Let them walk, Cara thought. I can"t afford this kind of charity. I might not even still be in business in August.
"Mama?" Heather was opening her own pocketbook, taking out her checkbook. She wrote the check, ripped it from the book, and handed it to Cara.
"Thank you," Heather said fervently. "Thank you so much."
Bert had been sitting at his side of the worktable, putting together hospital bouquets, listening throughout the consultation. When mother and daughter were gone, he slapped his scissors on the table.
"Looorrrrd," he drawled. "When I looked out the window and saw those two pull up in that tired old Ford Fiesta I almost told them they"d come to the wrong place. What I don"t get is why you didn"t just tell them you can"t do a Bloom wedding for two thousand dollars. Why didn"t you just tell them to take their sad little selves out to Sam"s Club? They can get a whole lot of wilted chrysanthemums and daisies and carnations for two thousand dollars over there."
"Cut it out, Bert," Cara said sharply. "I can"t blame the girl for wanting something nice. Most girls dream about their wedding day their whole life. It"s not Heather"s fault all those magazines and websites love to feature fairytale weddings-but never explain what the price tags are."
"You"re not doing her any favor indulging in her little fantasy world," Bert said. "She"ll never find even a half-a.s.sed photographer or a caterer with the kind of piddly budget she"s talking about. She should just get her sourpuss mama to give her the money she"d spend on a tacky wedding and then elope. Spend the money on a trip to South of the Border, or a down payment on a double-wide."
"Fun is fun, but now that"s just mean," Cara said. "When did you get to be such a b.i.t.c.h?"
"And when did you get so high-minded and holier-than-thou?" he shot back. "Come on, Cara, lighten up, will you? We always used to have such fun around here, but lately, you"re so serious. Everything is so dire. Frankly, it"s depressing."
Bert"s phone, which he"d placed on the worktable beside him, buzzed to signal an incoming text. He looked down, read it, then scrambled down off his high-backed stool. "I"m going to lunch."
"You just got back from a coffee run that took thirty minutes," Cara said. "And you came in thirty minutes late this morning. You"ve been pulling this same disappearing act all week. I warned you earlier, Bert. We"ve got Mary Payne"s ninetieth-birthday party tonight, and the bar a.s.sociation dinner at the Chatham Club tomorrow night, not to mention the phone orders we need to get done and delivered. I can"t get it all done by myself. And I shouldn"t have to."
"Are you telling me I can"t take a lunch hour? That"s probably against the law, you know."
"I"m telling you you"ve already taken a lunch hour," she shot back. "If you"re really hungry, I"ll go upstairs and fix you a sandwich, or we can get a pizza delivered. But we both know that"s not the case. We both know that text you just got is a booty call from your new boyfriend."
"Screw you!" Bert said angrily. "Just because you"ve got no life and live like a nun, doesn"t mean I have to." He picked up his phone and walked deliberately toward the door.
"I mean it, Bert," Cara said, clenching and unclenching her fists. "If you walk out that door now, you"re done. Don"t bother coming back."
He had his hand on the doork.n.o.b. He hesitated, then strode back toward the worktable.
Relief flooded Cara"s body. She didn"t want this. But he"d pushed her right to the edge.
Bert opened the drawer on his side of the worktable. He picked up the backpack he"d slung over his chair and tossed in a paperback book, his favorite scissors, and a coffee mug. Then he reached up to the shelf behind the table, took his iPod station and iPod, and threw them into the bag with the rest of his belongings.
"I"m not giving you a reference for another job," Cara called, just as he reached the shop door.
"I don"t need one." He slammed the door. Hard.
43.
Poppy stood at the front window, watching the squirrel in the tree outside, and waiting, Cara felt sure, for her friend Bert to change his mind and come back.
"He"s gone," Cara said, getting up to scratch the dog"s ears and toss her a conciliatory puppy treat. "Anyway, he"s just a man. They come and they go, girl, and when one decides to leave, all you can do is get out of the way."
Poppy gave her a baleful look, then concentrated on chewing her treat. In the meantime, a battered white pickup truck pulled up to the curb outside, parking in the loading zone. A youngish man in paint-spattered overalls and a green John Deere tractor cap got out of the truck and stood on the sidewalk. He pulled a smart phone from the bib of his overalls, stepped backward and began taking photos. He trotted across the street and snapped more photos as Cara stood, watching.
The man recrossed and walked past the shop window and out of her line of sight. Cara opened the door and peered out, just in time to see him rounding the corner and turning south on Whitaker.
