Page 23 of Sol
I wondered what that couldbe.
After the first day blur of introductions and activity, in no time at all class ended and the students filed out. Trent lingered in the back, waiting to talk tome.
Goddammit, that was what I askedfor.
When the room had emptied, he started walking up the aisle. “Dani,” he said in a low, sexy voice. The one I wanted to hear. My throat grew thick, and I could feel my pulse in it. “I got a lot to tellyou—”
“How are you? How’s Degan? It’s been so long! Tell me everything!” My voice came outbreathless.
As he strode up, I leapt from behind my desk, ran up to him, and gave him the welcome hug he deserved. He groaned, reached under my armpits, and lifted me so my arms closed around his neck, my feet off the ground. Cradling me tight in his arms, he held me easily while I clung to him, stroking his hair, his strongshoulders.
He felt so safe, so secure. Likehome.
Nuzzling his face against my cheek, he gripped me firmly, but his chestshook.
“What’s wrong?” I asked against his scratchystubble.
“It’s so good to see you,” he whispered, trembling, taking a step back and leaning against a desk for support. “You don’t know how many times I Googled you. How long I’ve looked foryou.”
“You have? Just ask Degan, he’d tell you,” I said, as I snuggled into this big, fine, hunk of man, not wanting to let himgo.
He held me closer, burying his nose in my hair. “Can we go somewhere andtalk?”
And with the way he said it, I got chills. A sense of trepidation washed over me. I didn’t know what he was going to say, but whatever it was, I knew I wasn’t gonna like it. Intuition made me pull back from him, and he set me back down on the ground in front of him. “Did my loopy brother stay at the hotel to sleep over his jetlag?”
He shook his head. And I knew, I just knew, that something hadhappened.
“Where ishe?”
My phone buzzed with a text from Lulu asking how my first day went. I pulled it out of my skirt pocket and set it upside down on adesk.
Letting out his breath, he said, “I’d like to talk to you, but not in public. Can we go to your place?” The way he said it, while the words were a question, it was a command. There wasn’t any arguing withhim.
“Sure,” I said warily, drawing out the word, making it have more than one syllable. “Let me pack up mythings.”
Like at the beginning of class, he helped me gather my papers, but this time he was silent. He had his own papers shoved in his back pocket. Once I had my belongings, I said, “This way. I’m only a few blocks from theschool.”
Henodded.
Oh no. Now he’s gone mute. This can’t begood.
Following me down the hall of the school and out the door, we exited into the bright, sunny street and continued to my apartment. In the heat of midday, store owners rolled down metal doors to close up their shops for the three hour break the Spanish take for lunch beginning at twoo’clock.
We came to my building. Lulu had secured the place for me to rent for summer—a professor at the school routinely let it out. As we trudged up the four sets of stairs, Trent still said nothing. When we stepped into my room that served as a living room, bedroom, and kitchen, he said nothing. He wasn’t even breathing hard from the walkup.
This garret studio apartment came with potted plants hung at intervals from the sloping rafters, and I’d strung fairy lights across the room. Afternoon sunshine poured in through the windows. Floor-to-ceiling doors opened to a tiny patio balcony outside where you could see a tower from thecathedral.
I set my things down, texted Lulu to come over as soon as she was able to chat, and sat down on the sofa. After inspecting every window, almost casing the joint, he sat next tome.
“Want a drink of water?” Iasked.
He shook his head and gazed at me with a pained expression, making me even more apprehensive about what he was going to say. Finally, I couldn’t wait any more and turned tohim.
“Is Degan hurt? Is he mad at me about the last time we talked, so he didn’t want to see me? Did he,oh no, did he reenlist again? I’d hate that. I have no use for the military. I told him that. Maybe he got transferred somewhere.” Fully aware that I was babbling and not letting Trent get a word in edgewise, nevertheless I couldn’t seem to stop talking. Finally, I just asked, “Please, Trent. Just tell me. Where’sDegan?”
He opened his mouth to speak, and he made sounds. Those sounds formed words in the English language that I knew had meaning, but as he said them, I found that even though I taught language, I didn’t understandthem.
Time slowed down so much that I could probably have watched the rate of my fingernailsgrow.
