To Jody's surprise, he gave her a long hug before he leaned back and looked at her. "If you really love her, don't screw this up. Let go of whatever it is from the past that keeps getting in your way. Sometimes, we only get one chance at the real thing."

Tears kept Jody from speaking, but she managed to nod.

"Good luck with the new mother-in-law," he whispered before he sped out the door.

Jody grinned in spite of herself and locked up behind him.

"We're lucky to have him helping us," she said when she returned to her worktable. "We're going to miss him when he graduates and moves on."

Denise didn't answer.

"Denise, how much longer are you going to stay mad at me?"

Again Denise didn't answer.

"You know, if you intend to act like this, maybe we should forget about attempting to renovate the shop, because at this rate, we won't have a shop in three months."

Denise's childish behavior and Jody's exhaustion sparked the outburst, but once said, the statement lay between them like old dynamite, one wrong move and everything could explode.

The phone rang shortly after two. Denise was closer to it and picked up. Jody knew by the sudden straightening of Denise's shoulders that Ellen was on the line.

"It's for you." She handed the phone to Jody and left the room.

"Hi," Ellen said. "I hope I didn't make things worse."

"No, it's about as cold as it can get here."

"I tried calling you at home. When I didn't get an answer, I a.s.sumed the shop must have gotten swamped with orders today." Jody told her about the large rush order.

"Do you want me to come down and help?"

"No, we should be able to finish in plenty of time. We have to deliver them before six tomorrow evening." Jody glanced at the clock. "Make that six this evening." She stifled a yawn. "Even if we get behind, Eric will be back around seven and he can make an arrangement faster than Denise and me put together. The guy is amazing to watch."

"It's a good thing he's majoring in engineering and won't ever be in compet.i.tion with the shop," Ellen teased.

"Tell me about it." Jody could smell coffee perking. "Why are you up so late, or early? Whichever the case may be."

"I'm still tweaking numbers. The home office wasn't happy with the results of one of our a.s.sessments, so I'm having to look at other options."

"Sounds boring."

"I usually enjoy it, but I seem to be distracted by something and can't keep my mind on work."

"Sounds serious. What's the source of this distraction?"

"As though you don't know."

Jody could see Denise standing at the front window looking out. She realized Denise wouldn't return until she got off the phone. "I'm sorry to cut you short, but I need to get back to work."

"I don't guess there's much chance of me seeing you at lunch."

Jody groaned; she had forgotten about the possible lunch plans. "No. In fact, I probably won't be able to see you until Monday. The next three days are going to be really hectic."

At that moment, Jody could not have guessed what an understatement her prediction would be.

Chapter Thirteen.

The phone at Petal Pushers started ringing at eight Friday morning and didn't stop until after seven that night when Denise finally took it off the hook.

Eric came back a few minutes later and dropped into a chair beside a worktable. "I'm exhausted."

"It hasn't exactly been a tea party here," Denise said as she trimmed the stem of a yellow rose.

"Did you have any trouble getting the delivery to the banquet hall?" Jody asked. She was arranging a funeral spray. She hated making funeral sprays. They depressed her, but they accounted for a substantial portion of their sales.

Eric went to the utility closet and got a small whisk broom and dustpan. "I got to the hotel with no trouble," he said as he began sweeping up the snippets of stems and discarded petals from Denise's table. "The banquet hall was located in one of those odd stand-alone additions they have downtown. There are only two ways in. You know the kind I mean. It's a long room that usually hangs out over one of the pools, and it only has the one elevator and a single flight of stairs." He dumped the debris into the trash can and started cleaning Jody's table. "Jody, you should be so glad you weren't delivering today. The elevator was being repaired, and I had to carry the arrangements up the stairs to the hall."

"You had to carry all sixty of them by yourself?" Denise asked, looking over her shoulder.

"I had about half of them upstairs before two of the banquet organizers appeared and started helping. As G.o.d is my witness, I'll never take another flight of stairs," he groaned in his best Scarlett O'Hara drawl. When no words of sympathy came his way he peered at the two women. "You two look like c.r.a.p."

"Thanks for your intelligent observation," Jody growled. She couldn't remember the last time she'd slept, and Denise looked as though she might topple off her stool with the slightest push.

"When was the last time you ate?" he asked after returning the broom to the closet.

"I'm not hungry," Denise said as she shaped yet another bow.

"I'm too tired to eat," Jody said.

Suddenly, someone started pounding on the front door. Jody was so startled she dropped her scissors.

"Who the h.e.l.l is that?" Denise asked. "Eric, please go tell them we're closed."

"Sure. When I get back we will begin our conversation about you two going home and getting sleep."

"Too much to do," Jody and Denise mumbled in unison.

Jody retrieved her scissors and went back to work. She heard the bell ping as Eric opened the door. She slid off the stool to stretch her back, but she had been standing so much during the day that her feet began to throb almost instantly. Choosing the lesser of the two aches, she crawled back upon the stool.

"I'm so tired," Jody said. "After Sunday I don't want to see another flower for-"

"A month," Denise finished for her.

Jody looked up, surprised. She had for the most part spent the day silent or talking to herself. Denise's response gave her a brief shot of hope. Maybe she was calming down.

Denise turned to her. "Since Eric has started full-time for the summer, I think you should start your vacation on Monday."

Jody frowned. "You always go on vacation first, besides it's only May. I don't normally go until July or later."

"I can't leave now. I think it would be best if we had some time away from each other, so I'd really appreciate it if you took your vacation early."

"Well, tough petunias. I don't want to take my vacation early." Jody threw the scissors down. "If you are so d.a.m.n disturbed by my presence, you can leave."