"Here, Poppy!" Cara locked the front door and headed for the rear of the shop and the door into the courtyard. Poppy bounded out into the garden and gave a short, surprised yelp as the stranger stepped into the garden through the door from the lane.
"Hey!" Cara called, her voice sharp. "What do you think you"re doing?"
Poppy barked loudly, and lunged forward, but Cara caught her by her collar.
"Uh, the landlord sent me over." Seeing him up close, she could see he was probably in his mid-twenties, with brown hair sticking out from the back of his cap, and a string of tattoos on both forearms. He took a half step backward.
"Which landlord?"
He looked confused. "The one who owns this building, I guess. Wanted me to give him some estimates for doing all the work needs doing."
"Him? The last I heard, Sylvia Bradley still owns this building. Was she the one who called you?"
"Look, ma"am, I don"t want any trouble. I"m just doing my job. The guy called me, gave me this address, said he was looking to restore an old building on West Jones Street."
Cara felt her face go hot with anger. "You"re talking about Cullen Kane?"
"Yeah."
"Did he give you the key to get through that gate just now?"
"Sure."
"You can"t just come in here like this. I live here. This is my business. My rent is paid up until the end of the month."
"Hey, all I know is, the guy said it"s okay. He has keys to the place, he sent me over to look around. I"m not gonna bother you or nothin"...."
He took a step toward Cara, and Poppy let out a deep-throated warning growl, the likes of which Cara had never heard before from the people-loving puppy. She grasped the collar tighter. Her unwanted visitor looked uneasily around, as though he might need a weapon to fend off this fluffy white killer guard dog.
"What"s your name?" Cara asked.
"Ricky Ucinski."
"Ricky, no offense, but I"m not letting you in my house."
"Geez," he said. "What do I tell Mr. Kane?"
"Tell him the crazy woman who lives here set her dog on you when you unlocked the back gate. And tell him if he sends any more contractors over here again, I"ll do the same thing to them."
Ricky Ucinski looked distinctly uncomfortable with this message. "You wouldn"t really set that dog on me, would you?"
Poppy growled again, as if on cue.
Cara gave a grim smile. "I really don"t think you want to find that out, Ricky."
Apprentice floral-designer needed. Owner-operated floral design studio in downtown historic area seeks a.s.sistant/apprentice with artistic flair, design skills, working knowledge of flowers helpful, but not mandatory. Ideal candidate must be responsible, reliable, self-starter. Duties also include some clerical work and flower delivery. Must have valid driver"s license and immediate availability.
Cara looked down at the Craigslist help-wanted ad and thought for a moment before rapidly typing the most important addition to the ad: Whiners, sulkers, and self-involved slackers need not apply.
She added her contact information and hit the Send b.u.t.ton. It was nearly four o"clock. She"d loaded the van with the afternoon"s deliveries, and taken Poppy on a brief walk. But she had one pressing piece of business to attend to before anything else.
Cullen Kane Floral Design Studio was located in a former Piggly Wiggly grocery store on Habersham Street in midtown Savannah. As far as Cara knew, nearly everything in Savannah was located in a building that used to be something else, and everybody knew what that something was. In her case, she only knew it because she"d spent ten minutes staring at Kane"s website, which trumpeted that his studio was located "in a sensitively upcycled circa-1946 Piggly Wiggly."
The old red-brick building had been painted charcoal gray, and now sported crisp red-and-white-striped awnings over the plate-gla.s.s windows. Huge terra-cotta pots on either side of the front door had palm trees underplanted with white lobelia and asparagus ferns, and the front door itself was painted a gloss red, with wrought-iron inserts featuring the intertwined CK logo, which was also painted in four-foot-high letters on the side of the building.
She parked the van in the lot beside his shop, trying to ignore the stabbing envy in her gut. Kane had at least sixteen s.p.a.ces in his own dedicated lot, where more palm trees were planted in oversized wooden tubs. A gleaming black Mercedes box truck emblazoned with the CK logo was parked near the door. If a truck could look chic, this one did.
Cara took a deep breath and pushed the door open. The air inside the shop was lightly perfumed and deliciously cooled. The ceiling was open to exposed wooden roof rafters, and dropped ceiling fans whirred soundlessly overhead. A reception area had been screened off from the rest of the building with a red latticework part.i.tion, and in front of it, at a black midcentury modern desk, sat a familiar figure-Bert Rosen, dressed in an unfamiliar tight-fitting black T-shirt with the scrolling CK logo.
