Love in Bloom (4 page)

She had finally broken down and put in a desperate call to her younger sister. Bobbi was a disaster in heels, but she had artistic flair and a way with flowers that couldn't be taught. Hope just had to make sure she kept her sister away from the phones and the computer. Nobody could screw up an order like Bobbi. Nobody had a heart like Bobbi, either. God bless her, when someone needed help, she came at a run.

Hope was in the middle of stocking the refrigerator case when the phone rang for what felt like the millionth time. The frazzled, irritated side of her wanted to snarl, “What?,” but, professional that she was, she said a calm, “Changing Seasons. May I help you?” Until she heard the voice on the other end of the line. “Clarice! Where in the world are you? If the answer isn't Timbuktu, being held by terrorists, you're dead meat.”

“I'm in Vegas. I'm married!”

Hope blinked and gaped at the receiver. “To Borg?”

“I am totally in love. He is amaaaazing.”

No, amazing was that Clarice could run away to Vegas with someone she'd known a whole week. And leave her boss stuck up to her neck in flowers. “Why didn't you at least call me and let me know you were going?”

“Well, it was kind of sudden.”

Kind of? There was an understatement. Clarice tended to take her whole free-spirit thing too far.

“Borg got laid off and was going down there to check out working at his cousin's garage. And he found this great deal on Travel-ocity, so we figured, what the hell.”

What the hell. No job, no money, just jump and hope a net appears
. It sure took all kinds of people to make the world spin. And thanks to Clarice, Hope's was going to be spinning like crazy.

“We're staying at the Bellagio,” Clarice continued. “Borg used his whole last paycheck for this. Isn't that sweet? You should see the fountain. It's awesome. This whole place is awesome.”

Hope tightened the phone ear bud and went back to her birthday arrangement. “I've heard it's fabulous.”

“And the shopping. Oh, my God. We are having so much fun. I'm so happy,” Clarice ended on a squeal.

Hope couldn't help smiling. Clarice knew how to live in the moment, that was for sure. She just wished Clarice was living in the moment here at the shop, helping her. “Well, I wish you both the best. Good luck. And let me know where to send your last check.”

“Thanks. You're the best. Speaking of luck, I've gotta get back to the slots. Take care. And, Hope?”

“Hmm?” Hope said absently, her mind already on the mountain of orders still waiting to be filled.

“Go for it. Find somebody and just . . . go for it.” Before Hope could respond, Clarice was talking to Mr. Wonderful. “Hey, baby. What? You lost how much? Damn.” To Hope, “Gotta go!” Then the line went dead.

The bell over the shop door jingled and a familiar voice warbled, “I'm here to save the day.”

Thank God. Help. “I'm in the back,” Hope called.

A moment later, the red velvet curtains partitioning off the work room parted and through them stepped her little sister, the reincarnation of Scarlett O'Hara, only with blond hair and bigger boobs.
She was wearing jeans, boots, and a black leather jacket over layers of style.

She blew over to Hope and hugged her, enveloping Hope in a mist of DKNY perfume. Bobbi never could put on perfume with a light hand. The parade of men who chased her never seemed to mind.

Normally Hope wouldn't, either. But when she was going through chemo the smell of perfume had made her sick. It still did a little. Now she had to be careful around the thing she loved the most: flowers. She still couldn't come close to the most potent ones like stargazer lilies. And selling potpourri and scented candles was not an option yet, either.

She pulled away and tried not to make a face.

“What?” Bobbi's eyebrows rose with sudden understanding. “The perfume? You can smell it?”

“Um.”

“Sorry. If I'd known I was going to be coming here, I wouldn't have put any on. I'll wash it off and go perfume-naked the rest of the day, I promise.”

Hope nodded. “Thanks. I hate to cramp your style.”

“Nothing cramps my style,” Bobbi said with a grin.

“Well, that's good to know, 'cause if you kept dousing yourself with that stuff, I'm afraid I'd have to lock you in the cooler.”

Bobbi stuck her tongue out and went off to de-scent herself.

“Thanks for bailing me out,” Hope said when she returned.

