Chapter Three #2
Kimberly could tell she had wounded him with that last comment. She always hated to see that pain in his eyes, the pain that he didn’t let anyone else see, the pain that he trusted her to erase whenever they were together. Now, she was the one to cause it.
“Then let’s just get this over with.”
The drop of his voice and the rigid set of his jaw made Kimberly want to crawl into a hole.
It was the same feeling she had when he turned away from her on Thursday night to disappear into the woods.
Regret for being too harsh, for not being more forgiving, for not feeling the warm fuzzy things that come with reuniting with an old friend.
But Shane wasn’t really a friend anymore. How could he be?
A feeling of defeat slithered through Kimberly’s guts as she led Shane toward the register counter and the rolltop desk.
“Here?” he asked, gesturing to the desk.
“Yep.”
“So, we have to move all this?”
“Yep.”
And with that, they began grabbing up the display items and transferring them to the counter.
Kimberly tried not to think about how close Shane was to her.
It was the closest he’d been in ten years.
Her mind trailed back to that memory. The anguish, the misery, the teenage angst of wanting to stomp her feet and scream that it wasn’t fair.
But there was no time to throw a fit. Not that her father would have let her.
Still wrapped in blood-stained bandages, he ordered Kimberly and her mom about the house, deciding what they could take and what they couldn’t.
A flurry of throwing clothes in suitcases, retrieving old boxes from the garage and attic to stow away their valuables, silent tears, and secreted fearful looks.
At the time, they didn’t know where they would go, what they would do, or what would happen if they didn’t leave Warrington fast enough.
All the while, Kimberly thought of Shane.
What did he think of her? What was he doing?
Would he show up on their doorstep at any moment to give them the relieving news that they could stay?
Kimberly constantly peered out the front windows, looking for any sign of her boyfriend’s truck in the driveway.
When she wasn’t watching the street or sorting through what she’d take with her into the unknown, Kimberly checked her phone for any messages.
In the end, there was no word. No sign of Shane. Absolutely nothing, even when they passed the Warrington town sign on their way to God only knew where. What she wouldn’t have given to be this close to him on that day, to hold him one last time.
“What?”
Kimberly jumped and realized she had been staring at Shane, a felt bar lined with dazzling beaded bracelets between her hands.
And for an untold number of seconds, he had been staring right back at her.
She had forgotten just how beautiful his eyes were.
It was less about the color and more about the gentleness in his gaze, the softness in its depth that he seemed to always reserve just for her.
Those eyes were the closest she had come to home in ten years.
Her cheeks went hot as she quickly turned and put the jewelry rack away. “Nothing.”
Kimberly kept her eyes down the rest of the time as she rushed to finish. But, in true ironic style, Kimberly did the one thing she always warned against in the florist world. Never rush. If you rush, you make mistakes. And she made one. Well … almost.
She had snatched up several of the wooden quote plaques to stack them and save herself the trips. But she stacked a small one under too many large plaques, and it began to lean.
Kimberly let out a tiny shriek as she noticed too late that they were about to fall to the tile floor.
Shane spun and must have seen her distress.
In a mere second, they went from being a few feet apart to sharing air.
His hands braced the plaques in place. One of her hands had somehow landed on top of his.
She couldn’t breathe. They didn’t move. Kimberly could feel the tension in his strong hand, and how hers trembled while his was stone steady.
It wasn’t fair that her world seemed to crack under the pressure, and he acted like he didn’t even care.
In a single beat of terrible, soul-crushing thought, Kimberly wondered if he ever cared.
“You got it?”
She nodded silently, and their hands separated so Kimberly could take the plaques to the counter.
They cleared the desk, and with Kimberly on one side and Shane on the other, they moved it away from the wall and in front of one of the big picture windows.
With the desk facing the window, it’d be a great spot to show off the gift displays, and she could figure out a way to decorate the bland backside of the desk so it wouldn’t be an eyesore from the inside.
With a less than even voice, Kimberly explained to Shane what she wanted for the rack; three shelves with space for at least five flower buckets on each row, and the bases tilted just a little so customers could easily pull out the flowers. She brought out a bucket for him to get the measurements.
