Chapter 21
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Jonah
Snow was melting and the weather forecast was clear.
It would’ve been a good evening to travel and meet Summer after she got home from work.
A month of going to Bozeman each weekend for dates and overnights had gone by.
I wasn’t behind on work, but I’d had to halt side projects and focus on my orders since I was gone every weekend.
It had gutted me to tell Summer I had to stay home, but the bar-height table and four matching stools made from repurposed barrels wouldn’t finish themselves.
I needed to get them done and packaged. The delivery truck could pick them up Monday morning.
I would’ve had extra time, but I’d used up what cushion I had buried in Summer’s sweet body on Saturdays and most Sundays.
As it was, I would have to work through Saturday, barely finish Sunday morning, and spend all afternoon packaging each item.
The payout was the biggest I’d commissioned. I couldn’t fuck this up.
Yet I was worried about messing up what I had going with Summer. Would she think I was like her prick of an ex—too busy with work I thought was more important than her?
She had become very important to me. I couldn’t let her down, but she also deserved more than a mountain bum.
I put a screw in the seat of one of the stools. The whir of the drill filled the silence. I placed another screw and the shop door opened. I jerked, the drill whirred, and the screw clattered to the floor. “Shit.”
Who the hell was—
“Knock, knock.” Summer pushed her sunglasses on top of her head. Her hair was back in a ponytail and more of her strawberry tint was growing out along her scalp. She smiled and sauntered toward me.
My pulse picked up and my dick came to attention. The weeks were long when she wasn’t around. My podcasts weren’t as interesting, and I didn’t look forward to going into the house for a bite to eat.
I drank her in. I’d thought I’d have to get through the weekend and then another week before I could see her again. “Hey.” I set the drill down. “You came?”
She smiled shyly and shoved her hands in her pockets, walking toward me. “I thought I could travel this time. I know you’re busy and I don’t have to stay in your house—”
I caught her around her elbow and tugged her toward me. “You’ll be in my bed.” I crushed her mouth with mine. She tasted of minty gum and heaven.
Her giggle passed right into me, and she clung to my shoulders. She pulled away and gazed up at me with those luminous brown eyes. “So you’re okay that I invited myself?”
“Since when haven’t you invited yourself?”
She playfully swatted my shoulder. “Have you eaten yet?” I shook my head and she smirked. “I knew it.”
When she wasn’t in the house, I didn’t care how often I went in to eat. If she wasn’t on the other side of the table, the food was less appealing. “You don’t have to cook for me.”
“I want to, and I don’t want to bother you.
I know you’re serious about getting this order done.
” Her gaze landed on the table. “Oh my god. Is that it?” She pulled away and I instantly missed her heat and her strawberries-and-sugar scent.
She rounded the table, staring at it like she was in a museum and that damn thing was the special exhibit.
“You can touch it.”
She flashed a grin my way. “I like touching your things.”
I liked when her fingers were on my things.
“Wow.” She clasped her hands behind her back despite my words. “Star Wars?”
“Yep.” The client had sent collector’s items of old Star Wars toys with specific instructions for how to place the X-wings and TIE fighters in the channel of epoxy between the slabs of walnut.
Special orders were more stressful than pieces I made via my own inspiration, but this table had made me sweat a few times.
My blood pressure wouldn’t return to normal until I got notice that the set had arrived to the buyer unharmed.
I hadn’t even taken pictures. If I put that shit on my website, then I’d get more requests. More precious objects to cover in epoxy. More stress. No, thanks. I didn’t do this job to worry about epically fucking up someone’s valuables.
“Impressive.”
“Thanks,” I said impassively. I was proud of the job, but a thousand what-ifs were running through my head and I wasn’t used to the pressure. I didn’t like it.
She pivoted to the chairs. I had four lined up against the wall, ready to be packaged. “Those are so cool.”
I watched her swivel from one side to the other. She had to be picturing how it’d all go together.
“Seriously. That’s some talent.”
“I’m glad you got to see it. It’s the last special order like this I’m taking.”
Confusion lined her brow. “Why?”
“No more working with someone’s family heirlooms.” I nodded toward the table. “Those toys were the customer’s dad’s collectibles. He passed five years ago.”
“That’s such a sweet way to remember a parent’s passion.” She crossed to me again and tucked her arms under mine. “You made him something he’ll treasure forever.”
The anvil was back on my chest. “I just make furniture.”
