Page 83 of This Feeling

“When do you close for lunch?”

“In about fifteen minutes.”

I nodded and kissed her gently on the cheek before stepping away and glancing at the flowers. “What’s going on here?”

Harper seemed dazed momentarily, then shook her head and looked at the table. “Just making some bouquets for the front end.”

“Can I have a hand at it?”

Harper’s eyes lit up. “You sure can! You’ve already proven good at this, so let’s see what you come up with using these flowers.”

“Is that a challenge, Ms. Browning?”

She wrapped her arms around my neck, lifted onto her toes, and kissed me. “Yes, it is, Mr. Gallagher.”

“Challenge accepted.”

“Harper?” Lucy called out. “I need your help up front.”

Pouting, Harper let go and took a few steps away from me. “You okay back here by yourself?”

I nodded. “Yep. Don’t worry about meorthe flowers.”

She looked at the flowers then back to me. I could see the curiosity on her face for a moment, then she smiled, turned on her heels, and left me to it.

“Oh my goodness!”

I glanced up to see Harper standing there, a stunned expression on her face. My heart stopped momentarily as I looked back at the arrangements of flowers on the table. I’d put some in vases, and others in tissue paper and bags. They looked good to me…but I wasn’t the one who did this for a living.

“Is that a good ‘oh my goodness,’ or an I’m-going-to-have-to-redo-all-of-these ‘oh my goodness’?”

She slowly shook her head. “Declan, you’ve done anamazingjob. Look at these arrangements! Are you positive you’ve never done this before?”

I shrugged. “I guess I just have an eye for colors. My grandmother used to say that when she saw my coloring books.”

Harper laughed as she made her way over to me. “Well, you have an eye for flower arrangements, too, that’s for sure.”

“Closed for lunch?” I asked, pushing the last of the lilies into the vase I was working on. If my Marine Corps buddies could see me now, I’d never live this down.

“Yes, I just locked up after Lucy left. She’ll be back in an hour.”

Smiling, I took her hand in mine and pulled her to me. “There’s a lot I can do to you in an hour, but we should leave some time for actually eating lunch.”

Her breathing picked up as my mouth found the sensitive spot behind her ear.

“What to do with you…what to do…?”

“Declan,” she whimpered, as her body leaned into mine.

My hands moved to her hips, then to the button of her jeans. She’d looked adorable earlier when she came out of her bedroom dressed in white jeans and a blue shirt that made her gray eyes look pale blue.

“Kick off your shoes, Harp.”

She held onto my shoulders and did as I asked. Her eyes never left mine as I pulled her pants down, then off each leg. Lifting her shirt over her head next, I let my gaze slowly move down her body. She stood there in nothing but white lace panties and a matching bra. My heart hammered in my chest as I drank in the sight of her.

“Fuck, you’re so beautiful.”

She moved nervously from foot to foot until I cupped her face and kissed her softly. Turning her until she was up against the table, I slowly drew away. Her chest rose and fell as she watched me take a few steps back from her. I pulled my shirt off and dropped it to the floor to join her clothes.

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