In the Garden Trilogy (19 page)

Pansies didn’t mind a bit of chill, she thought, so if they got a few more frosts, they wouldn’t be bothered. And their happy faces, their rich colors would splash spring right at the entryway.

Once she’d positioned the planters, she got her clipboard and noted down everything she’d taken from stock. She’d enter it in her computer when she was finished.

Then she knelt down to do something she loved, something that never failed to comfort her. Something that always made sense.

She planted.

When the first was done, the purple and yellow flowers cheerful against the dull gray of the planter, she stepped back to study it. She wanted its mate to be as close to a mirror image as she could manage.

She was half done when she heard the rumble of tires on gravel. Logan, she thought, as she glanced around and identified his truck. She saw him start to turn toward the material area, then swing back and drive toward the building.

He stepped out, worn boots, worn jeans, bad-boy black-lensed sunglasses.

She felt a little itch right between her shoulder blades.

“Hey,” he said.

“Hello, Logan.”

He stood there, his thumbs hooked in the front pockets of his work pants and a trio of fresh scratches on his forearms just below the rolled-up sleeves of his shirt.

“Picking up some landscape timbers and some more black plastic for the Dawson job.”

“You’re moving right along there.”

“It’s cooking.” He stepped closer, studied her work. “Those look good. I could use them.”

“These are for display.”

“You can make more. I take those over to Miz Dawson, the woman’s going to snap them up. Sale’s a sale, Red.”

“Oh, all right.” She’d hardly had a
minute
to think of them as her own. “Let me at least finish them. You tell her she’ll need to replace these pansies when it gets hot. They won’t handle summer. And if she puts perennials in them, she should cover the planters over for winter.”

“It happens I know something about plants myself.”

“Just want to make sure the customer’s satisfied.”

He’d been polite, she thought. Even cooperative. Hadn’t he come to give her a materials list? The least she could do was reciprocate. “If Graceland’s still on, I can take off some time next Thursday.” She kept her eyes on the plants, her tone casual as a fistful of daisies. “If that works for you.”

“Thursday?” He’d been all prepared with excuses if she happened to bring it up. Work was jamming him up, they’d do it some other time.

But there she was, kneeling on the ground, with that damn hair curling all over the place and the sun hitting it. Those blue eyes, that cool Yankee voice.

“Sure, Thursday’s good. You want me to pick you up here or at the house?”

“Here, if that’s okay. What time works best for you?”

“Maybe around one. That way I can put the morning in.”

“That’ll be perfect.” She rose, brushed off her gloves and set them neatly on the cart. “Just let me put together a price for these planters, make you up an order form. If she decides against them, just bring them back.”

“She won’t. Go ahead and do the paperwork.” He dug a many folded note out of his pocket. “On these and the materials I’ve got down here. I’ll load up.”

“Good. Fine.” She started inside. The itch had moved from her shoulder blades to just under her belly button.

It wasn’t a date, it wasn’t a date, she reminded herself. It wasn’t even an outing, really. It was a gesture. A goodwill gesture on both sides.

And now, she thought as she walked into her office, they were both stuck with it.

“I DON’T KNOW HOW IT GOT TO BE THURSDAY.”

“It has something to do with Thor, the Norse god.” Hayley hunched her shoulders sheepishly. “I know a lot of stupid things. I don’t know why.”

“I wasn’t looking for the origin of the word, more how it got here so fast. Thor?” Stella repeated, turning from the mirror in the employee bathroom.

“Pretty sure.”

“I’ll just take your word on that one. Okay.” She spread out her arms. “How do I look?”

“You look really nice.”

“Too nice? You know, too formal or prepared?”

“No, just right nice.” The fact was, she envied the way Stella looked in simple gray pants and black sweater. Sort of tailored, and curvy under it. When she wasn’t pregnant, she herself tended to be on the bony side and flat-chested.

“The sweater makes you look really built,” she added.

“Oh, God!” Horrified, Stella crossed her arms, pressing them against her breasts. “Too built? Like, hey, look at my boobs?”

“No.” Laughing, Hayley tugged Stella’s arms down. “Cut it out. You’ve got really excellent boobs.”

“I’m nervous. It’s ridiculous, but I’m nervous. I
hate
being nervous, which is why I hardly ever am.” She tugged at the sleeve of her sweater, brushed at it. “Why do something you hate?”

“It’s just a casual afternoon outing.” Hayley avoided the D word. They’d been over that. “Just go and have fun.”

“Right. Of course. Stupid.” She shook herself off before walking out of the room. “You’ve got my cell number.”

“Everybody has your cell number, Stella.” She cast a look at Ruby, who answered it with chuckle. “I think the mayor probably has it on speed dial.”

“If there are any problems at all, don’t hesitate to use it. And if you’re not sure about anything, and can’t find Roz or Harper, just call me.”

“Yes, Mama. And don’t worry, the keg’s not coming until three.” She slapped a hand over her mouth. “Did I say keg? Peg’s what I meant. Yeah, I meant Peg.”

“Ha ha.”

“And the male strippers aren’t a definite.” She got a hoot of laughter out of Ruby at that and grinned madly. “So you can chill.”

“I don’t think chilling’s on today’s schedule.”

“Can I ask how long it’s been since you’ve been on a date—I mean, an outing?”

“Not that long. A few months.” When Hayley rolled her eyes, Stella rolled hers right back. “I was busy. There was a lot to do with selling the house, packing up, arranging for storage, researching schools and pediatricians down here. I didn’t have time.”

“And didn’t have anyone who made you want to make time. You’re making it today.”

“It’s not like that. Why is he late?” she demanded, glancing at her watch. “I knew he’d be late. He has ‘I’m chronically late for mostly everything’ written all over him.”

