Twisted in Tulips (9 page)

“Yeah. That’s it. Rumor has it it’s our kind of scene.”

Only unlike his service days he no longer looked for the rowdy bars. If Clint had stayed the same he would be disappointed.

Five minutes later, they walked into Sam’s. It was louder than normal with most of the racket coming from the back room. Since his favorite corner table was occupied Jace headed to the bar. He hated his back to the room, but the mirrors behind the bar would allow him to see most of the room and the front door. Sam set drinks on a waitress’s tray before heading their way with a smile.

“Good evening, gentlemen.”

“Sam.” Jace nodded toward the back room. “Sounds like a party.”

“A reunion. Military men seem to like my bar all of a sudden.” She grabbed a mug from a shelf. “You want the usual?”

“Yeah.”

With his glass already half full she gestured to Clint. “How about you, cutie?”

“Whatever he’s having.”

She passed their drinks over without more chatter and moved down the bar to other customers.

“So,” Jace swiveled his stool to face Clint. “About this woman.”

“You’d like her.” He grinned the grin of a half-gone goon. “She’s sexy. Smart. Tough. And has a persuasive knack you wouldn’t expect for getting her way.”

“Like convincing you to come see me.” He knew a woman like that, only Misty used stubbornness to win her arguments. His skin tightened. His neck prickled. It was the same every time he thought of her. The longer she stayed away the more he thought of her. The more he thought of her the more he craved her. Craved her to the point his reactions were almost as visceral as when he saw her.

“Something like that.” Clint sobered as his drink sat untouched. “I’ve been thinking a lot about you, what happened, what you were left to face alone.”

“Because of this woman?”

“Before. The unit wasn’t the same without you.” He hesitated a moment. His eyes bounced around the bar almost nervously. “I wasn’t the same.”

The bar noise crescendoed and faded. Jace’s heart thumped like an incendiary device ticking away the seconds to detonation.

He’d spent the last year alone. His blood family had been gone before his injury. His heart family had walked after. Perhaps if he was lucky, very lucky, some of that family was returning.

“I can’t tell you how sorry I am for turning my back on you, Jace. There aren’t enough words.”

“You know what?” He pushed his beer away. Emotions as thick as the Florida air after a storm clogged his throat, but sound was returning and his heart rate was normalizing. “I don’t want any apologies. I’m just glad you’re here.”
Glad to have family again.
He held the last back with his tears. Vulnerability wasn’t something Marines did.

“Then joining the party in the back room should thrill you.” Clint picked up his beer and slid off the stool. “The unit is here with their families.”

Jace’s mouth gaped long enough for his throat to dry. When he spoke it was more like a rasp. “Did you organize this?”

“No. Well, not alone.”

“Your lady friend?”

Clint shrugged. He’d been doing a lot of that.

“I’ve got to meet this woman.”

“Later.” Clint led the way to the back room filled with men from the unit.

By the wall where he’d first kissed Misty, Jace stopped. On a table pushed against the wall was a large photo of the unit from before his last mission. It was printed in crisp color and framed in a pine that matched his furniture perfectly. He didn’t need to see the vase of tulips or read the note to know who had set up the reunion.

He picked up the paper and rubbed his fingers over the crispness. He unfolded it.

I understand you too. You’re a private man who probably doesn’t like surprises, but I’m hoping you’ll like this one. You deserve your family
.

He’d misjudged her again.

Chapter Ten

Waking late with a hangover no secret remedy would cure kicked off a day filled with dingbats and dumbasses.

One of the women on his staff flushed her access badge, which couldn’t have been easy since it was supposed to be around her neck at all times and the lanyard wasn’t broken. She had to have been having sex, but Jace really didn’t want to ask. Especially if the embarrassed shame flooding her cheeks had been any indication. He’d written
unavoidable mishap
on the report.

Then he’d had to split up two men who’d decided to go after the same woman. Their desires had turned violent as they turned on each other. One wound up with a dislocated shoulder, the other a black eye and both had new reports in their HR file. In the end they’d faced the reality of the situation. Convincing the woman she liked men rather than women wasn’t happening.

A woman harassing her ex-husband, a journalist trying to sneak into one of the labs, and an engaged couple visiting Tulle and Tulips Designer Weddings breaking a restroom toilet during an afternoon sex adventure had led up to the crowning moment. A visiting six-year-old, unattended by Mom, got into a server room and almost took the building’s main security system down. He’d found the giggling girl just in time. The idiot who’d left the door unlocked had so far been too cowardly to step forward.

Through it all Jace struggled with his AWOL focus. Misty and thoughts of seeing her had patrolled the frontline of his mind. She’d set up an amazing reunion for him and hadn’t stayed around for the thank you or to watch.

“I hear you’ve had…a day.”

“A day.” Jace looked up from his last report to find Trevor leaning casually against the doorjamb. He’d loosened his tie and undone the top button of his peach shirt, yet he still looked crisp and innately powerful. A look in the mirror wasn’t needed for Jace to know his own crisp look had withered hours ago. “I guess that’s one way to put it.”

“Seems you handled it well.”

“Just doing my job.”

“Which is done for the day.” Trevor jerked his head. “How ’bout a drink?”

“You taking a night off from your pursuit to get Lori to marry you?” It was common knowledge that while Lori and Trevor were crazy in love and committed, she had yet to accept his proposal. From what Jace had heard, Trevor asked every night.

“Hell no. She’s at a wedding for one of her brides, but I won’t miss a night with her.”

It was a sentiment Jace seconded. Misty’s windows had been dark by the time he and his unit had closed down the bar. He’d entertained the ideas of pounding until she woke or sleeping on her doorstep or breaking in. In the end, none of those actions from a man who’d had too much to drink adequately said thank you or inspired romance. But tonight… “If we could do that drink another night… I want to finish this report and then I plan on tracking someone down.”

