She grinned, the sadness from earlier forgotten, and wondered momentarily if this was wrong. After all, she had only been single for a few weeks.
All that rationale went out the window as Andrew leaned forward and planted a soft kiss to her cheek.
Surprised, she flinched slightly, feeling her skin heat up. “Okay.” Her entire body tingled in anticipation as she took a deep breath and looked into Andrew’s blazing, green eyes. She was single and available, and Andrew was certainly out there, up for the taking.
“Yeah?” Andrew couldn’t believe his luck. He had been trying to be good and take things slowly, but it had become more difficult after each visit. Seeing her once per week was not enough anymore.
She nodded. “Yeah.”
Pulling back from their bubble, Andrew grabbed his bouquet of flowers. “I’ll call you to set it up.”
“You’re sure?” she questioned, bewildered and uncertain. This was Andrew Miller, now Harris, we were talking about. He was the boy who drove her crazy when she was little, and also the boy who had grown up into one of the most handsome men she had ever laid eyes on. There was no denying the attraction she felt toward him. Plus, he wasn’t one to hide his own flirtatious nature, something that garnered her more than a little teasing from Mrs. Davis.
“I’ve been waiting over eighteen years for this, Christina Laurence. I’m not letting you get away again.” With those parting words, Andrew winked and exited the shop, leaving Chris in a puddle of swoony goo.
. . .
On Wednesday evening, an excited yet nervous Andrew, found himself leaning by the door of the little flower shop, waiting for the pretty florist to lock up.
He had forgotten a crucial thing in his plan to ask her out. He had told her he would call, but he forgot to ask for her number.
Now, he could have googled her number, or even given a call to Henry or good old Mrs. Davis. Heck, he could have called the shop and spoken to Chris herself, but this was the perfect excuse to see her again. Andrew would never pass up a chance to feast his eyes on the beautiful, petite brunette.
Looking at his watch, he knew she would be coming out soon. After all, she was responsible for closing up the shop for the evening. He remembered from previous conversations with Chris that she usually locked up on Wednesdays and left about fifteen minutes after the shop was officially closed. This gave her time to put away a few things and count the money in the register.
Chris looked around the shop, happy with what she saw. It wasn’t a large space, and it certainly wasn’t new. The antique looking counter with the equally antiquated cash register, stood proudly near the front door. It was surrounded by knick-knacks and an assortment of small arrangements. Tiny twinkle lights hung around the walls near the ceilings, casting the room in a soft glow. The walls were adorned with a variety of different frames and floral themed wall sconces. It was all very tastefully done, and come the holiday season, Mrs. Davis would set up the shop to look almost like a Christmas village, complete with an antique train set. Chris still had months before then, but she couldn’t help smiling at the mental image it brought forth as she turned off the twinkle lights and opened the front door, locking it as she stepped out into the warm July evening.
The thought that Mrs. Davis had been relinquishing more responsibility to her and had even started drawing up the paperwork in order to transfer the shop into Chris’s name, had her head swimming with happiness. So much so, she hadn’t noticed Andrew standing by the door as she tested the knob, making sure it was locked.
“Chris?” Andrew’s deep voice rang out in the quiet downtown streetscape. Chris yelped, jumping, and pressed her hand to her mouth as she eyed Andrew—who she didn’t quite recognize at first quick glance—dubiously.
“What the heck?” she asked; eyes wide, breathing a bit off, and key poised snugly between her forefinger and middle finger, ready to defend herself against her attacker.
Eyeing the key, Andrew held up his hands in surrender. “Whoa, there, sweetheart.” He smirked, taking the keys out of Chris’s fist. “It’s just me,” he continued reassuringly.
Chris took a deep breath, her heart gradually getting back to a normal staccato rhythm as she steadied herself. “Jesus, Andrew, do not sneak up on me like that...ever again.” Another deep inhale and exhale as she pressed her hand to her chest.
“Why? You’ll key me to death?” he teased. Andrew couldn’t help it. The sight of her small fist holding the set of keys as a weapon was comical. This brought back so many distant memories from when they were kids. One of the things he loved to do was tease her, and her face as he did so hadn’t changed one bit.
