"Nothing wrong with her appetite," Hayley confirmed. "She smiled at me today. I know they say it's just gas, but—"
"What do they know?" Roz sprawled in a chair. "They inside that baby's head?"
"Logan asked me to marry him."
She didn't know why she blurted it out—hadn't known it was pushing from her brain to her tongue.
"Holy cow!" Hayley exploded, then immediately soothed Lily and lowered her voice. "When? How? Where? This is just awesome. This is the biggest of the big news. Tell us everything."
"There's not a lot of every anything. He asked me yesterday."
"After I went inside to put the baby down? I just knew something was up."
"I don't think he meant to. I think it just sort of happened, then he was irritated when I tried to point
out the very rational reasons we shouldn't rush into anything."
"What are they?" Hayley wondered.
"You've only known each other since January," Roz began, watching Stella. "You have two children. You've each been married before and bring a certain amount of baggage from those marriages."
"Yes." Stella let out a long sigh. "Exactly."
"When you know you know, don't you?" Hayley argued. "Whether it's five months or five years. And he's great with your kids. They're nuts about him. Being married before ought to make both of you understand the pitfalls or whatever. I don't get it. You love him, don't you?"
"Yes. And yes to the rest, to a point, but... it's different when you're young and unencumbered. You can take more chances. Well, if you're not me you can take more chances. And what if he wants children and I don't? I have to think about that. I have to know if I'm going to be able to consider having another child at this stage, or if the children I do have would be happy and secure with him in the long term. Kevin and I had a game plan."
"And your game was called," Roz said. "It isn't an easy thing to walk into another marriage. I waited a long time to do it, then it was the wrong decision. But I think, if I could have fallen, just tumbled into
love with a man at your age, one who made me happy, who cheerfully spent his Saturday with my children, and who excited me in bed, I'd have walked into it, and gladly."
"But you just said, before, you gave the exact reasons why it's too soon."
"No, I gave the reasons you'd give—and ones I understand, Stella. But there's something else you and
I understand, or should. And that is that love is precious, and too often stolen away. You've got a chance to grab hold of it again. And I say lucky you."
* * *
She dreamed again of the garden, and the blue dahlia. It was ladened with buds, fat and ripe and ready
to burst into bloom. At the top, a single stunning flower swayed electric in the quiet breeze. Her garden, though no longer tidy and ordered, spread out from its feet in waves and flows and charming bumps of color and shape.
Then Logan was beside her, and his hands were warm and rough as he drew her close. His mouth was strong and exciting as it feasted on hers. In the distance she could hear her children's laughter, and the cheerful bark of the dog.
She lay on the green grass at the garden's edge, her senses full of the color and scent, full of the man.
There was such heat, such pleasure as they loved in the sunlight. She felt the shape of his face with her hands. Not fairy-tale handsome, not perfect, but beloved. Her skin shivered as their bodies moved, flesh against flesh, hard against soft, curve against angle.
How could they fit, how could they make such a glorious whole, when there were so many differences?
But her body merged with his, joined, and thrived.
She lay in the sunlight with him, on the green grass at the edge of her garden, and hearing the thunder
of her own heartbeat, knew bliss.
The buds on the dahlia burst open. There were so many of them. Too many. Other plants were being shaded, crowded. The garden was a jumble now, anyone could see it. The blue dahlia was too
aggressive and prolific.
It's fine where it is. It's just a different plan.
But before she could answer Logan, there was another voice, cold and hard in her mind.
His plan. Not yours. His wants. Not yours. Cut it down, before it spreads.
No, it wasn't her plan. Of course it wasn't. This garden was meant to be a charming spot, a quiet spot.
There was a spade in her hand, and she began to dig.
That's right. Dig it out, dig it up.
The air was cold now, cold as winter, so that Stella shuddered as she plunged the spade into the ground.
Logan was gone, and she was alone in the garden with the Harper Bride, who stood in her white gown and tangled hair, nodding. And her eyes were mad.
"I don't want to be alone. I don't want to give it up."
Dig! Hurry. Do you want the pain, the poison? Do you want it to infect your children? Hurry! It will
spoil everything, kill everything, if you let it stay.
She'd get it out. It was best to get it out. She'd just plant it somewhere else, she thought, somewhere better.
But as she lifted it out, taking care with the roots, the flowers went black, and the blue dahlia withered and went to dust in her hands.
* * *
Keeping busy was the best way not to brood. And keeping busy was no problem for Stella with the
school year winding down, the perennial sale at the nursery about to begin, and her best saleswoman
on maternity leave.
She didn't have time to pick apart strange, disturbing dreams or worry about a man who proposed one minute, then vanished the next. She had a business to run, a family to tend, a ghost to identify.
She sold the last three bay laurels, then put her mind and her back into reordering the shrub area.
"Shouldn't you be pushing papers instead of camellias?"
She straightened, knowing very well she'd worked up a sweat, that there was soil on her pants, and
that her hair was frizzing out of the ball cap she'd stuck on. And faced Logan.
"I manage, and part of managing is making sure our stock is properly displayed. What do you want?"
"Got a new job worked up." He waved the paperwork, and the breeze from it made her want to moan
out loud. "I'm in for supplies."
"Fine. You can put the paperwork on my desk."
"This is as far as I'm going." He shoved it into her hand. "Crew's loading up some of it now. I'm going
to take that Japanese red maple, and five of the hardy pink oleanders."
He dragged the flatbed over and started to load.
"Fine," she repeated, under her breath. Annoyed, she glanced at the bid, blinked, then reread the client information.
"This is my father."
"Uh-huh."
"What are you doing planting oleander for my father?"
"My job. Putting in a new patio, too. Your stepmama's already talking about getting new furniture for
out there. And a fountain. Seems to me a woman can't see a flat surface without wanting to buy something to put on it. They were still talking about it when I left the other night."
"You—what were you doing there?"
"Having pie. Gotta get on. We need to get started on this if I'm going to make it home and clean up
before this dinner with the professor guy tonight. See you later, Red."
"Hold it. You just hold it. You had your mother call me, right out of the blue."
"How's it out of the blue when you said you wanted us to meet each other's families? Mine's a couple thousand miles away right now, so the phone call seemed the best way."
"I'd just like you to explain..." Now she waved the papers. "All this."
"I know. You're a demon for explanations." He stopped long enough to grab her hair, crush his mouth
to hers. "If that doesn't make it clear enough, I'm doing something wrong. Later."
* * *
"Then he just walked away, leaving me standing there like an idiot." Still stewing hours later, Stella changed Lily's diaper while Hayley finished dressing for dinner.