Chapter 13

Marty was dusting around the shop, with Peaches ‘helping' by swatting her tail and rubbing her face against various surfaces. She looked up as the door opened, admitting Darla.

"Hey!" Marty said happily, tucking her dust cloth onto a shelf to mark her spot before hurrying over to greet her sister with a hug. "What brings you around these parts?"

Darla returned the hug. "Oh, you know, just browsing. Hey there, Peaches."

"Does Auntie Darla smell like a puppy?" Marty asked the cat. "Is that a very interesting smell?"

Peaches gave a small mrrp of agreement, then proceeded to rub her face all over Darla, covering up any puppy smell with cat smell.

"I hope you're prepared to have Scout have to snuggle all over you to get you back to your proper level of dog-mom scent."

"Oh no," Darla deadpanned. "Puppy snuggles. How terrible. Woe is me."

The two sisters cracked up. Marty picked up her dust cloth again and kept working, Darla following to help her move items so she could get between and behind them.

"Thanks!" Marty said. "You're a better helper than Peaches."

"Ha, thank you," Darla said. Then there was a slightly strange pause. "So, how's the store?"

Marty glanced quizzically at her sister and then around the space. "Uh, it's fine? Normal?"

If Darla noticed the question implicit in her sister's tone, she didn't let on. "Cool, cool, that's good." Another strange pause. "So, nothing new coming up?"

"Well," Marty said. Sometimes Darla needed to get to things in her own time. "Spring is coming, so I'll be putting out some new inventory. But nothing really big, no."

"Nice," Darla said. "That's nice. Sometimes it's good to not be busy, don't you think?" Then she made a big show of looking at her watch. "Wow, well, look at the time! Since I am really busy, I have to run! Store looks great! Love you, bye!"

"Love you too, weirdo!" Marty called as her sister hustled out the door.

Peaches made a sad sound.

"Yeah, I don't know either," Marty confided in her cat. She finished up her dusting, then decided to call Wyatt, since this was a time of day where they both frequently experienced lulls in the hectic work of running a small business.

"Hey, Mar!" he greeted on the second ring. "What's up?"

"Not too much," she said, idly scratching Peaches behind the ears. "Just thought I'd call and say hi, since I have a quiet moment. Although, Darla came in here just now and was being so weird."

"Oh yeah?" Wyatt asked.

"Yeah," she confirmed. "She was asking about the store and if I was busy and in a way that was casual but not, if you know what I mean? Like, she was pretending it was no big deal but she clearly had some kind of point. And then she practically bolted out of here."

"Oh, wow, huh, that is weird," he replied. "So strange."

For a moment, she pulled the phone away from her ear. Everyone was being strange today. She gave a mental shrug. Maybe it was just one of those days, just a random weirdness in the air, like when hospitals reported being busier on full moons. She dismissed it.

"I almost would have thought she had some big news, like telling us she and Rick were expecting or something," she confessed, "except she would have been happy, not nervous, I think. Also, what would my schedule have to do with that?" She paused as an idea occurred to her. "Oh, I'm such a doofus. I bet she's going to ask us to puppy-sit so she and Rick can do a date night or a weekend away or something!"

"Yes!" he said, the word surprisingly exuberant for such a minor mystery. "That's probably it. You nailed it, sweetheart."

"Yeah, I'm a real detective," she joked. "Call me ‘Marty Holmes' from now on."

His laugh was a bit more normal. "Yeah, I will. But listen, hon, a customer just walked in. Catch up with you later?"

"Of course." This frequently happened when they were on the phone. Such was the life of a small business owner. "Love you!"

"Love you too," he said before hanging up.

Sure enough, Marty soon got a customer too, an older couple who ended up buying two lamps, a side table, and a few odds and ends for the bedroom they were redecorating now that all their kids had moved out of the house. Marty enjoyed a chat with them about their renovation plans. She liked talking with customers, and knowing how they planned to use their spaces always helped her recommend the right pieces for their homes. Having that information pleased the designer in her.

In the end, the couple bought quite a few items, far more than the usual sale for the middle of a weekday.

"Now that is the kind of unusual event I can get behind," she told Peaches happily as she logged the sale into her inventory record. She returned to work, pleased when the rest of her day was blissfully normal.

One of Liam's favorite things about the BB, besides the books that he was now practically addicted to thanks to Monica, was the breakfast. Every morning, it was an amazing breakfast. Back in Boston—which he was increasingly struggling to think of as ‘back home'—he usually went for speed and convenience when making breakfast. He'd throw together a smoothie with some protein powder before a workout or slap together a quick egg sandwich. Breakfasts at the firehouse were a bit more involved, but that cooking tended toward speed too, since an alarm could pull them away from the table at any moment.

