Page 26 of Lady and the Butcher
My mouth was dry. My palms were damp. I told myself I was being dramatic, that people stood on sidewalks all the time. But deep down, I knew better.
He was waiting.
The next customer took her sweet time picking out a pacifier set. I rang her up without ever turning my head toward the window, but my awareness of him was like heat on the back of my neck.
When the door closed behind her, I let myself look.
Still there.
I crossed to the counter and pretended to check my appointment book. This was insane. I should just go out there and ask what he wanted.
But I didn’t.
I made another lap around the shop, fiddling with displays, moving a basket two inches to the left, flipping a burp cloth sothe stitching faced forward. Each time I drifted near the front window, I felt the pull of him—steady, unblinking.
The minutes stretched. A delivery truck rolled past, blocking my view for a heartbeat. When it cleared, he was still there, hands in his pockets now, head tipped slightly like he could hear my pulse from where he stood.
The air in here was too warm. Or maybe that was me.
I caught my reflection in the glass of the front display and winced. My blouse was clean enough, sure, but my skin looked sallow under the overhead lights, my eyes ringed with shadows from the birth that had stolen my night. My hair—God, my hair—had been shoved into a knot hours ago, and no amount of smoothing it down was going to disguise the frizz haloing my head. I looked like what I was: a woman who’d been up all night wiping sweat and tears and other things from someone else’s body, then rolling into her shop on caffeine and hope.
This was the truth of me. Not the polished version he’d first seen at the party, where the lighting was dim, the champagne fizzing, and my laugh had come easier because I wasn’t exhausted to the bone. Then, I’d looked put together, maybe even desirable. That girl in the dress—she was a façade, a version of me I could only hold onto for a few fleeting hours at a time.
Would he see the difference? Would he notice the circles under my eyes, the smudge of mascara I hadn’t bothered to fix, the way my posture sagged with fatigue? And if he did, would it matter?
The ugly truth pressed harder than I wanted to admit: I wanted him to like me like this, too. I wanted him to want the real, messy, unfiltered me—the woman who smelled faintly of antiseptic and milk, who kept spare clothes in the back room because she never knew what she might get splattered with on a call, who survived on black coffee and granola bars half the time. But I’d been burned before by men who liked the shiny versionof me and recoiled when they realized the work, the grit, the exhaustion that came with it.
My chest tightened as the thought burrowed deeper. Maybe he’d stand there and stare all day, but once he saw me up close, once the sharpness of his gaze took in all the flaws I couldn’t hide, maybe he’d lose interest. Maybe I’d already lost whatever edge I’d had at that party.
I tugged at the hem of my blouse, trying to stretch it straighter, smoother. Pointless. There was no hiding the fact that I was worn out, and my pulse jumped at the thought of him seeing me this way.
Finally, I snapped.
Enough.
I slipped out from behind the counter, my sandals loud against the floor, and pushed open the door. The humid Charleston air hit me like a wall.
He didn’t move. Didn’t greet me. Just let his gaze travel slowly from my hair to my hips, like he was memorizing every inch.
“You planning to come in?” I asked, my voice sharper than I intended.
“Not yet.”
The answer landed low in my belly. “You’ve been standing here forever.”
He gave a ghost of a smile. “I’ve been standing here long enough for you to notice. That’s all that matters.”
My throat tightened. “Why?”
He ignored the question. “You busy?”
I crossed my arms. “I have a shop to run.”
His eyes flicked to the door behind me, then back. “Close it.”
The nerve. “It’s the middle of the day.”
“Close it,” he repeated, not louder, but heavier.
