Janet gave a grateful smile. “Thank you. Aunt Charity, what time does your flight leave?”
Destiny’s mother checked her watch. “We fly out of Billings at noon. I just stopped to say a quick goodbye to Destiny.”
Janet nodded. “Love you, guys; thanks for coming to the wedding.”
“We wouldn’t have missed it.” Charity waved.
I would have, Destiny thought, but she waved and smiled as she watched the car pull away from the curb, the wedding cans clanking behind them.
Her mother put an arm across her shoulders. “Doesn’t it feel good to be helping out? To be back in Snow Valley?” She sighed. “Your father brought your bag into the shop. Don’t forget you’re staying with Aunt Faith this week.”
How could she forget? She’d been blackmailed into staying there. “Okay.”
Her mother grinned. “Sweetie, I know it’s been hard, I do ... but you haven’t been back to Snow Valley in a year and a half.”
“Don’t do this, mom,” Destiny snapped, rolling her eyes and taking off back to the flower shop. She didn’t need this lecture right now.
“I know you don’t want to hear it,” her mother said, keeping in step with her. “But being back in Snow Valley is good medicine for you. And I want you on your best behavior at Aunt Faith’s house.”
Destiny looked back. “You know I wouldn’t stay with her if I wasn’t being forced into this arrangement.” Destiny had always wanted to go to Europe, and MSU offered an exchange program. Her mother had given her consent to go on the exchange next semester—on the condition that she come to Snow Valley for Janet’s wedding and then watch Janet’s shop for the rest of the week. Janet’s parents had taken Janet’s daughter and gone to Disneyland, so Aunt Faith’s place was her only option for lodgings.
Her mother frowned. “Faith has been worried about you. She said she went to see you in Billings three weeks ago, and you refused to go to dinner with her. Why didn’t you tell me that?”
Destiny paused. “This is why you made me come here for this stupid wedding? Because I refused dinner with Aunt Faith?” Indignantly, she thought of all the quiet whispers between them at the wedding.
“Don’t act that way, young lady. You know it’s more than that. You’ve been in Montana, less than an hour away from Snow Valley, for the past year and a half, and you haven’t been to see her once.”
Destiny flung open the door to the Flower Girl and threw back a glare. “Don’t act like being here will fix anything.” Unwanted tears threatened, and she fiercely blinked them back. “Fate’s dead, mom. She’s dead. Do you get that? It doesn’t matter if I talk to Aunt Faith or not—Fate’s not coming back! You need to get over it!” She turned sharply, nearly colliding with her father and toppling the box of inventory he was bringing in from behind the shop.
He steadied the box, shaking off the surprise. “Whoa. Hey.”
Destiny stormed into the store, past her father and straight to the refrigerators that held the flowers. Janet had gone through the process of showing where the flowers needed to be set up and in what order, so Destiny would just focus on that. She grabbed a box of tulips and rushed out past her parents, ignoring her mother’s concerned look and her father’s frown.
What did they want from her? Her best friend and favorite cousin, the person she’d loved, the one she’d planned her college career with, was dead. She’d still gone to college at MSU. She’d moved on with her life. What did they want? Trying to swallow her thoughts, she moved toward the front display and began pulling out the tulips, stashing them quickly and stiffly into the vases.
Her father moved to her, a cautious second line of defense in the battle. This had always been his role, the buffer between her and her mother. “Destiny, you know your mother and I understand your reluctance to come back here, but you also know that we love you.” He put a gentle hand on her shoulder. “We want you to heal.”
Instantly, tears spilled down her face. Her father could always do this to her. His tone reminded her of when she was little, when she’d felt like he was her personal hero. He was always a soft place for her to put her head when she needed comfort. She wiped at the tears. “Fate is gone. There’s no healing from that,” she whispered, turning to her father. “I’m sorry.”
But her father pulled her into his arms. Then her mother was hugging them, too.
Destiny felt guilty. She’d been awful to them. All of them. Even at the wedding, she’d barely spoken to anyone and then slipped out early, saying she had a headache.
Her mother softly kissed the top of her head. “I know, baby. I miss her, too.”
“Me, too,” her father said through a quiet whisper. “You two were peas in a pod. I always wished we could have lived here so you could have grown up together.”
She’d wished that, too. More than anything, Destiny had always wished she could have grown up next door to Fate. But her parents had chosen to live in California, so she’d only been able to spend a week or two with Fate in the summers. Those weeks had been what both of them had lived for, and they’d almost had their dream of being together—going to college and sharing a dorm room—until the accident.
She and her parents stood there, huddled together. It was the first time in a long time that they’d had a moment like this. Destiny hadn’t allowed a moment like this to happen. Softening, she sniffed and pulled back. “You guys need to catch your flight.”
Her mother blinked and shook her head. “I don’t want to leave you.”
Her father cleared his throat. “Maybe we could stay for a few more days.”
“No.” Destiny held up her hand. “No. You both have jobs to get back to.” Her father was a surgeon, and her mother was an attorney. They were busy people.
“You’re important to us.” Her mother took her hand. “I mean it. We’ll stay.”
She hugged her mom again. “I need to do this, okay? To be here.” At this moment, she realized she really meant it.
