LITMIR.BIZ

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her lack of dates with her dowdy clothes, Matt probably saw her as some kind of charity case. Did he know she was still a virgin, too?

      Purity flowers took on a whole new meaning, sending anger careening through Sarah’s veins. The probability that Matt had sent those flowers because he felt sorry for her became more and more obvious by the second. By the time she reached the elevator, she just wanted to die.

      Matt Burke stood with Carmella and Penny, watching Sarah as she marched, head high, to the elevator. His thoughts were in such turmoil and the situation was so unusual—not to mention uncomfortable—that he wasn’t sure what to do.

      “Go after her.”

      Matt faced Carmella. “What?”

      “Go after her. She can’t leave these beautiful flowers.”

      Matt almost said, “Yes, she can,” but he changed his mind. He wasn’t sure why seeing Sarah get flowers caused a tightening in his chest, he only knew it did. Now that he’d gotten over the shock that Sarah would waste perfectly good roses, he wasn’t upset to see her leave them behind. In fact, he had an ungodly urge to toss them out his office window.

      “I’ll take them to her,” Penny said, grabbing the flowers and pivoting toward the door.

      “No!” Carmella yelped as she caught Penny’s hand, but she lowered her voice and said, “Matt will take them to her.” She paused to lift the vase from Penny’s grasp, and her smile reappeared as she offered the roses to Matt. “You drive by her apartment complex on your way home. You can take them right to her door.”

      “Oh, no!” Matt said, backing away from the flowers as if they were poisonous. “She doesn’t want these.”

      Carmella chuckled. “So what? If she refuses to take them from you, the worst that could happen is that you’d get stuck with a dozen long-stemmed roses and a beautiful vase.”

      Penny said, “Maybe he’s afraid someone will mistake him for a delivery man.”

      Matt sighed heavily. “I’m not afraid of anything! I just know she doesn’t want them. I’ll feel like an idiot going to her door with flowers that she doesn’t want.”

      Carmella sauntered around Sarah’s desk and picked up the card. “I don’t think she ran because she didn’t want the flowers.”

      Matt said, “Huh?”

      “I think she ran because she did want the flowers.”

      “Ohhhh!” Penny said. “I get it. When I set the roses on her desk she was excited. When she saw the card, she got mad. It’s like she wants flowers from somebody, but she doesn’t know who sent these.”

      Carmella nodded. “So she doesn’t know if her secret admirer is the man she wants it to be. And if it is the man she wants it to be, she’s probably angry that he wasn’t mature enough to sign his name.”

      “You guys are nuts,” Matt said, though their rationale did make an odd kind of sense. Sarah might be too calm and pragmatic to behave like a swooning female. But if there was somebody she liked, somebody she really, really liked and she wanted to get flowers from him, Matt could see Sarah getting angry that the guy was too chicken to sign his name.

      In Matt’s opinion, Sarah was much too good for this coward.

      Penny reverently whispered, “She must really like him.”

      Carmella only smiled.

      Matt felt as though somebody had punched him in the stomach. He couldn’t believe that Sarah had fallen for somebody and that he hadn’t noticed. He couldn’t believe the man she’d fallen for was a spineless idiot who didn’t know how to make a decent move. A move that involved admitting who he was. He couldn’t believe Sarah falling for someone bothered him more than the fact that the guy was a spineless idiot. But he did know it probably wasn’t wise for him to be the person going to her apartment right now.

      “A woman should do this.”

      “I have a salon appointment,” Carmella said. “Penny lives across town. Besides, she has kids to go home to.”

      “I can’t take these to her!”

      “Why not?”

      “Because I’m not that sensitive. I don’t know what to say. I don’t know how to get her to accept these flowers.” And he wasn’t even sure he wanted to. That was the tricky part.

      Carmella sighed. “Matt, what day is it?”

      “August 29.”

      “What’s Monday?”

      “September 1.”

      “What happens on September 1?”

      “It’s Labor Day, but on Tuesday my staff goes to work on the quarterly report.”

      Carmella handed him the vase of roses. “A wise man who had a quarterly report due would want his executive assistant at her desk on Tuesday morning. Sarah looked pretty mad when she left. You don’t want her to spend her long weekend brooding and be too tired or too upset to come in.”

      Matt groaned.

      “Take these flowers to her, make her understand that it doesn’t matter who sent them. What matters is that somebody cares about her.”

      Matt shook his head, as affronted as Sarah. “Then why couldn’t he sign his name?”

      Carmella shrugged. “Haven’t you ever been so tongue-tied with someone that you watched from a distance because you couldn’t go up to her and talk?”

      Matt swallowed. He did know what it was like to be so tongue-tied with someone that he watched her from a distance rather than make real contact. It wasn’t a lover or potential lover. It was his mother. And he had been ten at the time.

      “Think of this guy like that. Somebody who is inexperienced or somebody who likes Sarah so much that he’s afraid to make a mistake.”

      Matt stared at the flowers. His situation wasn’t anything like the situation Carmella was describing, but she had struck the right nerve. The feeling was the same. He’d never approached his mother back then because the fear of rejection was stronger than the hope that she’d welcome him with open arms. He knew this flower-sender’s emotions like the back of his hand.

      “When you give the flowers to Sarah explain that somebody who doesn’t know how to admit it likes her and she should be flattered.”

      “And you think that will cheer her up?”

      Carmella and Penny simultaneously said, “Yes.”

      “Fine,” Matt said, turning to go into his office for his briefcase. “Get me her address.”

      Forty minutes later Sarah opened her apartment door and there stood her boss, holding the purity flowers he had sent her because he felt sorry for her. Heat scalded her cheeks as her blood pressure and anger rose.

      “Hi.”

      She drew a long breath, not sure what to say that wouldn’t contain a curse word. Pure. Ha! If he pushed her she would show him pure.

      “Carmella was right. You can’t just leave these at the office over the weekend.”

      “Sure I can.”

      “Well, it’s physically possible,” Matt agreed, “but it’s not right.”

      “Sure it is.”

      “No, it’s not. Let me in so I can explain these flowers to you.”

      For three seconds Sarah only stared at him, blown away by his very casual admission that he had sent the roses. How else would he be able to explain them?

      Too curious to hear what he had to say to reject him out of hand, she said, “All right. Come in.”

      Sarah

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