Page 8 of Alpha's Sunflower Smiles

Sighing to myself, I closed the door of the shop and slid the bolt home, locking up for the evening. Well, if Pete’s evening was a flop and mine looked the same, at least Ronnie, Ty and Alder would be enjoying my massage oil.

Chapter 4

Pete

Ireally should have stayed away but I was feeling sorry for myself. I’d stayed at the office late last night and gone home with a headache, which only got worse when I’d checked my phone and saw that I had a dozen messages from Papa, telling me that he was disappointed in me.

I thought by morning, my headache would have gone but it was worse. I’d need to sort the whole situation out but I couldn’t think what to do that would work out for the best.

My feet carried me over to Sunflower Smiles without my consent. The door chimed as I went in and Wilfred looked up and smiled.

His smile slipped from his face and he moved out from behind the counter and came right over to me. “Is everything alright? You look awful.”

I blinked at him, trying to think of something to say. For some reason, my brain caught on the idea that I looked terrible and I wanted to peacock around to show him that I didn’talwayslook awful. It didn’t help that Wilfred was wearing a silver-grey shirt that made his grey eyes seem to shine, and he looked absolutely captivating.

Clearly I had taken too long to answer because Wilfred said, “You know, I’ve got some excellent tea for that. Come out the back and I’ll make you a cup. It’ll get rid of that stress headache.”

“How did you know I had a stress headache?”

“Oh, um, I suppose I just… looked? Were you in a rush?”

I hesitated. I probably should leave and get to work, and let Wilfred get on with his day, but I didn’t have the strength to say no to spending some time with him. “A cup of tea would be really nice, actually.”

He smiled again, and I swear it worked like a balm on my soul. My headache was already retreating.

“Sure, come through. I’ll get you settled and then we can chat.”

I followed Wilfred through to a workshop-slash-office and looked around, taking everything in. It was a surprisingly large space, easily twice the size of the actual shop. And it was cluttered and smelled of clay and lavender. He pointed out a few of the things while he was putting the kettle on. There was a potter’s wheel and workbench and so on.

It looked well-used. I could tell immediately that Wilfred spent a lot of time out here. He moved around the space so easily, stepping round a stack of boxes beside the desk. I watched him work.

When he handed me a steaming mug, I took it, raising it to my nose to smell the aromatic tang of the herbs. Normally, herbal tea smelled too flowery for me but this one was actually very pleasant. It had a fresh scent without being floral.

“Do you normally give away tea, as well as candles?”

He smiled at me again and – again – I was struck by how natural it seemed for him to do that. He beamed at me as though he was just enjoying being in my company.

“I only give tea to special people, too.”

“Do you have to write this down on your list of things you’ve given away?”

He waved a hand. “No, I’ve already written off that packet of tea because Richard was stressed the other day from looking through these accounts. I don’t think I need to write it down again. Although hang on!”

He leapt up and hurried over to the desk, rifling through some papers to find a post-it note and scribbled on it.

When he came back, I raised my eyebrows in a question.

He shrugged sheepishly.

“I might have given away a test product, and I need to ask Richard if that counts or not.”

I nearly smiled. “So you give away things all the time?”

“Notallthe time!”

“Only to special people?” I teased.

“Exactly!”

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