Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
Two cups of tea and half a package of Oreos into the night, and Elliot couldn’t remember the last time he’d talked so much or wanted to talk so much.
Daisy seemed to bring it out in him. She made it easy.
Going on dates had always felt like a performance, and one he’d never been good at.
It was why he had been so relieved to be in a long-term relationship.
But now that they really were ‘performing’ a relationship, all the pressure was off. He didn’t need to impress Daisy because it was all fake anyway. He could just be himself.
‘Okay,’ she said, leaning back in her chair.
‘Let’s see, we’ve covered how we met.’ Didn’t even really have to lie for that one.
They met at the flower shop, of course. ‘Allergies.’ Easy, none.
‘Pets,’ she said with a frown. Unfortunately, none on all fronts for that one.
‘Favorite books.’ The Book Thief for him and The Witch of Blackbird Pond for her.
‘And family history.’ Daisy was an only child and her parents still lived in town. Her mom helped her run the flower shop.
‘Actually, shouldn’t I know your parents’ names?’ he asked, taking another Oreo and dunking it in his tea.
Daisy winced like she was dreading that question.
‘My dad’s name is Allen. And my mother’s name is Daisy.’
Elliot smiled. ‘Same as you?’
‘Yes, same as me.’ Daisy did not seem nearly as amused as he was. ‘Same as my grandmother as well.’
Elliot’s eyebrows rose of their own volition. ‘You’re all named Daisy?’
She sighed like it was the worst fate she could imagine. ‘Yes, we’re all named Daisy, we’ve all run this flower shop. For like generations. It’s … it’s … ridiculous really.’
‘I think it’s cute.’ He was fully grinning now. An entire family made up of Daisies? And they all ran a flower shop? It was something out of a fairy tale.
‘Of course you do,’ she said, her scowl deepening.
‘What does that mean?’
‘Everyone thinks it’s cute!’
‘And you don’t like being cute?’
‘Cuteness is for kittens and babies and little girls. Not grown women. Not people that want to be taken seriously. Have you ever heard of a CEO named Daisy? Or an astronaut?’
‘Do you want to be an astronaut?’
‘No! But that’s beside the point. I just…’ She sighed again. ‘I just thought I was getting away from this name and this shop and this life and … I got sucked back in.’
‘You don’t like it here?’ He hated to think that she was unhappy here in this little town that he’d grown to love, even if they’d barely noticed he was there.
She looked up at him with her amber eyes, and he wanted to tell her she was wrong, that she wasn’t cute, she was beautiful.
‘I like it here fine.’ She shrugged. ‘I just thought things would turn out differently.’
‘I get that.’ He was supposed to still be living in his three-bedroom house with the attached garage, the one Leigh had insisted on so they wouldn’t have to walk outside in the winter to get to the car, and the fenced-in yard for his dog, Sam.
God, he missed that dog. He wasn’t supposed to be sitting in the back of a flower shop, sipping chamomile tea and eating cookies, in an apartment that smelled like roses with a woman he wasn’t supposed to have a crush on.
But he was finding that he was glad he was here.
She gave him a small smile that lit up his chest, and he was even more glad the universe had deposited him here.
‘Doesn’t it get confusing, though?’ he teased. ‘All having the same name?’
Daisy sighed again and scrunched up her face like she really didn’t want to answer that question. She spoke so fast, he barely understood her next words. ‘My grandmother goes by June, and my mother goes by May.’
Elliot couldn’t help the laughter rising in his throat.
‘Don’t you dare.’ Daisy pointed at him. ‘Don’t laugh.’
‘They go by their … birth months?’
Daisy’s eyes rolled toward the ceiling. ‘Middle names that happen to be birth months.’
‘Daisy June and Daisy May?’
‘Yes.’
‘And what’s yours?’ he choked out, barely able to control his mirth.
She looked him dead in the eye and said, ‘November.’
‘Daisy November Scott.’
‘Maybe I will kill you after all.’
He held his hands up in surrender. ‘I like it!’
‘Shut up.’
‘It’s very sophisticated,’ he said, fully laughing now and Daisy cracked a smile as she crumpled up a napkin and flicked it at his face. ‘Like the name an astronaut might have.’
Daisy shook her head, laughter tumbling from her lips. ‘I don’t actually want to be an astronaut.’
‘Okay, you don’t have to be.’ He grinned at her.
‘I like running the flower shop.’
‘Good.’
‘Sorry I got grumpy on you.’
‘You can be grumpy whenever you want.’
She paused, her laughter fading as she watched him. She ran a finger around the rim of her mug, and Elliot tracked its path with his gaze. He thought he might like to be under Daisy’s finger like that, traced, touched.
It had been so long.
‘Thanks,’ she said, biting into another cookie. Crumbs stuck to her bottom lip, and Elliot imagined wiping them away with his thumb. Maybe he would press into the plushness of it, maybe he would follow with his mouth—
He shook his head.
‘So, you never tried going by November?’
‘It doesn’t really roll off the tongue.’
Do not think about Daisy’s tongue. Or yours … licking off those crumbs…
Elliot shifted in his seat.
‘And it’s not really something you can coo at a baby.’
‘Little Novie?’ He teased, trying desperately to get back on track here. This was fake. He was not starting a real relationship with Daisy. He wasn’t equipped to start a real relationship with anyone.
And then Daisy crinkled up her nose in that cute way that he’d already grown to like too much, and he lost the thread all over again. His brain was telling him this was fake, but his body was feeling very real things about Daisy at the moment.
She twisted apart her Oreo halves and, God save him, she licked the cream with one long swipe of her tongue. Elliot swallowed hard. Had Oreos always been so erotic?
Why had his dick chosen now to awaken from its two-year slumber?
