Coming Up Roses

by Staci Hart

  Should have worn sunscreen. Irresponsible asshole.

  My teeth ground together with a squeak, and my eyes followed my hands as I snip, snip, snipped stems, imagining they were Luke’s neck.

  I realized I sounded like the insufferable one, like he’d said. But ten years of being ignored by Luke Bennet would do that to a girl.

  Maybe ignored was the wrong word. Forgotten. Rejected. Disregarded.

  Because Luke didn’t ignore anybody. In fact, he had a knack for making every person he came across feel special and important to him. As such, every girl in a thirty-block radius—including yours truly—had, at some point, had a massive crush on the handsome, cavalier charmer. Regardless of the fact that he systematically snakebit every woman he came across and exploited every little crush to the fullest extent.

  The worst part? He didn’t do it with a single malicious intention. He just gave and took and moved right along.

  I almost couldn’t be mad at him.

  Almost.

  Except I couldn’t forgive him for the night he’d forgotten. He didn’t remember that kiss, touched with whiskey and fire. It had branded me like a red-hot iron, but it’d meant so little to him, he didn’t seem to have a flicker of a memory of the moment. And the next day, when I saw him at work, he treated me as if it had never happened.

  Worse—he’d brushed right past me on his way to manhandle my best friend, Ivy.

  “Lucas Bennet!” Mrs. Bennet said in that fond way a mother scolds her child. “Let me get a good look at you.”

  He set her down, standing proudly, smiling softly. If he wasn’t a beast, he’d look like a boy.

  Mrs. Bennet lifted her hands to his face, her gnarled fingers brushing his cheeks. My heart lurched at the sight.

  Rheumatoid arthritis had twisted her hands, limited her mobility, ceased her passion. I’d been her hands for years, my mentor, my surrogate mother. She’d taught me everything I knew, inspired my own passion. I’d found my calling, thanks to her.

  I’d found a place to belong, thanks to her.

  And now, Luke had returned with his stupid, perfect ass and his pizza bod. You know the kind—broad shoulders, narrow waist that pointed to some spicy pepperoni you’d just love to get in or around your mouth. Even through his T-shirt, I could make out the landscape of his back—hills and valleys, ridges and rolling bulges, like alluvia drawn by water running through sand.

  My life as I knew it had officially been flung into a meat grinder, and Luke Bennet’s hand rested firmly on the crank.

  Snip, snip, snip, I cut, so mad that I saw everything behind a curtain of fuchsia. I barely even noticed Brutus, the shop’s cat and premier rat hunter, had taken a seat on the table next to me, watching me with detached curiosity, golden eyes knowing and dark fur gleaming.

  I had known Luke was coming home—the rest of the Bennets had just arrived, and per the usual, he was late. Really, I should have assumed he’d be working here. What else would he do? The whole point of their return was to help with the shop, and everyone had a job to do. Even Luke. Though the extent of his skillset consisted of making a joke out of everything, seducing unsuspecting women, and being a nuisance. Working the counter seemed to be the only thing he could do.

  It was here where we’d first met, here where he’d worked every summer until he graduated high school. And then he gallivanted off, never going to college, never planning for anything. Instead, he traipsed around the city without a care in the world, working a hundred jobs in a handful of years. Then, he met Wendy, and off they went to California by way of a Vegas courthouse. Two months—that was the length of their courtship.

  Seriously, she could have been a serial killer for all he knew.

  No one thought Luke would ever get married, but if I’d had to pair him with someone, it would have been Wendy. They were equally vain, vapid, and vacuous, thus making them perfect for each other.

  No one had been shocked when he caught her riding a Hollywood producer like a pony.

  I’d heard she’d laughed. I’d heard she’d mocked him. I’d heard she’d left him because she learned the flower shop was failing, thus depleting Luke’s trust and income by way of his share in the store.

  I’d heard a lot of things, though who knew how many of them were true? Because everyone loved Luke, and as far as they were concerned, he could do no wrong. The way Mrs. Bennet spoke of Wendy, she was an evil thing with no other desire but to ruin Luke’s life and happiness. Luke’s brother Kash had softer things to say, but they still painted her as a user and abuser of sweet, innocent Luke.

