Page 67 of Jake

Lauren: This was fun.

Catherine: Gotta go, my mother is finally here.

She looked down at her phone, confused and flustered from such a short text. She did love him. She’d barely come to terms with it, but she did, even if it was too fast. That didn’t mean he felt the same way though.

Then again, he was taking her on a trip and wanted to spend lots of time with her. They’d spent the last several weekends together and hung out with all their friends. Surely that meant something?

She was back to nervous when he finally emerged from the office.

“Everything’s all set.” He grinned. “I’m going to go pack some things and then we’ll meet the car downstairs.”

“Where are we going?” she asked.

“You’ll find out when we get there.” He leaned down and kissed her.

“What if I didn’t bring the right clothes?”

“Then we’ll get you something.” He shrugged like it was just that simple.

She let him go to the bedroom and kept her seat on the sofa. Well, that much that Catherine had said was true. What about the rest?

When he didn’t come back right away, she ventured to the bedroom to see what he was doing, only to find him moving clothes around.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“I realized when I was packing how much I hate living out of a bag and you do it every weekend, so I thought I would make room for you to keep some things here,” he answered. “I mean, if you want, no pressure.”

Did she want to? If she didn’t overthink it, then the answer was yes. “Thank you,” she said quietly.

“You’re not mad or panicking?” He stopped and looked at her.

“No, I think I’m really good with that.”

“Thank God.”

In three long strides, he closed the gap between them, crushing his lips on hers. She smiled under the kiss. She wasn’t going to overthink anything, this weekend at least.

“You have no idea how worried I was that this was a bad idea.”

“I appreciate that you thought of me. It’d also be nice to be able to stay an extra night if you wanted me to some weekends,” she confessed.

“Stay an extra night? I don’t want to you to leave, ever.” He grinned.

Skipping right past that, he went back to setting this clothes in drawers. His suitcase was on the bed closed so she assumed he was already packed.

“Let’s go,” he told her when he finished. “The car will be downstairs by now.”

“You’re really not going to tell me where we are going?”

“Nope, you’ll love it though.”

She didn’t doubt it. It’d be hard to take her somewhere that she wouldn’t love.

They got in the car and she looked out the window, staring at the buildings as they drove past. The ride to the airport was both too long and not long enough.

“I’m surprised you were able to get tickets so quickly.” She attempted some conversation to push back the butterflies dancing in her stomach.

“I didn’t.”

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