Chapter 27
TWENTY-SEVEN
Scarlett hugged her friends and waved off their offers to help with the last of the cleanup. “I need to get everything organized, and I work best when I’m alone,” she told them. “Thank you so much for putting this event together so quickly.”
Camilla tilted her head. “Are you sure you’re okay? You seem…off, somehow.”
“I’m fine.”
“Is Archer on his way?” Lucy asked. “Maybe he can cheer you up.”
Scarlett forced a laugh at her friend’s suggestive wiggling of eyebrows. Her throat felt tight, so her voice came out strained when she said, “I think he’s busy. I’ll be fine. I just need to do a quick inventory, cash out the register, stop at the bank, and then head home. I’m good, really. Just tired and insanely grateful to have you all as friends.”
“We should set up an automatic inventory system,” Amelia said, frowning at the buckets of flowers lining the side of the shop.
“That sounds great, babe,” Leo said, coaxing his wife toward the door. “How would you do that?”
“Well, first I’d need to create item codes for every type of flower…”
As Amelia began to rattle off a complicated sequence of steps for computerizing Scarlett’s entire business, Leo glanced over his shoulder and winked at everyone else. Then he led Amelia through the door, making encouraging noises as he asked questions about her hypothetical inventory system.
A sharp pain lanced Scarlett’s chest at the sight of a man so devoted to his wife. Leo didn’t know the first thing about data analysis, but he’d learned the basics because it was what Amelia did. Marlon worshipped the ground Camilla walked on. Cormac treated Lucy like a precious jewel to be protected at all costs.
And Scarlett couldn’t even get a date to her own party.
Camilla must have seen something in Scarlett’s expression, because she moved closer, looking concerned. Marlon and Cormac were at work doing security-type things, so it was just Lucy, Camilla, and Scarlett in the shop. Scarlett couldn’t wait for them to leave.
“What did he say when he called?” Camilla asked.
Scarlett shrugged, trying and failing to keep the movement from being jerky. “He just said he couldn’t make it.”
“It’s been a rough week,” Lucy noted.
Scarlett huffed. “You can say that again.”
“I’m sure he’ll come around,” the other woman added.
Scarlett shook her head. “I don’t think so. The way he sounded…it was like he was setting me up to break it off. Letting me down easy.”
Camilla frowned. “Really?”
Scarlett pursed her lips and nodded. “Yeah. Believe me, I’ve been broken up with enough times to know it’s coming.” The breezy tone Scarlett attempted didn’t quite work out, and instead she sounded bitter and sad.
“He’s terrified, probably,” Lucy said.
Camilla hummed in agreement.
Scarlett shook her head. “Of what?”
“Of you.”
“What?”
“He’s terrified of you,” Camilla repeated.
“That makes no sense,” Scarlett said with a scoff. “You don’t need to try to save my feelings. It’s fine, I promise.”
“Marlon told me about Archer’s upbringing, and I think it makes sense that he’d be afraid of jumping in if his feelings were strong.”
Lucy made a noise of agreement. “His friends are all he has. It would be scary to jeopardize that.”
Scarlett frowned and met Camilla’s gaze. “What do you mean, his upbringing?”
“Struggling all through school with no help,” she explained.
It still didn’t really make sense, but Scarlett nodded. “Right. He told me he barely graduated high school. But why would that matter? It’s not like it’s stopped him from being successful.”
“He grew up thinking he was deficient,” Camilla explained. “Marlon told me about how he used to act like the class clown to distract people from how much he struggled. He’d put on this show but inside, he was struggling.”
That sounded familiar. Scarlett thought about the incisive look he’d given her at Lucy’s wedding, when she’d had to pull herself together within the space of a few breaths in front of all of their friends. He’d known exactly what she was doing.
“And his parents didn’t even tell him about the dyslexia diagnosis until he figured it out himself as an adult. Marlon said he’d never seen him as angry as that day.”
Scarlett frowned. “He’s dyslexic?”
“Severely,” Camilla nodded. “He didn’t tell you?”
Scarlett shook her head, but the many instances of Archer joking about his own intelligence echoed in her mind. She remembered the expression on his face when his mother had called, and the hollow, broken look on his face when he’d showed up outside her house that evening.
“The fact that he was able to make it through school with zero accommodations is seriously impressive,” Lucy said. “Not to mention building his business.”
“I asked him one time how he manages it,” Camilla said, “and he told me that he got really good at reading people. He’s also really good at visualizing things, so he can conceptualize jobs in a bunch of different ways, which gives him an edge over the competition.”
“And he’s super charismatic,” Lucy added. “I think his personality wins half his jobs before he even quotes them.”
“For sure,” Camilla agreed.
“Wait.” Scarlett put up her hands, and the two other women fell silent. “How would this have anything to do with me? Does he think I would care that he’s dyslexic?” She felt vaguely offended. Did he think she was that shallow?
