Flowers on Main (6 page)

Jess nodded. “She said something about the ivy going across the table from the centerpieces.”

“Okay, then. I think that gives me enough to work with. Are the groom and best man and ushers supposed to have flowers for their lapels?”

Jess and Lauren regarded her blankly.

“I have no idea,” Lauren admitted. “I’ll call Tom, that’s the groom, and ask him.” She took out her cell phone and dialed. When he answered, she explained the situation and asked about the flowers, then shook her head for Bree’s benefit. She lowered her voice. “There is no need to panic, Tom. I swear it. Someone’s here right now, and we have it all under control. Whatever you do, do not say anything about this to Diana. She’ll freak out. Bye.”

She stuck her phone back in her pocket. “Everything set here?” she asked Bree. “Do you need me to stay and help?”

“No. I can take it from here. I’ll do the bouquets first, if you want to send someone down in an hour to get them. If they’re not right, we’ll have time for adjustments.”

“You’re a lifesaver, Bree. I’ll make sure Diana knows about this.” She grinned. “After the ceremony, anyway.”

When Lauren and Jess were gone, Bree took stock of the flowers and went to work. The bouquets were easy enough, thanks to the bride’s desire for simplicity. She held them up for Jess’s approval when she came back from checking on things in the kitchen to make sure the food for the reception was on track.

“What do you think?” she asked her sister.

“Classy and elegant,” Jess said at once. “I’m in awe of you.”

“Let’s see how you feel when I’m through with the tough stuff.”

As she finished each centerpiece, she carried it into the dining room where four tables were set with white linens, sparkling crystal, white candles, sterling-silver place settings
and silver-edged china. She set the low arrangement of flowers in the center, then pulled strands of ivy between some of the place settings. She studied it, decided it didn’t look quite right and went back to gather some of the extra rose petals to scatter across the table with the ivy. She stood back again and concluded it didn’t look half-bad.

Jess came in as she was placing the last arrangement. “Oh, my,” she said, her voice filled with delight. “Bree, they’re beautiful. A professional couldn’t have done better. I swear if you weren’t off making a name for yourself as a playwright, I’d insist you do this for a living.”

Bree regarded her with surprise. “Really?”

“You’ve always had a knack with flowers, but what you’ve done here today, especially under pressure, it’s amazing. Much better than what I’ve seen from the florist that people around here usually use. The Hilliards are going to be ecstatic. You really did save the day. I’ll see to it that they pay you accordingly.”

“I don’t need to be paid,” Bree said. “This was an emergency. I did it as a favor to you. Besides, it was fun. I’ve always loved doing stuff like this.”

“You do work like this, you get paid,” Jess insisted. “And I’m taking pictures of these arrangements, too.”

Bree regarded her blankly. “Why?”

“Who knows, maybe one of these days you’ll get sick of Chicago and decide you want to take up floral design,” she said jokingly. “These will be the first pictures for your portfolio. I’m starting one for the inn, so I can show clients other events we’ve held here.”

Bree gave her a hard hug. “You are a very smart woman, sister of mine. Bring the pictures by the house later, so we can show them to Gram. She’ll be thrilled to see that some of those flower-arranging lessons she gave me have paid off.”

On the way home, Bree thought about the sense of satisfaction she’d gotten from what should have been a few incredibly stressful hours. She was halfway back to the house when an idea began to take shape. She made a U-turn and drove into town.

She rode slowly along Main Street, then pulled into a space in front of the only empty storefront downtown. It was two doors away from Sally’s, which could be a drawback in terms of the potential for crossing paths with Jake, but that also meant that everyone in town would know about a new shop within days of its opening. Most people in town had breakfast or lunch at Sally’s at least once a week, if only on Sundays after church. As she sat there, the vague idea in her head evolved into an actual plan.

She’d been in the space many times over the years when it had been a dress shop. She could imagine its possibilities for what she had in mind. She pictured the window filled with baskets of flowers, maybe even stands filled with colorful, ready-to-go bouquets on the sidewalk out front when the weather wasn’t too hot to wilt them. She could even envision the sign painted in the window in ornate gold script entwined with a few decorative flowers: FLOWERS ON MAIN, and beneath that, in a much smaller font,
Proprietor Bree O’Brien.
She could see it all as clearly as if it had been in the back of her mind for years, just waiting for an incident like today’s to lead her here.

