8. Jonah #2
“That's ridiculous,” I say, but even as the words leave my mouth, another woman passing by slows her pace, giving me a lingering once-over.
“A good ass in nice jeans tends to have that effect in places like this. Just think of what would happen if you threw on a cowboy hat. You’d have your pick of any lady in town, married or otherwise.”
“Oh my god, no,” I stutter, horrified at the suggestion. “I am not wearing a cowboy hat.” The very thought makes me want to crawl back into the changing room and barricade the door.
Lila laughs, clearly enjoying my discomfort. “Relax, Professor. I'm just messing with you.” She glances at the group of women again, a strange expression flickering across her face before she turns back to me. “You should go over and introduce yourself.”
My lips form a thin line. “Can we just...” I gesture vaguely toward the checkout counter, desperate to escape this unexpected and unwanted attention. “I think I have everything I need.”
“Almost.” Lila grabs a waterproof jacket from a nearby rack and tosses it at me. “One more thing. Rain gear.”
I catch the jacket against my chest, grateful for the distraction. “Right. Of course.”
As we make our way to the checkout, I can't help but notice the blonde woman is now actively trying to position herself in our path. I fix my gaze firmly on the floor, but it doesn't help.
“Excuse me,” she says as we approach, her voice sweet and deliberate. “I couldn't help but notice you two, are you storm chasers?”
I look up, startled by the question. Before I can formulate a response, Lila steps in front of me.
“We are,” Lila answers for the both of us.
“That’s amazing,” the blonde says, her attention fixed on me. “My friends and I were just saying how brave you must be.” She extends a hand. “I’m Amber.”
I shake it, a little reluctant, aware of Lila shifting beside me. “Dr. Jonah Reed,” I add automatically.
“A doctor?” Amber’s expression brightens with interest. “Of medicine?”
“Meteorology,” I correct. “I study atmospheric physics.”
“Even better,” she says with a smile that's clearly meant to be flirtatious.
“I've always been fascinated by...weather.” The way she says “weather” makes it sound like she's referring to something entirely different.
Before I can respond to Amber's painfully obvious flirtation, Lila slides her arm around my waist, pressing herself against my side.
The sudden contact makes me stiffen in surprise.
“Are you two together?”
“Don’t mind him, he’s painfully shy when it comes to getting a little attention. It’s a part of his condition,” Lila says, her voice shifting into something I've never heard before—sweet, possessive, and laced with amusement.
“My condition?” I echo weakly, completely lost.
Lila's hand tightens on my waist as she gives Amber a conspiratorial look. “The lightning strike. Two years ago, he was holding a metal weather station when it happened. Doctors say it's a miracle he survived.”
Amber's eyes widen. “Oh my god, that's terrible!”
“He's so brave about it,” Lila continues, patting my chest affectionately.
“But sometimes, when he gets...excited...” She nods in the general direction of my crotch.
“The electrical activity in his brain goes a little haywire. Last time he tried to flirt with someone, he seized up and spoke in nothing but weather forecasts for six hours straight.”
I stare at Lila in disbelief, my mouth hanging open.
“It was our third date,” Lila sighs dramatically. “I knew right then he was the one for me. Not every woman would stick around after a man recites wind velocity patterns like his wedding vows.”
Amber's mouth forms a perfect “O” of surprise. She takes a small step backward, her flirtatious confidence evaporating.
“We’re actually celebrating our anniversary by chasing this Texas system tomorrow. Nothing says romance like category five wind speeds, right, honey?”
I completely stop functioning.
Her body presses warmly against my side, fingers hooking lightly into my shirt like this is a normal thing she does. My brain immediately short-circuits under the combined weight of physical contact and the word honey.
Dammit. She was right. She touches me, and my brain overloads.
“Oh,” the woman says, visibly deflating. “That’s actually really sweet.”
Lila smiles brightly. “He proposed during a tornado warning.”
My head snaps toward her in horror.
Lila nods solemnly. “Very romantic.”
I open my mouth. Nothing comes out.
The woman laughs awkwardly and takes another step backward. “Well, I should get back to my friends. Good luck with your storm chasing.”
She retreats quickly toward the camping aisle where her friends immediately huddle around her whispering and glancing back at us.
The second she’s out of earshot, Lila drops her arm from my waist and steps away. The sudden absence of her warmth leaves me weirdly off balance.
“What was that?”
Lila shrugs, already turning toward the checkout counter with a completely unreasonable level of calm. “You looked overwhelmed.”