  Some days, it seemed I was the only one who thought he was a louse. I could fill a notebook with infractions to prove my case, if I were so inclined. There may or may not have been such a notebook somewhere in the recesses of my room, but I’d never admit, even with a gun to my temple.

  I was shivering, I realized, my fingers numb in the cold water, my wet shirt freezing, my hair dripping in icy rivulets down my back.

  “Oh, to have all my babies under one roof,” Mrs. Bennet crooned, her eyes misty.

  “Except Marcus,” Luke amended. “He wouldn’t deign himself to live at home, Mr. Independently Wealthy.”

  Mrs. Bennet tsked. “He lives two doors down. Deny it all he wants, but he likes being home just as much as any of you.” She turned to me, beaming. “Can you believe it, Tess? Can you believe he’s home for good?”

  “No, I really can’t,” I said, snipping another stem with more force than was necessary.

  Her smile fell as she assessed me. “Why on earth are you all wet?”

  “Funny story, that.” I filled up my lungs to tell her that her son had humped me in the cooler, deciding to leave out the way his very large, very strong hands had felt clamped on my waist or the delectable feel of his hips nestled into my ass. My official statement was: groping and a possible concussion with some mild to moderate shaming to really lay it on thick.

  But he cut me off. “It was my fault. I scared Tess, and she hit her head. I would have come up sooner, but I was helping clean up.”

  Her face softened, opening up like she was looking at a box of kittens instead of her grownass lying liar of a son. “That’s my Lucas, always willing to help.”

  I rolled my eyes when she wasn’t looking. Luke caught the motion and smirked.

  Stupid bastard.

  I dropped my scissors on the table with a clunk and wiped my hands on a towel next to the bowl. “Excuse me. I’m just going to go get cleaned up.”

  “Okay, honey,” Mrs. Bennet said with a smile. “Come on, Lucas.” She threaded her arm in his and towed him toward the door. “Come get settled in.”

  “Oh, I will,” he said to his mother, though he was looking at me with that outrageous smile of his tilting his lips. “I’m in for the long haul. So don’t you worry. I’m not going anywhere.”

  3

  THE BROOD

  LUKE

  Mom hadn’t stopped talking, but I didn’t hear a word she’d said.

  I hummed like an engine, my skin sparked with electricity, and every thought in my head was of Tess Monroe.

  I remembered her as a sixteen-year-old kid with eyes too big for her face and hair like a shiny penny. We met here at the shop, though we lived a block away from each other, the Bennets went to private school, and Ivy and Tess went to the local public school. Once upon a time, we had been friends—summers spent working together in the shop, pizza and video games at her place, sneaking into the greenhouse after hours with booze my sister had bought for us. The occasional rabble-rousing with Ivy, Tess on our heels, hissing warnings that we’d get in trouble.

  And though I was a shameless flirt, it never went anywhere with Tess. But somewhere along the way, something changed. I always chalked it up to the loss of her mom since the events happened within a few weeks of each other. After that, Tess locked it down like Fort Knox, complete with an armored guard and automatic weapons.

  Didn’t stop me from trying though
my efforts seemed to piss her off even more.

  Mostly, I exercised my impulses on Ivy, who in turn exercised hers on me. We were never a thing, not really. Friends, sure. Hookups? Absolutely. But never anything more. I hadn’t seen her in five years.

  Tess either, and my, what a pleasant surprise that had turned out to be.

  I’d always been averse to the word no—respectfully, of course. With Tess, it was more of an itch I couldn’t stop scratching. I wanted her to like me. I wanted her to want me. I could count the people who didn’t like me on two hands, and Tess occupied the right hand, index finger.

  And that was something I decided to rectify.

  As the youngest of five, I’d learned early how to get my way, a skill that proven useful in life and lust. Not so much in love. In that department, I’d failed miserably.

