Page 5 of Falling

That was what soulmates were. That kind of connection.

I’d never found that. Maybe I never would.

“Just friends,” I said, caving. I’d known Seth long enough now to know that arguing with him was an exercise in futility. “Friends and people already dating or married to friends. All I want for my birthday is not to be set up with a total stranger.”

“Do you want to be set up with someone in town? Because that can be arranged.”

“Will you stop?” I asked, but I couldn’t help smiling. Seth was relentless. I knew he was doing this because he loved me, because he thought it was what I needed.

But I didn’t. I had everything I wanted. Mr. Right wasn’t about to just walk through the door, anyway.

“A stripper, then?” Seth asked as the door swung open. “Can I book you a stripper? It must’ve been a decade since you’ve seen a naked man.”

“You answered the door to me naked last week,” I said, looking over at the door, we’re closed already on the tip of my tongue.

Then I saw a strawberry blond head poking through the gap.

Great. Now the new librarian thought I was a pervert. A sad pervert who, okay, hadn’t seen a naked man in a sexy context in… a while.

Not a decade.

But a while.

“I don’t count,” Seth said, swiveling around to face the door. “Miles!” he enthused. “How’s your first day been? The bar is actually⁠—”

“Just opening now,” I interrupted.

Seth turned, looked steadily at me for two heartbeats, and then turned his most charming smile on the new librarian. Miles.

I was having a normal reaction to finding out his name. Totally normal. Couldn’t feel my pulse thumping in my ears at all.

Dammit.

I was definitely too old for this.

“Just opening,” Seth repeated. “Which means I have to leave,” he added, grabbing his purse and click-clacking his way to the door. “Tell my friend here all about it. He’s a great listener.”

And then Seth was gone, and Miles was standing in the darkened bar with dark circles under his eyes and a general disheveled look about him. Yesterday, he’d been as neat as the whiskey I thought I ought to be pouring for him.

“Drink?” I asked.

“I was hoping there might be food,” he said, stomach rumbling loud enough for me to hear from behind the bar as though it’d heard him.

“There might be,” I said. “Kitchen isn’t officially open, but if you’re willing to try an experiment?”

“Is it edible?” Miles asked, shuffling a little closer. He reminded me of the deer that’d come right up to me for a slice of apple last summer, cautious at first, but willing to risk human contact in exchange for food.

I wanted to feed him.

Part of me wanted to wrap him in a blanket and sit him down in front of a warm fire, but I figured he wouldn’t appreciate that from a total stranger.

“Hasn’t killed me yet.” I shrugged.

“I’m game,” Miles said, closing the rest of the distance to the bar and settling himself on the stool Seth had just vacated.

“Are you a vegetarian? Vegan? Or, uh, kosher?”

“None of the above,” Miles said. “I thought about eating one of the books in the library today.”