his gaze and said, “I been hiding.”
“All this time?” Hunter asked curiously.
Tyler nodded.
The absurdity of it made Hunter laugh. While he and Abby looked for Tyler, he was right under their noses. “Hiding, huh?”
Tyler said, “Yeah. You know,” he added, shifting his legs until he was sitting instead of kneeling, though Hunter sensed he’d done it more as a way to avert his attention, than to make himself more comfortable.
“Other girls get flowers,” he said, his focus skewered on a ball he gripped like a lifeline. “Lily got flowers the one time she stayed at the bed-and-breakfast. Chas brought them.” He looked at Hunter. “But my mother never gets flowers. She told Lily she would like some flowers, too.”
In a peculiar sort of way, Hunter knew exactly what Tyler was saying. He had walked into Abby’s life unannounced and turned her whole world upside down. It was no wonder she behaved irrationally.
“You know, Tyler,” he said, rising from the sofa, “I think you’re right.” Not only would taking Tyler’s advice start to form a bond between himself and his son, but it also wouldn’t hurt to get on Abby’s good side. Because he’d been trying to manage a bunch of uncontrollable instincts by presenting a logical, rational case, he’d just asked a woman to marry him, but he’d done it as if he were proposing a business deal, instead of marriage.
The kid had a point.
Abby deserved flowers.
“Let’s go,” he said and began to lead Tyler to the door. But remembering Abby’s frame of mind when she left the foyer, Hunter thought the better of it, and said, “Go tell your mom you’re leaving with me.”
Believing Tyler would walk into the kitchen, Hunter’s brows rose when the little boy only ran to the door and shouted, “Mom, me and Hunter’s going out.”
Hunter didn’t for one minute consider that appropriate notice, but when Abby called, “All right,” as if she were glad to be rid of them, he frowned. Nothing in this household went the way he thought it should.
On the front porch, he turned to Tyler. “Are you sure this is okay?”
Tyler nodded. “Yeah, you made her mad. She’s probably in the kitchen trying to bake something.”
“Bake something?”
Tyler shrugged and added mournfully, “Yeah, probably coffee cake, and we’re going to have to eat it for breakfast or she’ll get mad again.”
Hunter laughed out loud at the observation until it struck him that he and his son were having a normal, honest conversation. About Abby. Their common bond. Though he might have thought his marriage proposal abrupt, and Abby might have downright hated it, Hunter truly believed he was on the right track.
And Abby would come around.
Given that Brewster hadn’t changed much in seven years, Hunter wasn’t surprised to find that the Petersons still owned the florist shop. He was even less surprised to find them resting on their back porch in the fading rays of the sun.
“Evening,” he said to the old couple who rocked back and forth on a swing that hung from hooks in their porch ceiling. “Lovely night.”
“Great night,” old man Peterson agreed. “You new around here?”
Hunter shook his head. “No, I’m Hunter Wyman. My dad and I owned the old place on Church Road. I’m Grant Brewster’s business partner now.”
“Well, I’ll be,” Matilda Peterson said, her crochet needle stopping mid-stitch. “Hunter Wyman. Will miracles never cease.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Hunter said, though he wasn’t exactly sure what she meant by that. Was it a miracle he’d done so well for himself, or a miracle he was home? “I’m sure you know my son, Tyler,” he added, first, to include the boy and, second, to head off any speculation. Brewster was a small enough town that everyone surely knew about Abby’s child. But more than that, Hunter didn’t want any question about his plans. Not only was it important that his intentions were clear to everyone, but it was more important for Tyler’s sake that the boy understood he had not been abandoned—and neither had Abby.
“I’m here because I need some flowers. You wouldn’t happen to be able to open your shop to take my order to have flowers delivered to Abby tomorrow at the diner?”
“Don’t need to open the shop,” old man Peterson said. “Still got a mind like a steel trap,” he said, pointing at his temple. “I’ll remember. What do you want to send?”
He looked down at Tyler. “Any idea what your mom likes?”
Pleased to have been consulted, Tyler grinned. “Chas bought Lily roses.”
Mrs. Peterson gasped. “Filled the room,” she said with an appreciative sigh. “Those Brewsters know how to treat a woman.”
“I don’t doubt it,” Hunter agreed, realizing his friends had a penchant for the extravagant, flashy gestures that typically swept a woman off her feet. Unfortunately, since Hunter knew he had already tossed enough surprises Abby’s way by his proposal, he also knew it wouldn’t be wise to go overboard with this.
“I think I’ll just stick with a dozen.”
“Red?” Mrs. Peterson asked speculatively.
Hunter considered that. He knew that the color of a rose you sent to a woman meant something. He could also see from the look of anticipation on Mrs. Peterson’s face that red meant something really good.
“Make them red,” Hunter decided. “You can bill me or I can stop by tomorrow afternoon and pay for them, but I want to make sure she gets them first thing in the morning.”
“You got it,” Mr. Peterson said.
Hunter grabbed Tyler’s hand and turned to go, but Tyler tugged twice to stop him. “My mom’s gonna like the flowers,” he said with authority, and Hunter felt pride swell up in him like nothing he’d ever felt before. He wasn’t sure if it was the knowledge that he’d pleased his son or the knowledge that he was about to please Abby, but something filled him with warmth and rightness…maybe a combination of both.
“I think you’re right,” Hunter told Tyler, then a thought struck him and he stooped down and caught his son’s gaze. For the first time since he’d met Tyler, Hunter noticed that the little boy’s eyes were exactly the same color as his eyes. His nose was the same. His lips had the odd little upward curl at the corners that was the mark of all Wyman men.
Hunter was hit by a strong, almost uncontrollable urge to hug Tyler. To hold him. To feel the little boy that he’d created. To give him love. All kinds of love. To let him know that he was loved. So loved that Hunter could barely breathe for the strength of it.
But that wasn’t appropriate. He didn’t really know this little boy and Tyler certainly didn’t know him. He didn’t want to scare him.
Instead, he steadied his hands on Tyler’s shoulders. “One of the most important things about flowers,” he said, studying his
