Chapter 17
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Summer
Snow was still coming down, but the wind was almost nonexistent.
Jonah was clearing the driveway. I’d helped shovel before he’d run me inside, then worked with the skid steer.
He didn’t want to chance not seeing me through the curtain of flakes while he was buzzing around the yard and driveway areas, clearing a path to the shop.
I had tried to peek into the shop when he’d opened the big garage door to drive the skid steer out.
The place was well lit and full of stuff, but like the garage, everything had its place.
Unlike the garage, the inside was well lit and full of life.
Giant slabs of wood were leaning against the wall.
There were workbenches and tables, walls full of tools, and protective gear hanging from hooks.
I’d also spied a small lounge and a door that was probably a bathroom. How much time did Jonah spend in his shop?
Judging by those huge cuts of wood, he got his muscles from working. He might spend a lot of time on his feet, but he had an even floor and he wasn’t walking long distances. I’d witnessed him doing stretches and exercises when he thought I was still sleeping.
The last two nights, I’d gone to sleep in his bed—after an orgasm or two or three—and he’d let me sleep while he made breakfast. I might not have been dozing too hard. I might’ve liked getting doted on.
He was a thoughtful man.
I was bursting to talk to someone about us, but he hadn’t even told his parents we were a thing.
To be fair, his parents might be the most complicated ones to tell.
But he also hadn’t said anything about continuing what we were doing beyond the storm.
Once the roads were clear, was that the end of us?
I hadn’t approached any of my sisters about my relationships. I hadn’t wanted to worry them when I wasn’t happy, and when it came to Boyd, I hadn’t wanted to be told what I knew deep down inside.
This time though? The need to spill that I was sleeping with Jonah Dunn, that I was scared we were temporary, was bursting inside me until I thought I’d split apart at the seams.
I roamed the kitchen where I could see Jonah pushing loads of snow and called Autumn.
There was no way I was worrying Wynter this close to her due date.
I wasn’t bugging Scarlett and risking Tate finding out either.
Junie was on the road, and she’d tell me to hang on and enjoy the ride, to hell with the consequences.
Autumn answered. “How’s this round of getting stranded with the moody mountain man?”
“Climactic.”
“Oooh.” Fabric rustled. I could picture her in her little house in town.
She had land like the rest of us that Daddy had parceled out for her, but like me, she’d never made the commitment to build.
Like me, she sometimes just took the unofficial dirt road to a little clearing and gazed at everything until life straightened itself out.
I hadn’t done that in so long. But there was no point now. I could look at the snow-covered valley all day long, but I would still be as confused as before.
“Tell me all about it,” she urged.
I peeked out the window one more time. I could make out the outline of him in the cabin of the skid steer.
He was chiseling away at a giant drift that reached from one corner of the shop to the other.
“We opened up about Eli and how I felt and how he felt. But I’m afraid once the mess of this storm is cleaned up, he’s going to end things. ”
“Have you talked to him about it?”
“Sort of. He asked if we could not worry about it until we had to.”
“Oof.”
I sighed. “Right? Not exactly what a girl wants to hear.”
“Maybe he’s afraid that you’re rebounding and don’t know it.”
“I’m not. I got over Boyd so fast I should’ve sent apology notes to everyone who bothered to come out.”
She tsked. “If you hadn’t done all that, you wouldn’t have ended up in Jonah’s bed.”
And on the stairs, the couch, and last night, the kitchen table.
I stroked my fingers along the surface where he’d had me spread with his head between my legs and my heels on his shoulders.
I could see her point. So many unusual circumstances had to happen to get me and Jonah in the same place and especially to get us to leave together.
And stay together. “I don’t think Jonah believes in fate. ”
“Then prove to him that there’s more to it than fate, like chemistry, compatibility, and intent.”
“I intend to do a lot to him.”
“That might convince him more than anything.”
I laughed at her seriousness. “I was joking.”
“I’m not. Men respond to sex. Why do you think I’m single?”
“Autumn.”
“Kidding, Summer. We’re not talking about me, but I am saying if you come in hot saying you want forever and a family, that scares the shit out of a lot of men. Men you’d think would be old enough to not be led around by their dick.”
I lifted my brows at the bitterness drifting through the line.