Lucy shook her head. “It’s like this,” she started. “When my career fell apart, it felt like my world was falling apart. But then I rebuilt my life into something new.”
“Something better,” Camilla added.
“Yeah. So the fact that I was afraid of going out and getting another sales job meant I had to make my stationery business work. My weakness became my strength. But I was always afraid of changing it in case it all fell apart, until I realized I had the ability to do whatever I wanted.”
“Archer might seem easygoing,” Camilla added, “but he manages everything in his life really carefully. He’s had the same friends for decades. He has his own systems in his business. He has fail-safes and checks to make sure he never looks like he’s struggling.”
“And then I come in, and all of a sudden he needs to open all that up and expose it,” Scarlett finished, finally understanding.
Her friends nodded.
Scarlett let out a long sigh. “That’s all well and good, but what if he decides it’s not worth it to open up to me?”
Camilla gave her a sad smile and patted her hand. “That would be very silly of him.”
Scarlett’s chest caved in slightly. Everything felt so heavy . She needed to relieve some of the pressure, and what came out was a hoarse whisper: “I think I’m in love with him.”
“Oh, Scarlett,” Lucy said, and she and Camilla crossed the space that separated them from Scarlett to wrap her in a hug.
They held each other for a long moment, until Scarlett’s throat burned with trying to hold back her tears. She stepped away and shook her head. “I’m fine. I’ll be fine. I should finish up my work before it gets too late.”
“You want us to stay?” Camilla asked, brows drawn.
Scarlett shook her head. “I’m fine. Really.”
Her friends didn’t look convinced, but they did eventually bid her goodbye and exited the shop. As soon as the door was closed and locked behind them, Scarlett’s smile collapsed and her shoulders rounded.
She was in love with a man who might not be able to love her back the way she wanted. Once again, she’d be hurt and abandoned, tossed aside because she wasn’t worth the effort.
She allowed herself the space of three breaths to feel sorry for herself, then straightened. She hadn’t made it this far to fall apart now. She’d rebuilt herself after Jackson left her without a word. She’d created a business that could withstand a murder. Archer might not want to be with her, but she wouldn’t let that destroy her. Not again.
Her eyes still prickled with unshed tears, but Scarlett had work to do. Much of her stock had been purchased over the course of the party, and she had to make a plan to replenish it. That would require more rounds to the wholesalers to pick up new blooms. She made detailed notes, then went to the register and cashed out. Most people had paid by card, but there was still a bit of cash to take out and deposit at the bank.
The mundaneness of the tasks helped settle her mind. She was good at running her business. She enjoyed the thousand little tasks that made her shop a success. Nothing could take that away from her. Would she like a partner to lean on once in a while, when things got hard? Would she like someone to share her successes? Of course. But it looked like that was a fantasy that wouldn’t come true, so Scarlett had to make do with what she had.
Right now, she had a thriving business, loving friends, and a tight-knit community. Things could be worse.
Maybe if she repeated it to herself enough times, the ache in her chest would go away. After her conversation with Lucy and Camilla, she understood Archer a little bit more, but it didn’t stop her from feeling hurt by his disappearance today.
By the time she’d organized everything, Scarlett’s feet dragged. The bank was a couple of blocks away, so she locked up and drove there to make her deposit. Then, sitting in her car, she checked her phone.
No word from Archer. The last guttering flame of hope went out. She stared at the screen, feeling silly and hurt and silly for feeling hurt. What had she expected? That Archer would have texted her an apology and a declaration of love? That just because she now knew a little more about him, he’d decide she was worth the risk?
He was just like every other man in her life. He got what he wanted, and now he’d discard her like she was a sack of garbage.
Maybe it was the self-pity that caused her to miss the sleek black vehicle parked just around the corner from her house. She was so focused on getting home so she could curl up with a bag of M&Ms and a good book that she didn’t notice the unfamiliar vehicle, or the fact that the side gate leading to her backyard was ajar.
She didn’t even notice the shadow in her living room as she padded by on her way to the kitchen, and she missed the creaking of the floorboards behind her. After all, the old cottage creaked and groaned with every gust of wind. One more noise was nothing new.
It was her safe haven, and it would be the place where she licked her wounds and built herself back up to the strong, independent, smiling woman everyone knew her to be.
Or at least, that’s what she thought, until she heard a man’s voice behind her.
“You,” the voice said, “ruined everything.”
Whirling around, Scarlett backed into the kitchen counter. Her pulse shot up and her stomach clenched. “Who—who are you?”
The man was older, with wispy hair on top of his balding head and a sneer on his lips. He wore rings on nearly every hairy finger, and his leather jacket creaked as he took a step toward her. Every line of his body was threatening, but it was the cold blankness of his eyes that made Scarlett’s breath freeze in her lungs.
“I’m the man whose life you ruined,” he sneered. “So I’m going to ruin yours.”