Gin Fling (Bootleg Springs, #5)(106)

“Oh, definitely the pie. There’s whipped cream in the fridge,” he said, ignoring my demand.

He got up and loped into the kitchen. Returning with a spray can, he paused in the doorway and sprayed a dollop into his mouth.

“Jonah, I’ve seen you sweaty and shirtless. I’ve seen you do pull-ups until the veins in your arms tried to explode. I’ve seen you completely naked and wet in the shower. But I have never been more attracted to you than I am right now.”

He grinned. And when he kissed me, it tasted sweet and full of promises.

Billy Ray bayed from upstairs. There was a thump when he threw himself off the bed and stampeded down the stairs, barking accusatorially.

“We’re right here, buddy,” I assured him. He nosed at the food on the table. “You may have one dino nugget. But that’s all I’m willing to share.”

“Hey, how many kids do you think we should have?” Jonah asked, picking up the remote control. “You like kids, right?”

I let out the air that had trapped itself in my lungs. “I like kids,” I said carefully.

“I think it would be cool to have a family here, surrounded by family. They’ll have cousins and aunts and uncles.”

I felt a warm gooey sensation in my stomach.

He settled on the couch and arranged me between his legs so I could lean back against his chest. Outside the birds chirped, and the sun shone. Neighbors poured sweet tea and gossiped. My parents walked their grandpig. Jonah’s mama snuggled up to her boyfriend at the ice cream shop.

And everything felt just about perfect.

“Hey, did I tell you about the bear I saw?”





60





Shelby





I was pedaling my butt off, sweat beading on my arms and dripping from my chin. Jonah was next to me in the darkened studio. It was just the two us. The music thumped off the walls, reverberating in my bones. I could see the last mile ticking down down down.

“Almost there!” He flashed me his heartbreaker grin in the dark. “Keep going!”

My legs were burning. A white-hot fire under the skin had consumed the muscle and was now devouring bone. And I kind of almost sort of didn’t hate it.

“Go, Shelby honey, go!” Jonah crowed as the screen on the far wall clicked over to fifty.

I slumped over the handlebars in relief.

“No, you don’t. Keep moving. Bring the heart rate down slowly,” he said, stepping off his bike. He rested his hand on my neck, his thumb brushing the scar I bore there. A reminder of how close we came to nearly losing it all. A reminder that every day together was precious.

But the past was officially the past. Never to haunt us again. And the future stretched on in front of us like an endless happily ever after.

“How come you get to stop?” I huffed, but I managed to make a wobbly revolution of the pedals while I complained.

He crossed the room and grabbed two fresh sweat towels off the shelving system next to the festive fake Christmas tree and returned to me, still grinning. “Fifty miles, Shelby. Not bad for a little ankylosing spondylitis.”

I took the last of the resistance off the bike and let the momentum carry my legs around and around.

“That century ride isn’t going to know what hit it,” I predicted breathily.

Jonah and I had signed up for a romantic 100-mile bike ride through Canada this coming summer, and we were spending the cold West Virginia winter training in his new gym space.

He changed the music on his phone from hard-driving, celebratory rock to a slow, sweet country ballad. It was adorable how Bootleg Springs had claimed yet another victim.

“How you feeling?” he asked as I took a swig from my water bottle.

“Tired but good,” I said. “I promise.”

He looked… nervous? Excited?

“What’s going on with you?” I asked pointing a finger in the direction of his handsome face.

My flares had been few and far between since meeting Jonah, and when I did get knocked down by one, I had my handsome, pushy boyfriend to pull me back up. I was thriving. We were thriving.

Jonah’s new gym was a bustling gathering place year-round for townsfolk trying to work off a few extra pounds during the holidays, for summertimers trying to maintain lake bodies. To his loyal elder following who mostly just wanted to gossip and watch his back muscles flex.

With my PhD hot off the presses, I’d landed a research professor gig at the nearby Buck State University where I was heading a decade-long study on the opioid crisis in communities. My survey was also being rolled out as a nationwide initiative to identify, among other things, loneliness within communities and potential solutions. And I was working on a book. The story of how Bootleg Springs claimed me as its own.

Billy Ray was now almost full-grown, though he still acted like a puppy. Fortunately our paper towel consumption had finally returned to normal.

Best of all, we finally had a home. We’d saved and searched, weighed our options and overthought. And then on Thanksgiving Day, just last month, crowded around the huge table in Scarlett and Devlin’s new home, the Bodines had handed Jonah a set of house keys.

The keys and deed belonged to the Bodine childhood home, now stripped of old, sad memories. Refreshed and renovated. Ready for a new family. Our family.