Over the next month, I focused on work and school. I didn’t go out. I was alone most of the time, but I was content. Knox forced me to eat with him some and I went home twice for family dinners so everyone could see I was smiling. I was happy. I wasn’t lost and sad.

It was almost November when I looked up from the coffeemaker at work to see Slate walk in. He hadn’t been by since the night he picked me up on the road. He hadn’t texted and he hadn’t called. I had seen him only three times from a distance, and each time he didn’t see me and had been alone, too.

I was getting off work in five minutes. It was a Sunday and tomorrow was Halloween. We had been busy all week with the specialty coffee drinks that were about to change for Thanksgiving.

“Hey,” I said, feeling my face flush from excitement. Just seeing him this close and being able to smell him made me happy.

“Hey,” he replied as a smile curled up one corner of his mouth.

“How … how are you?” I asked nervously.

“Missing you,” he replied.

My chest tightened and my heart soared. He had missed me. I had lain in bed many nights telling myself I didn’t need a man to make me happy. I would find happiness inside me. However, it never made me not miss him. Wonder about him.

“Good,” I replied, untying my apron.

“Good?” he asked, still smiling.

I nodded and tossed my apron in the dirty linen basket. “I’m gone, Jake,” I called out to the new guy we’d hired last month. I was training him, but he had this. And if not, what better day than today to let him figure it out?

“Shift over?” Slate asked as I walked around the counter toward him.

“Yes,” I replied.

“Do you have plans?”

I nodded. “Yes.”

He looked deflated. “Oh.”

Then I stepped closer to him and put my palms on his chest as I stood on my tiptoes and covered his mouth with mine. This was what I had been dreaming about. Being near him. Being able to kiss him. Being able to know that he was there and life was going to be full of excitement and new things.

His hands found my face and he held it gently as he deepened the kiss. I slid my hands up his chest and wrapped them around his neck as his mint-flavored breath mingled with mine. I don’t know how much time passed before I finally pulled back and inhaled deeply to catch my breath.

“This. This is my plan,” I told him breathlessly.

He grinned. “Then I’m the luckiest fucker on the planet.”