He was talking on the phone and tapping notes into the laptop computer on the desk and didn"t notice her at first, which allowed Cara time to feel the full extent of the rage and jealousy boiling up from her gut.
Suddenly, it all fell into place. The no-shows, the long weekends, the long lunch hours and mystery text messages. Her a.s.sistant"s phantom boyfriend had finally been unmasked.
Bert clicked off the phone, but kept typing. Without looking up he parroted the greeting, which he"d already mastered. "Welcome to Cullen Kane Design. I"ll be with you in a moment."
"I can wait."
That got his attention.
"Cara?" His pale face bloomed a bright shade of red that exactly matched the screen behind his desk.
"Bert." She gestured around the shop. "You seem to have had a pretty busy lunch hour."
"You fired me," he said. "What was I supposed to do? Go on welfare?"
"I fired you four hours ago. You seem to have had a remarkably fast recovery. Or were you already working here-and I"m the last to know?"
He shrugged. "Whatever."
"Where is he?"
"Who?"
"Your boss," Cara said. "I need to see him. Right now."
"I"ll call back to the workroom and see if he"s available. What"s this in reference to?"
Cara reached over and grabbed the neckline of Bert"s black T-shirt, in the process knocking over a heavy crystal vase holding an arrangement of bamboo leaves and spiky red bird-of-paradise blooms. "This is in reference to him sabotaging my life, buying my building out from under me, and seducing a formerly valuable employee."
"Owww." Bert slapped ineffectively at Cara"s hand. "Cut it out."
She abruptly released the shirt and he snapped backward like a limp rubber band.
A stream of water flowed across the desk and into his lap. "Look what you did!"
"Never mind calling. I"ll find him myself."
She charged around the screen. Directly behind it was an informal seating area, with a pair of low white leather tufted sofas facing each other across from a chunky Lucite coffee table.
Behind that Cara saw six workstations, occupied by designers clad in signature black CK Design T-shirts, who were busily a.s.sembling what looked like enough extravagant flower arrangements to fill Savannah"s largest cathedral.
She kept going. At the back of the open s.p.a.ce she spied a gla.s.s-enclosed office. Cullen Kane sat at another midcentury modern desk. He was on the phone, his back turned away from the workroom, so he never even saw her coming.
Cara yanked the door of his office open. He spun around in his chair. "I"ve got to go," he told his caller. "We"ll talk later."
Kane hung up the phone. If he was surprised to see her, he didn"t show it. "Hi there. To what do I owe the pleasure?"
"We need to talk," Cara hissed.
"Love to," Kane said. He gestured to the chair facing his desk. "Please sit. Can I get you something to drink? What would you like? Perrier, some champagne? I"ll get Bert to bring us something."
Cara bristled. "Nothing. I want nothing from you. Except my life back."
"Oh, please." Kane gave an airy wave. "You"re upset that I bought your building?"
"Bought it out from under me," Cara said. Her face felt stiff and unnatural, and the anger, fizzing just below the surface, felt like a fast-moving rash. "To put me out of business."
"Not at all," he said pleasantly. "This was a good investment. That"s all. What? You think I"ve cooked up some grand conspiracy against you?"
"Haven"t you? You spread nasty rumors around town about my finances. You buy my building and then start sending contractors over to look at it-while I"m still living there. You poison my employee"s relationship toward me...."
Kane leaned back in his chair and studied her thoughtfully. "How long have you been harboring these paranoid delusions of yours? Really, Cara. First of all, yes, I bought your building. Jones Street is the most beautiful street in the historic district, and your block is one of the most desirable. I would have been crazy to pa.s.s it up."
"You don"t need another shop," Cara cried. "This place has four times the s.p.a.ce Bloom has. You"ve obviously spent a fortune redoing this. You"ve got parking, location, everything."
He shrugged. "I happen to like your building. It"s quaint. I like real estate, and it was a good buy."
"It"s a dump and you know it. The Bradleys haven"t spent one nickel on it in probably twenty years."
"I know. That"s what makes it so delicious. The possibilities are endless."
Cara swallowed the bile rising up in her throat. Swallowed her pride. "I want to stay in my building. I want a new lease. So. How much?"
"No telling," he said lightly. "You"ve turned away the two contractors I sent over there to get estimates."
"You walked the building before you signed the contract with Sylvia. While I was gone. You went through it, went through my apartment. And you didn"t even have the decency to ask my permission."