Page 76 of Highland Hearts Holiday Bookshop

We jumped apart, guilty.

“I’ve gotta run. Catch you later?” Alexander gave me another lingering kiss and I shoved him off me.

“See you later.”

Alexander pretended to tip a fake cap to me and then disappeared. Grinning, I gave a big sigh of relief. He’d articulated what I’d been thinking. What a breath of fresh air it was to be dating an actual adult who was direct with his feelings toward me.

Humming, I wandered back out into the shop and found Esther sitting at my front table, sketching out the window design, a fancy box of markers at her side. Andby fancy, I meant an actual wooden box with flowers burned into the outside, and the markers laid out neatly inside.

“That’s pretty,” I said, running a finger over the box. “Where did you get that?”

“Get what?” Esther stayed focused on her drawing, steadfastly not looking up from her paper.

“This.” I tapped the floral box and waited.

“Nowhere.” Esther’s face was a mask. I gave her a curious look. That was odd.

“This pretty box? That happens to look handmade? You just got from nowhere? It just showed up one day?” I wasn’t sure why I was pressing this issue, but Esther was acting weird, and something niggled in my brain.

“So you and Alexander?” Esther began, still not looking up at me.

Grabbing the box off the table, even as Esther made a soft sound of protest, I lifted it above me.

“‘Create beautiful art. Love, Daniel,’” I read out loud, my mouth dropping open. “You little sneak.”

“I am not a sneak,” Esther declared, rising from the chair and grabbing the box back from me.

“You told us you weren’t interested in him.”

“I wasn’t.”

“Clearly he’s interested in you.”

“Of course he is. Who wouldn’t be?” Esther looked at me like I was out of my mind.

“And you like him,” I said, not answering her question.

In response, Esthershrugged.

“Oh, come on,” I groaned. “He seems really great. And he’s handsome too.”

“I suppose.”

“Esther.” I widened my eyes at her. “What gives? Are you embarrassed of him?”

Esther rose and walked to the other side of the room where the tea tray and biscuits had been set up by the statement wall I’d been working on. She picked up a biscuit, dropping onto a chair, so I joined her.

“I’m not ready to share it with everyone yet,” Esther admitted in a rare moment of vulnerability. “Right now, it’s this perfect thing that’s just mine. Nobody can pick it apart or tell me why it wouldn’t work out.”

“Oh, Esther.” My heart twinged. “Isounderstand that.” It was what I had been doing with Alexander really. Keeping it just mine for a little longer, existing in this precious space of the unknown where if there were no expectations to be made, none had to be met.

“I figured as much, what with all the sneaking around you’ve been doing with Alexander.”

“I do not sneak,” I said, tapping a finger at my chest. “I walk confidently, like the strong woman that I am.”

“Speaking of strong women, have you found a match for Sarah yet?” Esther asked, diverting the conversation.

“No, I’m working on it, but the magick is failing me. I’ve gone through every past customer that I think could be a match, but when I use the quizzing glass, no linking word appears.” I worried my bottom lip as I thought it over.

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