9. David
DAVID
Mia Hansen can shoot a gun. She knows how to scare off a mountain lion if she runs across one.
She writes really fucking filthy fanfiction.
I figured she’d find a way for us to see one another secretly, but that it would involve a few white lies to our friends and family and getting outside of the Sapphire Falls zip code.
Instead, I’m eating cheese and grapes in a deer blind five miles from my house. And she’s wearing hunting camo.
All of that surprised me because I made assumptions about her.
So I will not assume she’s a sweet little virgin who doesn’t know what she likes or wants in bed.
I also won’t assume that she’s thinking about sex the way I am when I offer to teach her things.
But if she’d like to try some of the things her imagination comes up with that she hasn’t had a chance to before…I would really like to be the one that helps her out.
I’m not going to lie to myself about that.
Or her, if it comes up.
But, while she’s smiling and meeting my gaze directly, there’s a pink tint to her cheeks now that makes me think that her dirty little mind is thinking exactly what I’m thinking.
She reaches for an apple slice and dips it in the cheese, then takes a bite. After she’s crunched for a few seconds, she asks, “What do you like about the dirt bikes?”
“They’re super cool and go fast.”
She smiles but shakes her head. “There’s more to it than that.”
There doesn’t need to be more to it than that, but I think I like the fact that she realizes there is. I nod. “Yeah.”
I glance toward the window. Like the night of the tornado, I could blame this on the fact that we’re alone in the dark and it’s conducive to me spilling my guts.
But I know that’s not it. This is all about Mia and that she’s easy to talk to. I get the impression that she will understand what I’m about to say very well.
“It’s controlled chaos,” I tell her. “If you aren’t paying attention, if you haven’t developed your skills, if you don’t work on control, the bike can easily take over and become dangerous.
But you can master it. You can take this machine, this thing that can’t be reasoned with, that has no emotion, that’s moving at these incredible speeds and has this power to hurt you, and then completely control it.
You can turn that power into an adrenaline rush and fun instead of danger. ”
She’s not smiling now but she’s watching me with fascination. “It’s the same reason you like your job,” she says.
I feel my eyes widen.
But she nods as if she’s certain, and I don’t have to confirm it.
“You’re working with potentially dangerous situations all the time.
Weather, wildlife, other humans who are armed or inebriated or just feel rules don’t apply to them.
You’re facing all of that and exerting control over it.
Using your influence to make it safe and even fun in the end for everyone who is counting on you. ”
I knew she’d get it.
She continues, “And you like that because you felt a loss of control and felt like you didn’t have any ability to influence the chaos around your parents dying and what happened to you and your brothers after that.”
I nod.
Having her understand that, having her understand me , is now a problem. Because I like her even more.
“Pretty clear psych case study, right? “I ask.
“Wanting to exert influence over situations that seem out of control and not only control them, but turn them positive?” She laughs lightly.
“Yeah, I think it’s pretty obvious where that comes from, David.
” She pauses. “It’s the same place that drives me into fictional worlds.
In a story, all the motivations are explained to me.
I get to literally see inside people’s minds.
I get to see the journey all laid out, and I can know the ending before I even begin.
” She takes a breath. “That all, of course, comes from all the uncertainty in my early childhood. All the times I wondered why my parents made the choices they did. And not knowing how things were going to turn out.”
“Do you read the last chapter first in books?” I ask, already knowing the answer.
“Every time,” she confesses. She smiles self-deprecatingly. “Chaos was the theme of your childhood. Uncertainty was mine. You now need control. I love knowing what to expect. Books give me that. And I’ve discovered that writing…”
I lift my brow. She almost confessed to me. I love that she feels as comfortable with me as I do with her spilling secrets, and deep thoughts.
“Writing what?”
She lifts a shoulder. “I just write sometimes.”
I take an apple slice and swirl it through the cheese, then lift it to my mouth. I lick the cheese off before biting into the apple.