When a customer came in, Hayley patted Stella’s shoulder. “That’s my cue. Have a good time. May I help you?” she asked, strolling over to the customer.

Stella waited another couple of minutes, assuring herself that Hayley had the new customer in hand. Ruby rang up two more. Work was being done where work needed to be done, and she had nothing to do but wait.

Deciding to do her waiting outside, she grabbed her jacket.

Her planters looked good, and she figured her display of them was directly responsible for the flats of pansies they’d moved in the past few days. That being the case, they could add a few more planters, do a couple of half whiskey barrels, add some hanging pots.

Scribbling, she wandered around, picking out the best spots to place displays, to add other touches that would inspire customers to buy.

When Logan pulled up at quarter after one, she was sitting on the steps, listing the proposed displays and arrangements and dividing up the labor of creating them.

She got up even as he climbed out of the truck. “I got hung up.”

“No problem. I kept busy.”

“You okay riding in the truck?”

“Wouldn’t be the first time.” She got in, and as she buckled her seat belt, studied the forest of notes and reminders, sketches and math calculations stuck to his dashboard.

“Your filing system?”

“Most of it.” He turned on the CD player, and Elvis rocked out with “Heartbreak Hotel.” “Seems only right.”

“Are you a big fan?”

“You’ve got to respect the King.”

“How many times have you been to Graceland?”

“Couldn’t say. People come in from out of town, they want to see it. You visit Memphis, you want Graceland, Beale Street, ribs, the Peabody’s duck walk.”

Maybe she could chill, Stella decided. They were just talking, after all. Like normal people. “Then this is the first tic on my list.”

He looked over at her. Though his eyes were shielded by the black lenses, she knew, from the angle of his head, that they were narrowed with speculation. “You’ve been here, what, around a month, and you haven’t gone for ribs?”

“No. Will I be arrested?”

“You a vegetarian?”

“No, and I like ribs.”

“Honey, you haven’t had ribs yet if you haven’t had Memphis ribs. Don’t your parents live down here? I thought I’d met them once.”

“My father and his wife, yeah. Will and Jolene Dooley.”

“And no ribs?”

“I guess not. Will
they
be arrested?”

“They might, if it gets out. But I’ll give you, and them, a break and keep quiet about it for the time being.”

“Guess we’ll owe you.”

“Heartbreak Hotel” moved into “Shake, Rattle, and Roll.” This was her father’s music, she thought. It was odd, and kind of sweet, to be driving along, tapping her foot, on the way to Memphis listening to the music her father had listened to as a teenager.

“What you do is you take the kids to the Reunion for ribs,” Logan told her. “You can walk over to Beale from there, take in the show. But before you eat, you go by the Peabody so they can see the ducks. Kids gotta see the ducks.”

“My father’s taken them.”

“That might keep him out of the slammer.”

“Whew.” It was easier than she’d thought it would be, and she felt foolish knowing she’d prepared several avenues for small talk. “Except for the time you moved north, you’ve always lived in the Memphis area?”

“That’s right.”

“It’s strange for me, knowing I was born here, but having no real memory of it. I like it here, and I like to think—overlooking the lack of ribs to date—that there’s a connection for me here. Of course, I haven’t been through a summer yet—that I can remember—but I like it. I love working for Roz.”

“She’s a jewel.”

Because she heard the affection in his tone, she shifted toward him a bit. “She thinks the same of you. In fact, initially, I thought the two of you were ...”

His grin spread. “No kidding?”

“She’s beautiful and clever, and you’ve got a lot in common. You’ve got a history.”

“All true. Probably the history makes anything like that weird. But thanks.”

“I admire her so much. I like her, too, but I have such admiration for everything she’s accomplished. Singlehandedly. Raising her family, maintaining her home, building a business from the ground up. And all the while doing it her own way, calling her own shots.”

“Is that what you want?”

“I don’t want my own business. I thought about it a couple of years ago. But that sort of leap with no parachute and two kids?” She shook her head. “Roz is gutsier than I am. Besides, I realized it wasn’t what I really wanted. I like working for someone else, sort of troubleshooting and coming in with a creative and efficient plan for improvement or expansion. Managing is what I do best.”

She waited a beat. “No sarcastic comments to that?”

“Only on the inside. That way I can save them up until you tick me off again.”

“I can hardly wait. In any case, it’s like, I enjoy planting a garden from scratch—that blank slate. But more, I like taking one that’s not planned very well, or needs some shaping up, and turning it around.”

She paused, frowned. “Funny, I just remembered. I had a dream about a garden a few nights ago. A really strange dream with ... I don’t know, something spooky about it. I can’t quite get it back, but there was something ... this huge, gorgeous blue dahlia. Dahlias are a particular favorite of mine, and blue’s my favorite color. Still, it shouldn’t have been there, didn’t belong there. I hadn’t planted it. But there it was. Strange.”

“What did you do with it? The dahlia?”

“Can’t remember. Luke woke me up, so my garden and the exotic dahlia went poof.” And the room, she thought, the room had been so cold. “He wasn’t feeling well, a little tummy distress.”

“He okay now?”

“Yeah.” Another point for his side, Stella thought. “He’s fine, thanks.”

“How about the tooth?”

Uh-oh, second point. The man remembered her baby’d had a loose tooth. “Sold to the Tooth Fairy for a crisp dollar bill. Second one’s about to wiggle out. He’s got the cutest little lisp going on right now.”

“His big brother teach him how to spit through the hole yet?”

She grimaced. “Not to my knowledge.”

“What you don’t know ... I bet it’s still there—the magic dahlia—blooming in dreamland.”

“That’s a nice thought.”
Kill it.
God, where did that come from? she wondered, fighting off a shudder. “It was pretty spectacular, as I recall.”