In some ways she was as plodding and careful as Abby, but in others she was as impulsive as Jess. She went with her gut more often than not, and this felt right. Maybe if she hadn’t been going over her options for days now, if the decision to stay here hadn’t already been made, she would have waited, taken some time to examine this from every angle. As it was, she felt certain that this was something that could work, something she’d be good at, something she’d enjoy.

Before she could talk herself out of it, she reached for her cell phone and called the number of the management company listed on the discreet sign in the lower corner of the window. It was a number she should have known by heart, since her uncle had started the management company and one of her cousins was running it these days.

When Susie answered, Bree almost faltered. Should her cousin know about this before anyone else in the family? The answer was tricky since there were still some hard feelings among the various branches of the O’Brien family that went back to the construction of Chesapeake Shores. She waved off her doubts.

“Susie, it’s me, your cousin Bree.”

“Well, hey there. I’d heard you were in town when Jess opened the inn, but I didn’t catch much more than a glimpse of you at the party.”

Bree laughed. “Big bashes like that give me hives. I put in an appearance for family solidarity and all that, then hid out in the kitchen helping the chef.”

“I thought you’d be back in Chicago by now.”

“I decided to stick around. That’s why I’m calling, in fact. I’m interested in leasing the space that’s available on Main Street.”

“Really?” Susie said, not even trying to hide her shock. “I thought you were doing so well with your plays.”

“I was doing well enough,” Bree hedged. “But I want to do something different. How about I come by now and sign the paperwork?”

“It’s a two-year lease,” Susie reminded her. “We don’t like instability downtown.”

“I’m not crazy about instability myself,” Bree said. “Two years is fine.”

“Do you mind if I ask what kind of business you’re planning to open?”

“A flower shop,” Bree said, her voice brimming with excitement. “Flowers on Main.”

“You even have a name for it?”

Bree laughed. “And that’s about
all
I have at the moment. And a lease, if you’ll wait for me to get over to the office.”

“I’ll wait,” Susie promised. “I want to hear all about why you’ve decided to come back home.”

Mostly so she could report it to the rest of the family, Bree was certain. Still, word would get around soon enough. She just had to make sure that Gram, Mick, Abby and Jess heard about it from her before anyone else went running to them with the news.

And by the time she talked to her family, she was going to have a whole lot more than a lease and some vague idea that she could reinvent herself as a florist. Otherwise they’d start worrying about her the same way they fretted about Jess, convinced that she’d jumped into something without thinking it through.

Which, of course, was exactly what she was doing. But for the first time in months, she actually felt a stirring of excitement deep inside, a resurgence of self-confidence. Maybe her destiny had been to work with flowers all along. Or perhaps this was just a stopgap measure until she got her feet back under her. Either way it felt right for now.

“You’re going to do what?” Marty demanded, his tone incredulous when Bree worked up the courage to call and tell him she wasn’t coming back to Chicago. “Surely you’re not serious. What can possibly have possessed you to even
consider giving up the theater to open a flower shop? Are you having some kind of breakdown?”

His scathing tone stiffened her resolve. That a man who’d claimed to love her could even ask such a question in that tone was proof that she’d made the right decision. Chicago was not the place for her, and he was most definitely not the right man.

“Thank you,” she said wryly.

“For what?” he asked, clearly confused.

“For making it clear that I’m doing the right thing.”

“What are you talking about? I certainly said no such thing.”

“No, you said I must be having some kind of a breakdown.”

“Well, aren’t you? No one in their right mind would give up the opportunity you’ve had here to stay in that little hick town playing with posies.”

“I think I’m more suited to ‘playing with posies,’ as you put it, than to being demeaned at every turn by you.”

“When have I ever demeaned you?” he demanded, sounding genuinely shocked by the accusation. “All I’ve ever done was to support your work and offer constructive criticism.”

“Potato, potahto,” she said.

“What the hell does that mean?”

