Page 31 of Forget Me Not (The Shifters of Timberfall #1)

Bastien

Frozen air nipped at his exposed skin while Bas shuffled stacks of crates around in the cooler.

His phone chimed in his pocket, requiring him to utilize all his self-restraint to keep from dumping an arm full of the crates onto the concrete floor.

Quickly as he could, he freed his arms and dug his phone out to reveal one notification—an email, and the exact one he had been waiting for all morning.

Cyrus and Syve were right. Dez would want him to be happy. He’d want him to use the money he left behind if that’s what it took to get there.

Bastien had never set out to work as a butcher, it was not a lifelong dream of his, but once he was there, he could not imagine leaving. After years of working with no goal, he could confidently say he could picture himself in Hal’s shoes one day—nine to five at the shop and then home to his wife.

Maybe he was getting ahead of himself…Hal’s made him happy. Owning the butcher shop had become his goal and he knew he would regret it if he let the opportunity slip past him, so Monday morning he called the bank. Now it was all dependent on the message sitting in his inbox.

“You in here, son?” Hal called, peeking around the door. When he didn’t get a response, he stepped all the way into the cooler. “Everything okay?”

Phone held up in front of him, a broad smile on his face, Bas turned around and said, “Hal, I’m ready to talk numbers. Let me buy the shop.”

Syve answered the phone on the second ring. “Bastien, hey, everything okay?”

He could hear her sewing machine whirring in the background.

“Bambi, I did it.” Despite the warring emotions bouncing around in his body, his voice clearly held all of his excitement.

“Did it? Did what?” Syve asked. The sewing stopped, he had her full attention .

“I talked to the bank, and I told Hal I’d buy the shop.” He stopped pacing and covered his mouth with his free hand, waiting for her reaction.

A gasp. “Bas! That’s amazing! Congratulations! What happens now?”

“Well, nothing right now,” he chuckled. “We’ve still got to sit down and talk real numbers, get the bank involved—Hal said he’s got a friend who can help with the legal end. It’ll take a few months, but the ball’s at least rolling.”

“I’m so happy for you—both of you! Hattie’s going to love having Hal home all the time. It’s about time he retired, and this will be so good for you! Should we celebrate? Is that bad luck? Should we wait?” she rambled.

He just listened for a moment, relishing in her excitement.

“I wouldn’t be opposed to celebrating now. Actually, that’s part of why I called. It’s because of you and Cyrus that I finally went through with it. Come to dinner with me. A celebration—but also a thank you, for encouraging me.”

She hesitated, but before he could say anything else, she answered, “Okay, yeah. I’m in. When and where?”

He let out a breath, muscles relaxing. “Would tonight work for you? I could pick you up after work, say, six-thirty?”

“That’s in forty-five minutes; you know that right?”

“Well…I could be there sooner?”

“No, no! Six-thirty, I’ll see you then. Bye, Bas!”

Click .

Bas thought back to earlier, sitting in Hal’s office .

“ Well, I’d better have Hattie help me pick out some flowers to send Syve.”

“What? Why? What are you talking about?”

“You aren’t sitting here talking to me just because you woke up and changed your mind. She said something to you, you and I both know it was her, and I intend to thank her.”

Bas laughed. “You’re not entirely wrong.”

“You’d better spoil that girl, you hear me? She has a heart of gold. You’re a good man, I think you two could be good for each other.”

A replay of the nine-to-five daydream skittered back to the front of his mind.

This time, when he lumbered home after a long day behind the counter and opened the front door, he allowed his mind to keep wandering.

He imagined walking in to find his wife sitting at a table in the sitting room, auburn hair, streaked silver with age, a near constant whir from her little machines…

“Why don’t you roll on out of here a little early? Seems like you might be able to use that extra time to…I don’t know, swing by Maggie’s? Maybe call and make sure there’s a table waiting for you, wherever it is you plan on taking her?” Hal goaded, leaning against the corner.

“You eavesdropping, old man?”

Bas smiled, but he knew he was right. Asking Syve to dinner had been a spur of the moment decision, and he needed to make sure they had somewhere to go, at minimum .

Timberfall was not an outrageously big town, but by six o’clock, one could safely assume there would be at least a short wait for a table. Stopping by Blooming Pleasures to snag a bouquet from Maggie wouldn’t be a bad idea either…

“I’m capable of locking up. Tell Mags I said, ‘hi,’ and I’ll see her next Tuesday,” his soon-to-be not-boss insisted, all but shoving him out the back door.

Bastien laughed as he turned to jog the few blocks home to grab the Jeep.

Securing a table at Thyme to Eat was simple enough—he called on the way to the flower shop and managed to claim the last open reservation for the night at 6:45 p.m. Some might call that kismet.

Blooming Pleasures promised to be more of a challenge.

For a cute little shop, Maggie managed to stock dozens of different flowers, all on display in various glass-doored refrigerators.

In spring, it doubled as a nursery—any orphan plants were popped in a bucket and housed right there in the shop for the entirety of their life cycle.

Cut flowers, potted plants, vegetables, saplings—you name it.

There was even a contraption, in the back corner, used for growing tubers in a vertical fashion.

An idea struck him while he was greeting the florist and passing along Hal’s message.

“Maggie, I’d really love a specific flower—but I actually have no idea what it’s called.

” If he had the time, he could easily run out to the lake and pick a bouquet of his own, but for now, he would have to hope Mags really did have everything.

“If only someone here made it their life’s mission to know every single flower possibly attainable in North America,” she deadpanned. “Do you at least know what the flower looks like? Can you describe it to me?”

Bastien raised his hands in surrender, earning a laugh for his troubles, then did his best to describe the flowers painted on Syve’s door.

“Hmmm…maybe comfrey? Or morning glory? No…” She muttered to herself, tapping her chin while walking around, searching her cases.

“Ah-ha! Wildflowers, of course—here!” Maggie pointed to the glass door she had stopped in front of.

Sure enough, in the far corner, a vase brimmed with little blue flowers.

“Those! Those are the ones! Thank you. Can you make something up with those please? Oh, and what are they called?”

“Forget-me-nots, special little things…Do you want any other flowers mixed in? Peonies, perhaps?”

With a shake of his head, he declined, and she set to work arranging a miniature bouquet in a small blue vase.

Once the flowers were paid for, plus another order he would pick up the next day to take home for his mother, he checked the time.

Cursing under his breath, he gathered the flowers, thanked Maggie again, and bolted out the door.