  Sadly, I seemed to be the only one who was surprised.

  I pushed open the door, chiming the bell to mark our exit from the store, and around the sidewalk we went, to the grand stoop next to the shop that marked the Bennet family home.

  The Longbourne Flower Shop had been a staple of Greenwich Village since the nineteenth century when my industrious British ancestors purchased a handful of buildings and made it their home and business. Greenhouses were built on the roof and spanned the backyards of all five properties—the shop, our home, and three tenant buildings which had been sold in the 90s to fund Longbourne’s expansion. It was our claim to fame, our draw. We were the largest greenhouse in Manhattan, and that we provided our own flowers rather than the Chelsea market or Long Island made us famous. Once, at least.

  Home was a modest word for the building we occupied. Nearly five thousand square feet of Victorian brownstone stood proudly on Bleeker, our home passed down through five generations and grandfathered in by New York’s generous laws and codes. Six bedrooms, two parlors, servants’ quarters, a library. And as we passed through the grand doorway, the house seemed to be untouched by time, just like the flower shop. Although, rather than roller skates and skateboards and backpacks like when we had been kids, the entryway was littered with a jumbled pile of shoes, gym bags and purses, coats and scarves in the dead heat of July.

  Laughter and chatter floated through the walls and doorways, the chaos of the house as familiar as Mom’s arms around me and the scent of the flower shop.

  I’d always hated the quiet. Wendy hated that I couldn’t sit in silence. There was always music going, no matter the time of day or what I was doing. Even when I slept, I slept with white noise. It used to drive her crazy.

  Then again, everything drove Wendy crazy.

  It was just that the Bennet home was never quiet, nor was it clean despite a crew of three women who came weekly to try to manage the mess. Really, it consisted of them moving piles of things from one place to another in an effort to clean around them.

  Mom and I headed into the dining room, which brimmed with raven-haired Bennets.

  Our mother had an odd—and for some of the Bennet brood, inconvenient—taste for Roman names. The eldest was Julius, who went strictly by Jett. Calling him Julius would result in one of several reactions—a black eye, a popped nose, or a fat lip. Once, I’d earned all three along with an atomic wedgie. His twin sister was younger by three minutes. Elaine—Laney, which was our grandmother’s name—was as irreverent as she was headstrong and opinionated, a Bennet gene that streaked strong and loud. And then there was Marcus, who lounged at one end of the table in his suit with a newspaper in hand like some relic from the past—no one other than Dad read newspapers anymore. But there he sat with his nose in the crease like the dork he always was. At his side stood Kassius, my twin by Irish standards. Kash and I had been born eleven months apart and shared a room until I left for LA.

  By all accounts, he was my best friend on the planet.

  At the other end of the table sat our father, and though his expression was closed, his eyes shone bright and brilliantly blue—another Bennet trademark. As was typical, his shirt was smudged with greenhouse dirt, the beds of his nails always packed with soil, no matter how well he’d washed them. His hair was the color of freshly fallen snow, and his lips quirked at the corner like they held back some secret they’d never let go of.

  Their faces turned to us, coupled with a bawdy burst of noise, and before I could say hello, they were out of their seats and swarming me.

  Jett hooked me around the neck and pulled me, twisting me into an awkward hold. “Hey, little brother. Had enough tofu and bikinis?”

  “Never,” I said, twisting out of his grip.

  Laney flung herself at me, wrapping her slender arms around my chest. “I love that he calls you little when you’re taller than all of them.”

  I wrapped her up in a hug, laughing. “He’s just jealous. It’s hard being this beautiful.”

  Marcus wore a sideways smile as easily as his Italian suit, offering a hand for a shake. God forbid his shirt get wrinkled. “Good to see you, kid.”

  I rolled my eyes, keeping Laney in my grip with one arm when I took his hand. “You’re two years older than me.”

  “That’s dog years in maturity.”

  Before he could argue, Kash busted into the mix like a puppy, making a sandwich out of Laney, who squealed between us like a giggling piglet. Kash laughed into my ear, clapping my back.