“Your version of constructive criticism is to tear me down until I’m no longer convinced I can write a coherent thought or a well-drawn character. Oh, I’ll admit, in the beginning I was so in awe of you that I took every word as a pearl of wisdom, but I see now that in taking your criticism to heart, in molding my stories to win your approval, I was losing myself. The voice that I brought to my first play faltered in the second one and disappeared completely by the third.”

“You’re blaming me because your third play was a disaster?” he asked, incredulous.

“No, absolutely not,” she said swiftly. “I blame myself,
because I listened to you. Don’t get me wrong, Marty. You taught me a lot in the beginning. You’re an amazing playwright. But I can’t be a carbon copy of you. I needed to be myself, and somewhere along the way I forgot that.”

He was silent for so long, she thought maybe he was too furious with her to speak. But then he said, “Maybe that’s true.”

She was so stunned by the admission, she didn’t have a response.

He went on in that same thoughtful tone. “Now that you understand that, though, this is exactly the wrong time to turn tail and run. You need to come back here and get back to work. I’ll still help you, if you want it, or I’ll leave you alone.” He turned on the familiar charm. “You’re good, Bree. Those last reviews aside, you can’t lose sight of that. Besides, I miss you. I need you back here with me.”

That almost swayed her. Marty never admitted needing anyone. Then she remembered how quixotic his moods could be. He might need her today, but by tomorrow his ego would kick in, and he’d need no one, least of all her. Besides, if she was leaving Chicago at least in part because their relationship had turned toxic, then she could hardly go back because of some faint hope that it could change. She couldn’t allow him to charm her into forgetting how things between them had deteriorated.

No, she decided firmly. She needed to stay right here in Chesapeake Shores, at least for now. She needed to tackle something new, get a fresh start. The thing about writing was that it could be done anytime, anywhere. If inspiration struck, she had her computer and she had her contacts in the theater. Staying here didn’t mean she’d never write another play, just that if she did, it would be hers from act one scene one right on through to the closing curtain.

“It’s too late, Marty. I’m not coming back, at least not for the foreseeable future.”

“I’ll come there. I’ll change your mind.”

“Please don’t even try.” It might feed her ego a bit to have him come, but more worrisome was the possibility that she would succumb to his persuasion. She knew all too well how skilled he was when he wanted something. “If you care about me, even a little, you’ll let me make this change. Accept it and wish me well.”

“A few months,” he said with obvious reluctance. “You’ll be going stir-crazy and you’ll call me begging to come back.”

“Maybe I will,” she agreed.

“I can’t promise you it won’t be too late,” he warned.

“I can live with that.”

“Bree, my darling, you’re making such a terrible mistake,” he said.

“It’s mine to make.”

“And there’s nothing—” He cut himself off with a heavy sigh. “No, I am familiar with your streak of Irish stubbornness. I can’t change your mind now, can I?”

“No.”

“Will you come if I send a ticket when the next play opens?”

“It’s yours, isn’t it?” she said, remembering how thrilled the theater had been to get the play for its pre-Broadway run. Rehearsals had just begun when she’d left town.

“The first in five years. I want you here. You were my inspiration, my muse, when I was writing it, after all.”

The flattery was deliberate, she knew. She was also aware he’d probably said something similar to other women. Marty was like that, scattering little hints about his gratitude far and wide, so that everyone thought they owned a share of his success.

“I’ll think about it,” she promised. In a few weeks, perhaps
she could go back for a visit without feeling like a failure. She’d made friends there, people other than Marty she would miss. It would be a chance to catch up.

By then, too, she’d have her business up and running. She’d have her fresh start, an exciting new beginning. Marty’s seductive charm wouldn’t be a match for that.

“I’ll be in touch, then,” he said to her.

Only after they’d hung up did she realize that not once in the entire conversation had she sensed even the slightest hint of surprise on Marty’s part that she was closing the door on their relationship. Unlike Jake, whose passions still ran high over their breakup after six long years, Marty had let her go with barely a whimper of regret. For all of his claim to miss her and need her, she didn’t doubt for an instant that he would move on by the end of the week, if he hadn’t already. He was the kind of man who couldn’t survive for long without the adulation of a woman.