Page 82 of Knot in Bloom
Tuesday morning,nine-thirty AM. I usually pick up this week’s arrangement at seven-thirty, but I can’t bring myself to leave the hotel room.
The conversation with Caleb and Levi yesterday changed everything. Seeing my deception through their eyes made it clear how unsustainable this has become. I can’t keep buying flowers for imaginary meetings. I can’t keep lying to the woman I love.
I’m getting dressed to go confess everything when someone knocks at the door. Hotel housekeeping doesn’t start this early, and I’m not expecting any deliveries. When I open it, my heart stops.
Sadie stands in the hallway holding today’s arrangement—burgundy dahlias and bronze chrysanthemums that perfectly capture autumn’s richness. She’s wearing jeans and a soft blue sweater, her honey-blonde hair pulled back in a messy bun. She looks beautiful and concerned and completely unprepared for what she’s about to discover.
“Reid?” Her brow furrows with worry. “You usually pick up your Tuesday arrangement by now. When you didn’t show up, I thought maybe something was wrong.”
Panic floods my system. She’s here. At my hotel room. Full of evidence of my elaborate deception.
“Sadie, I—” I step partially into the hallway, trying to block her view inside. “You didn’t need to come all the way out here. I was just about to head into town.”
“Are you sick? You look pale.” She tries to peer around me, genuine concern in her voice. “I brought your arrangement, but if you’re not feeling well?—”
That’s when the wind shifts, carrying the scent from my room into the hallway. Her nostrils flare slightly, and I watch confusion cross her features.
“Do you smell that?” she asks, then understanding dawns. “Reid, why does your room smell like old flowers?”
My heart pounds as I realize there’s no way to explain this without her seeing everything. “Sadie, I can explain?—”
But she’s already pushing past me, her omega curiosity overriding politeness. The moment she steps into my room, she freezes.
I watch her take in the full scope of my floral graveyard. Arrangements from every week we’ve known each other, in various stages of decay. Some still recognizable, others reduced to brown stalks and scattered petals. The room that should smell like bergamot and cedar instead reeks of decomposition and desperation.
“Oh my god.” Her voice is barely a whisper. “Reid, what is this?”
I close the door behind us, my throat tight with shame. “It’s exactly what it looks like.”
She moves deeper into the room like she’s walking through a museum of her own work. Picks up a wilted stem from the firstarrangement I ever bought, turns it over in her hands like she can’t quite believe what she’s seeing.
“These are all from my shop.” It’s not a question. “Every week. For almost a month.”
“Yes.”
“But the business meetings—” She turns to face me, and I can see her mind working, piecing together the truth. “There are no business meetings, are there?”
The moment of truth. The confession I’ve been dreading and planning in equal measure. “No. There are no business meetings.”
She sets down the dead flower carefully, like it might break. “Then why?”
I run a hand through my hair, feeling like the worst kind of fool. “Because I saw you through your shop window one morning and couldn’t stop thinking about you. Because I wanted reasons to see you, to talk to you, to be part of your world even in some small way.”
Her scent shifts—not with anger like I expected, but with something softer. Understanding, maybe.
“You’ve been buying flowers you don’t need just to see me?”
“And keeping them because I couldn’t bring myself to throw away something you created, even when the reason for having them was fake.” I gesture helplessly at the evidence surrounding us. “I know how this looks. I know how pathetic this is.”
She’s quiet for a long moment, studying my face with those hazel eyes that see everything. “How long have you been planning to tell me?”
“Since yesterday. Caleb and Levi saw all this and made me realize I needed to be honest with you.” I take a shaky breath. “I was coming to your shop this morning to confess everything.”
“But I beat you to it.”
“You beat me to it.”
Another silence stretches between us. I brace myself for anger, disgust, the complete dismissal I probably deserve. Instead, she starts to laugh.
