Page 85 of With Stars in Her Eyes

Thea’s laugh carried across the space between us, making my chest lift.

“After the messy divorce, I just wanted to disappear from that world. Before then I mostly sang, but cello was better. Easier to fade into the background as an instrumentalist.”

“I don’t think you’ve ever faded into the background for one second of your entire life, Courtney Starling.”

My heart skipped a beat.

Silence fell between us.

I looked up, wanting to see what Thea was seeing.

The more I watched, the more I understood how the night sky felt like a living symphony. Those intense points of light with their subtle differences in color. Warmer or cooler. Blue, red, orange, yellow. The swaths of translucency. The pockets of absolute darkness. The occasional dart of a shooting star. And the perplexing perception of movement when in reality our own tiltedplanet was the rotation point, creating an illusion that the galaxies were dancing to a dirge across the horizon.

Thea shifted her weight, and something fell off her chair, interrupting my silly thoughts.

“What was—”

“Just the book. Forgot it was there.” Thea flipped through the pages. “I keep forgetting to ask what you thought of the ending?”

“So embarrassing. I think I have fifty pages left. The New York trip interrupted my reading. Literally the worst book club leader ever.”

“Ooooh, but some of the best scenes are in the last fifty pages.”

“The best scenes or the bestscenes?” My suggestive inflection on the last word hopefully made my meaning clear.

“Both. In fact.”

An idea popped into my head. “Well, given that we just had a superserious conversation about really intense life stuff… I think you should read me the rest of the book to keep me entertained for the next hour I’ll be sitting here.”

“Are you sure you want me to do that?” Thea’s tone was inscrutable.

“You said you could use a red light and it won’t affect the photo.”

“I mean because no matter what I read to you, you have to stay there until the alarm goes off on my phone.”

Something slightly competitive rose up inside me at the challenge. “I think I can handle it.”

“I guess we’ll see, won’t we.”

CHAPTER 28Thea

I flipped through to the chapter before the scene I knew would drive Courtney wild. It was my favorite scene in the book not just because of the hot sex in the next chapter but because of the tender moments too. The chapter before upped the drama and tension with big revelations, and it seemed like all hope was lost. But then there were sweet declarations of love in a surreptitiously delivered letter before things really began to heat up.

I’ve learned I was a sucker for the love letter trope.

After a quick sip of coffee from my thermos I began to read.

Courtney smiled through the first entire chapter, and it was the same smile she had on her face when I readA Wrinkle in Timeduring the snowstorm. I had never liked reading aloud in front of anyone before, but I loved seeing Courtney enjoy it.

It wasn’t until the next chapter that Courtney’s expression shifted. Her eyes widened. Her lips parted slightly, and even in the low light I could see a dark flush coloring her cheeks.

“‘Caroline dismissed the servants from the drawing room after they delivered the tea tray. The men would likely remain smoking and drinking for hours in the dining room. If she was going to speak to Elinor it would have to be now. If Elinor’s elder brother’s intentions held, they would both set out for Paris in the morning.

“‘Years would likely pass before they would return to London. Elinor’s copper curls glowed in the firelight behind her. Caroline risked the smallest glance at her as she poured two cups of tea. Every scrape of the spoon over the porcelain made Caroline ache to touch Elinor again.’”

“How do Regency romances make spoon scraping so horny?” Courtney shook her head.

“Shush,” I said. “And yes, it’s fairly impressive.”