2. Chapter One #2
"Worst storm since '87, I heard," adds the other.
They scan the café, their eyes landing on Betty and they shuffle across the creaky floorboards.
"There you are, Betty! Look, we saw a car broken down out there," says Cat-Eye Glasses, unwinding a scarf that looks hand-knitted and well-loved. "And we figured whoever owned it might need some—" She stops when she sees me, and her eyes light up. "Well, well, well."
Oh no.
"Etta, Mabel, meet..." Betty looks at me with a slight smirk on her lips.
"Molly," I supply, taking a sip of coffee that tastes like it was brewed by someone who understands that sometimes beverages need to be medicinal. "Molly Jennings."
"Molly!" Mabel—the sweet one—clasps her hands together like I just announced I'm giving away free puppies. "What a lovely name. Are you visiting our little town?"
This is the moment where I should probably craft some polite, vague explanation about taking a brief vacation or exploring the area.
Instead, my mouth opens and truth falls out.
"I'm visiting my sister," I say. "Sienna?
She has a little girl, Maisie? I'm supposed to stay with them for a while, but I don't actually know exactly where they live, and my car just died, and I threw my phone out the window somewhere near the highway because my ex-fiancé was a cheating asshole, and I may have made some questionable life choices recently… "
Jesus, Molly. Overshare much?
But instead of looking alarmed by my verbal diarrhea, all three women lean forward like I just started telling the most interesting story they've heard all week.
"...and I needed to go somewhere safe where he wouldn't find me, because the last time I tried to leave, he threatened to—" I stop, realizing I'm telling my life story to three strangers.
But something about their kind faces makes me continue.
"Anyway, so I thought I'd visit my sister Sienna because I haven't seen her in a long time. .. well, not since—"
"Sienna Wright?" Etta cuts in, her glasses sliding down her nose. "With the little firecracker Maisie, you say?"
Mabel nods vigorously. "Oh, we know exactly where they live, dear!"
Betty slides the slice of pie toward me and winks. "Looks like you found your welcoming committee."
Etta beams at me like I'm her long lost best friend. "Sweet girl... Sienna. Lives over on Misty Peaks Road in that little blue house with the crooked mailbox."
"The one Beau fixed last month after the snow knocked it sideways," Mabel adds, opening her Tupperware to reveal what appears to be homemade cookies.
"No!" Etta interrupts sharply. She shakes her head in disagreement so fiercely her glasses slide down her nose again. "It wasn't Beau. It was Jamie, remember? Jamie Striker from Mountain Rescue?"
Mabel's sweet face transforms into something surprisingly fierce. " Etta Mae Garrison , I was standing right there when it happened. It was absolutely Beau."
"You were not standing anywhere but in your kitchen making those snickerdoodles," Etta shoots back with her own glare. "Jamie had his truck, and he—"
"Ladies," Betty interrupts gently, sliding the cookies toward me like a peace offering while the two women glare at each other across the table.
Mabel huffs. "It was Beau."
"Jamie," Etta mutters under her breath.
"Regardless of who fixed what," Betty continues with the patience of someone who's clearly refereed this type of argument before, "Beau's handy with just about everything. I'm sure he could help with that vehicle of yours out there."
"He's a good man," Etta says firmly. "Quiet, but good. Builds those beautiful cabins up on the ridge."
"Bit of a grump, though," Mabel adds cheerfully. "Hardly says two words to anyone."
I'm about to ask who this mysterious handyman-cabin-builder-slash-mechanic is when the bell above the door chimes again and the weirdest experience I've ever had happens.
In an instant, all conversation stops. Actually stops, like someone hit a pause button on the entire café.
I look up, cookie halfway to my mouth, and my brain promptly forgets how to function.
The man filling the doorframe is... enormous. And not just tall, but substantial … everywhere.
He has ridiculously broad shoulders that span the entire entrance, dark hair that's dusted with snow, and eyes the color of storm clouds that scan the room with the kind of awareness that suggests he notices everything and misses nothing.
And just as I thought might luck might have run out today… those striking eyes land on me.
Time stops.
I'm pretty sure my heart stops too.
My coffee cup freezes halfway to my lips, and I'm vaguely aware that I'm staring like an idiot, but I can't seem to make my brain send the "stop gawking at the handsome stranger" signal to my face.
Betty is grinning. Grinning. Like she just won some kind of cosmic lottery. Etta and Mabel exchange a look that can only be described as gleeful.
And the mountain god in the doorway is still looking directly at me.
Breathe, Molly. Breathing is important for survival.
But I can't breathe, because something is happening here. Something that feels like the universe just shifted on its axis, like all my terrible decisions and broken luggage and destroyed phones led me exactly here, to this moment, to this café, to this man who's looking at me like...
Like he knows me…?
But that's impossible.
Isn't it?
And then I feel it again—that urgent pressure between my legs.
Except now I'm not entirely sure if it's because I still desperately need to pee... or if it's something else entirely. Something that has everything to do with the way this stranger is staring at me like I'm the answer to a question he's been asking his whole life.