Page 2 of Melting for the Firefighter

Wondered whether he would let me touch them.

Wondered several other things that would make Grandma reach for her church directory.

His eyes travel over my curls, pause at the neckline of my dress, then settle on my waist.

My ex used to pinch the softness there and ask whether I really needed dessert.

Lance looks at the same place as though he wants both hands on it.

My pulse trips over itself.

His attention shifts to the white roses and rosemary on my worktable.

“Making mine already?”

The arrangement was supposed to become a display piece, but it contains the exact flowers he orders every year.

Apparently, my hands remember him as well as the rest of me does.

“It can be yours,” I say. “The rosemary and I are having creative differences.”

The corner of his mouth shifts.

Lance rarely smiles. Every almost-smile feels like something I have earned.

“Same as last year?” I ask.

His gaze returns to mine. “You remember?”

“White roses. Rosemary for remembrance.” I reach for a stem of blue delphinium. “And these, because your mother grew them along the back fence and let them take over.”

He goes still.

The silence between us changes.

The first time Lance came into my shop was two years ago, three weeks after Grandma died. He stood at this counter and asked me to choose flowers for the anniversary of his mother’s death.

When I asked what she had loved, he told me about the delphinium.

He also told me she sang while washing dishes.

Lance does not give away many pieces of himself.

I kept the ones he gave me.

“You said she was a terrible singer,” I add.

“She was.” His expression softens. “Never stopped her.”

“I think I would have liked her.”

His eyes hold mine.

“She would’ve liked you.”

The certainty in his voice reaches into the lonely place inside me and presses.

I turn to the flowers before he can watch me come apart over six quiet words.