Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
Daisy had passed the shop over to Lu for Tuesday evening’s spring-wreath-making class, and Elliot had changed his spit-up covered shirt and now they were sitting together at The Pumpkin Spice Café.
It seemed safer than being together in Daisy’s tiny apartment again.
Between Elliot’s above-average hugging skills and the way he looked rocking baby Owen, Daisy’s feelings for him were more confused than ever.
Actually, that wasn’t true.
Her feelings were becoming quite clear.
She was attracted to Elliot.
She glanced across the table at him to confirm.
His brow furrowed as his gaze flicked from where his laptop was opened to some old copies of the Dream Harbor Gazette to his phone, where he was googling some of Daisy’s relatives, to a dusty old book of town history he’d found at the library.
Okay, so he was a giant nerd (was that a red flag?), but he looked hot in those glasses and the way his damn hair refused to stay in place was really doing something for her.
Yep, attracted.
And it was highly inconvenient. She wasn’t supposed to be attracted to her fake boyfriend. Elliot looked up and caught her staring at him. His cheeks immediately turned pink in that adorable way they always did, and Daisy had to repeat her mantra all over again.
Done with relationships.
Done with love.
‘Sorry,’ he said, his cheeks flushing deeper. ‘This is probably boring you.’
‘No! Not at all,’ Daisy assured him, focusing back on the article he’d pulled up on the screen. ‘I had no idea the flower shop was such a town institution.’
‘The building itself is over two hundred years old. And you can see in this early photo here, that stained glass above the door is original. Which is remarkable really.’
‘I’ve always liked those windows.’
‘They’re gorgeous and very rare to find in such good condition. Especially here in the US.’
‘Was it always a flower shop? I thought my grandma said our family opened the shop in the nineteen-twenties.’
‘That’s right. Before that it looks like it was an apothecary of sorts.’
‘Like for potions and stuff?’ Her mother would just love that news.
Elliot chuckled. ‘Herbal remedies, I guess you could call them.’
‘I wonder if they would have sold something to break a love curse,’ she muttered, taking a sip of her smoothie. It was good, filled with local strawberries.
The Pumpkin Spice Café wasn’t busy this time of day.
They’d be closing soon, and Jeanie was working her way through the room, wiping tables.
She smiled at Daisy as she went by, her gaze flicking between her and Elliot.
The café owner’s dark brows rose in question, and Daisy gave a little shrug in return.
It was harder lying to everyone than she thought it would be.
She liked Jeanie. She didn’t want to lie.
But the more people who knew this was fake, the more likely the truth would come out. Daisy just needed to fake it for a few months, tops. And then she could set Elliot free and go back to her self-imposed single life. The one designed to keep her safe from further heartbreak or humiliation.
‘Oh, here’s what I was looking for,’ Elliot said, clicking a few more links.
‘Here’s a picture from the early days of your family’s shop.
It was just called Daisy’s at the time. Apparently, they did flowers for the mayor’s wedding, and that really launched the business.
They were very well known for weddings.’
Weddings. Ugh. Right from the start, apparently.
Daisy peered at the grainy, black and white photo.
A few people stood smiling out in front of the shop, relatives of hers, presumably.
One woman stood out, though, mostly because she wasn’t smiling.
She looked miserable, actually, dressed all in black and staring straight at the camera like she would rather be anywhere else.
But that wasn’t the only thing that made her stand out.
‘She looks exactly like … me.’ The resemblance was so strong that goosebumps raised along Daisy’s arms. She sat back in her seat, needing some distance between her and the past staring at her through the computer screen. ‘That’s spooky.’
‘It’s uncanny, right? Do you know who she is?’
Daisy shook her head. ‘No. I can ask my grandmother. She might know.’
‘She’s clearly a relative.’ Elliot shut his laptop and started gathering his books, noticing that Jeanie was about ready to lock up. ‘You two could be twins if it wasn’t for the hundred-year age gap.’
‘Yeah,’ Daisy said, her voice faint. It wasn’t so much the fact that she had the same face as that woman, it was more the misery she saw in her eyes.
Was that how Daisy looked? Did she give off an air of tragedy so strong that it was clear to everyone she was cursed?
And what happened to this poor ancestor of hers?
‘You okay?’ Elliot’s gentle touch on her lower back brought her attention to the present.
‘Oh, yeah, fine. Just thinking about … you know … history,’ she finished lamely.
‘That’s how I spend a lot of my day,’ he said with a quiet laugh.
‘Do you need to do all this research for the inn renovations?’
