Chapter 34
Chapter Thirty-Four
Daphne
The alarm went off at four-thirty, and for the first time in years, I didn't resent it.
I lay there for a moment in the gray pre-dawn light, my body heavy with the pleasant exhaustion of too little sleep and my mind still drifting through memories of last night.
The stars. The meteors. Micah's hand warm in mine, his voice low and close as he traced constellations across the sky.
The kiss he'd pressed to my cheek before leaving.
A smile tugged at my lips—unbidden, unstoppable, and I let it happen.
Let myself feel the giddy warmth of it, the teenage flutter that seemed ridiculous at my age but was too lovely to suppress.
Then I hauled myself out of bed, because the market wouldn't wait for lovesick daydreaming.
The morning routine was so ingrained it required almost no thought: shower, dress, braid my hair back to keep it out of my face.
I pulled on my usual market clothes—worn jeans, a soft long-sleeved shirt, my favorite canvas apron with the deep pockets.
Practical. Familiar. The same uniform I'd worn every Saturday for five years.
The herbs were already bundled and waiting in the cool darkness of my drying shed—lavender and rosemary and sage, thyme and oregano and basil.
I'd prepared most of them earlier in the week, tying them with twine in careful bunches, but there were always last-minute additions.
Fresh-cut flowers from the garden, their petals still wet with dew.
Vegetables pulled from the earth just hours ago, dirt still clinging to their roots.
Jars of preserves lined up like jewels, their contents glowing amber and ruby in the light of my headlamp.
Loading the truck was meditative work, each crate placed with care to prevent shifting during the drive.
The familiar weight of the baskets, the earthy smell of fresh produce, the soft rustle of herbs, these were the textures of my life, the sensations that had anchored me through five years of solitude.
They felt different now. Richer, somehow.
Like I was experiencing them for the first time instead of the five hundredth.
The drive to Haven's Rest was quiet, the roads empty in the pale morning light.
Mist hung low over the fields, the sky was that particular shade of lavender-gray that existed only in the moments before sunrise.
I drove with the windows cracked despite the chill, breathing in the smell of damp earth and green growing things.
My phone sat on the passenger seat, and I found my eyes drifting to it more often than they should. No messages yet, it was barely five in the morning, but some silly part of me hoped to see any of the guys name on the screen. Just a good morning…or anything really.
Stop it, I told myself firmly. You're a grown woman, not a teenager with a crush….But the smile came back anyway, and I didn't try to fight it.
The market square was already stirring when I arrived, vendors setting up their stalls in the soft gray light.
I spotted Eleanor three spaces down, arranging her needlework displays with the same meticulous care she brought to everything.
Mrs. Chen was setting out her legendary pies, the smell of cinnamon and apple drifting across the square.
Home. This was home, in a way I'd never let myself fully acknowledge.
Not just the cabin in the woods, not just the garden I'd built with my own hands, but this, the community, the familiar faces, the weekly ritual of gathering and selling and connecting.
I'd been part of it for five years without ever really being part of it.
Holding myself separate, maintaining distance, participating without engaging.
But this morning, as I unloaded my truck and began setting up my stall, I felt something different.
A belonging that went deeper than geography.
"Morning, Daphne!" Eleanor called, her voice warm despite the early hour. "You're glowing this morning. Good night?"
I felt my cheeks heat and busied myself with arranging my herb bundles. "It was nice. Went stargazing."
"Stargazing." Eleanor's tone was knowing, and I didn't have to look up to know she was smiling. "With that handsome one that is all serious?"
"His name is Micah." I muttered quietly, cheeks heating up under her stare.
"I know his name. I also know that smile on your face, and it's not from looking at stars." She laughed at my spluttering protest. "Oh, don't worry. I won't pry. Much. But I'm happy for you, Daphne. Truly."
I finally looked up, meeting her warm brown eyes. "Thank you, Eleanor. That means a lot."
"You deserve happiness, dear. We all think so." She gestured vaguely at the market around us—the other vendors setting up, the early-bird customers starting to trickle in. "This whole town's been rooting for you, you know. Even when you were too stubborn to let any of us in."
