“Great. You’re coming with me to the Rosewood River Country Club this week. I just go on free play night, so there are no requirements. You can jump in when you feel like it and play when you want to.”
“That sounds great.”
“Do you work out with your prodigy just once a day?” she asked, as she reached for her iced tea.
“For these first two weeks or so. We just want to wait for that knee to heal a bit more. But yeah, we’ll start two-a-day workouts here pretty soon.”
Thoughts of Clark dancing around in his shorts with no shirt on, sweat glistening on his chest as he belted out the lyrics flashed through my mind, and I couldn’t help the smile that crossed my face.
He was quite possibly the most entertaining man I’d ever met, even if he wasn’t my type at all.
“You have a much more exciting job than I do. I don’t get to see any hot men in their undies at the flower shop,” she chuckled.
“Trust me. Cocky professional athletes are the last guys you want to see in their undies. They already know they look good. And you get to make people smile all day by handing them bouquets of blooms. That sounds dreamy.”
“I do love it. It wasn’t actually my plan to own a flower shop. I wanted to be an interior designer. I love it. I went to school on a full ride,” Emilia said.
“And what happened?”
“My grandmother got sick, and this was her flower shop. My parents didn’t think interior design was a real profession.” She rolled her eyes. “So, they really pushed for me to take over The Vintage Rose. The good news is that I still get to be creative there.”
It infuriated me on her behalf that she wasn’t encouraged to chase her dreams.
“Yeah, but you should have been able to do whatever you wanted to do. Do you have any siblings?”
“I have an older brother, Jacoby, but he lives in New York.”
“They didn’t want to guilt Jacoby into running the floral shop?” I asked, my voice teasing and trying to keep things light, though I didn’t find it the slightest bit funny.
She laughed. “Jacoby is a lawyer in New York. He just recently made partner at some big firm. He’s sort of the superstar of the family. I’m the ‘daydreamer,’ as my father calls me.”
“You know, I think that’s why I read so much. I never have time to daydream, so I’d take that as a compliment. I need to daydream more.”
She shrugged. “Books are a form of escape, so that’s probably your way of having a break from all the stresses in life, whether from school or work or the expectations we put on ourselves.”
“Ain’t that the truth. I’ve got a date tonight with a glass of wine, a hot bath, and a romance book.”
“That’s my kind of evening. But don’t forget: Saturday, we’re going to Booze & Brews, and we’re going to line dance, have some drinks, and act like normal women in our late twenties,” she said.
“Looking forward to a night out in Rosewood River.”
“It’s tourist season, so we might even find ourselves a handsome, grumpy, alpha hero looking to sweep a woman off her feet,” she said.
“I’m in for the line dancing, but that’s it. I’m here to work, and then I head back to the city. I’ve got no time for romance.”
“I guess you’ll just have to read a lot while you’re here,” she chuckled.
That’s the only place I was interested in romance at the moment.
In the pages of a book.
“The training sounds like it’s going well,” Randall said, as I held my phone to my ear and walked toward Clark’s house.
He lived less than two blocks from the guest cottage I was renting, and I was happy that I could walk there.
“Yes. I think the knee is healing well. But he’s stubborn and keeps asking me when he can start running again.”
“He’s definitely someone who likes to push himself, which is both good and bad news. He’s the hardest-working guy on the team, but he’s stubborn about listening to his body. Hence the reason he did whatever it took to score that winning goal to win the Stanley Cup,” he said.