Autumn wasn’t shy about wanting to settle down, but thankfully, she was pickier than I had been about who she would tie herself to.
Her choosiness had also led to her loneliness.
I had a lot of respect for her, and a lot of sympathy. My sister had a lot of love to give.
“But seriously,” she continued, “if you are clear about what you want out of a relationship with Jonah and he gets weird, then you might have to consider that you two are in different places in life. You might have to consider that he’s not willing to leave his mountain cabin of safety.”
“I don’t want to leave it either.”
“Okay, then. Say you two decide to continue the bangfest and tell everyone you’re a thing—are you okay being solo at a lot of things you’d normally have your partner there with you for?”
I ran my bottom lip through my teeth. “It was kind of like that with Boyd. Jonah won’t sit out my life events because he thinks he’s too busy for them.
” I realized now Boyd had thought he was too good for the stuff going on in my life.
He’d come to Daddy’s funeral and left right after, citing work obligations. I’d been content to let him go.
My daddy’s funeral. When Boyd knew what I’d gone through with my birth parents.
Jonah had been at Daddy’s funeral. He’d even stopped in at the reception to give his condolences to Mama. Then he’d left as quietly as he’d come. No need to give excuses that made him look important.
“I really like it here,” I confessed. “And I really like him.” I’d be more devastated than any breakup if he cut things off before we were official. I also wouldn’t be okay staying his little secret.
I would not be okay if I heard he was hooking back up with Jackie Weller.
“Then be honest, Summer. Tell him what you want and what you expect. Just because he’s been a hermit and he’s been hurt and he’s been through a mind fuck about you and his brother doesn’t mean you should settle for his hang-ups.”
Twice in my life I’d been brutally honest. First, with Eli, and Jonah’s life had been irrevocably altered, physically, mentally, and emotionally. Mine had been changed too, but I hadn’t lost as much as him. The second time was before my wedding. And again, I’d tipped Jonah’s existence upside down.
Yet if he didn’t want to be with me, then . . . I didn’t know. I didn’t want to find out.
I shouldn’t have called Autumn. She looked sweet and innocent, but she could cut through bullshit better than any of us.
A whisper snaked through my head. Maybe that was why you did call her.
Wynter and Junie would say Get it, girl. Have that fun. Then Wynter would tell Myles all about it.
Scarlett would tell me to take things slow. She knew enough of Jonah to know he’d been hurt, and she’d been at my wedding. She’d want both of us to be cautious.
My brothers might ask me what the hell I was thinking, then get to Jonah and tell him that if he hurt me, they’d take it out on him.
Autumn was pragmatic. She was honest. She knew me and she knew Jonah, and she knew that ripping off the bandage of truth was the best way to face this problem.
Because the storm was coming to an end. The snow was supposed to quit tonight. Then another couple of days of clearing roads and I could make my way down the mountain. How long would I be welcome back? How soon before my time pining for Jonah Dunn was over?
Jonah
Summer wandered among the various projects I had in progress. The block of black walnut was for a gamer’s epoxy table. I’d sent several designs and he’d finally decided on one with a few changes.
She ran her fingers along the elm that had arrived before the storm had begun.
I had ordered the wood, knowing it’d make a beautiful table I could sell online.
Then she wandered to the various end tables I was almost done with.
I took smaller projects to fill in the larger orders, and the end tables were easy enough to sell for a better profit margin.
People could justify spending four figures on a useful piece of art better than some of my bigger tables that ran close to five figures.
I couldn’t do massive dining room tables, or even meeting room tables. I was only one person, and while I was strong and used leverage to my advantage, moving giant slabs of wood and epoxy wasn’t possible without help. I was a one-man show.
“Wow,” she breathed as she inspected the charcoal-filled wells in the holes left behind by the knots in the wood.
She had been quiet last night. My rusty senses said she wanted to talk, but I didn’t prod her. She might bring up topics I wasn’t ready for.
Like, should we tell people we were a thing?
Were we a thing, or did she just want to keep fucking?
If she wanted more than sex, then what? I’d rarely moved beyond sex in my earlier dating.
My relationships hadn’t been mature or healthy, or Jackie wouldn’t have left with some guy she’d just met to move to a place she’d never been before.
If that wasn’t a spotlight on how little I offered, I didn’t know what was.