Page 34 of Scr*wed By the Minotaur in Hallow's Cove
“I’m terrified,” I admitted, swallowing.
His grin faded, replaced with that deep steadiness I’d come to crave. “You’ve done things that are so much harder than this, Lea. You already built it. All this is just letting them in.”
I tried to hold onto that, the warmth of his words. “Still want them to like me, though. Is that pathetic?”
“I’d be more worried if you didn’t.” He drew me closer until my knees touched his. “As long as you remember that I alreadydo.” He leaned in, kissing just below my jaw, then lower, over the flutter of my heart.
God. He was completely unfair. “You’re going to make me smudge my mascara,” I warned, even as I wound my fingers through his hair and let myself collapse into the kiss. He tasted like everything I’d ever wanted, ever been brave enough to wish for. I wanted to stay tangled with him forever, but after a minute I broke away, breathless.
“Is there a time limit on those five minutes?” I asked.
He grinned, teeth flashing. “There’s always time for you.”
One more kiss, quick and hungry, and he nudged me toward the door. “Go,” he said softly, “before I wreck all your hard work getting pretty.”
I gathered my bag, found a clean pair of sandals, and we walked down together, out into the scented dusk. Rick squeezed my hand, steady and grounding.
The windows of Coming Up Daisies were all aglow. I could see Maisie through the front glass, already there with a camera, fussing with the decorations. Inside, the shop was transformed: every shelf and table teeming with color and light, the air sweet with blossom and sugar and the musk of freshly cut stems. There were more people here than I’d seen in one place since moving to Hallow’s Cove. Some from Rick’s circle, some from the coffee shop, a few faces from Killy’s, and—my heart stuttered—Barnaby, rising like a specter among the arrangements, elegant in a tailored deep blue suit. He caught my eye the moment I entered, inclined his head once, and offered the smallest, most gracious of smiles, as if I’d passed some secret test.
I was ushered to the register by Roan, who’d made a brilliant new logo and insisted I pose for a Polaroid before she’d let anyone else buy so much as a single marigold. Behind the counter, they’d strung up a banner; it had “Opening Day!” in wild, painted letters, where every word bloomed with hand-drawn vines and tiny, grinning sunflowers. The whole place looked alive, humming with possibility. It was exactly what I’d dreamed but never dared to ask for.
Within minutes, the bell above the door was ringing, letting in a steady current of customers—neighbors, regulars from the coffee shop, even a group of awkward high schoolers who immediately started cracking jokes about “carnivorous plants” and pretending to feed each other’s sweaters to the Venus flytraps. It should have been overwhelming, but I found myself beaming, laughing, fluttering from the register to the displays and back again, answering questions about soil and light, snipping ribbons, making up impromptu bouquets on the fly. Every interaction left me a little more dizzy, a little more convinced that maybe, just maybe, I could make it work here.
When the rush hit its peak, Rick hovered near the back wall, more bouncer than boyfriend, arms folded and keeping a watchful eye over the proceedings. His smile was proud, indulgent, and a little awed—like he couldn’t quite believe I belonged to him. I caught him staring a few times and stuck my tongue out in retaliation. The tips of his ears went pink, which was all the reward I needed.
The evening blurred in a riot of color and conversation. I lost track of how many times people congratulated me, how many hands I shook, how many times I had to dodge an overly eager hug from a customer. I felt like a country fair prize pig—admired, petted, slightly overwhelmed—but instead of making me retreat, it made me want to work even harder, to give them all something extraordinary to come back for.
I caught little flashes of my new community in the crowd: Maisie, snapping pictures; Mitch, the wolfman from Cool Beans, laughing with his partner Clay and a burly rock troll over a potted rosemary; Roan, as promised, affixing her gorgeous signage to every flat surface while also somehow managingto hand out cookies on a tray shaped like a watering can. I even spotted Gwen from Killy’s, crisply dressed and holding a bouquet like it was both a shield and a badge of honor. Every time I tried to thank one of them for coming, the words came out all tumbled and breathless, a little too much like the beginnings of a happy cry.
I was so distracted by the whirling, joyous chaos that I didn’t notice Rick slipping out the back, but a few minutes later he returned, two champagne bottles dangling from his monstrous fingers. He made a show of popping both at once, the corks ricocheting off the ceiling while the crowd whooped and applauded like we’d hosted fireworks instead of a flower sale.