Breakfasts at the BB were leisurely and delicious, and Liam had taken to bringing his book with him to read as he ate. Monica's chef was officially one of Liam's favorite people.

And the coffee. Man, it was good coffee. He always drank a second cup.

Which meant that when he passed Seastar Espresso, he meant to keep walking. He did not need more caffeine.

Except when he saw Claire inside, sitting at a table, he found his feet steering him inside the shop before he could make a conscious decision to do so.

The bell above the shop dinged, and a middle-aged woman behind the counter greeted him. Charity must have been off work today. It was Claire's look that drew his attention, however, the flash of happy surprise that crossed her face when she saw him… followed by a quick hint of a blush.

He liked seeing that blush. He liked it a lot, actually.

"Hey, Liam," she greeted. "Come in for a coffee? Want to join me?"

"I'd love to," he said. "Let me just order my drink really quickly."

"Sure thing." She had a book in her hands, and he made a note to talk about his newfound hobby with her. "It'll give me a chance to finish my chapter."

He went to the counter and ordered decaf. He didn't need to be shaking with caffeine jitters. Claire already made him feel jittery enough.

He had been thinking about her a lot since he'd opened up to her a bit that day in her flower shop. Well, if he was telling the truth, he'd been thinking about her a lot longer than that.

But ever since he'd confessed that he was even considering staying in Whale Harbor, a picture of what that might mean for him had started to take on shaper focus. And a lot of that picture had to do with the woman in the shop with him now, who was slipping the folded receipt she was using as a bookmark into her battered paperback.

He liked spending time with her. He wanted to spend more time with her, and not just because they were working together.

One step at a time, Hiller, he reminded himself. He retrieved his coffee and sat down at the table with Claire.

"I'm not stopping you from reading, am I?" he asked, nodding at the book, a mystery by the looks of the cover.

She waved a hand. "Oh, no. I've read this one a million times, actually. It was one of my mom's favorites, so I like to return to it every now and again. I guess at this point I've probably read it more than she ever did."

He picked up on her use of the past tense. "Your mom passed away?" he asked gently.

She gave him a sad smile. "Yeah, when I was a kid."

"I'm so sorry."

"Thanks. It's still sad, of course, and probably always will be, but it's not a fresh wound. I'm at the point where reminders of her make me happy more than anything else. That's actually what led me to open up the flower shop, in a roundabout way."

"Oh yeah?" He took a sip of his coffee. Even decaffeinated, Charity's shop had a very nice brew.

"Yeah." He was relieved to see that Claire's smile was happy now. "My mom was an amazing gardener, and a lot of my favorite memories of her were of us working in her garden. Now, obviously I complained every time she asked me to pull weeds," she clarified.

"Obviously," he agreed with a grin. "That's basically your job as a kid when asked to do a chore."

"Exactly. But as time went on, I found myself liking the work as much as I liked spending time with her. And then, after she passed away, it was a way for me to feel close to her. Gradually, I started to love it for its own sake and voila. Flower shop owner extraordinaire." She gave a silly little mock bow. He liked the goofy side of Claire. It made him feel lighter.

"That's really cool," he said. "Even though you're the one starting the shop, it's kind of like a family tradition, in that way."

She tilted her head, considering this. "You know, that's a great way of thinking of it. I love that." Her smile turned mischievous. "Now, if only my dad had been the one to sell me the building, then we'd really be in a family business."

"Your dad is a realtor?"

"He is," she confirmed. "But the store was actually managed by the other realtor in town, my dad's rival."

"Whoa, scandal," he joked.

"My dad was really understanding about it… but you could tell it drove him nuts." Her wicked smile suggested that there was a tiny part of her that still liked pushing her parents' buttons as much as she'd confessed to doing as a kid.

"That's still cool, though. I never had any professional overlap with my parents. My mom was a preschool teacher; she recently retired. My dad is the head of the maintenance department for all the public works in my town. So when something breaks down at a public school or in a park, he's the guy you call to get it fixed. There was a few times he got called in to fix something at my school when I was a kid," he recalled with a laugh. "When I was little, it was awesome. I would brag that it was my dad fixing the broken water fountain or whatever it was. When I got older…" He trailed off with a sheepish smile.

"Parents are, like, so lame," she said with a hair flip, imitating a teen from an eighties movie.

"Exactly."

