The Sweetest Secret

by Jacquie Underdown

‘Welcome to the country.’

  ‘And I love that part of my job. That’s why I do this. But the deliveries, because of the long distances between towns, is taking up so much time, and I don’t feel like I’m servicing the customers to the best of my ability. I take my profession seriously, Sam. I’m more than just a florist—I help people with their lives …’

  The door opened, the bell tingling. The man she served early Monday morning, her very first customer, strode into the store. He was smiling, his eyes bright—a complete contrast to the demeanour he possessed earlier in the week.

  She stood, meeting him on the main floor.

  He pounced at her, picked her up in his arms and spun her around. ‘You’re a bloody genius,’ he said, grinning at her. ‘A bloody genius.’ She couldn’t stop the smile that spread across her face. She had happy customers before but never had she had someone bodily lift her into the air.

  It was a mixture of awkward and exhilarating, exhaustion and rejuvenation. A glance back to Sam revealed he was on his feet, watching the interaction warily.

  The man placed her feet back on the ground. ‘She forgave me. A couple of times.’

  Ellie laughed. ‘Glad to hear it, though maybe a bit too much information.’

  ‘So now I want a bunch that says ‘I will love you forever.’’

  ‘Okay, well, you’re lucky, I still have some roses left. You can’t go past roses for expressing one’s undying love.’

  ‘How about yellow,’ he said, pointing to the vase holding the powder yellow roses.

  Ellie shook her head quickly. ‘No, yellow is a sign you’re not in it for the long haul. They are the flowers of players. And I think your girlfriend has a touch of sophistication, especially if the last bunch was such a hit. So that rules pink out. For love, I think we need red.’

  She picked up a few stems and arranged them in her hand. ‘How many are you thinking?’

  He shrugged.

  ‘A dozen isn’t a grand enough gesture, more than eighteen would feel a little disingenuous. I think eighteen will be …’

  ‘Perfect,’ the man finished for her.

  ‘Exactly,’ Ellie said with a smile, already bunching the long-stemmed red roses into a big triangular arrangement.

  She skipped around Sam, who had taken his seat again, and tore off a sheet of pewter tissue paper, then dressed the flowers. From the wall mounted dispenser, she cut off a long stretch of black ribbon and tied a big bow around the bunch. The red contrasting with the grey and black was striking. Elegant.

  ‘For you,’ she said, handing the flowers over.

  ‘My girlfriend will like these?’

  ‘Definitely.’

  He nodded, grinned. ‘You have real talent.’

  Ellie’s cheeks swamped with heat, never one to take a compliment easily. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘I’m Gareth by the way.’

  ‘Ellie. Lovely to meet you.’

  Gareth pointed to Sam. ‘She’s a keeper.’

  Sam shook his head. ‘She’s not my …’ But he didn’t finish.

  ‘I get it, man,’ Gareth said with a wink.

  The nod and slow smile from Sam showed he wasn’t going to argue the point but humour this man instead.

  They fixed up the money. Gareth told Ellie more than once that he’d be back, then he left.

  Sam was looking at her with a smile on his face when she fell into the seat beside him with an exhausted sigh.

  ‘What?’ she asked, cheeks flushed with warmth under his intense chocolate gaze.

  ‘Gareth was one happy customer.’

  ‘He was. A little more exuberant than I’m used to, though I generally do have many happy customers.’

  Sam nodded, considering her for a long moment before saying, ‘I think I’m starting to sense that. I guess my question is: why? I’ve worked with a few florists, and I’ve not seen that type of reaction.’

  Ellie cleared her throat, shrugged. She wasn’t sure if she should speak the truth, or if he were open-minded enough to hear, truly hear, what she was saying.

  One thing she’d learned over the years was that people were incredibly dismissive of anything that could be remotely associated with the ‘unexplainable’.

  It was frightening sometimes, the voracity with which people were ready to put down what she said out of fear she was ‘new age’, or god-forbid, ‘spiritual’, of which she was neither, but that wasn’t the point.

  An abashed smile crept onto her lips and she couldn’t meet his gaze. ‘I can somehow sense what flowers the customer needs for their particular situation.’