The observation landed somewhere tender, and I had to blink back an unexpected prickle of tears. "I'm trying to be less stubborn."
"I can see that. It looks good on you." Eleanor patted my arm and returned to her own stall, leaving me to finish my setup with a heart that felt too full for my chest. The morning rush came like it always did—a trickle of early customers that swelled into a steady stream as the sun rose higher.
I fell into the familiar rhythm of it: greeting regulars, making change, answering questions about growing conditions and preservation methods.
The lavender was popular today, the purple bundles disappearing almost as fast as I could set them out.
The tomatoes, too, fat and red and still warm from the morning sun, split open at the slightest pressure to reveal seeds suspended in golden jelly.
"These are beautiful," a woman I didn't recognize said, cradling a tomato like it was precious. "You grow all of this yourself?"
"Every bit of it. No pesticides, no synthetic fertilizers. Just good soil and patience." I told her, my customer service smile on my face but it felt more natural than normal.
"You can taste the difference." She selected half a dozen, along with bundles of basil and oregano. "My mother used to grow tomatoes like this. I haven't tasted anything like them since she passed."
The words sparked something—a connection, a shared understanding. "My foster mother taught me to garden. Margaret. Everything I know about growing things, I learned from her."
The woman smiled, warm and genuine. "Then she taught you well. These are a gift."
After she left, I stood there for a moment, turning her words over in my mind.
A gift. I'd never thought of my produce that way, as something I was giving rather than selling.
But maybe that was part of what had been missing.
The transactional nature of it, the careful distance I maintained even in the act of sharing what I'd grown.
Margaret would have understood. She'd always said that gardening was an act of faith—you put something in the ground and trusted it to grow, even when you couldn't see what was happening beneath the surface.
Just like people, she'd told me once, her weathered hands gentle on my shoulders.
You plant seeds of kindness and patience, and sometimes it takes years before you see the bloom.
I'd been young when I landed in foster home, angry and scared and convinced that no one would ever want me.
She'd taken me in after one meeting….one look at my clenched fists and wary eyes and I had been adopted after being moved around foster home to foster home.
The first day I met her she gave me a towel and a smile.
Come on, she'd said. The tomatoes won't plant themselves.
Somehow, in the dirt and the sunshine and the quiet rhythm of growing things, I'd started to heal.
Started to believe that maybe I was worth something after all.
The morning wore on, the sun climbing higher and the crowd thickening.
I sold out of lettuce by nine, tomatoes by ten, and was running low on herb bundles by eleven.
A good day. A very good day. And through it all, that warmth in my chest persisted—part exhaustion, part happiness, part the lingering glow of last night's starlight.
I was rearranging my remaining stock when I felt it—that prickle at the back of my neck, that instinctive awareness of being watched. My stomach clenched, and for one terrible moment I thought Trinity—
When I looked up, it wasn't Trinity.
It was Levi. He stood at the edge of the market square, two coffee cups in his hands and a grin on his face that could probably be seen from space.
His blond hair was tousled from the breeze, and he was wearing a soft blue henley that made his eyes look impossibly bright.
When he caught me looking, his grin widened even further, and he started weaving through the crowd toward my stall.
"Morning, sunshine," he said, setting one of the coffees down in front of me. "Heard you had a late night. Thought you might need this."
I wrapped my hands around the cup, the warmth seeping into my fingers. "How did you know I'd be here?"
"It's Saturday. Market day." He said it like it was obvious, like of course he knew my schedule, like he'd been paying attention. "Plus, Micah mentioned you probably wouldn't get much sleep after he dropped you off at two in the morning."
"He told you about last night?" I blinked, but I should have guessed they talked about the dates to one another.
"He told us it was 'optimal.' That's Micah-speak for 'amazing beyond his wildest dreams but he's too emotionally constipated to say so.'" Levi leaned against the edge of my stall, completely at ease, like he belonged there. "How was it really? From your perspective?"