‘That’s always how it starts,’ he said as they headed for the door. ‘I like to restore old buildings to their original glory. It’s usually why I’m hired.’
‘Are you good at it?’
‘I like to think so, yeah.’
The smile he gave her then was different from the shy one he usually flashed. This one was confident, like he knew how good he was at his job.
Oh, no. Confident Elliot was even more attractive than shy Elliot.
Damn it.
‘I bet you are.’
They were standing just outside the café now, Daisy’s face tipped up to his.
He cleared his throat. ‘Thanks for letting me bore you with that.’
‘I wasn’t bored.’
‘Maybe we can do it again some time?’
More time sitting in close quarters with Elliot? Daisy’s mind wandered to quiet library tables and cozy café corners, to heads bent together and hands on knees, on thighs, to darkening evenings like this one where they stood so close together and it would be so easy to … lean in.
She swallowed hard.
‘Sure. It would be good for people to keep seeing us together,’ she said, and the reminder of their arrangement sent Elliot’s confident smile slipping, just a little.
Maybe she was doomed to be as miserable as the woman in the photo. Maybe that Daisy had been just as screwed up in love as she was.
‘Right. Definitely.’ Elliot stepped back. The moment turned awkward, and Logan pulling up in his beat-up pick-up truck didn’t really help.
‘Hey,’ he said with a nod, through the open window.
‘Jeanie’s on her way out,’ Daisy told him, and thankfully she appeared from the alley beside the café.
‘Daisy, Elliot, you’re still here! I wanted to ask what you two were studying.
’ Jeanie went to the driver’s-side window on the truck and leaned in for a kiss.
Logan happily obliged and envy shot through Daisy like ice through her veins.
She’d thought she had that. She thought she’d found her person. Twice.
And she’d been wrong. All the nights she’d spent crying over David came roaring back to the forefront of her memories. Did she really want to go through that again? Definitely not.
‘Just town history,’ Daisy told her, swallowing down her emotions. ‘Elliot was filling me in on some details about the flower shop.’
‘Oh, neat!’ Jeanie said. ‘Anything interesting?’
‘You’re not the first person to think the café was haunted,’ Daisy said, remembering the little tidbit she’d found in that weird town history book.
‘Really?’
‘Yeah, it used to be a hat shop, and the owner swore that a ghost named Sally was scaring his customers away.’
‘No way!’
‘But I guess his business was going under and he just needed someone to blame.’
Jeanie laughed. ‘Wow, anything else?’
‘Daisy has a family member with a striking resemblance to her,’ Elliot said.
‘Do you know who she is?’
‘Not yet,’ Daisy said, really not wanting to think any more about her sad relative. Or her own sad life for that matter.
‘My grandfather’s pretty interested in town history and my grandmother knows everything about everyone so’—Logan shrugged—‘if you want to pick their brains, I’m sure they’d love it.’
Elliot’s face quite literally lit up.
‘That would be incredible.’
Logan chuckled. ‘I’m not sure incredible is the right word, but it could be interesting. Feel free to come up to the farm anytime. You ready?’ he asked, turning his attention back to his wife.
‘Yep,’ Jeanie replied cheerily and when Logan got out of the truck to come around and open her door for her, Daisy wanted to curl in a ball and cry.
‘Bye, guys!’ Jeanie called, oblivious to the emotions swirling through Daisy. She gave a weak wave back and was left alone on the sidewalk with Elliot, the setting sun painting Main Street in gold and pink.
How romantic.
* * *
‘Walk you home?’ Elliot asked.
‘I live three buildings down. I think I can make it alone.’ Daisy was fiddling with the zipper on the black hoodie she’d thrown on over one of her ubiquitous black T-shirts. Something had clearly upset her, he just wasn’t sure what it was.
‘I know, but who knows what dangers you might face at this time of night.’ He tried to joke, and Daisy’s mouth lifted in a reluctant smile.
‘It’s six o’clock.’
‘I hear it can get rowdy in Dream Harbor at dusk.’
She just shook her head, still fighting her smile and started walking. Elliot fell into step beside her. He felt silly when they landed in front of the flower shop thirty seconds later.
‘What happened?’ he asked.
‘What do you mean?’
‘You got sad.’
Daisy avoided his gaze, running her fingers through her hair. ‘I’m sad a lot, Elliot. I just don’t always show it.’
‘Me, too.’
She looked up at him, and he wanted to cup her face in his hands and run a thumb over the delicate skin on her cheeks. But he tucked his hands in his pockets instead, not wanting to overstep, not sure what Daisy wanted from him.
‘You never talk about your ex-husband.’