by Angie Pepper
All her indecision was making her late for work, plus the late-spring sky was gray and threatening rain, so she drove her car to work instead of walking.
She drove past Ralph’s Garage slowly, looking for any sign of Luca. The windows were still covered in paper, so she couldn’t see anything.
The sign for the garage had been upgraded and looked perfect for the neighborhood. Luca hired a guy who specialized in hand-painting signs to come in and spruce up the letters. The sign artist also added a line about motorbikes, exactly as Tina had suggested.
Tina opened the flower store—only fifteen minutes late—and tried to keep herself busy and her mind off Luca. Her heart still skipped a beat every time someone came in the door.
It was lunch time when a blond woman Tina didn’t recognize came in.
The woman pretended to be looking at the new ferns and orchids, but her browsing behavior wasn’t normal. She looked at each plant with the same amount of time, and she kept sneaking looks at the florist.
Tina said, “Are you looking for an orchid today?”
“Just looking,” the blond woman said, then she quickly scuttled back out again.
Tina pulled out her phone and checked it again. No messages from Luca.
Even though he hadn’t replied to her previous joke text about her sister, Tina sent him a new text message: Have you been sending spies over here to the flower shop?
To her surprise, he responded immediately: No. Why?
She frowned at the phone. She should have been glad he replied, but this wasn’t the sort of sweet, romantic message she’d been hoping for.
Tina: Some blonde chick was just in here staring at me.
She waited five minutes for a response and didn’t get one.
The door chimed again. She looked up, expecting to see Luca, coming to surprise her with something thoughtful.
Instead, she got the blond woman back.
This time, rather than pretending to look at the plants, the blonde walked right up to Tina at the counter and shoved the screen of her phone at Tina’s face.
The blonde asked, “Did you make this?”
There was a photo of flowers on the screen. Tina recognized the raffia tie from Gardenia Flowers’ regular supply. More importantly, she recognized the extravagant arrangement. It was the one Luca had dropped a bundle on the first time he’d visited the shop.
Tina took a better look at the blonde, meeting her ice-blue eyes. The woman was older than Tina, maybe forty, but really pretty, like a Barbie doll. She’d had her eyebrows done with the trendy new style.
Tina answered cautiously. “Ma’am, if the arrangement came with one of our cards, then it must have been prepared by either me or my coworker.”
“I saw Luca Lowell in here two weeks ago,” the woman said.
Tina didn’t give anything away.
“He was talking to the other girl who works here,” the blonde said. “It was busy in here, and he was behind the counter. It looked like he was helping her sell flowers.”
Tina stayed quiet. On the Wednesday before last, Luca had been there, helping Megan sell out the store so that Tina had no choice Thursday morning but to go for breakfast with Luca. That had been their first date. Number one.
The blonde tapped—or scratched—the counter with her long nails. She wore thick gel nails. She had an angry tigress energy. Tina quickly assessed that this woman was one of Luca’s exes, one of the women he was a jerk to. This was the woman who’d been angry at Luca, and now it seemed she was angry at Tina, too.
“Luca was in here selling flowers,” the angry blonde said. “Wasn’t he?”
Tina feigned ignorance. “Who? Someone named Lucas?”
Angry Blonde squinted at Tina’s face. “The other girl’s your sister, isn’t she?”
“Yes,” Tina said. “My sister works here with me. She’ll actually be here any minute now. I’m sure she’d be happy to help you.” Tina looked at the door. Any minute now, she thought. Please show up early today, Megan. Please walk in the door right now.
Angry Blonde said, “And you both know Luca Lowell. He bought Ralph’s Garage. Everyone on this street knows about him.”
Tina snapped her fingers. “Oh! You mean Luca. The guy who bought the garage. He’s been getting to know some of the people who work up and down the street. For business networking, I guess.”
The woman leaned on the counter. “You’d better warn your sister,” she hissed.