Chris rolled her eyes, now reacquainted to his smart mouth and witty banter. He hadn’t changed much since they were kids. “Yeah. No... Maybe? What are you doing here, anyway?”
He shrugged, a grin still plastered on his too-good-looking face.
Chris shook her head and gave him a small push, the equivalent of how he used to pull her pigtails. The pair began to walk toward Chris’s car, which was parked about twenty feet down the street.
“I forgot to ask for your number,” he eventually admitted, slowing his stride to keep with hers.
She stopped by her car, unlocking it with the remote. “Really? Is that the best you’ve got?” She tilted her head and raised a brow in challenge.
“And maybe I wanted to see you again?” he hedged, shuffling his feet. Only Chris could bring out so many emotions in him. One moment he was sure of himself, cocky and even a bit arrogant, and the next he felt like that ten-year-old pulling at her pigtails.
He looked so sweet, standing there, ears pink and eyes downcast, looking at her through his long eyelashes. It made her heart pitter-patter and her belly do flip flops, something no other man had ever made her feel. “That’s...nice, actually.” She liked his sincerity. It gave her the impression she could open up to him; trust him. This was a definite good step in the right direction.
“So, can I have it?” he inquired, taking a step forward.
She opened the door to her car and threw her purse on the passenger seat. “It’s 555-4773, but I’m here, and you’re here, so you don’t have to call me now.” It was her turn to tease him.
They had been playing this game of cat and mouse over these past few weeks. Teasing, flirting, all innocent, of course, but it didn’t stop either of them from wondering about the other and wanting to push things further.
“Well, I may still want to call you. I mean, what if I have to cancel?” He pouted, jutting out his bottom lip. Something Chris noticed he did quite often.
She laughed, throwing her head back and shaking it side to side in mock disbelief. “Oh, my God! That would be tragic, but that would mean we’ve made plans.”
“Touché,” he countered, then looked around nervously. “Come have dinner with me.”
“Right now?” She frowned, looking down at her jeans and tattered sweater, as she ran a hand through her tousled hair. “It’s late and I look like crap.”
“You look beautiful. Come on. Unless you have plans. I mean, shit, I’m an ass. I didn’t even think of that.” His face grew serious for a moment as he wondered if he had pushed too far, too fast. He wanted to get closer to her and find out what he had been missing all these years, but he also didn’t want to scare her away.
Chris caught on quickly and diffused the situation. “No, no...God, no. No plans. Unless you count a microwaveable frozen dish and some stale box wine.” She shrugged and looked away, feeling oddly conflicted and maybe even a tad pathetic given her solitary evening plans.
“How about a burger and fries at the diner?” Andrew took a deep breath and let it out quickly. “We don’t even have to call it a date. How about two old friends eating together and getting reacquainted?” he rambled, voice faltering.
He is so cute, Chris thought. She bit her lip to keep herself from saying anything while he spoke. When he was finally done with his nervous word vomit, she asked, “So
are you going back on the date offer, or...?”
“Oh, no,” he backtracked. “I want to take you out, God, I do, I just...” He trailed off and looked at her, really looked at her. She was giggling silently, eyes shining and happy. “God, Chris, I’ve been wondering where you’ve been all these years. You have no idea, do you?”
“No. Not really. How about you buy me a burger and tell me,” she offered with ease. She knew by his sudden awkwardness he was without a doubt attracted to her, and he wouldn’t have flirted with her or asked her out otherwise. Mrs. Davis was undoubtedly right all along.
This was how, on a warm Wednesday evening in July, the two found themselves sitting across from each other at the diner down the street from Daisy's Flowers. They talked in depth about their pasts and education.
“Mrs. Davis is handing over ownership in a few weeks. I’m excited,” she admitted, before shoving a French fry in her mouth.
Andrew, transfixed by Chris’s pouty, naturally red lips, nodded then shook himself out of his trance. “That’s great. I didn’t even know you’d become a florist.”