He poured me the first glass, leaning over the register to hand it to me with a soft, conspiratorial wink. “To the Queen of Daisies,” he toasted, voice low enough that only I could hear. “And to her new kingdom.”
I laughed, my cheeks feeling hot. “You are so dumb,” I said, but when I looked at him, the moment shimmered with gratitude. Not for the toast or even the party, but for the world he’d built around me, scaffolding out of faith and bone. “But thank you,” I whispered, lifting my glass to clink his. “For all of it.”
He tipped his head, letting that golden grin blaze for me alone, and in that second I knew I was completely, irrevocably his.
The crowd thinned as the evening waned, the last stragglers leaving with arms full of hydrangea and cinnamon buns. I started collecting discarded cups and napkins, still half-afraid the mess would eclipse the glow of a night I didn’t want to ever end. But Rick was already sweeping behind me, making short work of the debris. At one point I caught him dipping the broom handle low and spinning it like a dance partner, grinning when he saw me watching. He crossed to where I stood, took my handwith exaggerated gallantry, and pressed a kiss to the back of my fingers. “Permission to escort you upstairs, Ms. Thompson?”
I should’ve played coy, but I couldn’t muster it. I only nodded, my heart too full to risk words. He locked the door behind us and pulled me close as we climbed the stairs, his hand gentle but insistent on the small of my back. The adrenaline of the night lingered in my veins, making every brush of contact electric. Up in my tiny apartment, the shadows felt less like a hiding place and more like a cocoon as he folded me into his arms and lifted me clear off the ground.
“You did it,” Rick whispered in the hush, his voice a gentle vibration against my scalp. “You’re one of us now.”
I let out a shaky laugh, equal parts relief and disbelief. Tears prickled at the corners of my eyes, and I buried my face in his chest so he wouldn’t see. He set me down, but I couldn’t seem to let go. The world felt so big, so loud; maybe I’d built a new home here, but damn if it didn’t still scare me sometimes, the size of what I’d allowed myself to want.
He hugged me tighter, reading my mind in that uncanny way he had. “You deserve this,” he murmured, rubbing circles over my back with his palm. “You always did. You just needed a little proof.”
He pulled back just enough to tilt my chin up, eyes molten gold in the thin light. He kissed me slow at first, deliberate, as if he was memorizing the shape of my lips, the taste of the words I hadn’t said yet. Each pass of his mouth made me ache, made me want and want until I was dizzy with it.
“I want to be inside you,” he said, voice a low rumble that vibrated through my bones, “before you even think about taking off that pretty dress.”
I barely managed a nod before his hands swept over my hips, hauling me flush against him. The skirt bunched up, fabric cool against my thighs, his hands hot and possessive underneath it.He backed me against the wall, never breaking the kiss, and in one deft motion slid my underwear down, past my knees, past my ankles, discarding them on the floor. The shock of bare skin met cool air and the searing heat of his hands, everywhere at once, cut through me.
One thick hand lifted me by the thigh, bracing me in place, while the other undid his pants with practiced ease. I felt the heat of him, already hard, pressed against the wet, desperate ache between my legs. He slid in slow—so slow—until I was full and stretching around him, breath knocked from my lungs by the sheer size of it, the delicious fullness. I arched back, head pressing into the wall, and he kissed down my throat, right where my pulse thundered.
The world spiraled with every thrust. He fucked me, steady and deep, each movement a sweet relief after the giddy, anxious tension of the evening. I wrapped both arms around his neck, held on as he rocked into me, the muscles in his back shifting under my palms like tectonic plates. He grunted with every snap of his hips, the sound primal and hungry, and I moaned into his shoulder, half-laughing at how greedy we were, how we could never get enough.
He made me come so forcefully against the wall that I bit down on his shoulder, hard, and the only thing that saved me from sliding to the floor was his solid hold. I came back to earth straddling his hips, his cock deep inside, our breaths mingled in the hush of the dark. He thrust a few more times, rougher now, chasing the edge, and with a low, helpless growl, he came, his heat flooding me as he spilled into a gutted, quiet stillness.
