Page 26 of Sterling Touch
Cort casually leans against the shelf. “I need to pick up a puffer.” He holds one hand outward in a fist, the other a few inches away, motioning back and forth like he’s pumping something up. I could make a sexual remark back at him but bite the inside of my cheek instead.
“Do you mean a powder duster?”
“Yeah, that.” He snaps his fingers while the corner of his mouth curls a little higher as we stare at each other another second. “My momma needs it for her garden.”
Mary Haven. “How is your momma?” I sigh sweetly, having fond memories of his mother.
“She’s good.” His smile falters only a little bit. Cort lost his dad to a heart attack in the time our families have been separated. Seventy-something seems too young to be a widow.
Then again, my father became a widower in his thirties.
As silence lingers, I tip my head to the side. “The puffers are in the next aisle over.”
Cort exaggerates a nod but doesn’t press off the shelf. Instead, he turns his attention back to the smokers.
“I’ve been looking at a smoker for my bees,” I explain, taking the sting out of my early joke. “I’m a beekeeper.” Playfully jabbing a finger in his direction, I narrow my eyes. “No little bee jokes.”
Cort’s mouth twitches a little higher. His arms cross and he glances back at the smokers. “A beekeeper? Really?” Disbelief doesn’t fill his tone half as much as his question implies. And the curl of his mouth is still slight but teasing.
His full smile would be devastating.
When he brings his gaze back to me, a spark flickers in his eyes. “St. Valentine. Patron saint of bees.”
I blink. “What?”
His face sobers a little, but that smile doesn’t leave his mouth. “Don’t tell me you never heard such a thing? That St. Valentine loved bees.”
I have heard such a thing, but I wasn’t awarehehad.
“Where do you think Little Bee comes from?”
My mouth gapes a second before I respond. “Me being an annoying child, buzzing around you and Stone, following you everywhere.” As Cort had accused me of doing on numerous occasions as a kid.
“That was never the reason I called you Little Bee.”
I’m gobsmacked a moment. Had there been a deeper meaning to the nickname? There couldn’t be.
He tips his head toward the smokers. “Do you even need to shop here?”
He means since I’m a partial owner of Sylver Seed & Soil, do I need to make purchases. I could have ordered something online from a beekeeping group I belong to, but I like tosupport our family business, even if the proceeds just get turned around as dividends paid out to me quarterly. Our brother Judd is a financial wiz and the family accountant, not to mention CFO of the Seed & Soil.
“Can’t you collect compensation for years of working here?”
I chuckle. “It’s been yearssinceI worked here.” Back in high school and during college, I spent as much time as I could helping out in some capacity or other. There was never an expectation to work at Sylver Seed & Soil just because I am a Sylver. Clay holds the honor of wanting to be here the most. Judd fell into his position because our oldest brothers worried they’d lose him otherwise, and Stone was hellbent on keeping the family together. Even Knox works here now, after his retirement from the Navy.
Thoughts of my brothers remind me why I shouldn’t be so casually chatting with Cortland in our family business. Chatting in a way that’s only one flimsy layer away from flirting.
Stone would be so hurt. And I couldn’t be the one responsible for breaking his heart again.
“Anyway.” I turn my head, aiming my focus at the bee smokers but not really seeing either of them.
Cort presses off the shelf and steps up beside me. More like just behind my left shoulder. A little closer than necessary. Close enough I get a whiff of him. Balsam fir, fresh air, and all man.
The position almost reminds me of how he stood behind me once upon a time. The things he said to me. What we did together.
Cort stretches his arm around me, brushing his inner bicep against my shoulder as he points at one of the two smokers.
“I heard this one is top of the line. Best for blowing smoke up someone’s ass.” He chuckles near my ear, and I close my eyes a second, breathing in the sound, sensing his heat behind me.