Denise jumped from her stool and planted her hands on her hips. "If that's the way you want it, fine. We can dissolve this partnership and move on."

Jody heard a startled gasp and turned to find Ellen and Eric standing in the doorway. For a moment, Jody forgot her exhaustion. She couldn't stop the smile that appeared with seeing Ellen. She wished she could hold her.

Jody saw Eric glance from Ellen to herself and back to Ellen. He rolled his eyes and smiled.

"What are you doing here?" Denise snapped at Ellen.

"I've brought everyone something to eat."

"I'm not hungry," Denise and Jody snapped in unison.

"You're right," Ellen said to Eric. "They are cranky as a couple of old sore-tail cats. His a.n.a.logy not mine," she said as Denise turned on her. "I think you both should go home and get some sleep."

"There's too much to do," Jody explained. "The order for the banquet put us behind in our orders today. If we don't catch up tonight, we'll never be able to get through tomorrow."

Ellen walked to the desk, which at the moment was about the only area in the workroom that wasn't covered with flowers and floral supplies. She began to pull containers from the bag. "I picked up Chinese. Since I wasn't sure what everybody liked, I got a hodgepodge, so there's a little bit of everything here."

"I'll start another pot of coffee," Eric said.

Without waiting for Jody and Denise to join her, Ellen began to put together two plates. She set a plate at each end of the desk. "Do you two think you can remain civil to each other long enough to eat? Or should I put one plate out front?"

Jody hung her head. Denise's threat to dissolve the partnership frightened her. Surely, Denise wasn't that angry at her, was she?

The delicious smells from the Chinese food began to fill the room. The loud rumbling of Jody's stomach embarra.s.sed her, but she smiled when she heard Denise's stomach growl too.

"I guess I'm hungry enough to sit with the devil himself." Denise went to the far end of the desk.

"Too bad you'll have to settle for little old me," Jody shot back as she moved to the other end of the desk. For several seconds there was silence as the two of them attacked the stack of egg rolls.

At some point, a cup of coffee appeared in front of Jody, who continued to devour her lemon chicken.

After they had eaten, Eric and Ellen began to clear away the food containers. Jody stood to go back to work.

"Where are you going?" Ellen asked.

"Back to work."

"No, I want you both to sit here for at least another half-hour and rest. You're no good to anyone if you're too exhausted to work."

"Jody, I'll finish the spray you were working on," Eric offered.

"And I can complete the arrangement you were making, Mom," Ellen said.

"You can't finish that," Denise protested.

Ellen's hands went to her hips in a manner so much like her mom's that Jody smiled. "I don't suppose you remember that I spent my summers helping out at that little flower shop you used to work at on Culebra," Ellen said. "Nor the fact that for four summers during college I worked in a flower shop in Los Angeles. I'm perfectly capable of completing an arrangement, Mom."

Jody leaned back in the chair and propped her feet up on a stack of boxes. She wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth. Thirty minutes of rest was all she needed to get herself through the night.

When Jody awoke her neck and back ached. She slowly lowered her feet to the floor and moaned. The squeak of a chair made her turn in time to see Denise raise her head up from the desk. There was a large red circle on her forehead where it had been resting on her arm.

"I guess we fell asleep," Jody mumbled as she looked around the workroom. Ellen and Eric were nowhere to be seen. The worktables were filled with completed arrangements.

"Good lord, it's after seven," Denise said looking at her watch.

"The orders. It looks like they finished them," Jody said.

They went to look at the ma.s.sive display of flowers. "They must have worked all night," Denise said, gently touching one of the arrangements.

Jody suddenly remembered the comment Denise had made about dissolving their partnership. The thought made her ill.

"You wouldn't really dissolve our partnership because I'm dating Ellen, would you?"

Denise paused. "I can't begin to tell you how much I hate this rift between us, but as a mother, I can't just stand by and let you hurt Ellen."

"How can you be so sure I will?"

Denise looked at her. "How can you think you won't? You're nineteen years older than her. Even if you were to make a go of the relationship, which I don't think you will, in twenty years you will be sixty-four and Ellen will be forty-five. Is it fair to her to be saddled with that kind of burden? What happens when you're seventy? Do you want her to be stuck caring for you, when she'll still be a vital, active woman?"

Jody had no response. How could she argue with the numbers? Ellen would be hitting the prime of her life just as Jody was beginning to settle into the comforts of old age.

"I need time, Jody. We all do. You need to think about what you're doing."

Jody nodded. "I'll start my vacation on Monday," she said. "I can go to Missouri to visit my parents."

Jody's parents had moved back to Missouri after her dad retired from civil service. He'd been stationed at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio when Jody was small. After one enlistment in the Air Force and with no prospects waiting for him back in his small Missouri hometown, he took a civil service position at Lackland and stayed in San Antonio until he retired. He'd told Jody many times that his job was in San Antonio, but his heart was in Missouri.

Denise nodded. "Thanks. I appreciate your making the effort, and I really can't get away now."

"What about the partnership?" Jody asked, praying Denise would say she'd made a mistake.

"If you insist on continuing to see Ellen, I'm afraid that may be our only option."

Jody was about to protest when the front doorbell chimed.

It was Ellen. She was carrying several brown paper bags. Upon seeing the two of them, she smiled.

"Good morning, sleepyheads. Bringing you two food is getting to be a habit. I borrowed your keys, Mom." Without waiting for them to answer, she gave Denise a quick peck on the cheek. "Mom, I'm ignoring the fact that you didn't return my greeting and that you may have even attempted to turn away from my kiss." Without breaking stride, she turned to Jody and gave her a hug and a peck on the lips.