  Sam’s eyes widened—not so much with shock or disbelief, but rather with curiosity. ‘Really?’

  Ellie sipped her tea. ‘Yes. Really. It’s helped me become successful. Except, when I’m overwhelmed and stressed like I have been most of this week, and my intuition leaves me.’ She rolled her shoulders, then her neck side to side, trying to loosen up the tension there. ‘Gareth was my first customer. He got to me while I was still fresh.’

  ‘I think you’re being too hard on yourself. That last bunch looked amazing.’

  She shrugged. Perhaps she was, but she planned on remaining in Alpine Ridge for a long time and that required her to be an asset here.

  She loved her job. Floristry was a big part of her life. She wanted more than anything for this to work.

  ‘I want the community to accept me. I need this.’ She smiled wearily. ‘I don’t know. Maybe I just need a good night’s sleep.’

  ‘Have you thought about hiring someone to handle the deliveries for you?’

  Ellie laced her hands behind her head, elbows out to the sides, and released a long, noisy exhale. ‘Yeah, it had crossed my mind. I was trying to make this happen on my own. But, I think I do need help.’

  Now that she had admitted that, the week’s stress slowly dissipated like fog on the lake once the sun warmed the surface.

  ‘Stress does have a way of overcomplicating things. For a few months after Mitch’s wife died, my brother and I were incapable of making on-the-spot decisions. I don’t even know how we managed to get through the harvest. ‘

  ‘And who is Mitch to you?’ Ellie asked.

  He smiled. ‘Sorry. I have a tendency to think people have all the information that lives in my head. Mitch is my eldest brother. His wife Rachel died last April during childbirth.’

  Ellie gasped ‘Oh, God, how … terribly sad.’

  Sam scratched his chin with his palm. ‘Yeah. But we’re coming out the other side.’

  Ellie’s throat tightened. She didn’t know Mitch or Rachel, but the pain of it all was imprinted on Sam’s features and stormed in his eyes. ‘I’m really sorry.’

  He gave her a faint, sad smile. ‘Thanks. Anyway, that’s not the cheeriest topic to talk about.’ He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small packet, which he held in his hand. ‘For you. A shop warming present. I can usually charm people with flowers but to charm a florist requires a little more imagination.’

  He’s trying to charm me? She looked into his eyes as she took the packet from him. Her fingers were a little shaky as she unpeeled the wrapping paper.

  ‘I guess it’s more like an apology for being such a dick on Sunday.’

  She peered at him for a long moment, noting the coy curl of his lips. ‘Why were you such a dick on Sunday?’

  He shook his head and gestured at the present. ‘Open that first.’

  Curiosity stirred beneath her flesh. She ripped off the remaining paper and pulled out a circular glass medallion attached to a silver chain. She held it closer. A wispy dandelion was set inside.

  Her heart stuttered. She looked into his eyes. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘It’s a wish. When you were younger and saw these blowing around, did you make a wish?’

  Out the side of her grandmother’s house was a big patch of grass. In the summer, when the predictable Victorian heatwave would arrive, right about January, the dandelions would be everywher
e.

  When she was eleven or twelve, skipping on the grass with her jump rope, despite the heat and sweat and warm summery wind, she was determined to reach one hundred skips without getting her feet all tangled.

  At first, she saw the white wispy ball of fluff from the corner of her eye. Always alert, she quickly flicked her head to see what it was. A dandelion was blowing haphazardly above her head. Her feet caught in the rope. She was at eighty-seven skips but didn’t care, instead, dropped the handles and held her palm up.

  It seemed the dandelion was attracted to her because it flew directly into her hand. That may not be the way it really happened, but it was the way she remembered it happening.

  Closing her fingers over the dandelion, she caught it. Carefully, so the wind didn’t gather it up and blow it away, she held it by a few thin, feathery threads, closed her eyes and made a wish.

  She couldn’t remember what she had wished, some such youthful desire. Then she blew on the dandelion and it was taken again by the hot wind, tossed this way and that, her wish igniting its long slender petals.

  Ellie smiled at Sam. ‘I made wishes all the time.’

