16. Jonah #2
Lila glances back over her shoulder, fully aware of what she's doing to me. “Good thing you made coffee then, Professor,” she murmurs. “Sounds like you need it.”
“I actually have something for you,” I say, keeping my voice neutral.
Lila pauses halfway to the coffee maker. “Oh?” Something shifts in her expression. “Do you now?”
She thinks I'm about to drag her back into bed. It's written all over her face—and the fact that she seems entirely willing does something embarrassing to my ego.
I reach into the paper bag beside the coffee maker and produce a brightly colored package.
Mini powdered donuts.
She stares at them. At me. Back at the donuts.
“…You're kidding.”
The laugh escapes before I can stop it. “You should've seen your face.”
“You complete asshole.” But she's already laughing, eyes bright with something between betrayal and delight. “I thought you were finally losing it.”
“Oh, I'm losing it.” I hold out the donuts.
“Here. You mentioned how you liked them on our first day, when we were discussing road trip snack hierarchies.” I shrug, trying to appear casual though I remember every detail of that conversation.
“You said powdered donuts were 'God's apology for creating mornings. '“
“How did you know I’d like these?”
“You mentioned them. On our first day, when we were discussing road trip snack hierarchies.” I shrug, trying to appear casual, even though I remember every detail of that conversation. “You said powdered donuts were 'God's apology for creating mornings.'“
“And you remembered that?” She takes the package from me, her fingers brushing mine.
“I remember most things you say,” I admit. “Occupational hazard. Details stick.”
My brain takes an embarrassingly long time to come back online. That I'm capable of forming complete sentences at all after kissing her feels like a minor scientific miracle. Nobel Prize-worthy, really.
“You asked what this means,” I say. “Whether we're actually doing this.”
Something in her expression shifts.
“We're kind of a disaster on paper,” she admits.
“Incredibly romantic.”
“You know what I mean.” She gestures vaguely with her good arm. “You have labs and classrooms. I have a truck and a radar subscription.”
“I know.”
“And we're just supposed to make that work somehow?”
The uncertainty in her voice is real now.
I look at her against my chest and feel something click quietly into place.
“Yes.”
Lila blinks. “That's it? Just yes?”
“Yes.”
“Jonah.”
My fingers trace lightly along her waist. “ I don' t know what it looks like yet. But I know I don' t want it to end when the season does.”
Something shifts in her face—goes quiet and unguarded in a way I haven't seen before.
“Well, that’s probably the hottest thing you’ve said to me so far.”
“I sincerely hope not.”
“Oh, Professor.” A slow grin. “You really don't know what that voice does to me.”
I exhale as she shifts closer, her knee sliding between mine. My entire nervous system registers the movement before my brain does. She watches my face with that particular attention she reserves for incoming weather.
“There,” she says, and the tone is new, not a challenge or a tease but a kind of quiet triumph, like she’s discovered something secret and holy in the way I’m looking at her now.
“There what?”
“That.” Her eyes flicker, not away but deeper in. “That look you get when you’re trying to be composed and losing badly.”
I pull her closer, not with urgency, just with a need to close this last fraction of space.
She’s right. I’m defenseless. Maybe I always have been with her.
“You do that to me constantly.” It’s as much a confession as an accusation.
We’re past that now. The room feels vacuum-sealed around our bodies.
For once, Lila doesn’t quip or roll her eyes; she just breathes, holding me in that rare, unguarded way that makes me forget she ever wore the armor of sarcasm or bravado.
She looks at my face for a long, unhurried moment. “You meant it, didn’t you?” she asks, but it’s rhetorical, or nearly. “Earlier.”
I know what she’s asking, but I want her to say it. I want to hear her name the thing that’s been pinging between us like atmospheric pressure for days now. “Which part?”
“All of it.” Her thumb moves along my jaw. “Me. This.”
I lean forward until my forehead meets hers
“Yes,” I say. “I meant it.”
Her eyes close, and something in her relaxes, like the tug-of-war she’s been playing with herself just snapped clean. Then, quietly, against my mouth, she says, “Okay. So we figure it out.”
“Wasn’t that the entire point of us talking?” I point out.
She shrugs with a smile before reaching into her mini donut bag, and retrieving another one. “Yes, and we did. Now…the second most important question of the day.”
I brace for whatever is about to come out of her mouth. If she so much as suggests sex, I will implode, and will forever live as a stain on these walls.