For those few minutes as she explained her vision, Shane never looked up at her. He just scribbled the dimensions on a little notepad and made a rough sketch of what she described.
“Okay,” he said. “I think I’ve got it. I’ll need to run to get the lumber, but I can be back in about an hour to get started. Where can I do the cutting and assembly?”
Kimberly leaned against the counter and hugged her middle. “There’s a gravel parking lot behind the store.”
Shane nodded, picked up his tool bag, and turned to go.
He was almost to the door when Kimberly couldn’t stand it any longer and dashed after him. “Wait!”
Shane stopped and angled toward her but said nothing. When those eyes landed on her again, the way they had before, Kimberly almost lost her resolve. But not quite.
“Listen … I’m sorry I’ve been a bit of a bitch to you.”
“A bit?”
Kimberly winced. “Okay, a lot of a bitch. I just … I’m scared, Shane.”
His brows knitted and he finally turned, giving his full attention. “Scared?”
“Yes, I’m scared. I’ve had a lot going on lately, and with you showing back up, it’s really dug up a lot of thoughts and feelings that I’ve worked hard to bury, you know?
You really hurt me, Shane. More than anyone ever has, and to have you just appear out of nowhere, it’s overwhelming.
On top of that, knowing I might run into your dad at any moment just has me—”
“My dad’s dead, Kim.” Shane’s voice came out firm, almost biting, as if he didn’t want to have to say those words one more time to anyone. “It’s just me and my pack that’s here in Tolstone.”
Her jaw dropped. Isaac Snyder was dead? No longer alive? Not roaming around somewhere on this earth like a skulking villain ready to pounce on her and her family one more time?
Absolute relief was chased by shame for being so glad to hear this news. Then, sympathy for Shane rushed in like ice water to startle her back to the present.
“I’m … I’m sorry to hear that.”
Shane smirked. “No, you’re not. And that’s okay. I get it.” He took a few steps closer and Kimberly thought to retreat but stood firm in her strappy leather sandals. “I really hope it’s some comfort to you to know he’s not in Tolstone. You’re safe.”
He stopped, a little abruptly, as if he hadn’t realized he was venturing that close.
“And if it’s even more of a consolation,” he continued, “I know I hurt you. I can’t put into words how sorry I am that I did that to you.
I don’t expect you to ever forgive me, but I can promise you that I would never do anything to intentionally hurt you like that again. ”
“Don’t make promises you can’t keep.” The whisper came out so soft, but loud enough to crack Kimberly’s heart wide open again.
Shane’s chest rose with a big breath. “This one, I will keep.”
A flicker of movement by his side told Kimberly that he had almost lifted his hand.
For what? To touch her face? Her arm? Take her waist and pull her into a long overdue kiss?
He was within reach now, dragging her under with that look and the smell of his body wash.
Any of the above would have been perfectly welcome to her addled brain.
Instead, he gave her a reassuring smile and left the flower shop. Kimberly, dazed and overcome with a longing she didn’t want to feel ever again, watched him hop into his truck—the old red pickup truck, and pull into roundabout traffic.
Kimberly didn’t know how long she had been standing there, practically floating off the floor after all that just happened.
Now she remembered why she had fallen for Shane in the first place.
He made her forget everything. When they were together, it was just them, and the outside world was nothing more than the blurry background on an old photograph.
But that was one thing she couldn’t afford right now.
Forgetting the real world. Getting lost in a romance with Shane was still out of the question.
She had too many problems, too many flaws.
Her temporary—and she sincerely hoped it was temporary—inability to shift, coupled with her lack of dominance, and highlighted by the fact that Shane and his pack would be gone from Tolstone within a couple of months at best, was the ideal cocktail for heartbreak.
She wasn’t the perfect match for him, she had her trauma to work through, and they were not destined to be together for the long haul.
Getting her emotions caught up in anything to do with Shane Snyder was just too much.
She couldn’t let all of these things distract her from getting her head and wolf in the right place.
He might have had full intentions to keep his promise not to hurt her, but Kimberly had to do her part and not let herself get in a position to be hurt. Not again.
*