And then she disappears into her bedroom.
Leaving us alone in the tiny living room.
I find a vase—actually a mason jar, because I don’t own vases—and fill it with water. Arrange the flowers. Set them on the counter.
When I turn around, Brody’s looking at the dragon illustration Jessa left on the coffee table.
My heart stops.
“Is this yours?” he asks quietly.
“Oh. Yeah. It’s just—something I was working on.”
He picks it up carefully, his gaze falling over every line, taking it in like some sort of fine art.
The silence stretches.
“It’s incredible,” he says finally.
“It’s just a silly doodle.”
He looks up at me, and his eyes catch mine in that sort of unescapable way. That way that makes me feel seen…and so vulnerable. There’s something in that look—something I can’t quite read. Like he wants to say something. Like he’s deciding whether to say it.
Then he sets the illustration down carefully. “It’s really good, Chloe.”
His voice is so genuine it makes my chest ache.
“Thanks,” I manage.
He doesn’t know it was rejected today. Doesn’t know that publishers think my “creativity and heart” aren’t enough. Doesn’t know that this silly dream of mine just got professionally dismissed.
And I’m not going to tell him.
“Ready to go?” I ask, grabbing my coat before he can ask more questions.
“Yeah. Of course.”
He helps me into my coat—his hands gentle on my shoulders—and I try very hard not to think about how good he smells or how close he’s standing or how my heart is doing that weird flutter thing again.
We head downstairs and out to the street. The Shelby is parked at the curb, gleaming under the streetlights.
“So,” Brody says as he opens the passenger door for me. “How was your Sunday?”
I slide into the car. The leather is cold but familiar now. “It was good. Went to church. Had lunch with Jessa. Worked on some business stuff.”
He gets in the driver’s seat. Starts the engine. “Church?”
“Yeah. My church does this thing where they go through books of the Bible slowly. We’re in 2 Corinthians right now.”
I’m rambling. I always ramble when I’m nervous.
And what’s there to be nervous about? Oh, I don’t know. Maybe the fact that this fancy little car smells just like him and there’s a very real possibility that it overrides my brain’s ability to be rational and I end up throwing myself at him over the middle console during the next red light, and now all I can seemto think about is justnotdoing that…Yeah, I think I’m nervous about that.
And so I keep going, boring him with details about the morning’s sermon. “Yesterday was about not losing heart. How God is at work in us even when we don’t understand what’s happening. When everything feels hard or confusing or like it’s falling apart.”
I stop.
That got way more personal than I intended.