Chris laughed. “I didn’t. Well, not at first. I got a business degree and ended up working at the Westfield Accounting Firm as their office manager slash secretary slash coffee maker. I liked it, but I didn’t love it, you know?” Andrew nodded, as Chris took a sip from her pop. “So, after about a year I started dabbling with taking some online floral design classes. It was fun and gave me something to aspire to that seemed to come naturally to me. When I went to see Mrs. Davis about maybe working for her, she explained how she wanted to retire. It was win-win for both of us. You remember how I used to love playing in Nana’s garden?” Her smile was a mile wide as Andrew took in all of that information.
“Oh, yeah, Mom used to help pollinate the plants in the spring, and then Eva would make that special iced tea.” Andrew grinned at the memory of his mother running around the Laurence’s backyard with Q-tips in a baggie “doing what the bees used to,” as she had called it.
Chris snorted. “Special tea...” She shook her head, giggling. “Turns out Mom’s ‘special tea’ was actually mostly made up of gin, I think.” She rolled her eyes. “No wonder it made them so giggly.”
Andrew’s eyebrows knitted together. “I wasn’t actually looking at them; I was too busy watching you run around the backyard, picking flowers. I’m surprised you never got in trouble,” he said, tucking into his food.
Lost in the same memory, Chris added, “They’d let me pick anything, but I always picked the wild daisies. You loved those.” She sighed, remembering how sweet he was when they played together.
Andrew’s mind wandered back to when he was eight, to one of those times when he and Chris had counted how many petals were on a daisy. “The numbers were never the same,” he commented aloud.
She smiled. “You remembered.”
“Chris—” Andrew reached across the table and ran his finger over Chris’s knuckles “—I told you, I never forgot anything about you.”
Chris’s belly did those familiar flip flops again and she wondered if this was all a dream. The Man in the Moon wasn’t real, yet here was Andrew: perfect in every way and very, very real. “I can’t believe you’re back,” she whispered, her voice shaky.
“I’m not going away this time, Chris.” Andrew’s voice was sincere. Chris couldn’t help the swoony feeling that shot through her body like a lightning bolt, taking with it all her misconceived perceptions and letting her drop whatever guard she’d had about getting to know him again. She was single and so was he. They knew each other as kids and there was no reason why they couldn’t get to know each other as adults.
Hell-bent on opening up to him, Chris told Andrew about missing her mother and how her Nana Laurence had been the one to step in when she needed a motherly figure up until she had also passed in her sleep.
Andrew could relate all too well. Not a day went by where he didn’t think of his own father, and how much fun they’d had together before he died. Looking at the mirrored glass every morning when he shaved reminded Andrew of his dad. He had grown up to look like the splitting image of the man he loved so much. It was the one concrete reminder he had of Andy Miller Sr.
Andrew, in return, told her about his childhood in Chicago and how different it was from Westfield in the eyes of a ten-year-old.
Opening up to each other felt natural. Chris had never even told Frank about some of the things she was now discussing with Andrew.
Things like that time she scraped her knee on Jared’s Slip n’ Slide and had to have stitches. Of course, Andrew remembered and asked her if she still had a scar.
The fact he remembered such a trivial thing made her feel as though she was actually important to him, something she missed. It was all well and good to be comfortable being single, but that feeling of knowing someone truly cared about you, it was kind of a wonderful thing.
“Favorite band?”
They were done eating now and had reverted to what was basically a game of twenty questions.
“Kiss. You?”
I wish, Chris thought. Those lips could be used as a deadly weapon; she was sure of it. “Hmm, hard one. Right now I’m really into Maroon 5. It varies, though.” She paused briefly, thinking of her next question. This was getting to be a lot of fun. “Okay, favorite movie?”
“But you didn’t answer the last one, cheater.” He cocked an eyebrow in challenge.
“I have several, actually. I can’t narrow it down,” she countered with a smile.
“All right, all right,” he conceded. “The Shawshank Redemption. You?”
