Petal Plucker

The man I hate might be the first one to pluck my petals…

Confession: I, Dandelion “Dani” Wright, am twenty-six years old and have yet to be deflowered. No man has hosed my hyacinth. Fondled my freesia. Diddled my daffodil.

You get the point.

My excuse? I was too busy running my family’s flower shop and winning floral design competitions.

Suddenly that whole pesky virginity thing becomes a big deal when Jacob West walks back into my life. The boy I once loved. The same boy who humiliated me when he stood me up for prom.

This Jacob is no boy, though: he’s all man now—confident, charming, and so sexy my metaphorical blossoms are getting scorched. I can almost forget I’m supposed to hate him forever. Almost.

To make things worse, he’s my main competition now, since he took over his parents’ flower shop. If I give into this sizzling attraction between us, it could jeopardize everything I’ve worked so hard to achieve.

But if I’m not careful, he might not just be the first man to pluck my petals—he might also be the only man to capture my heart.

The day Jacob West walked into my store after breaking my heart nine years ago, I had just gotten my hand stuck in a vase and was trying rather desperately to free myself from its glassy confines.


I don’t make a habit of getting my hands stuck in things, vases or otherwise. But today had been a shit-show, starting with my dad being afraid I was going overboard on the lily bouquets, and then my first customer complaining that her cut flowers had died. After two weeks, mind you.

And then I’d dropped my nice little flower clippers inside a vase. Just as I’d gotten my fingers around the handle of the clippers, I realized that my wrist was too wide to get out of the vase.
And that was how Jacob found me. Because of course that would be how he first saw me after nine years.


“Dani?” he said, stepping toward the register. “Is that you?”


My back was turned, and I hadn’t yet laid eyes on him. I muttered, “Sorry, one second.”

But when I whipped my head around and saw that face, the hand that had the vase attached to it dropped to the counter and made such a loud sound that we both jumped.


Jacob looked—the same. But not the same. He was older, obviously, and his blond hair had darkened to a deep gold. His eyes were the same bright blue, but he had a few fine lines at the corners of his eyes. It only made him seem more interesting.

Stubble dotted his jaw where once he’d been smooth as a baby. I couldn’t remember him ever sporting facial hair as a teenager. Since he was so blond, I’d assumed his beard would grow in patchy or red. 


Not that I’d ever thought that deeply about Jacob’s facial hair. 
He seemed taller than when he’d been seventeen, and he was more filled out. He wasn’t that skinny teenager anymore, although he’d always been muscular in a skinny-boy kind of way since he played so many sports. But now he looked like a man, whereas before, he’d just been a boy.

A boy who’d stood me up for prom, who I’d watched drive off with his ex-girlfriend when he should’ve been at my house putting a corsage on my wrist.


After that betrayal, I’d dated a bunch of guys who’d turned out to be weirdos, shady motherfuckers, or guys who worked for the mob but had neglected to tell me. Pretty hard to believe that I had trust issues, right? It might be the reason that I was twenty-six and had yet to have sex.

I’d pretty much resigned myself to dying a virgin. Very tragic, I know.


It was amazing, though, how a history of lies and betrayal and ruined proms could fly out the window so quickly when face-to-face with someone. That someone being insanely, ridiculously, I-hate-my-fucking-life hot. 


Why did he have to get hot?
I heard the dangerous saxophone sounds of “Careless Whisper” playing in my mind. I hadn’t heard that song in my brain in nine years, and I hadn’t missed it one bit.

When I was kid, that song played like an absurd soundtrack every time I so much as saw Jacob’s name written on top of his homework.


In seemingly slow motion, I watched Jacob approach the counter. Was this a dream? I pinched my leg with my free hand, but Jacob didn’t disappear. 


“Um, do you need help?” He pointed to the vase. 


I’d forgotten about the vase. Nothing had mattered except that Jacob West was in the same place as I was.

I picked up my hand, stared at the vase as if I’d just become aware of my current predicament, and said bluntly, “No.”


“Are you sure?”
Like I was going to let Jacob help me. I said something vague and hurried to the back, desperately trying to get this thing off my hand.

But to my immense humiliation, it wasn’t going to budge. My wrist ached. I pressed my forehead against the cool wall and took in deep breaths.


Jacob. West. Was. Here.