“Misty?”

“How’d you know?”

“I recognize a fellow pursuer.” Trevor grinned with a happiness that transformed his professional polish to a giddy gleam. “And Lori told me about the pizza and gift card.”

“I owed her an apology, and she works too hard.”

“We all work too hard at times, and that was some apology.”

“I know how to admit I’m wrong. I was wrong about Misty.” And he was going to top the apology with a thank you she wouldn’t forget.

“She’s a surprising woman.” Trevor pushed off the wall. “Good luck.”

Thirty minutes later, descending the back stairwell with the certainty that Misty was alone in her office with all the other planners gone for the night, Jace didn’t feel like he needed luck.

He had waited.

He had planned.

He would conquer.

With a swipe of his master key, he was in the lobby of Tulle and Tulips. Muted light shone from Misty’s office. Moving closer, before seeing her elegantly decorated space, he knew she wasn’t there. It felt empty.

A door at the back of her office hung open. A song played with lyrics about not being able to find the way home reaching him. The raspily sung words had fit him and his life to perfection until last night. No. Until Misty. He just hadn’t recognized all the changes in himself until last night.

Because of Misty he’d released his judgmental views. He’d lost all issues with her clothes. Before long, when men looked at her they’d look with envy because they’d never know how amazing the sexily clad woman was.

Following the music, he went into the warehouse section that was larger than he’d thought. Tables on wheels were set up in long rows with acrylic sign holders hanging off the edges every few feet. He imagined the wheels were so the arrangements could be rolled in and out of the giant refrigerator in the back corner. Most all of them had signs with names and flower types listed. Vases, rolls of ribbon, branchy-looking twig stuff, cans of spray paint, blocks of foam and other assorted supplies sat in groups on the different tables, clearly waiting to be put into whatever arrangements they’d be used in.

The last row of tables danced with thick and tall tulips. Their soft fragrance filled the air. It was like looking at a field of them. Red tulips kissed with white edges, white kissed with red, pure white, pure red, and a creative blend of both colors in one. The music shifted to something with a soft and melodic kind of rise and fall that wailed chick-flick soundtrack. It suited his mood.

A bundle of the tulips rose into the air and then bounced down until they disappeared. Walking along the tables, moving closer and closer to where Misty worked, the sense of sunshine and happiness grew in a quiet swell within Jace’s chest. At the end of the table, he found himself facing a shorter sea of tulips. Misty, dressed in one of her habitual skirts and blouses, was in the middle. She knelt on the floor as she wove thin strands of gold wire into a braided, mesh pattern. It extended from the top of the art deco-style vases and reached to the bottom of the shortest bloom. The flower stems had even been done in a sort of braid.

The effect was hope and elegance. Pride for what Misty accomplished with some flowers and wire filled Jace until his chest grew tight and each heartbeat struck his ribs with the certainty of a church bell.

“You’re amazing.” The simple statement came out more quietly than he’d intended, but she heard.

Her head popped up. She spun at the waist. “Jace.” With wide eyes, she stood and turned to fully face him. “What are you doing here?”

“I had to see you.” As if an invisible rope extended between them was being shortened, pulling him, he walked through the vases until only inches separated them.

“Why?”

Her skin glowed with the pleasure she found in her work. Until getting the job with Blue Chip and being granted control of his own actions it was a pleasure Jace wouldn’t have recognized. A soft line of gold dust, likely from the wire paint, brushed her upper lip. Mesmerized, he reached out to smooth it away. Instead, his thumb rested at the line’s edge. The moment stalled, suspended in perfection.

He hadn’t been sure what he wanted to say or how the moments would play out. He’d only known he couldn’t have waited a second more to see her. “I missed you.”

“I missed you.” She stepped closer.

“I owe you a thank you. For last night.”

“I heard you had a good time.” She didn’t smile or move or make a gesture other than to stare into his eyes. “I spoke with Sam earlier.”

“It was…” Heat filled his face. His throat tightened. His chest, right in the middle and radiating outward, ached. His eyes burned. His vocabulary washed away beneath a sudden avalanche of tears fighting for freedom.

He shook his head to dislodge the urge to cry.

Misty took the last step that separated them and rested her hands on his hips. Serenity shrouded her gaze. “It was something you deserved.”

“I’m not so sure. The way I’ve acted at times, the things I’ve said and thought.”

“Came from the angry side of a wounded man.” She kissed him simply. “You aren’t that man.”

“I was that man.” The last of his walls disintegrated into ash. As boldly as Misty entered his life she’d just as quietly changed it. “You’ve changed me.”

“You made me like cranky men.”

“I was judging people worse than they ever judged me, and you helped me to see that.”

“I was doing my own judging, especially in regards to my mother.” She unknotted his tie, but didn’t pull it free of his shirt collar.

“She’s a piece of work. I can see how she makes things difficult for you.” He popped two of her blouse buttons free and was rewarded by the view of her breasts swelling over the top of her lacy bra.

“She’s still my mom, and thanks to you we’ve had the chance to talk and come to a truce.” She untucked his shirt. When her fingers brushed his undershirt he wished for the first time he’d forgone the extra barrier.

“How’d I do that?” He worked another button free so she was exposed to her navel.

“You made me realize I was using my appearance as a weapon. While I do love my clothes and the way they make me feel they’re no longer a defensive wall against my mom.” She popped his wrist buttons free.

“So you won’t be changing the way you dress?” Jace pulled her blouse from her skirt and pushed it off her shoulders. It pooled at her feet in a satiny puddle that looked equally as soft as her skin felt.