Releasing her, her mother let out another round of tears. She wiped them away and nodded. “Okay. I’m proud of you.”
Her dad hugged her one more time. “So proud.”
“Go,” Destiny whispered.
He hesitated. “Two things,” he said as he pushed his glasses back and slipped into father mode. “We checked the grades online last night and saw that you have a B in your computer science class?”
She frowned, thinking of the jerk of a TA who wouldn’t let her have extra credit to make up for missing labs. She’d handed in all the assignments, but hadn’t realized she had to physically be in class. “Look, I went to see the stupid TA before I left, and he’s a jerk.”
Her mother cocked an eyebrow. “Well, that’s not going to work if you want to go to Europe. You know that.”
She stifled her anger, realizing it was her fault. “I’ll figure out how to get my grade up.”
Her father nodded. “I know you will.”
“What’s the second thing?”
Her father swallowed and looked to her mother, then back to her, like he didn’t want to tell her. “I checked into the college you’ll be going to next semester in Paris, and it has an art program.” He flashed a nervous grin. “It’s actually one of the best. I contacted them and—”
“What?” She was mortified. “Why would you do that?”
“Honey.” Her mother put on her attorney face and crossed her arms. “You gave up your art when Fate passed, but you’re good. We think you have a shot at—”
“Just stop!” Her voice jumped an octave. “Go.” She pointed to the door.
Her mother held her firm look, but her father sighed and shook his head. “You have so much potential.”
She didn’t speak, but another round of tears threatened to surface before she blinked them back. How dare they do this to her!
He took her mother’s arm and shook his head. “We love you, Destiny.” He nodded to the door. “C’mon, we have to go catch our flight.”
He
r mother’s bottom lip trembled, and she ran and hugged Destiny one more time. Unwillingly, Destiny surrendered to the hug. “Love you, baby,” her mother said softly before letting her go and rushing to her father’s side.
They walked out of the shop and her father turned back, raising an eyebrow. “The deadline to submit your portfolio is this Saturday. Think about it.”
But Destiny wasn’t listening; she was already headed back to the refrigerators. She gave him a parting wave. “Be safe; love you guys.”
The door dinged, signaling their complete departure, and she turned back, watching them get into the rental car. Fingering a tulip, she let out the breath she’d been holding since her father had said “art program.” She didn’t paint anymore. That was just the way it was.
***
She worked straight through the next eight hours. She greeted patrons and provided the “Yes, that was such an amazing wedding” and “Yes, I’m Janet’s cousin” speeches repeatedly. At five o’clock, she was tired. But, she reflected, the business of the day had kept her mind off her parents, and especially the art comment. Pshaw, like she needed an art program. She was done with that.
She decided she would finally scan the inventory. Sitting beside the stack of boxes, she realized how good it felt to get off of her feet. One of her guilty pleasures in life, what her father would call her vanity, was her pair of high-heeled clogs. What her father didn’t know was that wearing heeled clogs actually wasn’t as hard on the feet as some men would think. She loved them: they gave her an extra three inches, which, when added to her five feet six inches, really made a difference in how she felt.
Getting on her knees, she began scanning the boxes one by one. Each time, she made sure it connected to the computer before going to the next one. The process was tedious, but no big deal. Granted, she wasn’t a computer genius, but she considered herself technical enough to get by.
Then, without warning, the computer started beeping. Really loudly. It sounded like an alarm of some kind was going off. She stood and ran to the computer, then gaped when a creepy skull popped up on the monitor, its jaw moving up and down like it wanted to eat her.
So she did the only thing she could: she called the guy Janet had told her she shouldn’t call.
Chapter 2
Adam Moon pulled his Subaru into the back of the Flower Girl and turned off his blasting rock-and-roll music, the kind his father said was just plain noise. Jerking open his car door, he stalked toward the shop. He’d told Janet he couldn’t be interrupted this week. If he wanted to get a high score on the GRE, he had to put in the time, and between his work as a computer science TA, his side projects, and his own schoolwork, spring break was his last chance to study for the GRE. The previous weekend had flown by. Of course, he’d helped out with Janet’s wedding on Saturday, lugging flowers everywhere with Sharon and the Snow women. He’d let Janet boss him around, and he’d even put on a happy face for her.
And that man. Michael Hamilton. Adam scoffed. If Michael hadn’t come strolling into town last summer like some blast from the past and swept Janet off her feet in less than a week, maybe things would be different. Maybe he would have had a shot at dating Janet.
He thought of how beautiful Janet looked in her wedding dress. Then he cringed.
Chase, his younger brother by two years, had chastised him when he’d been sitting next to him at the wedding. ‘Dude, she was never into you.’
The truth of that comment had put Adam in a bad mood for the rest of the weekend.
Okay. Fine. Janet had never been into him. She was three years older than him. So what? Maybe the real reason for the bad mood was that Chase’s little truth-telling had forced Adam to take a hard look at his track record for past relationships. When was the last time he’d really been interested in a woman? He’d had Laura his junior year of college—last year. She’d been his girlfriend for a while before leaving him with the complaint that he took his “programming’” much too seriously.
