Page 17 of Seduction in the Mountains

"I got it, man. Go after him!" Alex pushes me.

I run out the door, yelling Levi's name. Outside, I skid to a stop and look both ways, seeing Levi storming toward the coffee shop.

Fuck.

"Levi! Hold on!" I race down the street, breathing hard as I catch up to him. "Dude, you are so fucking fast. What the hell?"

He's angry, talking to himself, and I hear him mumble something about "birds of a feather."

Still embarrassingly winded, I try to reason with him as we get closer toThe Reading Grounds. "Levi, man, I think I need to take a night and think this through before—"

He stops abruptly and whirls on me, cutting me off as I back up against the building next to Miranda's place, my arms up in surrender. The look on his face is so comically enraged that I blink hard and dig my fingernails into the palms of my hands to keep from laughing. His eyes are a little wild, and his hair sticks straight up like he gripped it all the way here. He's a real-life giant-sized Yosemite Sam, and all I can do is let him rant.

Levi yells, "No thinking! They run away and never come back when you give them time to think."

Oh shit. Thisisn'tabout me.

I nod. "Right, man. Who are you talking about?"

He turns towardThe Reading Groundsand practically bellows, "The runners!"

Alex catches up to us as I grab Levi's arm. I try to haul him away from the front door, whisper-yelling, "Levi, parents could be on the street right now, and I'm new. I don't know what they look like!"

"They'd love that, wouldn't they?" He turns to me and says in a mock falsetto voice, "Talk to me more, tell me how you feel, blah blah blah." He drops an octave to his regular voice. "But then you tell them how you feel, and they run away like their ass is on fire, taking your heart with them, and you don't get to say anything about it!"

I turn to Alex, but he looks as lost as me, shaking his head. This obviously happened before our time in Duhring Park.

Levi suddenly freezes. Putting a hand to his mouth, he steps back like he’s snapped out of a daze. He looks around the street quickly, then back at Alex and me with wide eyes. "Oh, fuck."

I look over as the door to the coffee shop opens, and Miranda pokes her head out.

"Levi? Cole? What's going on out here?" Miranda looks up and down the street, searching for the cause of the commotion.

Levi stares at me with panicked eyes, silently pleading for me not to say anything.

I shake my head subtly at him, assuring him it's between us, and turn to my girl. "Miranda, we need to talk."

She bites her lip, pausing for a moment. Nodding, she motions me into the shop.

Alex puts his arm around Levi's shoulders. "Hey, bud. Let's go for a walk." He leads a still-befuddled Levi back to the bar, waving me toward my conversation with Miranda.

This town is crazy. God, I hope Miranda doesn't break my heart and make everyone hate me because I never want to leave.

When I get inside, Miranda has pulled down the chairs at one of the tables and is sitting with her hands folded in front of her. I pull out the chair across from her.

She clears her throat, starts to say something, and then stops. A range of emotions flits across her face. Anger, sadness, frustration, and embarrassment roll over her like spotlights. I wait for her to reveal which one she's leading with tonight.

Finally, she shrinks back in the chair, looking young and tired, and whispers, "I'm scared."

This. I can work with this.

I nod. "Miranda, I grew up in a town a little bigger than Duhring, and everybody expected me to take over my uncle's construction business. I didn't want to. I wanted money. So I took off for college and worked my ass off to get into a profession that made a lot of money. And I hated it. I missed my friends, sure, but what I missed more was not needing anything to have a good time."

I can't tell what Miranda’s thinking as she watches me. It drives me crazy. This seems like an important moment, though. One I need to handle delicately. I place my elbows on the table and scrub my face before continuing.

"I wasn't happy, but I was also afraid to quit. I didn't want to work for my uncle or take over his business, but I also didn't want to work a corporate job for the rest of my life. I felt stuck. After four miserable years, I woke up one day and decided to do more with my life. I went back to school and got my teaching certification. When I landed the job here in Duhring, I thought I knew what happiness was again." I smile at her, and she returns it, biting her lip.

"Butnothingcompares to what I felt when I walked into your coffee shop last week." Her breath catches as I gaze deeply into her eyes. "For the last eight years, I've hoped and wished and dreamed about seeing you again, Miranda. Now I've found you, I'm not letting you go." I lean forward on the table, grabbing her hands. "You are end game for me. Worth whatever time you need. I'll tackle any trials and tribulations our story's plot takes, but I know without a shadow of a doubt thatyouare my happily ever after."

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