“You told a stranger we were married.”
“You looked like you were about to apologize to her for existing.”
“That feels exaggerated.”
“She touched your arm and you stopped blinking.”
I follow her toward the register, trying to recover from the fact that for thirty full seconds I apparently had a wife. A wife named Lila. Which is not a thought I should be having.
At all.
“Besides,” she says casually, setting clothes onto the counter, “it worked. She backed off, and you survived the interaction.”
I stare at her. “You could’ve just said I wasn’t interested.”
“Where’s the fun in that?”
“That was fun for you?”
Lila glances sideways at me, clearly fighting a smile. “Honestly? A little.”
Heat climbs back into my face.
I can’t fully process how naturally she fit against me. Or how instinctively my hand had almost settled against her waist before my brain caught up. Worse, some deeply embarrassing part of me liked hearing her call me honey entirely too much.
“Unless,” she adds lightly while the cashier starts scanning our pile of clothes, “you wanted her number?”
“No,” I answer immediately.
Lila’s eyebrow lifts.
I clear my throat. “I mean…no.”
Because the truth is, I barely noticed the other woman after the first thirty seconds.
All I’d really been aware of was Lila touching me. Lila smiling at me like we shared some private joke. Lila casually inventing an entire fake marriage with enough detail that my brain immediately started filling in the blanks in ways that frankly feel medically concerning.
“You know,” she says, voice quieter now, “most guys wouldn’t need rescuing from a pretty woman flirting with them.”
I glance down at her. “Most women don’t usually flirt with me.”
The teasing expression slips from her face for just a second.
Like she genuinely doesn’t understand how that could possibly be true.
Then she shakes her head lightly and looks away. “That honestly feels like a societal failure.”
The cashier begins eyeing us with undisguised interest. I wonder how much of our conversation she overheard.
“Just stocking up for tornado season,” Lila tells the cashier with a casual ease I envy. “Getting my partner here properly outfitted.”
The cashier—a middle-aged woman with a name tag reading “Darlene”—smiles knowingly. “First chase?”
“Is it that obvious?” I ask, resigned to my transparent status as a novice.
“That'll be $348.72,” Darlene announces, and I nearly choke.
“Three hundred—” I sputter, fumbling for my university credit card. “For clothes and boots?”
Lila rolls her eyes. “Would you rather be comfortable and safe, or cheap and miserable?”
“I'd rather not bankrupt myself before we even see a tornado,” I mutter, but hand over my card anyway. The university expense account will cover this—I hope. I'll just have to categorize it as “essential field equipment” in my report.
Once we're outside the store, shopping bags in hand, Lila checks her watch. “Not bad. We still have time to grab some supplies before heading out.”
“More supplies?” I look down at the bags. “What else could we possibly need?”
“Road snacks,” Lila says with a mischievous glint in her eye. “Unless you want to discover what happens when your blood sugar crashes while we're tracking a supercell.”
I try to imagine what constitutes “road snacks” in Lila's world.
“I suppose that makes sense,” I concede. “A balanced selection of complex carbohydrates and proteins would be optimal for maintaining energy levels during prolonged observation periods.”
Lila stares at me for a beat before bursting into laughter. “God, you really do speak like a textbook, don't you? I was thinking more along the lines of Funyuns and Mountain Dew.”
“That's...” I struggle to find a diplomatic response. “Not nutritionally sound.”
“Neither is getting caught in an EF-3 tornado, but sometimes life's about taking risks,” she counters, heading toward her truck. “Besides, everyone knows the rule of tornado alley road trips. The more neon orange your fingers are, the better your chances of spotting a good funnel cloud.”
“I'm fairly certain there's no scientific correlation between processed snack foods and meteorological observation success,” I say, following her with my shopping bags.
“Says the man who's never had a Slim Jim revelation while watching a mesocyclone form.”
“A Slim Jim revelation?” I can't help but laugh. “Is that a technical term in storm chasing?”
“Absolutely. Right up there with a bean burrito breakthrough.'“ She grins, and something in my chest does a strange little flip. “Trust me, Professor, there's a whole vocabulary of junk food meteorology you haven't been exposed to in your ivory tower.”
I shake my head, still smiling. “I suppose my education has been lacking in certain practical areas.”
“Don't worry,” she says, patting my shoulder with mock solemnity. “I'll make sure you're fully versed in the sacred traditions of road trip snackology before this partnership is over.”
“I look forward to my education,” I reply, surprised to find I actually mean it.