Maybe it was true that he got, as Chase would say, ‘a bit obsessed’ with his work. So what?
Trudging up the steps to the flower shop, he yanked the door back. Who did people call when they needed something? Huh? Huh? Oh, yeah, right. Him. The obsessed person!
The first thing he noticed was the loud blaring sound. That actually made him smile. He’d specifically added the blaring noise as a fail-safe so people wouldn’t continue to mess things up after they’d already messed things up. Pretty brilliant, if he did say so himself. Looking around, he saw that a horrendous amount of boxes, partially broken down, lay scattered all over the floor. He covered his ears and trudged toward the back, appreciating the fact that his little computer alarm had worked. No one was touching the computer. No one was messing it up more and making more work for him to fix.
But he didn’t have much time to appreciate the handiwork of the skull on the screen or the piercing noise.
Someone stood. As soon as he saw her face, he recognized her. She was that annoying girl from last week. She had caught him when he’d been trying to get out of town and asked for extra credit.
Seeing her here in Snow Valley made something click. She was Fate’s cousin. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t noticed the similarity before. Well, honestly, he could believe it. He didn’t really notice much these days.
She was his brother’s age, two years younger than him. He’d heard the gossip about her. He’d heard she’d struggled after Fate’s death and she hadn’t been back to Snow Valley since then. Honestly, he had tried to forget the gossip he heard, seeing it as another inconsequential thing that took up too much space in his brain. That space was for storing important things—like coding information.
Looking at her right now, he couldn’t imagine being able to forget the girl in front of him. A fierce, angry expression lit up her face; her green eyes were wide, and her lips were pursed together. It was the same kind of crazy look his mother used to give him when he was little and he’d taken something apart around the house so he could figure out how to put it back together. Watching her fling her long, red, curly hair over her shoulder, he could tell she was angry.
All his thoughts felt as if they’d been yanked out of his brain. He evaluated her, noting the thick clogs, the kind those girls wore around campus—the ones trying to impress people. His gaze traveled upward, over her skinny jeans and her flowing red top, which was tied loosely at the top.
She pointed at him. “You’re that arrogant jerk TA.”
She hadn’t shown up to lab even once. Then she’d emailed him last week, complaining that her grade was low and stating that she wanted some extra credit to get her grade up because she’d missed some labs. He didn’t give out extra credit. Then she’d had the gall to track him down during office hours. “Right, you’re the slacker who doesn’t think she has to come to class.”
Pursing her lips, she crossed her arms. “I have aced every test. I handed in all the stupid assignments. I just didn’t realize it was mandatory that I had to physically show up to lab.”
Walking deliberately around her, he leaned in to the computer and efficiently began to work. “Well, maybe you need to learn to read the fine print.” He tapped a few keys, and the computer jamming sound stopped.
The silence provided a sudden awkwardness. They stared at each other for what felt like forever.
Then her lip curled. “Really?” She exhaled. “Are you seriously not going to let me do some extra credit? I need my grade higher to do my exchange next semester.”
He studied her for a second; not liking that she was this close to him. Even though it was a flower shop filled with all kinds of smells, he could tell she was wearing something fruity. She smelled like kiwi, or coconut, or … Wait, was he really analyzing this? He refocused on the computer. “Not my problem.”
She seemed on the verge of spontaneous combustion, but he ignored it. If he fell for every excuse as to why people didn’t show up to lab, he’d be fired for not enforcing t
he policy.
She moved in, looking over his shoulder. “You’re such a jerk.”
“Whatever.” He let the insult roll off his back and tried to pinpoint what had made the whole thing shut down.
She didn’t move.
“You can go,” he stated.
But she continued to stand there, bending down and peering at the screen. “At least tell me what’s going on with the computer.”
“You broke it.” He kept tapping on the keyboard, growing annoyed. “It looks like some of the inventory you scanned showed the expiration dates on the flowers were past due. You’re going to have to send them back.”
“But …”
He reached the list of malfunctions, then froze. He hadn’t been expecting to find a hacker attempt. “What sites did you visit?” he demanded.
She was silent for a few seconds. “I didn’t run any searches. I’ve been slammed all day with customers. Then I scanned inventory. It just started making that awful noise.”
The deeper he looked, the worse it was. Attempt after attempt had been made until the hacker had broken into his software. Some Malware virus was trying to go through all the protections he’d put into place on the credit card numbers Janet had on file. His eyes flitted to the empty flower boxes. “Don’t you know anything? You should have scanned them before you emptied them,” he growled in a low whisper.
“Listen, you’re not my TA here. You can’t just be … rude.”
But he no longer heard her or smelled her. Sweat beaded on his forehead, and his heart was racing faster than when he’d run that sprint down the side of Billings Mountain for the marathon last year. How was it possible that some computer hack was invading? The settings he’d put into place to protect Janet and her business were ironclad. He immediately started on shutting down the whole system, not wanting to waste time trying to track how they’d gotten in.
“Hello.” She tapped his shoulder.
“Just hold your horses.” He was almost there. With one last keystroke, the whole laptop turned off.
Spring in Snow Valley: A Snow Valley Anthology Page 29