Chapter 1 #3
“That was my aunt’s rule, because Marshall’s ex-manager or whatever he was, the one who ran off with all his stuff, once mutilated several of my aunt’s prize tomato plants when he was trying to make pico.
Given your massive restaurant success and quote-unquote fancy culinary credentials, I’m sure you can figure out how to prune a few herb plants without stabbing yourself—or worse, mauling my rosemary. ”
“I don’t know. It’s been a while since I’ve gotten my delicate chef’s hands dirty.
How can you be sure?” He slid sunglasses onto his face and grinned at his hands, which somehow managed to have flawless cuticles despite the rough and scarred spots.
His knuckles were still smudged from when Felicity had taken the sticky note. “Better supervise me just to be safe.”
Felicity stuck her hand on the hip of her ratty overalls and clutched her sweaty red paisley bandanna, tipping up the edge of her straw hat. “Do I look like your personal farmer?” she said, before seeing herself reflected back in his fancy polarized lenses.
Well, shit.
She did look like a cartoon version of a village farmer girl, down to her flaming red hair tied back in two sticky French braids.
Proving unable to miss irony when it smacked him in his self-satisfied face, Nic snorted again—that same goddamn snort as when she’d fallen on her ass right beneath his restaurant’s kitchen window.
His voice descended to a lower register as if to emphasize his gruff Texas masculinity. “I’m really not afraid to get my hands dirty, you know.”
“Swell.” Felicity pushed the list back into his hands and handed him a basket that had been hanging on a hook outside the shed. “Happy harvesting, cowboy.”
As she trotted toward the apartment stairs, she found Sam sitting on the old bench beneath Felicity’s tiny balcony. Felicity had avoided most social contact with her old friends since she’d moved back to Kansas in May, but Sam—bless her—kept trying.
The bookseller held up a hardback with stunning sprayed edges and a gilded filagree cover.
“I was going to put this on your desk at the shop but I saw y’all out here chatting.
” Sam didn’t look at all infuriated by Nic.
She seemed entertained by the entire situation.
How long had she been listening to them? “Looks like y’all finally met.”
“Thank you for the book,” Felicity said before mouthing the words He’s a treat where Nic couldn’t see.
Sam’s eyes narrowed with amusement.
The gate on the other end of the garden, the one near the sprawling empty lot, opened with an ominous screech.
In sauntered the boomer bane of Felicity’s existence, the lawful-evil crank of the St. Clare Circle neighborhood: Bruce Hogan. An appearance of the actuary and collectible-chessboard entrepreneur never boded well.
Sam’s eyes had gone from amusement at Nic to icy, unabashed hatred as she glared at Bruce.
He was one of the few people who could make Sam lose her temper.
Her pregnancy was only barely visible, but she’d told Felicity the other day that her growing female fetus meant she had less room to stomach white male bullshit.
And they currently had the embodiment of that precise type of bullshit standing in front of them in baby-blue Argyle and triple-pleated khakis.
In addition to his other pursuits, Bruce was the longtime thwarted owner of lot SCC #456183a, the large empty lot next door featuring the foreboding public notice sign that might herald the end of the plant shop.
The lot itself was even more overgrown than the courtyard in front of the old church.
But unlike the muddy mess of the neglected courtyard, empty lot SCC #456183a had turned into two acres of a pretty sort of picturesque wilderness complete with several of Felicity’s favorite trees.
Children from the school nearby played there in the summer, and Felicity used to read on or under the giant bur oak in the far corner when she visited her aunt as a child.
He navigated the cobblestone path with care, avoiding getting dirt on the tassels of his pristine leather loafers. Bizarre that anyone would want to wear a sweater vest today. Sure, it was the end of September, but it was eighty-five fucking degrees.
Bruce was grinning the way Felicity imagined a hungry savanna animal did when it found itself beneath a boat of unsuspecting and tasty-looking tourists. The expression dropped a cold stone of dread into Felicity’s stomach.
“You know hippos don’t even like to eat humans?” Felicity said before she could stop herself. “They just hunt them for fun like gigantic skull-crushing psychopaths.”
A snort behind her back interrupted the runaway train of her thoughts. She wanted to kick Nic. She also wanted to preemptively kick Bruce Hogan, because she could feel what was coming. Were these violent urges childish? Yes. Did that make her want to kick both of them any less? No.
“Well now, that is a fascinating zoological fact to start the day with, Ms. Felicity Gallagher.” His voice recalled the smarmiest of right-wing talk radio personalities. “How fortuitous that I’ve found so many of you here. I have absolutely wonderful news for us all.”
Oh fuck.