Her Reason to Stay by Anna Adams

his expensive cotton shirt.
    “Hi.” He didn’t turn to her. His hard-edged profile presented a challenge. She willed him to look at her. She wanted to see whether his need was as compelling as hers.
    “May I help you?”
    Her stiff tone did the trick. She expected ice in his eyes, but he turned as if he’d been waiting to meet her gaze. His eyes devoured her as she tucked her hands behind her back to keep from touching him.
    “Daphne,” he said.
    She nodded.
    He came closer. “I heard you’d found this job.”
    “I was worried you and Raina might disapprove.”
    “Work’s important,” he said. “I have clients who—” He stopped, his smile, self-mocking and irresistible. “Not that I’m comparing you to my clients.”
    He probably could. She’d done things that would shock him as much—maybe more than—Raina. The knowledge restored Daphne to reality.
    “You need something for Mother’s Day?”
    “My son wants a bouquet, or maybe a plant for his mother for tomorrow. I need to look at your catalog. Can you still deliver an arrangement today?”
    “Sure.” She came around the counter, looking for a boy, but Patrick was alone. “Where is your son?”
    “He’s at home with my mother. I promised to bring a picture of whatever I send.”
    She led him to the catalog on a stand on the counter. “I can make a copy.”
    “What do you think?” Patrick asked. “Carnations?”
    “Does your son have a favorite color?”
    “Orange, and Lisa likes carnations.”
    She tried to believe her stab of envy had nothing to do with Patrick. She wanted to be a woman whose tastes were remembered.
    “I saw an arrangement with orange-tipped ones.” She leafed through the plastic-sleeved pages. “Here we are. You have three options.”
    “Will would choose the big one.”
    Daphne laughed and looked up to find Patrick watching her. His intensity literally robbed her of oxygen.
    They weren’t alone. Suddenly, she felt as if everyone else in the shop was also waiting, breath held, to see what happened next. But no one else could be as aware of the line of his chin, the dark shadow of his beard, the contrast between rough and smooth of his hand on her wrist and his mouth, curved in a tense invitation.
    She longed to move close to him, to let his mouth persuade her that nothing was wrong about her unexpected need of him.
    Instead, she made herself remember her job. “Do you have an address?”
    At first he looked blank. His fingers, long, strong, capable, trembled as he fished a folded piece of paper from an inside pocket. She caught a whiff of his spicy scent as he leaned toward her, smoothing the paper open. “She’ll receive it by tomorrow?”
    “As long as we send it by five.” She glanced at the wide-faced, Victorian clock over the door. “You still have plenty of time.”
    She entered Lisa Gannon’s information, but it was like typing with a set of ten cucumbers. Her hands didn’t want to work. Finally, she got as far as taking Patrick’s credit card and running it through Miriam’s old-fashioned machine.
    He signed the charge slip. She pushed his copy to him.
    “Thanks.” He took it from her.
    Their fingertips brushed. Just like a heroine in a romance novel, she felt a surge of desire. Yearning that made her stomach feel hollow and her legs heavy.
    “Let me make a copy of the picture of the bouquet.” She took the sheet out and ran it through the copier and pushed that across the counter, too.
    He folded it and added it to the same pocket as his ex-wife’s address. “I want to see you,” he said, low-voiced.
    She studied the other customers. No one seemed to be as interested as she feared. “Call me,” she said. “Or come to the hote—no, I don’t want you to come there.”
    “I’m not a snob.”
    “I’m not sure this is even the right conversation to be having.”
    “We have to,” he said in an almost-resigned tone. “I can’t pretend I don’t—” He glanced at the others in the