Chapter 6
Sawyer took a step closer. They were standing on opposite sides of the narrow wooden potting bench now. His eyes were dark, searching her face with an urgency that made her skin prickle.
“You won’t lose this place,” he said.
“You can’t promise that. You’re a brilliant lawyer, but you can’t invent three hundred thousand dollars out of thin air.”
“I don't need to invent anything.” He reached into his coat pocket and withdrew a small, heavy brass key, setting it on the wood between them. “This belongs to the municipal archives room at City Hall. The original carriage easement deed from 1890 is registered under a permanent covenant. It cannot be dissolved by a private sale without the signature of the primary occupant. You hold the occupancy rights, Amalia. Not Geller.”
She stared down at the key. It was old, intricately cut, cold against the warm pine of the bench.
“Why do you have this?” she asked, looking up at him through her lashes. “Why are you doing this for me?”
Sawyer’s jaw worked. He looked at her mouth, then at her eyes, his breathing shallow. For a terrifying, beautiful heartbeat, the space between them seemed to dissolve. He leaned forward, resting both hands on the edge of the bench, his face barely six inches from hers. She could smell the crisp citrus of his shaving soap, the faint, bitter trace of the chamomile tea, the rain in his dark hair.
“Because,” he whispered, his voice rough with an emotion he couldn't hide, “I cannot bear to watch you disappear.”
Her breath caught.
Her hands moved on the wood, her fingertips inching toward his. Every instinct she had cultivated over two years of mourning screamed at her to step back, but her body refused to obey. She wanted him to touch her. She wanted him to cross the line, to pull the wooden pins from her hair, to tell her that the ghost in his heart was finally dead and that she was allowed to live again.
“Sawyer…” she breathed.
The clock on the wall struck seven.
The metallic chime was like a slap.
Sawyer flinched. The warmth in his eyes shattered, replaced by a sudden, agonized realization. He pulled his hands back from the bench as if the wood had burst into flame. He stepped back into the shadows of the corridor, his face tightening into that impenetrable, professional mask.
“I have a conference call,” he said, his voice flat, hollowed out by effort. “The London underwriters don't tolerate delays.”
“Sawyer, wait—”
“The arrangement,” he interrupted, reaching into his breast pocket and pulling out a pristine white slip of paper, sliding it onto the counter beside the brass key. “The specifications for Saturday. I’ve updated the varietals.”
Amalia looked from his closed, shuttered face down to the paper.
Her eyes scanned the neat, black fountain-pen lines:
*Quarterly Standing Memorial.* *White Freesia (double-bloomed).* *Pale lilac.* *Sweet pea (mauve and blush).* *Scented geranium.* *Strictly white ceramic.* *No ribbon.* *No card.*
Amalia frowned, her mind stumbling over the names. “Sweet pea? You’ve never asked for sweet pea.”
“They are in season,” he said briskly, reaching for his umbrella.
“They’re barely in season,” she said, her head lifting. A strange, prickling sensation ran down the back of her neck. “And pale lilac… Sawyer, these were the flowers my grandmother grew behind her cottage in Camden. I haven't seen blush sweet peas arranged with freesia since I was ten years old. Julian and I talked about them once, years ago, when we were planning the shop’s garden…”
Sawyer went completely still. His hand was on the brass door latch. He didn't turn around.
“It’s a standard spring composition,” he said, his voice tight. “My… the person I buy them for had similar preferences.”
The words felt like a physical blow to her chest.
*The person I buy them for.*
The reminder of her. The nameless, faceless woman who occupied every corner of his mind. The woman whose memory was so sacred that even her preferred flowers had to be hunted down across county lines.
Amalia swallowed down the bitter, burning lump in her throat. “Of course,” she said, her voice dropping into professional coolness. “I’ll have them conditioned by Friday. Sweet pea stems are delicate; they don't like florist foam. I’ll use a wire frog in the ceramic bowl.”
“Use whatever is necessary.”
“And the card?” she asked, the question slipping out with an edge of quiet cruelty she couldn't entirely suppress. “Still no message? Still no name for her?”
Sawyer’s shoulders dropped slightly. He looked at the floorboards between his shoes, his knuckles turning white where he gripped the brass handle of his umbrella.
“Names don't bring people back, Amalia,” he said quietly.
He opened the door and stepped out into the freezing March drizzle, the brass bell jingling once before the silence swallowed him whole.
***
Saturday morning brought an unseasonably warm sun that broke through the gray sky, turning the shop into a greenhouse of gold light and humid green scents.
The arrangement sat in the center of the zinc counter, radiant and fragile.
It was, Amalia thought with a quiet, aching pride, the most beautiful thing she had ever created. The double-bloomed white freesias arched gracefully over the rim of the unglazed white bowl, their sweet, peppery fragrance drifting through the shop. Tucked beneath them were clusters of pale, fragrant lilacs and the delicate, ruffled wings of the blush sweet peas, their stems woven through a hidden wire armature so they appeared to be floating on air.
It looked like a bride’s bouquet that had been transformed into an elegy.
At precisely nine fifty-five, a plain white Mercedes Sprinter van pulled up to the curb outside. There were no commercial logos on the side, no florist decals, nothing but a clean, metallic gray license plate.
The bell above the door chimed.
A young man in a clean, navy-blue utility jacket stepped inside. He carried an insulated commercial transit crate lined with padded neoprene and an electronic signature tablet.
“Redford Botanicals?” the driver asked, checking his screen.
“Yes,” Amalia said, stepping out from behind the cold-room door. “You’re here for the Vance standing arrangement?”
“Vance account, quarterly standing memorial, code 408,” the driver confirmed, tapping his screen. He set the insulated crate on the counter, unlatching the lid to reveal the custom-cut foam insert designed to hold a wide-bottom ceramic bowl upright during transit.
Amalia carefully lifted the heavy bowl, cradling the ceramic with both hands, and lowered it into the padded cradle. The flowers sat perfectly secure, untouched by the walls of the crate.
“It needs to be kept away from direct air conditioning vents,” she noted, wiping a drop of moisture from the ceramic rim with a clean cloth. “The sweet peas will wilt if they’re exposed to forced air.”
“Understood, ma’am,” the driver said. He pulled a printed barcode sticker from his pocket and smoothed it across the side of the crate.
Amalia looked at the sticker.
It read: **VANCE TRUST — DISPATCH 04 // VAULT CONSOLIDATION // TRANSIT LOG B.**
There was no recipient name. There was no street address. There wasn't even a city listed—just an internal tracking code and a routing number for a regional commercial refrigerated warehouse in New Jersey.