Tina took a step back, out of face-stabbing range. The counter was between them, but those gel nails added half an inch of reach.
Tina lifted her chin and asked, “Warn my sister about what?” Tina was cautious, but she didn’t scare that easily. Her wrestling opponents in high school had learned that.
The woman’s face contorted with rage. In a low, threatening tone, she said, “You tell your sister that Luca Lowell is nothing but trouble. He’s a tease and a liar.”
“Good to know,” Tina said. She was too focused on the woman for it to register instantly, but it did start to sink in. A tease and a liar? That wasn’t the Luca she knew.
The woman was suddenly grabbing Tina by the wrist. “What’s this?” Angry Blonde demanded. “Is this a motorbike charm? Is this from him? From Luca?”
Tina yanked her wrist free. “Excuse me?” Tina could fight, but she also had manners, unlike the other woman.
The woman glared at her. “Luca gave that to you,” she said. “Didn’t he?”
Tina hid the charm bracelet behind her back. “My jewelry is none of your business,” she said. “If you’re not here to buy flowers, please leave. I have a lot of work to do.”
Angry Blonde retreated slowly, or at least she appeared to be retreating. She didn’t get far before she side-stepped around a greeting card display and entered the staff-only area. She was behind the counter now.
The instant the woman crossed the yellow line that marked off the staff-only area of the store, it was like a bell going off in Tina’s head.
What Angry Blonde didn’t know was that back in high school, when Tina and Megan’s friends were learning cheers and running around in pleated skirts, Megan and Tina were learning how to pin down opponents.
Angry Blonde went down like a house of cards. Tina held her down to buy a few seconds to think. Angry Blonde, who was now Confused Blonde, groaned and tried to fight her way out of the hold, but she didn’t have a chance.
The door chimed.
Was it Megan, early for her shift?
No.
It was Luca Lowell. “Hello?” He looked around the shop, which must have appeared to be empty. “Is anyone here? The door was open.”
“I’m down here,” Tina said. She was using her body weight to keep Confused Blonde from doing any damage with her tigress nails, but the top of her head would have been visible if Luca knew where to look. “Behind the counter.”
“What are you doing down there?” He walked around at a leisurely pace then froze in his motorcycle boots as he surveyed the scene. “Who’s that? Is that who I think it is?” He pointed at the blonde who was immobilized underneath Tina.
“I don’t know,” Tina said.
“You don’t know?”
“This isn’t what it looks like!”
“It’s not?” He stepped over the blonde’s flailing legs, hooked his hands under Tina’s armpits, and gently lifted her off the blonde. “Because it looks to me like you’ve got my former real estate agent in a headlock.”
“It wasn’t a headlock,” Tina said. “It was a chicken wing pin.”
“A what? Have you lost your mind?”
“Luca, she came at me! I had no choice.”
The blonde, who’d gotten to her feet, glared at both of them. “I’m pressing charges,” she said.
Luca stepped between the women, facing the blonde, and said, “No. You’re not.” He crossed his arms.
Then the woman cursed him. Not with swear words. She literally cursed him. “Curse you, Luca
Lowell!”
Gruffly, he said, “Leave now, and we won’t press charges against you.”
She cursed him again, this time with swear words.
Then she leaned to the side and spat at Tina, which nearly got her an ankle pick takedown, but luckily for her and the seven gel fingernails that hadn’t been snapped yet, Luca held Tina back.
The woman kicked over a ficus tree and stormed out of the flower store.
Chapter 17
Luca’s eyes were burning bright as he stared at Tina Gardenia, the wrestler.
“Remind me not to get on your bad side,” he said.
“Too late,” Tina said. “You are on my bad side. But don’t worry. I’m not going to go crazy and stalk your new girlfriends.”
“My new girlfriends?” He thumbed at the door. “You don’t think Jessica is one of my exes, do you?”
“I thought she was a little old for you, but yeah. What did you do to her?” Tina held up her hand. “Wait. Don’t tell me. I don’t want to know.”