Her smirk was knowing, like she saw right through me to the way I’d cussed for eight minutes straight when I’d thought I’d fucked up an X-wing position. “Hamburgers tonight?”
“I don’t have any thawed.”
“That’s fine. I have a salad to make while they’re thawing.”
I hadn’t restocked the fresh veggie supply since she’d surprised me with groceries. She must’ve brought more like last time, this time without shocking me fresh out of the shower. “Keeping me scurvy-free, one salad at a time.”
She swatted my ass. “I plan to keep those hips mobile too.”
Summer
Since it was early and Jonah was spending his Saturday in the shop, I stopped at the bar inside Copper Summit to chat with Autumn.
She usually arrived early to take care of the books.
When I walked in, our neighbor Jason was sitting at the bar.
Autumn had her head bowed over a tablet as she poked around.
When she glanced up, her lips curved. “Hey, you. Been a while.”
I didn’t often go more than a month without coming home, but having Jonah to myself without the town’s opinions or my family hovering had been too alluring to pass up. Mama knew. Teller and Autumn. If they’d told the others, I hadn’t heard about it. “I know. I’m a bad aunt and sister.”
Jason craned his neck over his shoulder as I wove my way through the empty tables. By the end of the night, this place would be half full. During the summer, the bar would be packed, but early spring was only the beginning of peak tourist season.
“Look what the cat dragged in.” Jason cackled.
“I made the cat work for it.” I gave Jason a half hug.
He smelled like fresh pine. His hat bumped my head and he chuckled and righted it.
Jason made a bad first impression. A guy in grungy clothing with shaggy whiskers and a dirty hat who was having a drink minutes after the doors barely opened.
He was fond of announcing it was five o’clock somewhere when he arrived.
That first impression was wrong. Jason liked to have a drink and shoot the shit with Teller or Tenor, whoever was around.
He ranched all day, called it early once in a while, and came to Copper Summit to wind down.
He was usually gone by six after one drink only, sometimes staying until seven if he caught one of my brothers.
Jason’s girls were sweet and he doted on them and his wife.
“I was just leaving.” He pushed away. “Glad I could catch you. You girls are always a breath of fresh air.” He strode out with strong strides that would also shock anyone who assumed he was a bar magnet, but Jason wasn’t that much older than Tate.
Autumn took the cash he’d left behind and shook her head. “That guy slips me a five like he’s Grandpa Bailey.”
I giggled and slid onto a stool. I spun to watch Jason get into his pickup and drive away. “Who’s got the fancy car? I thought for a minute Myles was escaping diaper duty to have a drink.”
Autumn snorted. “I think you’ll have to pry diaper duty out of his cold, dead hands.”
I laughed around a spear of envy. Lucky Wynter. I caught Autumn’s gaze and she smothered the same wistfulness.
I could ignore what I saw and how I felt, but I’d been away for what felt like forever and I’d been wrapped up too much in Jonah. “Someday, you’ll find someone.”
She shrugged and stabbed at the screen. Then she slipped the cover onto the tablet and sighed. “It’s fine. I’m just . . . I don’t know. Maybe I need to get another cat.”
I stood and went around the bar. I dug through the bottom cupboard for one of the bottles we saved from our special batches.
In this case, it was the first bottle of Summer’s Summit ever produced.
The line was sold everywhere, but Daddy had saved the first bottle for its namesake.
I kept mine here, knowing I’d be with family if I had a drink from it.
Autumn already had two short glasses ready. When we drank together and commiserated, we had our bourbon neat. I poured a finger for each of us and tucked the bottle away, then returned to my seat.
I lifted my glass. “Here’s to our future families.”
“I feel like I should hand in my feminism card whenever I bemoan my single status.” She returned the toast and we each took a sip. She closed her eyes. “Mm, that’s good stuff.”
Flavor burst over my tongue. Notes of caramel, vanilla, and smoky oak. All Copper Summit bourbon was quality, but my line was my favorite. I might be biased. “It’s okay to want a family. It’s okay to feel panic like it’s not going to happen.” It’d better be. I was feeling the same.
“I know. Logically, I do.”
“I’m a boss babe, and I still want a family.”
“You’re also a nepo baby.” She took another drink.
“True.” I had walked right into my job, a position I enjoyed. If I’d had to work and compete for it, would I feel differently? Maybe, but I also knew how precious family was and I wanted my own.
“You’re not exactly giving the best pep talk since you’ve been hot and heavy with Jonah.”