Page 38 of Hemlock

People take their time walking down the street, window shopping the boutiques. Kids aren't as happy as their parents, crying when they're dragged into yet one more shop where they won't even be allowed to touch anything. I can't imagine the level of torture that must be for them. Old ladies walk in groups of three or four, no doubt trying to find the sales and bargains that after-Christmas season brings, with shops trying to lower inventory one last time before shuttering for the after-season.

I was heading to the chocolate shop, but several screaming kids could be heard in that direction, so I change my plans, slipping into a shop filled with metal art instead. I startle almost running headfirst into a giant metal-pieced black bear, the different colors of the massive thing making me think of Lisa Frank or Andy Warhol. It's gaudy and impractical, but I can also see the hard work it took to make the thing, not that I know the first thing about welding.

"How many of those do you think they've been able to sell?"

I turn my gaze to the masculine voice, noticing his silver hair and beard. Bright blue eyes smile down at me, matching the grin on his face. He's a handsome man, albeit probably in his late-fifties or early-sixties.

Laugh lines mark his cheeks, small lines radiating out from his eyes, but they do nothing to hinder the man's good looks. I bet the women fought over him in his prime. He seems to have had a lifetime of laughter and smiles, and I can't help the way my face mimics his, my own mouth tugging up in the corners as I turn my attention back to the multicolored bear.

"I bet this is the only one," I answer. "It's too big to make more than one."

"Did you see this?" he asks, his hand cupped under a price tag so I can see it.

"Really? Eleven hundred dollars? Definitely the only one in existence."

"Or," he counters. "He sells one and makes another because that price would be worth the time that would go into it."

I look around the room. "I might have made a mistake coming in here. This place is way out of my price range."

The roar of a motorcycle draws my attention, but the angle I'm standing at prevents me from seeing it slowly drive past the front of the store.

"Waiting to meet someone?" the man asks, pulling my eyes back to his. "I should've guessed a pretty girl like you isn't single."

He's flirting with me!

A good-looking man is flirting with me and he isn't belly up to the bar and three drinks deep.

And yet, nothing. I feel nothing. Well, that isn't true, I feel something... for Owen, and man if that doesn't just fuck everything up.

I'm not supposed to care enough for a thought of him to slink inside of my head, but here I am, thinking of him just because another man is speaking to me.

I offer the stranger a gentle smile, but I don't give him anything else.

"Damn it," he says, a sad huff of breath leaving his lips with resignation. "All the pretty ones are taken. Have a good day."

I turn when he walks past me and watch as he leaves the store, wondering if I just lost my chance at something real. That man doesn't look like the type that would pick a lock and enter my home in the middle of the night.

The roar of another bike has me rushing to the large window at the front of the store, but the rider atop it is wearing a fuzzy helmet with bunny ears sticking out of the top. I may not know much about Owen, but I do know he wouldn't be caught dead wearing a helmet that looked like that.

I wander around the store just a little longer, looking more at the price tags than the actual items for sale, all the while wondering if I shouldn't take a damn welding class. Then again, with as many people who walked in, I only counted two that walked out with a purchase in their hands and nothing too big to carry. Being for sale doesn't mean it will sell, and I learned that from years and years of working retail and having to rotate and clear out old stock.

I have to come to the same conclusion where Owen is concerned. Just because he might be standing in front of me one day doesn't mean he'll be there the next. He made that clear with his disappearing act this morning. Accessible doesn't mean available and vice versa.

I pat the multicolored bear on the back just before leaving the store.

Chapter 19

Hemlock

Blame normally isn't such a hard thing for me to deal with. People do bad things, and they're culpable for it. Meaning their punishment is warranted. The people I hurt have earned whatever pain comes their way. If anything, they've caused more to others than I'll ever have the chance of causing them.

Knowing this and still wanting to blame Zara for how I feel makes absolutely no fucking sense. It isn't her fault I can't get her out of my head. That's my own failure. It doesn't stop me from wanting to pull her from her life and demand that she tell me what the fuck it is about her that keeps me from being able to focus.

I'm not supposed to think of anything else other than this fucking job. It should be mindless work, the outcome resting more on instincts than anything else.

Wanting to spend the day with her was why I had to bolt like my ass was on fire the other day. I crave that woman, and I didn't have to have Ace grilling me about her the other night to know that. I feel like she's a virus that has invaded my blood, and the life draining completely from my body is the only way to rid myself of her.

"You look like you've had better days."

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