Page 9 of A Spot of Tea and Sorcery: Vol. 6

Flowers.

Mr. Grimm was absolutely covered in flowers. A whole blanket of leaves and petals. Petunias sat on his feet, snapdragons bulged from his pockets, tiger lilies curled around his shoulders, dahlias in his hair, and the clinging green canes of the double-delight rose wrapped around his trouser legs.

“Never mind!”

The loud croak startled Luna, like waking from a trance. She turned to the raven, who had just emerged from the stairwell and landed on the counter close to Luna’s hand. Her sharp beak pecked at Luna’s fingers resentfully.

“What happened?” Luna whispered.

Debbie shrugged, wings fluttering.

“Don’t tell me you don’t know! You know everything that goes on around here! Did he relapse? Was it the poison?”

“Never mind,”Debbie suggested.

But Luna couldn’tnotmind. All her resolutions to somehow get through the day without interacting with her employer vanished in a heartbeat. She pushed away from the counter, approaching him softly. “Mr. Grimm?” she queried.

He stirred. All the little flowers draped across him stirred as well, turning sleepy faces up to her, blinking without eyes and yawning without mouths, contriving to look perturbed. Luna ignored them, studying her boss’s face instead. He looked somehow worse than when she’d left him last night. He’d undressed to his undershirt, his waistcoat and jacket dropped to the floor around him, along with the ensorcelled moon-and-stars dressing gown. Did he not bother to go upstairs after she left him last night? It looked as though he’d simply stripped out of a few more layers and collapsed on the spot!

Luna licked her dry lips. What in the name of the Green Mother was she supposed todowith him? Brushing aside a growling tiger lily, she nudged his shoulder and spoke again alittle more loudly: “Mr. Grimm?” The tiger lily swiped at her hand with a vicious leaf. She glared at it. “Well, I can’t just leave him like this, can I? We’re opening in an hour!”

The other tiger lilies began to growl, and the snapdragons stuck their many heads out of his pockets, petal-jaws gnashing viciously.

Luna turned to Debbie. “A little help?”

The raven croaked a few imperious,“Never minds!”but took flight from the counter, flapping and plucking and pecking at the flowers covering her master. They responded to her avian authority and began to slink away, resentful and unhurried. “That’s right,” Luna told them encouragingly, boosting the petunias along with gentle hands. “Go put yourselves back into your pots and vases, will you? I’ll be along with breakfast soon enough.” She turned then to the double-delight, who alone among the florals refused to budge, clinging still to Mr. Grimm’s ragged trousers. “I don’t suppose you want to tell me what happened here?”

The pink-and-yellow blossoms frilled their petals at her.

Luna sighed. “I thought not.” She shook her head and added, “If you’ll get back in your pot without a fuss, I’ll give you an extra scoop of Mama Morgana’s. Deal?”

Though resentful, the double-delight crept off after the rest of the plant life, leaving Luna to turn her attention to Mr. Grimm once more. He looked strangely bereft without all those flowers draping his limbs. His features, which had seemed so severe and aged last night, were gentled by sleep, rendered sweet despite the ugly purple stains which still framed his lips. His hair was a riot, and his sandalwood-and-cinnamon scent was replaced by a distinct funk. And yet, Luna could not fully deny the urge she felt to run her fingers through his messy locks. To trace the line of his jaw. To commit every aspect of his face to memory. Because this could be her last chance to do so. By this time tomorrowmorning, she would be on that mail train, several hours into her journey to Bromley Bay.

With a little set of her chin, Luna gripped his shoulder and gave him a firm shake. “Mr. Grimm,” she said. “You need to wake up now. Mr. Grimm, can you hear me?”

His eyes squeezed tight, and his mouth opened to utter something between a snore and a groan. Another shake, however, and his lids creased open slowly. “M-Miss Talbot?” he croaked hoarsely. Then his eyes widened, and he surged to his feet. “Miss Talbot!” he cried.

And promptly toppled forward into her.

“Oh! Mr. Grimm!” Luna gasped, wrapping her arms around him, knees buckling. She felt his hands scrambling against her back, trying to gain some kind of purchase, and while there were few things she desired in this life more than to be wrapped in his embrace, she found she was quite insufficient to the task of holding him upright on her own. Bracing her feet, she tried to ease him back into the chair. He collapsed, but was unwilling to let her go, and she found herself pulled awkwardly into his lap. She let out a little yelp of surprise, but his grip on her only tightened as he hugged her close.

“Miss Talbot!” he gasped, his voice muffled against her shoulder, where his face was currently pressed. “You came back!” One hand gripped her around the waist while the other ran up her arm, her neck, her face. It was an oddly intimate and wholly inappropriate touch, and Luna knew she ought to be deeply offended. Only she wasn’t. And that bothered her more than anything.

She caught hold of his fingers, pulling them away from her cheek. Her body flushed in all the places that hand had roamed. He drew his head back from her shoulder, his eyes wild and searching and strange as he stared up into her face. “And you’re all right?” he rasped. “You’re . . . you’re not hurt at all?”

“No, of course not.” Luna moved to slide off his lap. His hand at her waist resisted, but when she took hold of it, he allowed her to draw both his hands up in front of her, clasped between her own. She eased back to her feet then, standing between his knees even as he gazed up at her with an expression of desperate pleading. “I was only over at Mrs. Goddard’s, remember?” she said. Her voice quivered rather more than she liked. Part of her wanted to release her hold on him, to see where his hands might venture if given their freedom once more. But she held on firmly. “I’m fine, Mr. Grimm.”

“Mortimer—” he began.

“He’s gone.” Luna spoke with more conviction than she felt. “We’re safe. For now, at least. And so is Garden.”

Her voice seemed to calm him somewhat. Bowing forward, he pressed his forehead against her fingers and breathed hard. “I’m sorry,” he murmured at last. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”

Luna’s throat thickened. What was he apologizing for? His current behavior? His withheld truths? The sins of his past? It hardly mattered. None of it did, if she was honest. Not even the awful revelation of his identity. Because nothing could change what he had done to her heart. Nothing could change the way he had slowly broken down all her defenses and somehow installed himself as the most beautiful, the most important person in her entire life.

All her resolutions, so firmly planted overnight, threatened to be uprooted in a single blast of powerful emotion. She simply could not do this. Not with this man. Not right now. Not with tomorrow and the mail train and her departure looming so large on the horizon.

“Mr. Grimm,” she said, coloring her voice with sternness in an effort to disguise anything more vulnerable. “You need to get upstairs and put yourself in the shower. It’s only an hour until opening, and we’ve got a stack of commissions to get throughbefore the day is done. Pickups start at noon, and we don’t have any of those nosegays for the Governor’s Ball ready. Do you hear me, Mr. Grimm? We’ve got to focus now.”