Page 8 of Dahlia Made A List

“Nope.”

“The Shameless Readers is a book club, but the only books we read are romances. All kinds. If you have a favorite, we’ll add it to the schedule.” She arched a perfect brow at me. “You have a favorite romance, right?”

Feeling a lot like I did when put on the spot by teachers at school, I rushed to blurt out my answer. “Yes!As You Desireby Connie Brockway.”

“Ah, Egypt. An oldie but goodie. But too late, we’ve already covered that one. ‘Remember my words next time he calls you a bloody English rose’.”

“Yes! That is the best scene ever.”

“You thinking so is why you are the newest member of the Shameless Readers. I can’t believe you came all the way out here without asking what you were getting yourself into. You should have called me or something, girl.” She shook her head, her cloud of natural black curls dancing around her surprised face and tugging a smile to my lips.

“Did I dare not show up? I didn’t think telling Ms. Minerva ‘no’ was an option.”

“Of course it is. People tell me no all the time. Just ask my grandchildren.”

Speak of the devil.

“Ms. Minerva, you look amazing. Did you send a selfie of your new hair to your great-granddaughter?”

The older woman leaned onto her cane, her lips tipping up, and I swore a hint of a blush glowed in her cheeks. “I just might have.”

She ushered us deeper inside, but her hostess duties pulled her along to her other guests and when Maia stepped away to speak to someone, I took the opportunity to snoop.

Minerva’s home swelled with warmth and heart and happiness. The older woman’s personality gilded every surface, from the framed candid pictures of her family doing funny faces, to proud kids holding up 4H ribbons, and plenty of Minerva with an older man I assumed was her husband.

How many times over the last six months had she shared stories of her beloved Sherman? When she spoke of him, her eyes softened and her voice took on the lilt of a woman half her age. I imagined feeling so connected to another human that even years after losing them, a simple story stirred such deep emotion. The intensity of the experience: profound pain cushioned with decades of love and commitment, comfort and connection.

I swapped the bottles to my other arm as Maia found me again and led me around the living area with a centerpiece fireplace circled by plush sofas and fancy leather chairs. Maia paused to introduce me to several other women. As we joined the folks in the living room, even more called out a loud greeting as they entered behind and Maia was whisked away again to welcome the newcomers. Left on my own, I drifted off from the chatty bunch.

My gaze wandered over the assorted silver frames decorating a long narrow table behind the center sofa nearest where I stood. I recognized Minerva’s great granddaughter from the selfies Minerva had shared back at the shop and had to smile. That girl was something else, the rebel in the ever-so-proper family. She must take after Minerva more than even the older woman’s daughter and granddaughters.

In the next gilded frame, my eyes fell on another familiar face. One I’d just seen a few hours ago. Dark hair that curled around the collar of a black and red flannel shirt, lids heavy as though even amidst his family, he dare not relax his guard. Or share the secrets buried in his eyes. A sharp divot was etched between his black brows, and all evidence pointed to the line being a permanent fixture on his rough-hewn face.

My landlord.

He stood amidst a group of men and women. It looked like a generational photo, and taken not too long ago, too. “The grandkids”, Minerva would say. I grinned thinking of her bragging about these grown men and women. Two ran huge corporations, another pair practiced law, and another ran some sort of investment firm that had him flying off to places like New York, Chicago and the West Coast at the drop of a hat.

And in the midst of his illustrious relatives, Wyatt Weston in his inauspicious flannel. While his brother and cousins wore their wealth in the expensive cut of their clothes and their practiced smiles, Wyatt stood stiff and aloof, apart from his relatives in a way that resonated with the forgotten girl inside me. Part of the family but somehow a million miles distant, too.

I turned away, shrugging against the faint prickle between my shoulder blades, and found my way to the kitchen. Setting the wine bottles amongst all the others on the long farm table set before a wide bay window, I hurried back to the living room and grabbed a spot to sit. A moment later, Maia settled beside me, her bright mandarin orange sundress a beautiful contrast against the warm brown of her skin. She passed me a tall, tulip-shaped glass that gleamed in the lamp light, filled nearly to the brim with a swirling liquid mix of red, orange and gold.

“What is this?” I asked with an apprehensive grin. I could see myself spilling it already, drenching the cream suede sofa in colorful chaos. “I’m not sure I want to drink it and ruin something so pretty.”

Maia’s eyes smiled back at me as she tipped her glass, just enough to gently toast against mine. “Drink up. After your day? You definitely deserve a little sangria.”

My fingers clawed into the couch cushion beneath me, but my smile held as I tipped the glass in answer to Maia’s toast.

“Speaking of Dahlia’s day,” Minerva said, rounding one of the three sofas circling the room. “Betty Lester called me. Overflowing with the need to spill her gossip.”

I winced. Mrs. Lester smiled, waved even, whenever I passed her house on the way to my own. Most days she waved from beside her beloved azaleas. Matching bushes fronted my apartment, and more than once she’d fussed with those, as well. There’d be repercussions for dumping Brandon’s junk in those precious bushes.

I swore I caught her chatting the bushes up once, but I pretended not to hear her and shot up the stairs to my door. I’d been known to sweet talk my coffee maker, so who was I to judge?

“Said that man of yours was picking his tighty whities out of her prize-winning azaleas and she was considering having Pastor Joseph over for a cleansing. Him or Becca Stallings, with her sage and wild turkey feathers.”

My lips twitched into a smile at the idea of my neighbor arranging for a pagan cleansing of her bushes. But then, wasn’t that what I’d done by tossing Brandon’s crap over the balustrade? The Great Brandon Purge. An emotional and physical expulsion of a big mistake. The latest in a long line of mistakes. I pinched the skin between my thumb and index finger to shut down that train of thought.

“I’m making a vow of chastity.” The words escaped in a blurted rush. I sucked down a long swallow of sangria and avoided the eyes in the room. Swiping a droplet from the corner of my mouth with a clenched knuckle, I nodded hard, so my audience understood I meant my words. “Brandon’s not the first guy to cheat on me. And since I can’t seem to pick a good man, I’m thinking no man at all is the way to go.”

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