  “Missed you, man.”

  “You missed me being your wingman,” I corrected.

  “Please—if anybody was the wingman, it was me,” he said with a smirk, shoving me in the shoulder when he let me go.

  Dad nodded, his sideways smile firmly in place and his hands in the pockets of his scuffed-up pants.

  “Look, Mr. Bennet,” Mom said proudly. “He’s here! California’s too far. Always said it was, didn’t I?”

  “Glad you’re home, son. Hopefully the lack of miles between you and your mother will serve you as well as it will her.”

  “Oh, you,” she huffed playfully, swatting at his chest. “It’ll suit him just fine. It’ll suit all of them, won’t it?”

  We offered our agreement to appease her, as we always did. Truth was, four out of five grown Bennet kids moving home had been born out of necessity rather than desire. Though not our own necessity—that of our mother’s.

  It was the only way we were going to save the flower shop, and it would take all of us to do it.

  “Come sit down, Lukie,” Laney said, pulling me toward the table. “How was your flight?”

  “Long, but the flight attendant had a crush on me.”

  Marcus rolled his eyes as he sat. “You think everybody has a crush on you.”

  “Well, with bone structure like this, who wouldn’t?” I asked with a shrug. “Besides, I’m never turning down free drinks.”

  “You are girl crazy, Lucas Bennet,” Mom said with a tsk and a smile.

  “I can’t help it. I got all your charm and good looks. I was doomed from the start.” I jerked my chin at Laney, who sat next to me. “When’d you get in?”

  “Yesterday. God, I missed New York.”

  “What, Dallas wasn’t kicking it for you anymore?”

  “Oh, it was kicking something. More shit than anything, judging by the percentage of cowboy boots worn in that city.” She chuckled at her own joke along with the chorus of our laughter. “Honestly, I was looking for a reason to get out of there. I missed the city.”

  “You say that like there aren’t a couple million people there,” Marcus argued.

  “But it’s not New York,” she said, as if that explained everything. “It wasn’t hard to walk away from my corporate job, not even a little.”

  “What, you didn’t get turned on doing social media for a computer company?” Kash asked with a brow up.

  “Nope,” Laney said. “Now, if it’d been Apple, you’d have had to drag me back kicking and screaming.”

  Mom laughed a little too loud. “You didn’t all have to come home. Really, we were doing okay, weren’t we, dear?”

&
nbsp; Dad cleared his throat. “Okay being a relative term? Sure.”

  “See?” Mom said, gesturing to Dad in confirmation.

  Marcus’s face flattened.

  But when he opened his mouth to speak, Mom cut him off. “Now, we appreciate you kids coming home to help out, but don’t you dare feel obligated. Your father and I will be just fine. Don’t you worry about us.”

  Jett cast a glance around the table at us before covering Mom’s hand with his. “We’re happy to help out, Mom. Anyway, it’s not like we had anything else going on, did we?”

  We echoed our affirmatives in solidarity, which were, of course, lies.

  Laney had a great job with a stable, growing company. Jett managed a bookstore on the Upper West but had taken a leave of absence to come home. I’d been living on the other side of the country, not that I had any real roots there or any long-term prospects to speak of. Not that I did long-term either. But if I did, I still would have dropped it all to come home.

  Kash had never left though. Instead, he took to the greenhouses to help Dad, who wasn’t getting any younger. If anyone was going to take over the shop that’d been in our family for generations, it’d be Kash.

  And Marcus … well, after making a relative fortune in hedge funds, he’d bailed to day trade. And then to buy the shop—and its substantial debt—with the sole intention of turning the business around.

  The honest truth? Mom was perfectly content making pretty things and ignoring ugly ones, and Dad was happier in the dirt than the paperwork. When business was booming, Longbourn had taken care of itself. But when times got tough, no one possessed the acumen to patch up the holes in the boat. And it had almost sunk.

  I only hoped we would get it back on the water. With our bullheaded bunch, I had no doubt we’d get it moving again, if powered by nothing more than dog-paddling and sheer will.