Right now, he wanted nothing more than to drown in the physical. He could deal with his confusing swirl of thoughts about the future later.
Much, much later.
Chapter Sixteen
Cora couldn’t get her head on straight for the rest of the evening. She was a jumble of thoughts and feelings, good and bad and everything in between. Why had Trent taken her to the place where he wanted to build his home? It didn’t feel like the kind of activity for two people having fun, meaningless, great-but-going-nowhere sex.
It felt…personal. Real.
Real, like the secret she’d found out. The photo. Her revelation about his identity. It felt like a weight around her neck. More than once, she’d opened her mouth to try to broach the topic with him, but she couldn’t force herself to say the words. He’d seemed so…hopeful.
What kind of person would shatter that moment?
It was none of her business, yet she felt embroiled in his life when she shouldn’t be. Did he know? Had his parents lied to him? Would it break his heart if he found out?
You have to stay out of it. No good will come from meddling in his family life. Lord knows you hate it when people poke their noses into your family business.
And, in addition, seeing him open up had made her want to do the same. It made her want to tell him important things. Like her big, scary dream of being an author. She had fantasies of quitting her job at the agency and finding a quiet, beautiful place to spend her days writing. Like this vacation but…permanent.
She had dreams of sitting in a bookstore with a line of people waiting to meet her, clutching copies of her book to their chests. She had dreams of touching people with her stories, of knowing that her words had been a source of joy or healing or relief.
Those things were too terrifying to say aloud. What made her think she was so special that she could achieve something like that?
To take her mind off it, she’d settled on the couch with one of the books she’d bought from Maddy. She was halfway through and loving it enough that it whisked her away from her worries. Wasn’t that the most magical thing about books? Their power to transport you to a place where you could breathe again?
“Hey, bookworm,” Trent said, and her head snapped up, startling her out of her reverie. He settled down on the couch next to her. It was late now, and dark outside. “Still getting your nerd on?”
“If you’re asking whether or not I’m still reading, the answer is yes,” she said in a mock annoyed tone. “Call me a nerd all you want.”
“You’re a cute nerd, that’s for sure.”
“Maybe I think you’re a nerd for reading Architectural Digest.” She gestured at the magazine on the coffee table.
“Nah, I just look at the pretty pictures.” Trent winked.
“Thanks for showing me your place today,” she said, closing her book and pushing herself up into a sitting position.
“I’m not sure why I did that, honestly.” He raked a hand through his hair, as if suddenly bashful. “That was probably boring as batshit.”
“It wasn’t,” she protested. “I guess it’s…”
Here she was, overthinking things again. Reading into a situation more than she should. Why was it that she sought to be closer to every person in her orbit, as though it might fill some hole in her heart?
“What?” he asked.
“I don’t know what our boundaries are.” She looked down into her lap. “I don’t know what this is.”
“I don’t know, either,” he admitted.
“You shared something pretty personal today. Least it felt that way.”
He looked away, his gaze drifting out the back window and into the dark yard. There was a tension in him—a resistance. She felt it, too. The push and pull between logic and feeling, her brain telling her this wasn’t anything important and her heart murmuring its disagreement.
“I want to write a book,” she blurted out. It was like the words refused to be contained any longer, like her dreams had swelled to the point that she couldn’t keep them inside.
Trent’s lips lifted into an amused smile. “Wanted to even the score, did you?”
“Something like that.” She reached down to the little shelf under the coffee table and pulled out her laptop, opening the lid.
“Flight of the Caterpillar, a story of metamorphosis.” His eyes scanned the screen. “What’s it about?”
“It’s fiction,” Cora replied. “It’s about a woman who packs up her