  ‘This way you can make a wish whenever you need.’

  Her chest ached with a warmth of emotion she wasn’t willing to acknowledge. The history of this unassuming flower went back thousands of years. They were not only a food source and used for medicinal purposes but were a symbol of hope. ‘Thank you. It’s perfect.’

  ‘You can hang it up on your rear-view mirror or in a window.’

  ‘I will.’

  Sam had the sweetest heart wrapped inside a hulks body. But only when he was willing to show it. He could also be that hulk, like he had shown her on Sunday, and Ellie was more than intrigued as to why.

  ‘So is everything okay with you? You were … distracted on Sunday.’

  He sighed, shoulders rolling subtly inwards. ‘I’m sorry about that. I thought …’ He stopped, glanced at his hands, then met her eyes again. ‘I thought pushing you away might …’ He groaned, scrubbed a hand through his hair. ‘This is harder to say than I thought.’

  She smiled nervously but didn’t interrupt.

  ‘I’m attracted to you, Ellie. Very much so. And I thought pushing you away was the right way to handle that. Considering we both aren’t interested in a relationship.’

  All the breath left her lungs. ‘I …’ she hesitated, trying to think of how to respond to that. On some level, at least by the way her heart was melting, she was happy to hear this.

  But, rationally, when ruled by her head and not her hormones, this was bad news. She had sworn to stay away from men until she understood the reasons why she always chose those that were no good for her.

  Knowing she was physically attracted to him was making it hard to keep that promise to herself. And now learning that it was a mutual attraction just complicated things more.

  But his admission of attraction didn’t excuse his behaviour. He was cold to her, and she didn’t deserve it.

  ‘Don’t ever treat me like that again.’ And by the time she said this, she was a little angry.

  He shook his head. ‘I won’t. I promise. It’s not okay. I was hoping my gift, and me coming here to explain, might allow us to come to some kind of peace deal.’

  ‘Peace deal?’

  ‘Hopefully. If you forgive me.’

  She sighed. ‘Sure. No big deal.’ Except it was, but she wasn’t going to make whatever this was between them any bigger. A peace deal was the less difficult route. Maybe. Hopefully.

  ‘Oh, hell,’ Sam said, wincing.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I just realised most people think of a dandelion as a weed. I’ve just gifted you a bloody weed. Honestly, I’ve never thought of it that way.’ He sighed, smiled awkwardly. ‘Not very charming after all.’

  She shook her head, running her thumb over the glass. ‘I’ve never thought of them as a weed either.’ Growing up in the city, she didn’t see any, so they seemed extra special when she did go to Gran’s in the country.

  ‘It’s just that I dreamt about one, and you were in the dream too,’ he said. ‘I can hardly remember the details—’

  Ellie’s eyes widened. ‘You dreamt about one?’

  He sat back, forehead wrinkled. ‘Yeah. Why?’

  She waved away his question. ‘Oh, nothing. It’s probably nothing. Just folklore.’

  He leaned forward, elbows resting on his legs. ‘What folklore?’

  Ellie sipped her tea, placed the cup back on the bench. Eyes focused on her hand still gripping the cup, she said, ‘Supposedly when you dream of a dandelion, it represents a happy union.’

  Sam nodded slowly.

  She met his gaze and grinned sheepishly. ‘But, as I said, it’s just folklore.’

  ‘Right. Folklore.’ Sam sat up straight in his chair, ran his fingers through his dark hair. ‘You haven’t by chance eaten any of the Cupid cupcakes Amy makes?’

  Ellie narrowed her eyes. What did that have to do with anything? ‘Amy gave me two on the house. The day I met you.’

  Sam nodded, his lips forming a long tight line. ‘Of course she did. So, they were the cupcakes in the box that I … that you left behind, and I …’ he trailed off.

  Ellie laughed at the obvious distress pulling at his features. ‘What’s the big deal?’

  ‘No big deal.’ Sam wiped his palms on his jeans and looked around the shop. ‘You want me to help you clean up here?’

  ‘No way. Now that I’ve sat down, I’m not getting up. It can wait till tomorrow. I’m going to come in and put an ad online for a shop assistant while I’m here.’

