Wild At Heart (Wild 2)

“Because you really want to live in a subdivision?” he says.

I give him a flat look. “How long have you known that Phil was selling his place?”

Jonah’s bearded jaw tightens. “George may have mentioned something to me about it last week,” he admits.

“So then, why didn’t you tell me last week? And don’t say you haven’t had a chance. We’ve been talking about moving every day for the past month.”

He sighs heavily. “Because I knew you’d pull out your damn map and decide that it’s too far without even hearing me out.”

“So, instead, you tricked me into going there. You lied to me. Moose meat, my ass!”

“That was not a lie.” It’s Jonah’s turn to steal a glance at the nearby family, but they seem engrossed in their own conversation. Still, he drops his voice. “George asked me to drop that off for him if we were goin’ to see the place.”

“And, what? Did you think that when I walked into a log cabin in the middle of the woods with animal heads all over the wall, I’d jump at the chance to live there?”

“Honestly? Yeah, I thought you might.”

A burst of incredulous laughter escapes me.

“What? You said so yourself, it’s beautiful there, with the mountains and the lake.”

“Yeah. To visit!”

“It’s not that remote, Calla. The place is fully functioning. A well for water, plumbing, heating, everything. Anchorage is within easy driving distance. There’s a lot of cabins in Trapper’s Crossing. It’s a big tourist area.” Frustration furrows across his forehead, the small white scar from last summer’s plane crash falling naturally into a crevice.

“I don’t like these kinds of surprises.” The life-altering ones.

“Can you blame me for tryin’?”

Maybe not. But that’s not the point. “We’re supposed to be in this together, Jonah.” I realize as I say them that I’m echoing Agnes’s words. “Don’t manipulate me to get what you want.”

“I wasn’t trying to manipulate you,” he says slowly, as if his conscience is reevaluating that declaration as he makes it.

“Maybe not intentionally, but that’s what you were doing. And that’s not you. You’ve always been open and honest. You speak your mind. That’s what I love about you.” Hadn’t I just finished thinking about how much I love that quality about him? “This deceptiveness? It isn’t you.” It’s why I never caught on to his plan, which, in hindsight, I’m an idiot to have missed.

Jonah’s lip press together. “I’m sorry. I guess I just got caught up with how perfect this place is. I was banking all my hopes on you falling in love with it when you saw it. Phil was supposed to keep quiet until I tested the idea out on you.” He picks up a salt packet, only to cast it aside. “I was hoping you’d see the potential. Or you’d at least hear me out before you shot it down.”

An unpleasant silence falls over us, Jonah’s frustration palpable.

The urge to break through it—to solve for it—overwhelms me. I wonder if I’m going to regret this. “Fine.”

Jonah’s gaze flashes to mine.

“I’ll hear you out before I shoot down the idea.” And then I’ll shoot it down.

He takes a deep breath, his demeanor visibly shifting from stark disappointment to brimming excitement as he decides where to begin. “It’d be turnkey for the charter business. I mean, we’d still have to apply for an operations license if we’re letting customers onto our property but we wouldn’t have to deal with landing strip usage fees or rent, or any of that bullshit for me to fly. I wouldn’t have to get guys in to build a proper airstrip and hangar, and all the headaches that come with that, because it’s already done. That walk-out basement is the perfect space for

an office, so I’d be around when I’m not flying. We wouldn’t be in some shitty little trailer at an airport all day.”

From sunup until sundown, as my mother often complained my father was. He was never there.

“And it’s a nice house. Well built, tons of character.”

“Dated. And unfinished. And wood-y,” I counter. With three pint-sized bedrooms and only one bathroom on the second floor.

“Nothing that can’t be finished and updated.”

“Or gutted.”