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“That is disappointing.”

“You could paint it.”

He considers that, then he smiles. “I will think about it.” He closes the door and heads toward the workshop.

I stay in the car after he leaves. Yesterday, Locke kept talking to Ben when I walked away from him in Calhoun’s because he had something he wanted to keep doing. Today, he gets home and goes straight to something he wants to do next, with no hesitation and no glance back to make sure I’m following.

I thought hearing him tell Mara that he could have a life without me was what I needed. Maybe I needed to see it too.

I get out of the car and go inside. I put my purse down, kick off my shoes, wash the melted chocolate from my fingers, and change out of the blouse I wore for the interview.

Through the bedroom window, I can see part of the workshop.

Locke is bent over the worktable with his phone propped against a jar, studying a picture while he bends a length of willow between his hands. He isn’t waiting for me or trying to figure out where I am. He’s working.

I’ve wanted Locke for days. That was never the problem.

The problem was whether I could trust that he wanted me. Whether I could believe it came from him instead of from whatever made me familiar to him before he understood almost anything else.

He has a phone he knows how to use. A friend at the hardware store. Plans for work. Things he wants to learn. Places he wants to see.

And a future wicker flamingo. Possibly a flock.

He’s begun building a life that doesn’t require me to stand in the middle of it. And he still told Mara he wants me there.

Some stubborn part of me still wants one more piece of evidence, something that would make trusting this completely safe. But there isn’t one. There never will be. Fear can always find another reason, another question, another thing that might go wrong.

At some point, trusting someone means accepting that I cannot know everything he will choose tomorrow. I can only decide what I believe about the man he is today.

And I believe him.

For the first time, wanting Locke doesn’t feel like another risk I need to manage. It feels like something I’m allowed to want.

I want his mouth on mine. I want his hands on me. I want to know what happens when the careful restraint he has shown me stops being necessary because I tell him I want more.

And I remember what he told me yesterday morning: he stopped.

He could have kept touching himself and found out what happened next without me. He chose not to.

That memory sends another rush of heat through me.

Locke is still at the worktable.

For once, I don’t stand here and think myself into a different answer. I go outside.

He doesn’t notice me immediately, so I let myself look. The bend of his head over the table. Those long fingers coaxing willow into a curve. The complete focus I’ve only ever seen him give two things: wood, and me.

He has three pieces of willow laid across the table now and his phone beside them. One piece is bent into a long curve that might eventually become a neck.

I stop a few feet away. Locke looks up.

“Rachel.”

There is no question in my name. His attention shifts completely to me.

“What do you think?” He lifts the curved piece of willow. “The neck may need to be longer.”

I touch the willow on the worktable. “I have no idea.”