Chapter 7 - THE FIRST REAL DATE
Grant waited four months.
I counted.
I pretended I didn’t.
Spring returned to Whitmore Hall.
The lavender beds woke slowly.
The creek rose after March storms.
The sycamore produced new leaves.
Grant and I saw each other through work, but he never pushed.
Sometimes we had coffee after meetings.
Sometimes he walked through the greenhouse and asked embarrassingly basic questions about propagation.
Once he killed an orchid.
I banned him from touching expensive plants.
Then, one Thursday afternoon, he appeared carrying two paper cups.
“Coffee?”
“I’m holding pruning shears.”
“I can see that.”
“That was a warning.”
He placed my cup down.
“Dinner.”
I looked at him.
“That wasn’t a question.”
“Right.”
He tried again.
“Would you have dinner with me?”
“As what?”
“Two adults.”
“That sounds deeply romantic.”
Grant smiled.
“As a date.”
There it was.
I put the shears down.
“I’m going to say no.”
His face barely changed.
“Okay.”
“Do you want to know why?”
“Yes.”
“You’ve spent most of your adult life moving quickly because people accommodate you.”
He nodded.
“I don’t want our first real relationship to begin because enough legal paperwork expired.”
“Fair.”
“I want to know whether we actually like each other.”
Grant laughed.
“That sounds brutal.”
“It’s practical.”
“Then how do we find out?”
“We continue being friends.”
His expression softened.
“I’d like that.”
Three weeks later, I asked him to dinner.
The shock on his face was worth everything.
“You’re asking me?”
“Don’t ruin it.”
“I’m trying not to.”
We went to a diner forty minutes from the estate.
Grant had never been there.
Nobody recognized him for almost twelve minutes.
He considered that a personal victory.
We ate burgers.
Talked about things that had nothing to do with the company.
His years in London.
My mother.
His fear of becoming his father.
My fear of depending on anyone financially.
He asked why I had never married.
“I almost did.”
His face changed.
“When?”
“Twenty-six.”
“To who?”
“Ethan Blake.”
Grant tried and failed to hide jealousy.
I laughed.
“What happened?”
“He wanted children immediately. I didn’t.”
“And?”
“He believed I would change my mind if we married.”
“You didn’t.”
“No.”
“So you left.”
“Yes.”
Grant stared at his coffee.
“You’ve always been better at leaving bad decisions than I am.”
“I stayed at Whitmore my entire life.”
“That wasn’t a bad decision.”
“Sometimes I’m not sure.”
He looked up.
“Would you leave?”
“The estate?”
“Yes.”
“If the right opportunity came.”
His face tightened for half a second.
Then:
“What kind?”
That response mattered.
Not Don’t go.
What kind?
“I’ve been offered a partnership.”
“Where?”
“Charlottesville.”
“Doing?”
“Botanical products. Small-scale distillation and native-plant design.”
“You want it?”
“I might.”
He nodded slowly.
“That sounds like you.”
I smiled.
“It does.”
Our first date ended with Grant driving me home.
He stood outside my cottage.
“Can I kiss you?”
The question hit harder than I expected.
I shook my head.
“Not tonight.”
“Okay.”
No disappointment weaponized.
No persuasion.
Just okay.
At our fourth date, I kissed him.
Beside Mill Creek.
Naturally.
It was nothing like childhood fantasy.
Better.
Awkward at first.
Then familiar in a way that frightened me.
Grant pulled back before I did.
“You okay?”
“Yes.”
“You’re sure?”
“Stop interviewing me.”
He laughed.
Then kissed me again.
We dated slowly.
Quietly at first.
Not secretly.
There was a difference.
I refused to become the woman everyone believed had destroyed his marriage.
Grant refused to let that narrative stand.
When a society reporter eventually photographed us at dinner and published a story implying I had “waited in the wings,” Grant released one statement.
My former marriage ended because Caroline and I entered it for the wrong reasons. Lily Carter had no role in that decision and should not be blamed for choices made by me.
No romantic declaration.
No mention of childhood.
Just accountability.
I appreciated it.
Caroline did too.
She texted me:
FINALLY HE LEARNED PR.
I replied:
MIRACLES.
Her answer:
DON’T PUSH IT.
Nine months into our relationship, I accepted the Charlottesville partnership.
Grant went quiet when I told him.
“I start in June.”
“Full time?”
“Yes.”
“You’ll move.”
“Yes.”
He looked toward the greenhouse.
“Two hours away.”
“Roughly.”
“I hate it.”
I waited.
He continued.
“And I think you should go.”
My throat tightened.
“Why?”
“Because every woman who mattered in my family got told her life should fit around a Whitmore man.”
He looked at me.
“I don’t want to love you that way.”
That was the moment I knew.
Not beside the sycamore at twelve.
Not while smelling lavender during his wedding.
Not when he returned my wooden bottle.
There.
When wanting me did not become an argument against my freedom.
I moved in June.
Grant visited.
Sometimes.
Not every weekend.
Because I had work.
Because he had work.
Because healthy love had room for missing someone.
The distillery grew.
My first lavender line sold out regionally.
I hired three employees.
Bought a small house.
My own.
Grant helped carry boxes.
He did not offer to buy it.
Progress.
Then one evening, almost two years after his wedding to Caroline, he arrived at my house looking strangely nervous.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re terrible at nothing.”
He reached into his pocket.
I froze.
“Grant.”
“It’s not a ring.”
“Good.”
He pulled out a folded piece of paper.
A property map.
I stared.
“What is this?”
“The land beside Mill Creek.”
“What about it?”
“The employee trust voted to designate two acres for community use.”
“And?”
“They’re building a teaching garden.”
My eyes filled.
“What kind?”
“Lavender, apparently.”
I laughed.
“Apparently?”
“I was outvoted.”
“You hate lavender.”
“That’s a lie.”
The oldest joke between us.
Then Grant pointed toward a small rectangle on the map.
“What is that?”
“Greenhouse.”
Another rectangle.
“Workshop.”
“And this?”
He looked nervous.
“A little house.”
My heart stopped.
“Grant.”
“Not for us.”
I stared at him.
“For the program director. Whoever that eventually is.”
“You drew my childhood house.”
“I remembered.”
“Even the greenhouse.”
“I’ve always had excellent drafting skills.”
“You drew the kitchen through a tree root.”
“I was twelve.”
I laughed through tears.
Grant did not propose.
Not that night.
May you like
Instead, he handed me the map and let memory become something useful to other people.
And somehow that was more romantic than any diamond could have been.