“What's the plan for today, Professor? More storm chasing with your one-armed companion?”
I crinkle my brow. For once, she swerved off her normal course of chaos, and took the unexpected route. Why does that make me suspicious? What does she have up her sleeve?
“That depends on you. The weather pattern stalled out last night. There’s low level threats firing up over Illinois and Indiana in a few hours, but we’d never make it in time. However, there is also a developing pattern over the Rockies that should bring the weather to us tomorrow.”
“I'd be fine with a day to recover. As much as I hate to admit it, my shoulder is killing me this morning.”
“We could use the downtime to analyze the data we've already collected.”
“Nerd,” she teases.
Max jumps off the bed and trots over to us, pressing his nose against her leg. She scratches behind his ears with her good hand, leaving traces of powdered sugar in his golden fur.
“He needs a proper bath,” I observe. “The motel towel treatment didn't quite cut it.”
“And I need real coffee,” Lila adds, eyeing the murky liquid dripping into the cheap motel carafe with obvious suspicion. “This looks like something you'd extract from pond sediment.”
I glance at my watch. “There was a diner about a mile back. They should be open by now. We could get breakfast, find a pet store that has a dog wash, maybe even locate a laundromat.”
“A day of mundane errands,” Lila remarks, her lips quirking into a half-smile. “How refreshingly normal.”
I'm not sure how to interpret her tone. Is she mocking the idea?
“Is that a problem?” I ask, studying her expression. “We could find a storm simulator if you're going through withdrawal.”
She laughs, wincing as the movement jostles her injured arm. “I'm teasing, Professor. A normal day sounds...nice, actually.” She looks almost surprised by her own admission.
“Then it's settled,” I say, feeling oddly pleased. Max wags his tail enthusiastically, as if he understands and approves of our plans. I watch as Lila attempts to wrangle her wild curls one-handed, struggling with the towel wrapped around her head. Without thinking, I step closer.
“May I?” I ask, gesturing to her hair.
She hesitates for a second before giving a small nod.
Carefully, I unwrap the towel from around her hair, damp curls tumbling free around her shoulders in dark, wild waves. They’re soft beneath my fingers as I gently work through the tangles, trying not to pull too hard, Lila relaxes slowly in front of me as I comb my fingers through the damp strands.
“There,” I murmur. “That’s better.”
My fingertips brush the back of her neck as I smooth another curl loose, and I feel the immediate shift in her body—a tiny inhale, shoulders loosening beneath my hands.
Without really thinking about it, I let my fingers linger.
Slowly, I start working gentle circles into the tense muscles at the base of her neck while I continue separating the knots from her hair. Lila melts almost instantly.
“Oh,” she breathes softly. A small pulse of satisfaction moves through me at the sound.
“You’re annoyingly good at that,” she murmurs after a moment.
“At untangling things?”
“Mmm. That too.”
Her head tips back against my hand without thinking, trusting and warm, and something in my chest tightens painfully at how natural this feels.
My fingers slide gently through her curls again before settling back at her neck, and this time Lila actually sighs. My fingers are working slowly against the back of her neck when Lila opens one eye and glances up at me.
“So, about those errands…”
“I know what you’re implying,” I fire back at her. “I meant what I said last night. Not until I know I can’t hurt you.”
“Fine,” she scoffs. “But you can’t blame a girl for trying.” Lila sits up, letting my fingers fall away from her neck. “Since you’re not going to break out of your chastity belt, we should get going if we want to beat the breakfast crowd. Just give me five minutes to get dressed.”
She grabs her duffel with her good hand and disappears into the bathroom, leaving me alone with Max and my racing thoughts. The golden retriever looks up at me with what feels like quiet, knowing amusement.
“Don't start,” I mutter to him.
Max's tail thumps against the carpet as if to say he's not judging, just observing with great interest.
True to her word, Lila emerges from the bathroom five minutes later already losing a battle with her flannel shirt.
“This feels like a design flaw,” she mutters, trying unsuccessfully to maneuver the sleeve around her sling one-handed.
The oversized flannel is twisted crooked across her body, one side hanging open while the other bunches awkwardly behind her back. In the process of wrestling with it, the loose tank top underneath has slipped low on one side, exposing the smooth curve of her breast beneath the open fabric.
I stop breathing for a second.
Lila looks up just in time to catch me staring. Slowly, very slowly, a grin spreads across her face. “Well,” she says. “That got your attention.”