Page 26 of When Wildflowers Bloom

“Tell me about your wife,” I say.

“Hmm…” His cheeks fill with air before deflating. “I don’t really know what there is to tell. She never wanted kids; I always imagined she’d outgrow that. She got pregnant and we fell apart.” His words hit my sternum like a wrecking ball, but I must hide it well because he continues. “Then she went to Nashville or wherever she is.” He shrugs, as if it’s just that simple.

I clear my throat, staring at the back of a bottle of juice I can’t focus on. “Do you miss her?”

His response is immediate. “For Lucy.”

I put aloe juice in my cart, earning a look from him that makes me chuckle despite the shock of his words.

He clears his throat. “You know, you had a look on your face when you met her. Like you’d seen a ghost.”

The blood drains from my face in such a rush it makes me dizzy. Nauseous almost. I’ve stopped in the middle of the aisle and can’t make myself move as he leans on his cart next to me, waiting. Waiting for something I’ve never said out loud to anyone else.

“I’ve always wanted kids,” I say, half-truthing it.

“And?”

My mouth is dry, like it’s filled with sand. I’m not ready to tell him—or anyone.

“And I can’t have them.” I don’t look at him as I say it, and his pause makes me think he wants to ask more. Instead, he picks up a box of cookies.

When he sees me eyeing them, he shrugs and defensively says, “They’re organic.”

I click my tongue with a shake of my head. “Oh, Bo, you have so much to learn.”

Then, leaving my least favorite topic in the aisle of overly processed sweets, we walk around the nearly empty grocery store. As I shop, he asks me about every item I buy.Why did you pick that one?What are you going to do with that? What does that even taste like?And my personal favorite,What do you have against red dye 40?

He’s quizzing me in the cereal aisle and a voice interrupts the music over the speaker. “Good evening, shoppers, just a friendly reminder, we will be closing in ten minutes.”

Bo responds with a loud, “Boo!”

At the register, Monica has a knowing smile on her face as she talks to us. “Birdie, I didn’t know you had a boyfriend. You need to bring this man around more often!”

Before I can correct her, Bo says, “Monica, I keep telling her the same thing.”

I roll my eyes at them both, but I’m also smiling as we walk out of the automatic doors together and put the groceries in my trunk.

He leans against his Jeep that’s parked in the next space as I do the same against the minivan. Then it’s the looking: me at him, him at me.

“Bo.” I say his name because the silence is charged. Heavy.

He smiles one of his slow-to-grow smiles, arms crossed over his chest. “Birdie.”

I shake my head and roll my eyes.

“Now what? When do we start this Birdie Comes to Life school?”

He laughs softly, but the pause that follows—the way his eyes search mine—makes me want to rip out of my own skin. Anxious.

I open my mouth at the same time he unfolds his arms, pushes off the side of his Jeep with a familiar step that puts him in front of me, pressing one palm on the minivan by my head. He leans in close—so close his Bo Mountain Breeze consumes my senses and makes my knees buckle. When I imagine sliding the door of the minivan open, I clench my hands into fists at my side.

“You’re too pretty to be spending your Friday nights alone at grocery stores,” he says, voice low. Between his tone, what he says, and the way his beard barely scrapes against my skin, I stop breathing. Unsure of what he’s doing or what’s coming next. What I want to come next.

A quick move of his free hand and his palm settles at the base of my throat then slides up the side of my neck where two fingers stop and press gently to the spot just beneath my jaw.

I suck in a breath, my own heart pounding against his fingers. I press into the balls of my feet, pushing my back firmly against the van.

“What are you doing?” I ask with a whisper, not pulling my eyes off his. The truth is, I don’t care. Standing here with him looking at me with fingers pressed against my pulse point is more than physical, it’s intimate. Like him feeling my beating heart is him feeling a me I’ve yet to meet.

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