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“Run little girl. You want to play? That’s fine, have it your way. For now.” The rumbled of his deep voice almost lured her back under his spell. Almost.
“Oh, I always do. Until tomorrow, Whiskey.” She wiggled her phone in the air. “Don’t be late.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
The next morning Genevieve stood, mouth gaped open, a pug in one hand and not a clue as to why a crowd ten people deep stood between her and Blossoms.
“Coming through!” a boisterous man she recognized from the previous day shouted as he marched by with a large metal frame, followed by another man and another. She jumped out of the way only to bump into someone else.
What was going on?
Others carried large slabs of thick wood she recognized as the stage to go with the platform frames probably headed to the small plaza and parking lot in the back where there was plenty of room for this many people, she guessed. Usually, the town’s flower show was set up in the plaza. Not here.
She turned in a slow circle. Interesting.
Lines of flowers zigzagged and weaved from shop to shop, outlining an obvious path for people to follow. Before her eyes, the entire flower show from the town’s square was unassembledand relocated outside her parent’s flower shop and down the entire length of the building. Shop owners joined in, leaving their doors wide open for passersby to come in and enjoy their own array of flowers while they mingled. Even the quiet T-shirt shop was seeing a nice influx of customers.
Genevieve smiled and her heart warmed. This is what small-town living was all about.
The mayor helped carry an assortment of tulips, peonies, and blue and pink lupine to line against the stone walls and create a beautiful path of colors for people to enjoy and buy.
Everywhere she looked flowers spilled over to create a living sea of color and an aroma unlike anything she’d ever experienced.
Cars weaved in and out of the crowd that spilled over onto Main Street and laughter and chatter drowned out everything. She caught hints of words here and there as she began the task of making her way through. The main word was a name, Whiskey Morgan.
Hours later and her body still hummed to the sound of that name.
“Oh, excuse me. Watch out, girl with pug coming through.” A few elbows in the ribs, a couple of shoulder pushes and some dirty expletives later she’d made it halfway through the throng of people that couldn’t stop talking about flowers and Morgan and Holdings.
What had gotten into everybody? Realization slowly dawned. Apparently, it took longer than usual for the coffee to hit her system this morning. After leaving Whiskey last night, a very long night of frantic writing and talking the local editor into taking her story on as an extra at the last minute kept her up tonearly sunrise. So, it took time for the dots to connect. A broad smile replaced the frown of confusion.
“There she is!”
Genevieve whirled around. A brunette head poked out of the crowd followed by a blonde beside her. Where would she be without her friends? She smiled.
Genevieve waved to Venus and Stacey and pushed her way through to accept Stacey’s hand to pull her up the steps that led to the flower shop.
Two of the most important people in her life came to stand beside her friends. “Mom, Dad? You’re back already?”
“Hello, dear.” Her mom pulled her in for a tight hug and she greeted her dad with a kiss to the cheek.
“It’s good to see you, baby girl.”
“Hi, Dad, it’s good to be seen.” Her mom and dad joined them outside, their faces lit up like Pinegrove’s Christmas tree during the holidays.
“What’s going on?” She turned back to the crowd. For a second she reconsidered her powers of deduction. Maybe she hadn’t done this after all. “Did you guys pull all these people together for the flower show?” They were its major organizer so she had to consider that angle.
“Not at all, dear.” Her mom passed her Pinegrove’s morning paper folded to reveal her article. Her headline still made her smile. It read: PINEGROVE’S DEVIL MEETS THE POWER OF THE FLOWER.
“Catchy title. We just arrived half an hour ago to find this. Isn’t it great? We cut our trip short and found this surprise.” Her mom gestured to the crowd and all the visitors walking through the shops.
Genevieve felt her mouth go slack. She’d done it. She slammed her brain into park.
Oh no! In all the excitement she’d failed to realize one thing. She took her mother’s hands. “Then you guys know that Whiskey plans on tearing down the building? I was hoping to resolve the situation before you returned home. I didn’t want to spoil your trip with the bad news. Or potential bad news. I don’t know if any of this will help sway the board members and the city council, but I’m hoping.” She prayed and crossed her fingers and did some more praying that all her work and late-night B&E paid off. She’d keep her word about the other plans she found until she had a chance to show Whiskey the town he used to love, but if he pushed her all bets were off.
She looked between her parents but to their credit, neither of them appeared worried.
“Whiskey called us yesterday morning and told us everything. We cut our trip short so we could come back and see what needed to be done. We didn’t call because we didn’t want to worry you any more than necessary. You had so much pressure from the article you needed to write and your deadline. It didn’t seem fair when there was nothing that could be done.”