“The book was better,” she argued with a shrug, then continued, “Clueless.” She watched his face morph comically as he tried, but failed miserably, to hide his smirk. “Don’t even,” she warned, pointing a delicate finger in his direction. “It’s a girl movie, I know, but it’s my guilty pleasure.” She shrugged and sipped her Coke through a straw.
Andrew watched as Chris’s lips puckered and wrapped around that little straw. Nope, she really had no idea, he thought.
Unbeknownst to him, Chris did have some idea. She hadn’t been overly flirty or flirty at all, really. Being with Andrew was simply easy, and she found that part of her—the part mostly below her belly button and above her knees—wanted Andrew to make some sort of a move on her.
She wouldn’t go as far as sleeping with him, but holding his hand certainly wasn’t off the table. And maybe kissing. He had been taunting her with the sexy, crooked smirk from the moment she had laid eyes on him weeks ago. She had fallen asleep a few nights imagining what those pretty lips could do to her skin. The day-old stubble on his chin and jaw had also featured in a few of those sweet dreams.
Crossing her legs and shifting on her seat, Chris asked, “Favorite book?”
Andrew answered, “Anything by Stephen King,” and that was how the rest of their evening went until it got dark outside and Lynn, the diner’s owner, hinted that she needed to close up shop.
Chapter 4
Thursday morning’s alarm clock brought a smile to Chris’s face as memories from the night before came back to her full force. She closed her eyes and stretched her limbs, feeling the muscles expand and hearing the bones crack. She had gone to bed way too late, but it was well worth it to be able to spend so much time with Andrew outside the shop.
They had parted ways amicably, Andrew promising to call her and Chris giggling like a schoolgirl as she watched him leave. She had gotten into her car and sat there for a moment, thinking of her evening.
He hadn’t kissed her and they hadn’t held hands. There hadn’t been any physical contact, except that light brush of Andrew’s finger over her knuckles, but the shy glances and soft smiles he threw her way made her feel as though he’d wrapped her up in his warmth and touched her everywhere.
Rolling out of bed, she decided that whatever happened with Andrew from now on would only bring on good things for her. He wasn’t Frank. He didn’
t look at her like any of her exes had, and she felt this connection to him like no other, surely this could be a potential something.
“Nana, I think I like this one,” Chris whispered into the semi-darkness of her bedroom. She was walking by a picture of a younger version of herself along with Nana at the county fair.
Her work day went by like every other Thursday. They were busy doing arrangements for an upcoming wedding. Mrs. Davis had finalized details about her trip and had informed Chris she had only two more weeks before her ship left. Literally. The woman was going on a two-week cruise and not bringing a phone.
“And you’re sure I can handle things?” Chris asked; a frown the size of the Grand Canyon etched into her forehead.
“Pshh, dear, if you run out of ideas, Amy can help out. You know all the contacts as far as supplies go, and I trust you to order things as you need them. I won’t be here forever, Chris.” Mrs. Davis smiled reassuringly and patted Chris’s hand in a loving gesture. “I think you’re doing wonderfully.”
Taking a deep breath, Chris nodded, then went into the walk-in refrigerator to get some fresh flowers. While she was there, she used the cool air to calm herself down. Her self-confidence had taken a nose dive with her breakup, but the last few weeks had done wonders for her, and the lovely words coming from Mrs. Davis almost had her in tears. Happy ones.
She knew enough about the business that it was unnecessary for her to panic. Florists were hard to come by in Westfield and Mrs. Davis was the only one in the area. Most of the fresh flowers were delivered every other day, and she had a standing order for other supplies that came in once a week.
Chris took a few sprigs of baby’s breath, mindful of how delicate they were, and came out of the refrigerator. Hearing voices from the front of the store, she listened carefully and reminded herself that once she was alone in there, she would have to be more conscious of the doorbell out front.
“Chris?” Mrs. Davis called loudly, walking around the corner from the front of the store. Once their eyes met, the old woman was wearing a cheeky grin. “You have a gentleman caller.”
Man in the Moon (Sweet Escapes Book 1) Page 3