Page 35 of Accidentally in Bloom

He sputtered into his coffee as she sailed to her car, a slow curling smile on her lips. She loved catching him off guard, even if she still throbbed from his kiss.

He called after her. “You gonna spell that out in the contract, princess?”

“If you agree to five percent, then I happily will.” She paused with the car door open, standing outside of it.

“You’ll need to specify then, for the contract.” He walked toward her. His voice rumbled low. His eyes danced with laughter and heat.

She licked her lips, tasting him on her. Stop finding him so fucking sexy, Rose. This is not. Helpful.

He stopped in front of her, arm resting beside her on the car roof, neatly boxing her in one more time. “Does that mean I can’t go down on you, princess?”

Holy. Fuck. That throbbing started again.

He leaned in, whispering in her ear. “Bend you over a table and tease you with my fingers until you scream my name?” His eyes locked with hers, and she couldn’t form a coherent thought beyond the picture he was painting.

She should breathe. Breathing would be good right about now.

He hovered over her lips, voice barely a whisper. “Play with those perfect tits and have you sobbing, begging me to be inside you?”

Rose’s mouth went dry, and her mind went blank. All she wanted was her mouth on his.

Gray angled his head, his lips a whisper’s distance from hers. She licked her lips, and as she moved to him, he pressed off the car, walking backward. A mischievous smile grew on his face.

“Five it is, princess. Can’t wait to see that contract.”

This was the worst idea she’d ever had.

Two weeks later, Rose walked outside Bloom, hefting a stack of record books. She’d spent the morning trying to understand her father’s haphazard system for vendors, but she couldn’t make sense of his shorthand. She wanted to re-use the existing vendor relationships to keep bookkeeping simple. They needed to get the business up and running in the next few weeks.

She wrenched open the antique brass door handle and walked into the work-in-progress showroom. It was overwhelming how different it looked already. Lily, Vi, Gray, and even Nash and Aaron had been busy the last few weeks renovating the space.

The store smelled fresh and happy. They’d cleaned every inch within its life and burned candles when they were there. It was on its way to having that herby smell a flower shop should have.

White subway tiles now accented the old store walls. Fresh coats of paint were painstakingly put on day after day to cover up the old green paint. The high, tin ceilings now shone, and the store seemed twice as big since they’d painted the plaster walls a bright white. The dark teal panels, old dark wood floors, and copper accents made it feel like they were in a gorgeous coastal industrial space.

When they weren’t painting, caulking, or ordering new furniture, Rose ordered supplies for their opening weekend.

She walked through the space and ignored the hulking man that made chills run down her arms. She’d successfully avoided spending any alone time with Gray since their accidental make-out session. Rose had done everything in her power to put distance between them, going so far as to require Lily or Vi be with her at all times when he was there.

Focus on the store. Just ignore that perfectly sculpted back ranging over his toolbox.

She turned her attention to Lily, who blasted early 2000s punk rock through the store. She was clad in overalls, her hair tied up in a scarf, and looked like a Rosie the Riveter poster. Lily was up high on a tall ladder, putting in a floor-to-ceiling wall full of fake plants where they’d hang their new store’s logo. Having a show-stopping space where people would post selfies could only help their cause for the better.

“Looking good, kid,” she yelled at Lily over a My Chemical Romance classic.

“It’s coming together, but this ivy is a little bitch.” Lily wrestled with a twenty-foot strand, weaving it in and out of the grid she’d made.

Rose wanted the shop to feel like a trend-setting shopping experience, not a fussy flower shop. They had splurged on a neon sign in bright pink for the new logo Lily had designed. Her vision was fresh and modern, and Rose loved it.

Violet was crouched in front of her easy-to-care-for houseplant display. She spoke sweetly to a small philodendron in a terracotta pot. “Don’t mind the loud music, Gilbert. You need to keep Philomena company while I’m not here. And I know you’re very tough, but asking for help is okay.”

“Violet, what the hell are you doing?” Rose said from behind her.

Violet waved her away. “It’s scientifically proven if you talk to plants, they’ll be healthier, and I just feel like they might need some comforting after listening to Lily’s music.”

“Tell your plants to stop being such pussies,” Lily yelled.

Violet put her hands over the plants and gasped. “Language. It’s been scientifically proven that—”

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