“No problem. I'd have just sat around and ate chocolate or something anyway. That's the problem with working nights. You're home all day with nothing to do but fold your laundry and eat.”

Who was Bobbi kidding? She never stayed home for long. She was always out, either having coffee with a friend or lunch with some man she'd met at the Last Resort, where she worked as a cocktail waitress while she tried to figure out what she really wanted to do with the rest of her life.

Bobbi plopped her purse under the work counter. “So, how many million corsages do we have left to make?”

The phone rang. “Ask me after this call,” Hope said, and took the order. “We're going to be here till midnight,” she groaned when she hung up.

“You're going to be here till midnight,” Bobbi corrected her, starting on a corsage. “By midnight, I'll be serving drinks and dodging losers trying to cop a feel.” She heaved a sigh and shook out the silver bangles at her wrist. “I don't know how long I'm going to last over there.”

What to say to that? When it came to careers, Bobbi tended to have a short attention span. In fact, when it came to most things she didn't have a very long attention span. She started books but never finished them (unless they were romance novels, and even those had to be short), and she tried on different hobbies like they were shoes. So far she'd tried hiking (with one of her buff boyfriends—she'd hiked through a nest of wasps and that had ended that), cycling (“Boring,” she decided), French cooking (she almost set the kitchen on fire), and knitting (it took too long to see results). Her relationships didn't last long, either—not surprising, considering the undependable guys she picked. If a Hollywood producer decided to make another
Legally Blonde
movie, Bobbi would make the perfect star. She wouldn't even need a script. The producers could just follow her around all day.
Legally Blonde: The Reality Show
. And it would be a hit because everyone would love her.

“What we don't get done today, we'll finish tomorrow.” Bobbi put a hand over her heart. “I pledge to make sure that no Heart Lake High School dance queen goes without her flowers.” She gave a stack of pink tissue paper a dramatic tug and managed to knock over a container of carnations in the process. “Oops. Don't worry. I'll get it,” she said, reaching for the paper towels.

Maybe calling her sister for help hadn't been such a good idea.

“Don't worry,” Bobbi assured Hope, as if reading her mind. “I'll get into the rhythm here in a minute.”

“It's all good,” lied Hope.

“So, have you heard from Clarice yet?”

“She eloped to Vegas.”

“Oh, fun!” cried Bobbi. “I so need to go to Vegas. I hear the shopping there is incredible.”

“You wouldn't go with someone you'd known only a week would you?”

Bobbi gave a little shrug. “You don't need years to know if it's right.”

This coming from the woman who'd had one starter marriage and six boyfriends in the last three years. Talk about starting your twenties with a bang. “Sometimes you worry me, Bobs.”

“I know what you're thinking,” Bobbi said. “Even though my relationships haven't worked out, I still believe in love at first sight. I just have this way of killing it before it can grow.”

“I hate it when you talk like it's all your fault that things didn't work out with those bozos. It takes two to kill love,” Hope said, snapping the plastic container shut over a carnation wrist corsage. “You just haven't found the right man yet.”

Bobbi sighed. “I need to quit dating losers.”

Hallelujah
, thought Hope.
It's about time.

“I need someone who's nice. And responsible. Someone who doesn't just want to get into my pants.”

“Well, for that he'd have to be gay,” teased Hope.

Bobbi gave the florist wire holding her carnations together a vicious twist. “I hate men. They only want one thing. Nobody ever cares about your mind.”

“Your mind is mostly on
The Bachelor
and
People
magazine. Most guys aren't into that kind of thing,” Hope said.

“I like other things,” Bobbi protested. “I like dancing and shopping and . . . all kinds of stuff.”

“Soap operas and romance novels,” Hope supplied.

“So, what's wrong with that?”

“Nothing. I'm just not sure those are subjects most men are interested in talking about.”

The shop bell summoned Hope to the front of the shop, and she emerged to find Jason Wells, the hunk, standing in front of the refrigerator case, hands shoved into his jeans back pockets, looking at her premade arrangements. Her body had an instant high-voltage reaction. What cruel joke of fate was this, anyway?
Of all the flower joints in the world, he has to walk into mine.

