As if he sensed my thought, he ground into me, igniting the impending orgasm.
“Yes! Jonah!” My voice echoed off the walls.
“Fuck! Summer!” A feral growl ripped from him and he pulsed inside me. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”
I couldn’t form words as my climax peaked and crashed back down. “Oh my god,” I groaned, hanging off him.
He stood strong. Unwavering. He was it for me. If only he’d say the same about me. Autumn was right. I had to talk to him. But what if that was the end of it? The end of us?
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Summer
The rays of the sun bounced off the piles of snow. Between the wind and the drifts, the landscape wasn’t a white blanket. Green treetops stuck out and the brown tips of the tallest grasses were visible.
I shaded my eyes as I stared out the window. A winter wonderland. The road reports were good. They had been for the city and the surrounding county for a couple of days, but now the country roads were getting cleared. We were waiting on the main road, which would be cleared any minute.
My time at Jonah’s was coming to an end. I’d had days to bring upWhat now?and I hadn’t. I hadn’t so much as asked him what he thought about us when it wasn’t snowing.
The entire day before, I’d been in his shop while he worked. He’d given me a piece of wood to tinker with, like a toddler playing with pots and kettleswhile their parent cooked. We’d listened to music and his woodworking podcasts. There were several. I would’ve been bored silly, but I’d had him to watch.
His big body bunched and flexed when he heaved six-foot planks of wood around. A line of concentration creased his forehead when he was pondering his next move—to stain or not to stain, the best method to add sealant, or how heavy-handed to be with the epoxy.
I found craft work fascinating. I ran the distillery in Bozeman. So much of my job was managing people and resources, but I also knew each step. I could prepare the mash and mix additives to yield different flavors in the bourbon. I liked playing around with aging times and even sourcing new barrels for single-barrel batches to get different flavor profiles.
Jonah’s work paralleled those decisions. What were the various ways to bring out the personality of the wood and how could he best enhance those qualities?
I turned grain into spirits. He turned wood into furniture. I played with the flavors to bring out the grain profiles. He changed the wood’s shape to showcase the lines and grooves. Add in talent and efficiency and he brought in a lot of money, just like the distillery.
He came to a stop next to me at the glass. “What are you thinking?”
Grateful I’d let my mind wander to our similarities and not how our differences might interfere in our future, I smiled. “How alike our professions are.”
A tiny frown tugged at his lips. “I never thought of what I do as a profession.”
I gawked at his handsome profile. “You bring in that much money and you consider it ahobby?”
There was that uncomfortable shoulder lift again. “I just do it.”
He had an efficient process. And while he worked, he basically did daily continuing education with his podcasts and online videos. He brought in more money than my generous wage at the distillery. How much had he socked away? The guy was a rich mountain man up here all alone.
“If everyone knew how much money you make and how good at sex you are, you’d have hordes of women climbing this mountain.”
The tips of his ears burned red. “Summer.”
I laughed. “I’m serious. The sex alone would sell it, with your looks.”
He drew his brows together. “My looks aren’t anything.”
I scoffed. “You’re right. It’s your glowing personality that got my sweats off.”
He blinked. “I’m... not sure how to take that.”
“I like your personality. For the record.”
His lips quirked. “Noted.”
We stared out the window in silence. Was he having the same existential crisis about us? Or was he sexed out and counting down until I could drive my car down the road and get back to making more masterpieces and raking in the cash?
