Page 33 of The Replacement Fiance

"I've said goodbye to everyone but I didn't want to leave without saying goodbye to you."

Fresh tears spill down my cheeks.Why does this feel like a final goodbye?

"I'm so sorry, Logan."

"I'm sorry, too," he says.

"I never meant to hurt you."

"I know."

"Merry Christmas."

"Mariah, no matter how things ended between us, this was the best Christmas I've ever had since my mother died. I just want you to know that." He presses his lips to my forehead. "Thank you."

After one more squeeze of his arms around me, Logan grabs his backpack and is gone, and I find myself staring at my door feeling more alone than I've ever felt before.

13

Mariah

It's beenthree days since I left the Soraya, three days after the apologies and awkward goodbyes to Forrest, Emily, Brad, and my parents. It wasn't too awkward with Harper who volunteered to help Cooper with all his paperwork. She even convinced our parents to put him in the cabin that Summer had rented. After all, we couldn't just throw him out of the lodge after everything he'd already been through.

As for Logan, I haven't heard from him since he left the house with his friend Chad. I know they drove back to LA together, Chad overdue for his own visit to Southern California. I've tried not to check his social media account but in the end, I couldn't stop myself. A peek at the social media accounts Logan shares with his brother revealed that he, Liam, and his friends were riding their bikes up to Monterey. Actually, it was more than just a peek.

He seemed happy in the pictures with the ocean behind him. Some of the photos were taken from a drone high above, four motorcycles on the highway. If he's trying to move on, he's doing it and I can't blame him. I couldn't even call him my friend when it came down to it. Instead, I told my family he was my mechanic. How'd I become a spineless fool? And for what? All because I didn't want to tell the truth.

I wish I could talk to Logan and apologize but what else is there to apologize for? In the end, life ultimately goes on. Brides need their wedding and reception floral arrangements, lovers need their long-stemmed red roses, and debutantes, their corsages. And on Friday morning like always, I wake up early to arrange Mrs. Garrison's graveside floral arrangement just in case Logan comes by to pick it up.

But he doesn't.

Still, life goes on, and except for one little deviation from my schedule, I'm back at my flower shop making the floral arrangements for the New Year's Eve wedding scheduled for the following day. My florists and I have been at work since yesterday, crafting the bouquets, flower crowns, pew ends and hurricane lanterns for the church ceremony and the endless table arrangements for the reception being held at the country club. It's one of the biggest accounts I've ever handled and I'm grateful for the distraction. It keeps my mind too busy to replay everything that happened in Soda Springs, from the embarrassment and humiliation of being caught pretending to be engaged to the despair I felt when I saw my parents and my sisters' faces, a feeling made worse when Logan left.

How could I have been so blind not to see that he'd always liked me?

From the way he smiled at me whenever he stopped by on Friday morning to pick up his mother's flowers, the signs were all there. And it didn't even matter if he had a cold or the flu, Logan always showed up with that smile that I now realized had only been for me. It was the same smile I saw whenever I brought the delivery vans and my SUV in for service. How could I have been so stuck in the past when my present was drop-dead gorgeous and sexy as hell?

When I end up pricking my finger with florist wire, I remind myself to pay attention to the work at hand. After all, I'm a professional and right now, I've got a truckload of floral arrangements to deliver and employees who are looking at me, wondering why I'm suddenly so absentminded. I need to get to work and get my mind back in the game of running a business.

Broken hearts can wait.

14

Logan

The guysand I get back early from Monterey on New Year's Eve. Even though it seems like we simply hit the road for the fun of it, we were actually working. While I was away playing fiancé, Liam had entertained one of Adriana's suggestions that we chronicle our road trips and post them on our channel. According to Liam, we actually earn a pretty good revenue—not enough to live on but enough that you can't ignore the potential—from ads that run on a few of our existing videos.

"And those weren't even produced really well," he'd said over lunch while we were in Monterey. "Sure we were still figuring out how to work our drone and all, but viewers still loved the final product. They also love the idea of two brothers hitting the road and talking about stuff... as long as we don't talk about our love life and shit."

"Didn't Adriana edit those?" I asked and my brother nodded.

"She'll do the post production work. We have to come up with the trips," he said. "And it's not like we don't know the best routes around here. Just imagine, Logan, it's work and pleasure all rolled into one. What could be better than that?"

"Let's get it going then," I told him then. After all, I was going to need something to distract me from thinking of Mariah.

As we drive along the freeway heading south on the 405, Liam and I make one more stop before heading home. As he waits for me outside, I run into the supermarket to bouquet of flowers. It's not the same but it will have to do. I'd planned on canceling the standing order of flowers from Mariah's shop before we headed out to Monterey but I never got around to it. I'll have to do it after the New Year. I'm sure things won't feel as raw then.

The flowers I stick into my backpack are a sad replacement for the ones I normally bring with me every Friday and Liam knows it. I see it when he shakes his head just before we ride to the cemetery.

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