“Tina, I did not and would not date a woman like Jessica. That woman has red flags all over her. She tried, trust me. She showed up at my place with a bottle of wine, but I made it very clear I wasn’t interested.”
Tina crossed her arms. “I’m not an idiot, Luca.”
“No, you’re not. And you’re not weak, either. Obviously.”
“Your story doesn’t check out. If you never dated her and you rejected all her advances, why did you buy her that nice apology bouquet?”
“It’s kind of a long story. It’s hard to explain.”
Tina glanced over at the door. “I don’t see anyone else I need to pin down and immobilize at the moment, so why don’t you try?”
“That woman—Jessica Fitzgibbon—is a real estate agent. As you may know, real estate is a tough business. It’s not like your business, where you do a high volume of low-value sales. For a real estate broker, every deal has the potential to make or break their month, maybe their year.”
“I know how sales commissions work, Luca,” Tina said impatiently.
“Jessica’s family owns a new coffee chain that’s opening up locations all over the city. They’re expanding aggressively. The Fitzgibbons are very aggressive.”
“That, I can believe.” She waved her hand for him to keep going.
“Jessica was the listing agent for Ralph’s Garage. She put it up for sale, but she wasn’t actively looking for an arms-length buyer. She was waiting for the owners to get frustrated and agree to a lowball deal with the Fitzgibbon family. They would have knocked the building to the ground before the ink on the demolition permit was dry. Then you’d have a generic chain coffee store on the corner, and Ralph and his family wouldn’t have the equity they deserved.”
“And you stopped that from happening? How?”
“I went around Jessica and negotiated directly with Ralph. It was perfectly legal. Jessica put up a fuss when she heard about our deal. We went out for drinks, once, and she tried to negotiate her way into the day, and a commission. I said it was up to Ralph, but then he was so furious when he found out what she was up to, he threatened to sue her. There was no way he was going to give her a single penny. I might have thrown a little cash her way, just to cover the costs of the lousy advertising she’d done, but then she came over with a bottle of wine, tottering around my place in her spiky heels, and I decided I didn’t want anything to do with her.”
“You mean after you kicked her out of bed the next morning, right?”
He looked hurt. “Tina, who do you think I am?”
“You tell me. That woman wasn’t just mad about a lost business deal. It was personal.”
“I may have led her on a little,” he said sheepishly. “She did throw herself at me. I got confused. But I didn’t sleep with her.”
“You didn’t?”
“With Jessica? I got confused, but I’m not an idiot. What kind of guy do you think I am?”
“I think you’re the kind of guy who plays Scrabble with a girl and doesn’t text her the next day.”
“Oh.” He looked down at his boots. “I did get your message on Sunday.”
“Well? Why didn’t you text me back?”
“I’m not good at that,” he said. “Texting. It’s not my thing.”
“You were pretty good at texting when you were setting up dates with me.”
“Yeah.” He looked away. “I had some help from the woman who was setting up my accounting system. She doesn’t work on Sundays.”
“You blew me off all day because your accountant wasn’t available to help you compose the perfect text message?”
He winced. “She’s actually more of a bookkeeper.”
Tina didn’t know what to say, so she said nothing.
“I came by the flower shop, but it was Sunday, and you weren’t here.”
“That’s why the hours on the door for Sunday just say maybe.” She shook her head. “You walked up the street to come here, but you couldn’t take a minute to send me a single text message?”
He looked her in the eyes. “Come on, Tina. It wouldn’t have just been one message. I might have pulled it together for the first couple, but eventually I would have said something wrong, and then it would be there, on the record, where I couldn’t take it back.”
Tina shook her head. “You really don’t know the first thing about women, do you?”
“My mother passed away when I was five. I was raised by my father and uncle. I only know two things about women, and that’s all I need to know.”
She had to know. “What two things?”
“That I like women, and that the best kind is one that’s cute. Like you.” He batted his eyelashes. “Just you.”