She watches my mouth the entire time.
Her eyes on my mouth heat my blood.
“What do you write?” I should confess that I know this. I should tell her that I’ve read it.
But I want her to tell me.
“Romance,” she says.
Hmm, okay, far be it from me to tell the woman how to describe her own writing. Her characters definitely care about each other. “Are you a romantic, Mia?”
“For sure,” she says without hesitation. “How could I grow up with Scott and Peyton Hansen and not be?”
I smile. “I feel the same way about Tucker and Delaney.”
“There are actually a lot of great examples around here.”
“Is that why you write it?” I would love to know why she writes what she does. I’m fucking dying to know, in fact.
“Probably in part,” she admits. “Also…some wish fulfillment, I suppose.”
I almost swallow my tongue.
I’m not saying that her fanfiction has no romance in it. It also has humor and some pretty great heartfelt moments. Maybe that’s what she’s talking about too. She wants a relationship that has all of that.
But there’s no way she hasn’t put some real thought into those other scenes.
“Wish fulfillment,” I say, after I’m sure my voice will sound at least somewhat normal. “The things you write about are things you want for yourself?”
“Of course.”
Of course.
Of. Fucking. Course.
Well, I’m never going to get that out of my head.
And I’m probably not going to sleep very well tonight. At least not with any dreams of sweet candlelight dinners with Mia.
But that doesn’t mean Mia won’t be in them.
“Is your stuff available for reading?” I ask. Fuck. What happens when she finds out I’ve already read it?
“Yes.” She dips her head, looking down at her hands. “It’s posted online. It’s fanfiction. Though, really, I just borrow the setting and a few characters from the main fiction. The primary characters I write about, I made up. They don’t show up in the original series.”
“So you started writing it because you were a fan of something else?” I have to play a little dumb here, don’t I? I’ve had Charlie explain it, but I’d love to hear about this from Mia’s perspective.
“Right. But then I wanted more from the world. I was sad when it was over and wanted to stay there longer. I wanted to keep going back. Since there were no more books, I started coming up with additional stories on my own. And then I found this great community of other fans and writers and it just kind of grew from there. It’s really fun.
I feel like I have a chance to explore new ideas and…
” She shrugs. “Yes, some wish fulfillment.”
“So why not just write your own original stuff?” I ask.
“I’ve asked myself that,” she says. “Maybe I will someday. For now, I love the community and feel at home in that world. It makes exploring new ideas and themes and having these…adventures…feel safer?” She phrases it as a question and her brow furrows slightly when she says it.
“I never thought about it, but I think that’s it.
Since the things my characters are doing and the feelings they’re exploring are new and different for me, it’s nice that the setting and people around them are familiar.
It’s as if whatever happens to them, it's still safe, because in this world everyone is good and things end up happy.”
She seems to be thinking that over.
“That makes sense,” I offer. It does. Completely. “You love books and stories because you can know the ending. You can choose the stories that make you feel a certain way. That gives you a sense of control that you didn’t have growing up. I get that.”
She meets my eyes, and I feel that getting-familiar jolt of connection.
“If you’re writing the stories, you want to be sure they end up good and happy and that you get those same feelings,” I say, thinking out loud.
“But maybe your mind is telling you that the stories are bound to a set of rules then. Maybe that makes you feel restricted. Like you can’t actually tell all of the story you want to for fear it won’t turn out happy.
If you set it in a world you already know and that makes you feel good, that you can trust to give you a happily ever after, maybe your imagination is more free to let the adventure go where you need it to. ”
She’s staring at me now.
I shift uncomfortably. “Or fuck, I don’t know. Maybe you’re just really enamored with this other world.”
She reaches out and puts her hand on my arm. “No. David. You’re totally right. I think that’s it.” She swallows. “My stories are…the heroine is…she isn’t very experienced sexually.” She swallows again. “And the heroes—there are two?—”
Yes. I’m aware of that as well. It’s clear to me the heroine is in love with one of them and just very attracted to the other, but yes, there are two men helping this woman explore her sexuality.