"Although," she added thoughtfully, back to her regular voice, "I bet you learned fix-it stuff from your dad that's handy now, working with Braden and helping me with the store."

"You're right," he realized. "I should give him a call and tell him that. He'd love to tease me about all the times I didn't listen closely enough as he taught me how to repair something."

She laughed. She had a really nice laugh.

"And my mom did teach me how to cook," he added. "I'm pretty good, if I do say so myself."

One of the only things he didn't like about living in the BB was that he didn't have his own kitchen. He missed cooking, he suddenly realized.

She gave a low, impressed whistle. "Liam Hiller, breaking stereotypes. Not only a man who is good at cooking, but a firefighter too."

"You actually cook more than you think in a firehouse," he said. "Since our shifts are long, we eat a lot of meals together, and everyone takes turns cooking."

"Huh! I didn't know that."

They chatted easily for a while, Liam discussing how some Greek heritage on his mother's side meant that some of his favorite foods to cook were things from that tradition like souvlaki and moussaka. He was surprised to find, some time later, that he'd reached the end of his cup of coffee. He looked sheepishly at the empty cup, reluctant to end the easy flow of conversation.

"Any chance you feel like taking a walk?" he asked. Seastar Espresso wasn't crowded, but he still felt bad taking up space in the business without buying anything, and he couldn't handle more coffee today, not even decaf.

Her smile was immediate. "Let's do it."

They headed out onto the street, the weather still brisk but no longer bitter. Neither of them was wearing gloves, and Liam fought back the impulse to take Claire's hand. He'd let the conversation flow naturally, he decided, and then ask her if she wanted to go on a date with him when they were preparing to head their separate ways. That way, it wouldn't be as awkward for her or as embarrassing for him if she said no.

Although he was pretty sure she would say yes.

The thought emboldened him to take a step closer to Claire as a bitter wind gusted past, turning the weather from pleasant if brisk to miserable for a few short seconds. It was chivalrous to protect her from the cold, right?

He was very pleased when she didn't step further away, even after the wind abated. Every few steps, the back of his hand brushed against the sleeve of her coat.

"This is always the time of year where I begin to dream about living in Florida or California," Claire said with a laugh as she hunched into the collar of her coat. "Why does forty degrees in March feel so much colder than thirty in December or January?"

"It's like how December snow is pretty and festive but February snow is mocking you," he agreed.

"Yes, that's exactly it!"

Despite their complaints about the weather—which was, Liam mentally admitted, practically the birthright of any true New Englander—he was having a really nice time doing nothing but strolling along the sidewalk with her. The smile on his face felt easier and more natural than any smile had in a long time.

The words almost flew to his lips regardless of his plan to wait until the end of their walk. He was going to ask her out. He'd ask Monica for a recommendation about where to take Claire to dinner and would borrow something nice to wear from Dominic, since he'd only packed casual clothes when he came to Whale Harbor. It would be worth all the teasing he would no doubt get from his old friend.

Except just as he was about to ask, something caught his eye and stopped him in his tracks.

They were passing the veterinarian's office. Through the large, plate glass windows, he could see a television playing in the waiting room, turned to the local news. And on the news was the horrible image of a house consumed by flames.

He hadn't known it was possible to feel one's heart stop in the exact moment that you were flooded with adrenaline. The fire, per the crawling text at the bottom of the page, was in an area of Boston he didn't know well. He wouldn't have been summoned to the scene even if he'd been on active duty that day.

Even so, his body screamed at him to take action even as his feet froze on the concrete.

"Liam?" Claire's voice felt as though it were coming from very far away. It took physical effort to tear his eyes from the screen, where the house was suffering from the kind of damage from which there would be no return. He knew that all too well.

"Liam?" Her hand was on his arm now. He blinked down at it, feeling oddly confused by the gesture. Oh, yes, well. He was acting oddly, wasn't he?

"Are you okay?" Claire spoke again.

"Yeah," he said. His voice was too loud, and she raised her eyebrows, although not in alarm, thank goodness for that. He cleared his throat and tried again. "Yeah, I'm fine. I just… I just realized I have to go though, sorry."

"Liam, wait—"

He ignored her, turning instead on his heel and hurrying back toward his car, feeling almost as though he was being chased. His breaths came too quickly, and he didn't dare look at his hands, afraid he would discover them trembling.

It was only when he reached his car, closing the door behind him and pressing his forehead against the steering wheel while he took several long, slow breaths, that he realized the depth of his mistake.

Not only had he run away from Claire without asking her out, but he'd left without making plans to see her again… and without even saying goodbye.