“For a big, tough guy, you sure say the word cute a lot.”
“You win,” he said.
“What do I win?”
“My heart.”
He reached into his pocket and handed her a tiny, heart-shaped charm.
“It’s pretty small for such a big guy,” she said. “Did you buy that today? I didn’t think the jewelry store was open on Mondays.”
“I had it before,” he explained. “I didn’t want to scare you, so I took it off the bracelet before I gave it to you.” He looked at the tiny heart in her palm. “Isn’t it cute?”
It was cute. So cute, and such a sweet gesture, that Tina stopped worrying about exactly how confused he’d been the night Jessica Fitzgibbon visited his place. Jessica Fitzgibbon didn’t have Luca’s heart. Tina did.
“Now you have my heart,” he said. “Promise you won’t break it.”
Tina attempted to hold onto the heart while unclasping the charm bracelet, but her arms were rubbery from pinning Jessica Fitzgibbon by her chicken wings. Tina fumbled the heart and dropped it on the floor.
Luca frowned at her. “That’s not a good sign.” He crouched down and grabbed the heart charm then, instead of handing it back to her, tucked it into his pocket.
Tina said, “Really?”
“You dropped it,” he said. “That’s a sign. You’re not ready yet.”
“Give me the charm.”
“No.” He stepped back slowly, grinning, and started making his way out of the shop. “Are you going to be okay here without any adult supervision?”
“My sister will be here any minute now. Not that I need supervision! And what do you mean, adult? You’re only a couple years older than me, mister.”
“In a few years, you’ll know what I mean.” He winked. “I should get back to the garage. Let me know if any of my other stalkers come by.”
“You know I will.”
And then he left.
Tina checked the calendar to see if it was a full moon. She was not surprised to find that it was. She’d had some weird Monday mornings, but that one took the cake.
Chapter 18
Megan Gardenia strolled in late to take over at the flower store.
“You’re early,” Tina said with a snort. “For Tu
esday’s shift.”
Megan gave her sister a flat look. “There’s a rip in your sweatshirt.”
“I had to wrestle a customer.”
“Did you win?”
Tina grinned. “You wanna see the broken gel fingernail tips she left in the floor mat?”
“You know I do.”
Megan examined the victory trophies while Tina told her about the morning’s excitement.
Megan’s takeaway was “So, he doesn’t have a brother. That’s too bad.”
“Focus, Meenie. Luca bought two arrangements, and they were for different women. Who do you think the second one was for?”
Megan frowned. “The second flowers were for his more hardcore stalker. The one who’s going to murder you. You’d better sleep with one eye open.”
“Thanks. You’ve been super helpful, as always.”
Megan took a bow.
Tina gathered her things, passed along the instructions about the day’s orders and deliveries, and left the shop.
Outside on the sidewalk, the sun was shining again. Tina’s charm bracelet glinted in the light.
She thought about the cute little heart, and how she wanted to earn it back.
She walked up Baker Street to Ralph’s Garage.
Tina’s heart began beating rapidly, even though she was walking at a slow pace. What an adventure the day was turning into. It was no wonder her nervous system was so excitable. It wasn’t every day she wrestled a real estate agent.
She took a detour into Bookworm Books to catch her breath. Tina’s curvy blonde cousin, Peaches Monroe, was leaning on the counter, reading a paperback novel. Peaches was twenty-one, lived with her best friend who was the same age, and always had plenty of interesting stories.
Tina asked, “What are you reading?”
Peaches closed the book quickly. “Just trash,” she said. “I have terrible taste in books.” She wrinkled her nose and grinned. “And boys.”
“You’re still so young,” Tina said. “I’m sure your taste will mature, from boys to men.”
Peaches raised her eyebrows. “Speaking of men, have you seen the big hunk of man who took over Ralph’s Garage? He looks like he lifts the bikes over his head on his lunch breaks for exercise. Nice eyes, too.”