  Sam smiled, though there was a tightness around his eyes. ‘Sounds good to me.’

  Chapter 6

  The rain was pelting down as Sam pulled his ute in out the front of Mitch’s place on Monday morning. Typical winter weather—cold and wet. They had a meeting with a retailer’s representative this morning. A major bottle shop chain that, since signing with five years ago, had seen their profits soar.

  The representative was flying in so they could create a blend specifically for the retailer’s line.

  The Mathews Family Vineyard usually mixed its own blends from year to year, but this was a first creating one for a supplier.

  The lightness in his chest and his left leg bouncing was enough to remind him he was excited. It was another step forward for the vineyard; a way he and his brothers had put their own unique stamp on the operation since they inherited it seven years ago.

  As he drove, his thoughts drifted to Ellie. They tended to do that … a lot. More than he’d like to admit.

  Sam was a fairly grounded person, wasn’t one to believe in ghosts or superstition, but the dandelion dream, after Ellie had told him what it meant, kept playing in his brain. It made him nervous. What if there was some truth to the folklore?

  He shook his head and grinned at his own ridiculousness. Of course there was no truth to it. He’d dreamed of a woman whom he was attracted to, no big deal, and it just happened to also contain a dandelion. It wasn’t a bloody X-File.

  Cupid cupcakes . Yes, then there were the Cupid cupcakes. He’d actually heard firsthand of their matchmaking capabilities. His mate from school was getting married in spring thanks to his consumption of those cakes. Not to mention Tom and Amy.

  Snap out of it, Sam. Really. You’re frightened of fucking cupcakes?

  But it wasn’t cupcakes that frightened him. No. It was himself. It still baffled him that he hadn’t tried to get Ellie into his bed. Something about her made him want to tread differently, which was very much not like him.

  He ignored the answers that floated through his brain. One particular thought hinted that the reason he was different around Ellie was because he wasn’t just attracted to her in a physical sense, but that he liked her in every sense possible.

  All this attention he was paying to a dream and cupcake myth was reaffirming that.

  And he knew that if
he did lure her into his bed, he wouldn’t want her to leave.

  But before he self-analysed the reason why he’d want her to stay, he convinced himself that that little internal conversation hadn’t even happened.

  Sam looked up at Mitch’s home and resisted getting out in this downpour, but he wanted to say good morning to Sophie. During the week, he didn’t get to see her as often as he liked.

  He climbed out of the ute, barely missing a muddy puddle beside him. Head bent forward to deflect the worst of the big heavy drops, he dashed up the stairs and let himself into Mitch’s home.

  Georgia, Mitch’s nanny, was eating breakfast with Sophie at the dining table. She’d been a regular feature at Mitch’s home since he started back at work eight months ago. She was a bright, funny woman, originally from Texas.

  When her husband died, she decided to take life by the balls and has travelled all over the globe in a nanny capacity. Despite being wonderful with Sophie, she was good for Mitch too—they both knew the heartache of losing a spouse.

  Sophie grinned at Sam, pushing banana between her gums and teeth when she saw him.

  ‘Good morning,’ he said and rushed to her.

  She held her arms up and grunted what Sam interpreted as, ‘Pick me up now!’

  ‘Morning,’ he said to Georgia as he lifted Sophie from her highchair. Banana dripped onto his jacket along with a long line of dribble. He could wipe that off later.

  He cuddled Sophie, kissed her head, breathing in the baby shampoo scent of her hair. ‘You eating your breakfast?’ Yes, it was a Captain Obvious question, but it still seemed like such a milestone to see her picking up soft foods and feeding herself.

  It seemed like yesterday she was drinking solely from a bottle, and not long before that, too small to even leave the hospital.

  Mitch rounded the corner, smiling amusedly when he spotted Sam with Sophie. ‘Might want to look at having your own.’

  ‘Yeah, like it’s that easy.’

  Mitch shrugged. ‘It is, actually. But I think you mean the girlfriend aspect. The long-term girlfriend aspect that is.’

  Sam didn’t let the jibe affect his good mood, merely shrugged it off. ‘One day.’