“—and that’s all new and different and the things she’s learning about herself are exciting but a little scary, and she’s going through emotions about both men and…
” Mia takes a breath. “I think you’re right that at least setting it somewhere familiar, that makes me happy, makes it easier to write some of that more difficult stuff. ”
Charlie would fall off his damned chair if he knew I was just that insightful and I impressed Mia Freaking Hansen.
I can’t wait to tell him.
“Thanks for helping me figure that out,” she says, giving me a bright smile. “That’s a really great realization for me to have.”
“You’re welcome.” Now I want to know why Charlie feels the need to kill people in this town in this series he supposedly loves. “So,” I hear myself say. “What would happen in your romance story if the heroine and hero— one of them,” I add.
She smiles.
“—were out in a deer blind together?”
And she blushes.
A dark pink that makes me want to know every single dirty thought that just went through her pretty head.
She sits back, pulling her hand from my arm.
I did not want her to stop touching me. Which is the sure sign that it’s good she did.
“Oh, well, if it was at the beginning of the story, they’d talk and get to know each other better,” she says.
I nod. “Makes sense.”
“But he’d definitely kiss her.”
Heat hits me low and hard. My gaze on her mouth, I ask, “ He would kiss her? She wouldn’t kiss him ?”
She wets her bottom lip with her tongue. “Well, not this heroine,” she says, her voice a little softer. “She’s not confident enough.”
“Ah.” How much of Mia is in that woman? Then I do what I have to do and say, “We should probably get out of here.”
Because we are at the beginning of our story.
But I very much want to do middle-of-the-story things with her.
She takes a long, deep breath. “We should?”
“I told Jake Turner I’d get rid of whoever was out here. There’s a pretty good chance he’s going to send one of his boys out here to check that no one came back.”
“Oh.”
“That’s the thing about trespassing,” I say with a small grin. “The whole point is you can’t stay .”
“Right.”
I help her gather everything up and slip the food back into the thermal bag she brought along. I stretch to my feet and extend a hand to her.
She takes it, letting me pull her to stand.
We both pause, only inches apart.
If I were going to kiss her, this would be a really good time.
The position is perfect. The moment is perfect.
But I step back and motion for her to head out the door first. “I’ll carry the food. Watch your footing on the steps.”
She gives me a tiny eye roll and I swear, if she were my girlfriend, I’d swat her ass for it.
My palm itches with the urge.
But she passes by and I make a fist instead of putting my hand on that perfect ass.
The scent of her shampoo drifts up to me, though, and I’m pretty sure the dirty dream I’m certain to have tonight is going to involve spanking.
At the trucks, we both round to the passenger side of Charlie’s truck. Mia takes her cap off, tossing it onto the seat and running her fingers through her long hair.
“Ugh, it’s so humid out here.” Then she strips the long-sleeved camo tee over her head.
My heart stops for a moment, but she’s wearing a white tank underneath. She tosses the camo tee onto the seat as well.
Working on breathing evenly, I step around her to set the food on the floor, make a note to call Charlie immediately and ask what he thought was going to happen when I came out here and saw Mia with his truck, tell him that I gave Mia insight about her writing, and bribe him with an unlimited supply of tropical Skittles if he promises to let me in on future Mia plans to get me alone that he is privy to.
I’m so caught up in making my list that when I turn, it takes me a second to realize Mia is right behind me. Which puts her right in front of me.
I should kiss her.
I want to kiss her.
I think we’re to the point where kissing makes sense. We’re not going to be just friends. This might not last, but I don’t think I can live without ever kissing this woman.
I think she’d like it if I kissed her.
“Mia, I—” I have no idea what I was going to say.
Because Mia mutters, “Oh, for God’s sake,” grabs the front of my shirt, pulls me down, and kisses me.