Arlene James - Love in Bloom

Everything depended on making this work. Lily had staked everything on this scheme. Should she fail in Bygones, she would be buried in debt, and returning to her former occupation would be her only alternative, even if she wasn’t very good at it. Worse, it would mean returning home to the bosom of her family, and that she did not want under any circumstances but especially not in defeat. If she was to be the maiden aunt to her sister’s children, she would be so at a distance with a successful business to occupy her time and mind. She would not hang around Boston, pretending she wasn’t miserable and envious, while her sister and new brother-in-law started their family, something they were eager to do.

No, it was bad enough that her sister had married the man whom Lily had wanted for herself. Lily didn’t have to stick around and watch them have babies, not when she so wanted babies, too. If she couldn’t have a family of her own, Lily would do whatever it took to build a successful business in Bygones. That included, she reminded herself as Tate Bronson and his adorable daughter moved toward her once more, those things that went against her nature, such as speaking up. So, as he bent to take up another of her boxes, she found her voice.

“Uh, if you...if you could be careful.”

He gave her such a look, as if she were an inanimate object suddenly come to life, but he took great care stacking the boxes and hoisting them onto his shoulders. He then turned and walked away without a word. Isabella took up her backpack, chattering.

“I’ll have to sit in the corner, but it’s okay. I don’t mind. Daddy shoulda left the bags of feed at home. He didn’t figure you’d have so much stuff.”

“I see,” Lily muttered. She quickly took the backpack from Isabella and shouldered it once more, then pulled up the handle on one of the medium bags. “Think you can handle that?”

“Uh-huh.”

Using both hands, Isabella began pulling the bag toward the door. Lily stacked the remaining two boxes atop the remaining suitcase and, also using both hands, began backing toward the door. They made the sidewalk before Tate returned to scoop up boxes and bags.

“Come on.”

Lily tried to explain herself as they crossed the street and trailed across the parking lot. “I, um, looked into standard shipping, but it was cheaper to check some things as luggage and send the rest as air freight, and this way I have it all on hand when I arrive. I—I’m sorry I didn’t think to warn anyone that I would have extra luggage.”

He shrugged. “Part of my responsibilities.”

“Do you mind if I ask what your responsibilities are, I mean, so far as I’m concerned?”

“Get you there. Make sure you get set up in time for the Grand Opening.”

“Very good. I appreciate that.”

He seemed to thaw a bit then. “I’m your official contact with the committee and your host, at least through the Grand Opening reception.”

“Oh. All right. That’s nice. Thank you.”

“No problem. When you’re ready to hire help, I’ll have a list of names for you, too.”

“Ah. That will be useful.”

“When do you think you’ll be ready to hire someone, by the way?”

“Um, soon after the Grand Opening, I should think.”

“I see.”

“That is, if it’s successful.”

“The town’s done its part,” he told her.

“That’s good to know. What can you tell me about the town? I mean, beyond the statistics.”

He seemed to consider for a moment before saying, “Nothing much to tell.” Lily’s spirits sagged. She was tired and uncertain and hoping for a warm welcome, not this terse, tepid greeting. “You’ll see soon enough,” he added, stopping next to a dirty white double-cab pickup truck. He placed one of the boxes in the bed of the truck. Lily took a deep breath.

“Um, do you...do you think we could put those boxes inside?”

He turned a surprised look on her. “You want those particular boxes inside, not the suitcases?”

“What’s in the boxes is more valuable,” she said, pushing up her glasses.

He lifted his eyebrows. “Okay. If that’s the way you want it.”

“Yes, thank you,” she replied softly.

He reached into his pocket and an electronic beep sounded. He opened the back door of the cab and wrestled the big suitcase to the ground then transferred boxes to the inside. It took some shifting around, but they finally got everything loaded. As soon as they were all belted into their seats, Tate behind the wheel, Lily on the front passenger side and Isabella in a booster seat behind Lily in the back, Isabella spoke up.

“Daddy got on the SOS ’cause we’re Bronsons.”

“SOS?”

“It’s short for Save Our Streets,” he explained, starting the engine. “That’s the name of the committee that chose the businesses that got the grants.”

“Yes, I remember reading that in the paperwork, but what does being Bronsons have to do with it?”

“Bronsons founded the town,” he answered brusquely.

“They were brothers,” Isabella volunteered, “and one of ’em runned off with the other one’s sweetheart, so they hated each other.”

“Oh, dear,” Lily murmured.

“They got over it,” Tate stated matter-of-factly, and that was that.

Lily sighed mentally. She’d imagined a sweet little town, pulling together to do something grand, not feuding founders and “nothing much to tell.”

Suddenly Isabella piped up from the backseat again. “Are you married?”

“What? Uh. No.”

“Daddy’s not married, either.”

So, no fashion model wife then. That explained the falling-down hem on Isabella’s T-shirt. No conscientious mother would let such a pretty little girl go out with the hem coming down on her T-shirt, or so Lily imagined. A single father, now, he probably wouldn’t even notice such a thing. While Lily wondered about Isabella’s mother, Isabella wondered about other things, and she wasn’t the least bit shy in letting Lily know.

“Have you got a boyfriend?”

“Isabella!” Tate barked.

Lily cringed. “No, I don’t have a boyfriend, either.”

“How come?”

“Well, I—I just...” Lily felt her face heat.

“Don’t you want to get married and have children?”

My, what a direct child. “Y-yes. Very much.”

“Do you like babies? I like babies.”

“I love babies.”

“My friend Bonnie has a baby sister. I want a baby sister.”

Lily shot a glance at Tate Bronson, who was not married. Perhaps he and Isabella’s mother were divorced, and his ex-wife had remarried, and Isabella was hoping for a baby sister from that quarter. If so, that might explain the granitelike tightness of Tate’s profile just then.

“Isabella, that’s enough!” Tate ordered. “You pipe down now.”

“Okay, Daddy.”

“I mean it. Not another word.”

“Yes, sir.”

Lily sank down in her seat, feeling the undercurrents swirl around her. She didn’t know Tate Bronson’s story, but she knew her own.

Didn’t she want to get married and have children? Oh, yes. Very much. But that wasn’t likely when she didn’t even have a boyfriend, when she hadn’t ever had a boyfriend. And why was that? Wasn’t it obvious? Painfully obvious, she imagined, at least to Tate. Maybe not to his precocious daughter.

She just wasn’t the sort men noticed or in which they developed interest. She’d had ample proof of that already. She didn’t need any more, not from Tate Bronson or anyone else.

Lily turned her unseeing gaze out the quickly darkening window and prayed that she hadn’t made a horrible mistake in coming to Kansas.

Chapter Two

Her first sight of Bygones was not encouraging. Once they had gotten beyond the confines of the city, the landscape had seemed pleasantly green with rolling hills and lots of trees. About an hour out, however, that had gradually given way to flat golden plains and mere lines of trees following creeks and streams. By the time they reached the outskirts of Bygones, everything seemed dusty and barren in the moonlight. Lily pointed at a tall, ghostly shape rising sharply out of the dark.