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Cole: Lol. I’ll be waiting.
Watching her door like a hawk, Cole waited for Ian to flip the sign to CLOSED while he flipped his keys around his finger. He’d made sure that neither he nor Ian—who’d started teaching piano at the studio over the summer—had any lessons scheduled for the afternoon, because he’d wanted Mira all to himself. He’d also given a definitely not-possessed Ian twenty bucks to clean the bakery today, but what Mira didn’t know wouldn’t hurt her.
It had been three months since he’d moved to Red Falls, and like he did almost every day, he wanted to celebrate. The studio was filling up, Ian helped him run the scheduling, his boyfriend, Brendan, was actually a whiz at bookkeeping, and Cole was still getting decent recording gigs from his regular clients. He drank coffee with Mira every morning, had lunch with her every day, made love to her as often as possible, tucked her in every night, either at her place or his. He even took Linda to her therapy sessions when Mira needed to run errands or go for a hike or get the facials and massages he liked to buy for her because self-care really was important. He’d wanted, more than anything, to make her life easier, and he hoped that he had. He hoped he’d made the insurmountable feel mountable. But today might be a stretch.
When Ian finally flipped the sign, giving Cole a thumbs-up through the window, he held his breath. Then her door swung open. She emerged into the afternoon sun in the form-fitting blank tank dress he loved peeling off her, and he jumped into action.
“Hey, baby,” she said when he greeted her at his door, using the pet name that always made his knees weak, the one she’d bestowed upon him the first day he met her and started using for real after he surprised her in her alley.
“Hey, sugar.” He shoved his keys into his back pocket, giving his shaking hands something to do. “How was your day?”
“Looong,” she moaned, falling into his open arms. “I was up at three making the Sampson wedding cake.”
“Poor thing,” he said, not really meaning it, because the senator’s daughter’s wedding had done exactly what they’d hoped it would do, and now Glazed and Confused was swimming in wedding cake orders. He kissed her head. “Feel like doing something fun?”
Glancing up at him through her lashes, a sparkle in her eye, she said, “Yes. You should put your readers on, and we can play naughty teacher again.”
That did sound good. Maybe they should just do that.Focus, Cole. “I was thinking more like getting out of Dodge. Wanna go for a ride? I’ll drive.”
“A ride? Where to?”
Hopefully not to the evening news.“Remember when we talked about going back to the caverns?”
“Yeah,” she said warily. “I remember.”
“I think we should go. It’s a gorgeous afternoon, and you said you wanted to try—”
“Let’s do it.”
“Yeah?” he said, leaning back, the resolve blazing in her emerald eyes knocking the wind out of him. “You sure?”
“No.” She gave him a smile. “But let’s do it anyway.”
“That’s my girl.”
* * *
“This place is amazing!”He pointed to the tubes of rock sliding down the walls, the strange, lumpy formations rising from the ground like mineralized snowmen. “Everything’s so smooth and shiny.”
“It’s so hot down here,” Mira said by his side, her hand clutching his in a death grip. “So humid. Are you hot?”
“No,” he replied, because while it was humid, it was pretty chilly. But then he noticed the line of people walking the path in front of them. “It’s a line,” he whispered into her ear. “And you’re nervous.”
“Ugh.” She twirled her hair up into a bun. “Fucking hot flashes.”
Taking full advantage, he brushed his lips over her exposed neck and whispered, “Just don’t take all your clothes off, okay?” But when she reached around him to squeeze his butt, he twisted out of the way. “Ah, ah, ah,” he scolded, tilting his head toward the family lagging behind them, finding a plausible explanation for why he didn’t want her hands on his ass, at least not yet. “There are children present.”
Grabbing his elbow, her face suddenly paling, she yanked him close. “I think we’re almost there, just around that corner. That’s where they turn off the lights.”
“You remember it that well?” Cole asked, squinting down the walkway, because it all looked the same to him: subterranean, gloopy, like goblins carved themselves a tiny city out of rock.
Staring up at him, squeezing his hand with cold, trembling fingers, she said, “I don’t know if I can do this.”
“Do you want to leave?” It would mess up his plan, but he could adjust.
“I don’t know. I’m freaking out.” She fanned her face. “And I’m so hot.”
“You can say that again.”
