Prologue
Brent
#RosesareRed
“K-man, how’s it going?”
My cousin Kayson was at the counter of my mom’s flower shop, fiddling with a bouquet of flowers. It looked fine as it was to me, but then again, if I had any sort of eye for these things I’d have been behind the counter with him. I tried three summers in a row. It just wasn’t my thing.
“I should ask the same of you.” He stopped what he was doing and looked up at me. “Haven’t seen you in a while.”
It was true. Aside from his needing to be home more now that his omega, Reid, was about ready to pop, I had a ton of things I needed to do for my new TA position at the college. I still was working at the planetarium, but that was for dollars, not love. I loved teaching the intro math classes at the college, which was the true definition of TA apparently. Not that I would ever complain about basically being a poorly paid replacement teacher because, to me, it made it the best job ever.
“That’s because you have been too busy with your pregnant omega to be bothered with the likes of your lowly cousin.” I waited for his retaliation, but his attempt was thwarted by my mother handing him the store phone I’d only half registered had been ringing.
“It’s Reid.” She handed it to him, and he disappeared into the back room.
“Do I need to take you over my knee, young man?” Not that she ever had, not even once as I grew up.
I just rolled my eyes at her. I might be almost a quarter of a century old, but around my mom, I was still a petulant teen.
“Mom, I was joshing him.” I rolled them again for good measure.
“And I was messing with you, too. I can’t wait to see you when the love bug bites.”
She’d been on me to find an alpha and settle down ever since I reenrolled at the college as a grad student. She was sure I was doing so in some attempt to find meaning in my life, refusing to believe I was doing it simply to make myself more marketable.
I’d had two “grown-up” jobs since my first stint in college, both long-term substitute positions and those just didn’t pay the bills, not if I planned to live in anything other than a studio apartment and wanted crazy extravagant things such as health insurance. No, I needed more than just my teaching degree, I needed my masters in my field so back to college I went. Thankfully, Mapleville had an insanely good, yet tiny school complete with insane amounts of endowments to keep costs to a minimum.
“I’m here for flowers.” I puffed my chest out as if I’d just announced my engagement. Truth be told, it was for Chad who was nice enough and hotter than hell, but thought I was a little too predictable and boring.
Flowers for no reason were my best counterargument for him, which probably only proved him right, but I was trying.
“Flowers for some guy doesn’t make love.”
Why did she always have to be so blasted right? Heck, she told me the day Reid came to town that Kayson found his omega even if neither he nor Reid had a clue.
“He’s really nice.” Because telling her he was hot just seemed inappropriate even if my mom was the queen of oversharing, especially when it came to her and her Henry.
“That’s the best you got—nice?”
It kind of was, so I just shrugged. No sense engaging when the battle was doomed to result with me on the losing side. I was in college; it wasn’t like I needed to find Mr. Right. Mr. Right Now was good enough for the moment.
I was such a liar, especially to myself.
“Here, take these.” She handed me a premade bouquet of random flowers, the kind you would bring to your date’s mother or possibly your grandmother. They were not flowers for a beau, to be sure. “They say nice.”
“They say old lady.”
“Same difference.”
“Roses.” I stood firm, refusing her pathetic offering. Really, like men want gladiolas to woo them off their feet. “I need roses.”
“If you insist.” She put the flowers down before heading to the cooler. “Red?”
“Of course.” But the more we talked, the more I realized how right she was, even if her method of “helping” was less than ideal.
“Youth. I swear you alphas don’t get a brain until you hit twenty-five.”
“I’m twenty-four. I think I’m good.”
Before she could respond, my cousin came barreling back in as if the place was on fire, his face a cross between excited and freaking the fuck out.
“Gotta go. Baby time. Love ya.” He kissed my mom on the top of the head and ran, yes ran, to the front door.
“Call when you—never mind.” She gave up as the door closed behind him.
“Need me to stay and help, Mom?”
Her jaw dropped open before she quickly snapped it shut. That would be a resounding no.
“I’m good.” She handed me a half-ass bouquet of roses. “Go find your alpha and give him those.”
And that was just what I planned to do, except it turned out that saying about life being what happens when you are busy planning or whatever it is—yeah, that sucker turned out to be true.
I reached my beau’s, as Mom called him, office just during his break. Chad worked in the bursar’s office and was one of the few people who had an office with walls. I was kind of jealous of him in that. Holding student-help sessions in a cubicle was less than ideal.
As I stepped up to his door, I got a crappy feeling. A swift knock on the door later, followed by a thud and an “Oh shit!” and that feeling multiplied.
I opened the door to find Chad pulling up his pants and a very poorly put together Professor Hahn of the Art Department standing there looking every bit as embarrassed as he should be.
“It’s not what it looks like,” Chad began not directing it at either of us and earning him an evil look from both. It was as if he thought if he threw it out there, one of us would forgive him. Any anger I had at Professor Hahn flew out the window as he slapped Chad and walked out mumbling about being stupid for trusting his sorry ass.
I wanted to throw the flowers at his head but thought better of it as I walked on out of the office and through the main corridor, handing the flowers to Mrs. Henry as I passed her smiling face instead.
She’d been with the college for decades, and if my failed attempt at romance could keep that smile going, I was all about that. Lemonade and all that jazz.
Mom was freaking right. I did need the old lady bouquet.