“You're back,” she said.
Real professional, Hope.

He smiled at her. It was a friendlier smile than what she'd seen the day before, maybe even a mildly interested smile. “The flowers for my mom were a hit. Now I need something to make a woman feel better.”

Was he kidding? All he'd have to do was walk into a room. “Can you give me some details?”
Who's the woman, your girlfriend?
Like it mattered. She was not in the market for a man. But if she was, she'd take this one in a heartbeat.

“You can handle having flowers delivered in another state, right?”

“Sure. We're an FTD florist,” Hope said, moving to her computer. “What's the occasion?”

“Well.” He cleared his throat. “It's not exactly an occasion.”

She raised her eyebrows and looked at him.

“They're for . . .” He stopped mid-sentence, the words falling from his open jaw.

Hope didn't have to turn around to see what he was looking at. She knew. Bobbi had that effect on men.

“Hi,” she said from behind Hope. What was Bobbi doing out here anyway? Why wasn't she in the back room where she belonged, toiling away on corsages?

Jason closed his mouth and managed a feeble, “Hi.”

Hope tapped the keyboard impatiently with her fingers. “The flowers are for?” she prompted, trying to return some of the oxygen her sister had just sucked out of the room.

He cleared his throat again. “My . . .” He shook his head as if trying to restart his brain. “They're for my sister.”

“For her birthday?” asked Hope.

“No, just because she needs 'em.”

“What a nice brother. Sending flowers to your sister,” cooed Bobbi.

For a flash, Hope had thought he'd just made up an excuse to come in and see her again. Maybe he had. But now he only had eyes for her sister. She could feel a weed of jealousy growing in her the size of a sunflower.
Yank that out right now. You can't have him anyway.

“She broke up with her fiancé,” Jason said, eyeing Bobbi. “She feels like crap.”

“Boy, I know the feeling,” muttered Bobbi.

Jason moved closer to the counter where Bobbi stood next to Hope. “I bet you've never had that problem.”

She shrugged. “It always hurts to break up.”

Hope inserted herself into the conversation. “How much would you like to spend?”

“This man looks like he's got a big heart. I bet if it's for his sister, he doesn't care,” said Bobbi, and Jason's face took on a slightly red tint. Gorgeous as he was, he should be used to flattery from women. His embarrassment didn't stop him from smiling at Bobbi. It wasn't a casual smile. It wasn't a mildly interested one, either. It was the kind of smile ignited by the sparks of high-voltage sexual attraction.

“I just want something nice that will make her feel good,” he told Hope. “Have you got a flower for that?”

“Let's see,” she said, trying to ignore the sudden desire to give her attention-stealing sister poison ivy. A song from her favorite old
movie,
White Christmas
, came to mind. “Sisters, sisters,” mocked Rosemary Clooney.

You can't have him, she reminded herself, so why not let Bobbi have him? Because even though he wouldn't want Hope, she wanted him. And that was enough reason to balk at sharing with her sister.

But it was a shameful reason, especially since Bobbi had never done anything but look up to her. Oh, and chauffeur her to chemo, and buy her pretty scarves and hats to cover her bald head. Hope felt suddenly hot with shame. She should give herself poison ivy.

She ran a hand through her hair and redirected her brain to the business of selecting just the right flowers for the occasion. “Lily of the valley would be nice. It signifies a return to happiness.”

He snapped his fingers. “That'll do.”

“I agree,” said Bobbi. “Now, how about something for your wife?”

He shook his head. “I don't have a wife.”

“Girlfriend?” persisted Bobbi.

Another head shake. “Nope.”

“Boyfriend?” Bobbi ventured, looking ready to be thoroughly depressed.

He made a face. “Uh, no.”

“Oh,” she said cheerily.

“How do you want the card to read?” asked Hope.

“She loves poetry. How about something . . .”

“Poetic?” Hope teased. She loved poetry. She suspected she'd like Jason's sister. “Hmmm.” She gave the keyboard a thoughtful tap. How about this one?
Though lovers be lost love shall not.
”