michael’s mind. “Hey, dad.”
“Yeah.”
“Do you have extra lumber we could use to build a tree house on that property?”
His father didn’t speak for a second, and then he laughed. “Son, I reckon we can build whatever we put our minds to.”
He got off the phone; telling his father to call him after a deal was negotiated and he’d transfer the necessary funds. Then he stared at the pile of work on his desk and realized he couldn’t leave. He didn’t know what hair-brained idea he was having, but he couldn’t leave L.A. He had a business to run. He quickly pushed the buzzer on his desk. “Veronica, come in here please.”
She quickly came in the door, a smile on her face.
“Why are you smiling?”
“Because you want to go be with your one true love in Snow Valley.” She furiously blinked her eyes at him to tease him.
“I never figured you for an eavesdropper?”
The way her face lit up told him she had a plan. “I could manage the day to day with the team. You could promote me and, of course, increase my pay.” She grinned then continued. “You could fly in a few days a month and still do conference calls and emails from Snow Valley.”
He sobered, thinking through the logistics. “I could come out for recruiting meetings and meetings with big clients.”
She nodded. “We could combine those into every other Friday. Plus Billings has that airport right there. Not to mention the fact that great businesses run because of great people, and you’ve trained us well. It’s time to let us fly.”
He scoffed at her. “It’s time, huh?”
Veronica raised an eyebrow in challenge. “Trust us, boss. Trust me. I can do this. I’ve been waiting for a chance to prove myself.”
He watched her and the simple way she asked for the chance she wanted didn’t fall on deaf ears. After all…isn’t that what he wanted with Janet…just a chance? He cocked an eyebrow. “I like how your mind works.”
“What are you thinking, Cap?”
“I’m thinking about where my heart has always been.” He thought of seeing Pastor John at the wedding and what he’d said. He shook his head and marveled. The old man had a way of seeing into people’s hearts and knowing what they wanted. He always had.
“What?” She was confused.
“Do you believe in true love?”
“Sir?” She was confused.
He laughed, he sounded ridiculous. He turned to face her. “Okay, number one, it’s time for you to show me what you got.”
Determined, would be the way to describe her at the moment. “You can count on me.”
He swung around the desk and moved for the door. “Then what kind of raise are we talking? Twenty percent?”
She followed closely at his heels. “Twenty percent would be perfect, sir.” She laughed. “I don’t believe it.”
He got to the office door and grinned at her stunned face. “Believe it, Veronica. You’re the new CEO of Hamilton Enterprises.”
Chapter 24
Janet said goodbye to her last customer and then locked the door. Turning, she propped her back against the wall and scoured the shop with her eyes.
It had been a busy day. Not only had they been in charge of supplying flowers to three other weddings since Kevin and Molly had gotten married, but people also seemed to want more and more flowers: for baby showers, wedding showers, and anniversaries. She pressed a hand to her head. The flow of business had kept her busy, and she needed to be sure they had the inventory to keep up. She laughed. That was a good problem. When she’d first opened the store, she hadn’t known if it would be able to support her and Lacy. Now she was thinking about expanding. She would most-likely have to hire help for all the delivery requests she received. She had been able to manage it all because Lacy was still at Kurt’s, but when Lacy got back, she wouldn’t allow herself to work these kinds of hours.
Lacy would be back in another week, and Janet could hardly wait to catch up. The summer had gone well for Lacy and Kurt, and Janet was genuinely happy for them.
For a brief moment, her thoughts went to Michael. How would he improve her company? What would his people do to grow it or streamline it? She shook her head.
It didn’t matter. She’d ended that. If she were truthful, she couldn’t count how many nights she’d been tempted to call him just because she missed him. But why torture them both?
Janet walked through the store. She picked up bunches of flowers that were out and took them back to the fridge. She looked over the numbers and focused on placing orders for the next week.
Her phone buzzed, and she answered it, seeing it was from Kurt.
“Hello.”
“Hey.”
“Uh, is everything okay?”
“Yeah, Lacy and Tina are out shopping. I just wanted to call for a second.”
The fact he was calling and acting all nonchalant about it was just…weird. “Okay.”
He sighed. “I’m sorry, Janet.”
This really hadn’t been what she’d expected. “Did something happen?”
“No. No. Everything is fine. I just…I just see what a great kid Lacy is, and I want you to know that I’m sorry for failing her and for failing you, too. I know it’s neither here nor there, but I just wanted you to know that I want Lacy to be happy, and I want to make our friendship work for her.”
She had no idea how to respond. “Okay.” Was all she could get out.
“Also, I want you to know that whatever you end up doing with your life…I’ll be happy for you.”
Hold on. Stop the presses. Now she really didn’t know who had captured her ex-husband and was making him say all this crazy stuff.
“I mean it. I really hope we can leave the past in the past, for Lacy’s sake, and move on into the future. I know we won’t ever be best friends, but we could get along.”
This was more than Janet could have ever hoped for. “I’d like that, Kurt
.”
“Okay, well, we’ll bring her back next week. See ya later.”
“Later.” She hung up the phone and then stared at it. Weird. Something felt very wrong.
A knock sounded at the front door of the shop.
Many of her patrons had complained that she closed too early lately. For her, closing at six o’clock just made sense. She wondered if it was a last minute husband needing flowers for some anniversary as it had been a few nights ago. “Hold on,” she called and then unlocked the door and pushed it open.
Her father stood there.
Confused, she smiled. “Hey, Daddy.”
Leaning in, he gave her a gentle kiss. “Hey, Flower Girl, do you have a minute for your old man?”
Worry instantly filled her. “Is something wrong?”
He shook his head. “No, sweet girl, nothing is wrong.” He sighed. “I guess you have a good reason to feel that way after the past couple of years.”
“Yeah.”
“Can we go for a walk and talk a bit?”
“Okay, let me close up.” Janet quickly went to the back, locking it and turning off all the lights.
Her father stood in the store, holding a bouquet of roses. “I forgot to ask, can I buy these?”
She shooed him toward the front. “You don’t buy flowers here, Daddy. Remember, that’s one of the perks of financing the place.” She cocked her head to the side and pushed him out the door, turning back to lock it. “See, you sell your land to save my life, and you get free flowers the rest of your life. That’s the trade.”
He put an arm around her shoulder, pulling her in for a half hug as they walked. “No amount of land or money means anything if you don’t have the people you love.”
Gratitude filled her. She blinked. “You’ve always said that.”
“I mean that.”
They continued to walk.
“Who are the roses for?” Janet asked.
For a second, her father seemed confused. Then he jerked back. “Oh, right. See, a young man I know wants to ask the woman he loves to marry him, so he asked me to pick up some roses.”
Summer in Snow Valley (Snow Valley Romance Anthologies Book 2) Page 43