Why not on that date his mother had set him up on with the daughter of an old friend …
he couldn’t even remember her name and at the time he certainly hadn’t felt like licking anything off of her.
Or with that woman he’d met on one of the few times he’d attempted to go to the gym.
She was dressed in practically nothing, and he could not have cared less.
It was like his sex drive had left when Leigh decided to end things and now it had decided to storm back in. How inconvenient.
‘What about you?’ Daisy asked, breaking through his thoughts. ‘What’s your middle name?’
It was his turn to hesitate, which made Daisy lean in across the table, her eyes glinting with excitement. The position also caused her to press against the table, the top curve of her breasts rising above the neckline of her tank top, and Elliot had to look up to the heavens for strength.
‘Ooh, it’s a bad one, isn’t it?’
He shrugged, still not looking at her. Luckily, she thought it was just embarrassment about his name and not the inconvenient rise of lust rushing through him. ‘It’s not great.’
‘Tell me.’
‘I don’t think it’ll come up.’
‘I told you mine! You have to tell me.’
‘Okay, fine.’ Elliot sighed, bringing his gaze back to hers. ‘It’s Milton.’
‘Ha!’ A laugh burst from Daisy’s mouth. ‘Little Milty!’
‘Absolutely not!’ he said, but Daisy was laughing too hard to hear him and soon he was laughing again, too. It felt good, laughing with Daisy. Like he was finally breathing again, living, after so long being dormant.
‘Novie and Milt, those are some pretty weird pet names,’ Daisy said between giggles.
‘Should we have pet names?’
She nibbled her bottom lip, looking at him thoughtfully, like she was deciding what she might call him if they were in a real relationship. ‘Like what?’
‘Sweetie?’ he ventured. He and Leigh had never had pet names for each other. Was that some kind of red flag he should have noticed from the beginning?
‘My grandma calls me that.’
‘Honey?’
Nose-crinkle.
‘Babe?’
‘I’m not sure we can pull off babe…’
‘Pudding, pumpkin, baby cakes?’
Daisy was giggling again and he loved it. That sound, the way her whole body participated, her cheeks flushing pink. Beautiful.
‘Maybe we skip pet names?’ He couldn’t imagine calling Daisy ‘love,’ or ‘sweetheart,’ or ‘darling’ and not mean it. He would start to mean it. And then where would they be?
‘Agreed. I think that’s for the best.’
They were smiling at each other over the table and an alarming thought flashed through Elliot’s mind.
I could get used to this.
He could get used to talking late into the night with Daisy, laughing and joking with empty mugs and cookie crumbs between them.
And he realized what he was doing. It was just like when he met Leigh in college, and he’d been so relieved to find someone to be with, to share things with, to have a buddy, that he’d latched onto her and never let go.
He’d married the first girl that paid him any attention, and in the end, it had been the wrong choice. He had been the wrong choice for her.
Isn’t that what Leigh had said when she announced that she wanted a divorce? That they’d rushed things, gotten serious too fast, that she regretted not dating more in college? While he was so happy to never have to worry about being alone again, his wife was wondering who else was out there.
And here he was doing it again, fantasizing about spending the rest of forever with a woman he barely knew.
A woman who was here with him for exactly one reason and that was to save her business.
He needed to remember that. Daisy had her own share of heartache, and he was sure she didn’t want to add more.
He was sure she wouldn’t choose him under normal circumstances.
She wouldn’t have chosen him for this fake relationship, either, if he hadn’t been the one to walk into her flower shop at the exact moment her ex did.
It was all just an accident. She would have grabbed whoever had come into the shop that morning. It had just happened to be him.
‘I should probably go.’ He stood and Daisy followed him the few feet to the door.
‘What about PDA?’ she said.
He turned abruptly at her question, and they nearly crashed, her hands landing softly on his chest. He felt the touch down to his bones.
‘PDA?’
‘Yeah,’ Daisy said with a shy smile. ‘Public displays of affection. I just meant, should we … do that?’ She dropped her hands from his body like she was embarrassed they were still there, and he could breathe again. Just barely.
‘Uh … I’m not…’ He could breathe but not think. Not about anything other than her hands returning to his chest. He ached at the thought.
‘We don’t have to,’ Daisy rushed in to say. ‘I just thought we should discuss it first. You know, like if we should hold hands or anything like that.’
‘Holding hands is good,’ he said too quickly, but Daisy’s smile grew.
‘Okay, great. Holding hands is on the table.’
He reached out and she slid her fingers through his. Shit, he was so screwed. Because as soon as her hand was in his, he was fantasizing again. Wishing he could have more.
‘We could probably hug … you know … when we run into each other out in the world.’
Elliot swallowed hard. ‘Right, hugging would be a normal way to greet each other.’ He restrained himself from pulling her in, from pressing her against him right now.
‘Kissing, though…’
Kissing Daisy. Just the thought was killing him.
‘…that probably wouldn’t be necessary,’ she finished, her voice breathy, her eyes flicking to his mouth.
‘Probably not,’ he rasped.
Her gaze locked on his in the soft glow of her apartment.
‘I should go,’ he said again.
‘Right, of course.’ She gave his hand a squeeze before letting go. ‘Thanks for being my fake boyfriend.’
Fake. He winced a little at the word. He hoped Daisy didn’t notice.
‘Gotta break that curse, right?’ He forced a smile.
‘Right.’
‘Goodnight, Daisy November.’
‘Goodnight, Elliot Milton.’
‘I still don’t think that’s going to come up in conversation.’
Daisy grinned. ‘Oh, I’ll make sure it does.’
He waved goodbye to the sound of her laughter.
This was going to hurt later, but it was the best night he’d had in a long time.