Wild At Heart (Wild 2)

“It’s not funny! I was hiding under a table at the community center tonight, Jonah!” But at least I wasn’t home alone. I don’t know how I would’ve handled that.

“Five point nine, up in Denali, from what I heard?”

“Yeah. John owes Muriel a fish.” Of course her guess would be the most accurate.

He frowns. “Who’s John?”

“A guy at the planning committee,” I say dismissively. “You should have warned me! Why would I expect earthquakes in Alaska?”

“Most of them are harmless.”

“Yeah! Until the day the ground opens up and swallows us whole.”

Jonah pinches the bridge of his nose. He’s struggling to keep his patience in check. “Honestly, it didn’t even cross my mind to warn you. That’s how not-a-big-deal it is. It’s just something you get used to. You haven’t even noticed them until now.”

“Great. Another thing for me to get used to.” As if the long, dark winters, turbulent weather, menacing mosquitos, threatening wildlife, and general isolation aren’t enough, now I have to worry about earthquakes—and potential tsunamis. “Why are you home so late, anyway?” And why did he turn on the light?

“I helped get some smoke jumpers back to their base camp. They’d been out there for almost four days.”

Right. Those crazy people who jump out of planes to fight fires in remote spots. At least Jonah hasn’t told me he wants to try that. Yet.

“We’re supposed to get some rain over the next two days.”

“Does that mean you’ll be home?” My voice, once groggy, is suddenly brimming with hope.

“Depends. Am I gonna have to hear about earthquakes and bear attacks all day?” Jonah rolls onto his side again. “Jim O’Keefe asked me to do a fly-in for him and his sons in the morning, if it’s clear enough.” He drags the tip of his minty-fresh tongue along my bottom lip before kissing me on the mouth. My breath can’t taste nearly as pleasant right, but he doesn’t seem to care. “I missed you.”

My chest swells with warmth at his confession, the confirmation that he does still think about me when he’s chosen to be out there in the air.

“Anything exciting happen today, besides the earthquake?” he asks, his hand slipping into the back of my panties to fill his palm with my flesh. He squeezes gently.

“Muriel happened today,” I grumble, even as my body responds to his touch.

He chuckles. Jonah always finds my stories about that woman amusing. He has an exorbitant amount of patience for her that I don’t understand. “What’d she do now?”

“Basically told me that marketing is pointless and that I know nothing.” I relay the conversation from earlier.

“Tell her she’s wrong. She’d be lucky to have you helping this Emily chick.”

“She made such a big deal about how attendance has been down and how important it is that this one succeeds because they need the money for the community center, but she’s so stubborn, she’s not willing to try. It’s not like she’d even be paying me.”

“Did you say all this to her?”

“I was going to, but then the earthquake hit, which distracted me, and then, I don’t know, I started thinking maybe she’s right.” I shrug. “I don’t know the first thing about the people around here or marketing a winter carnival in Alaska! What if I completely screw it up? Or make no difference at all?”

“You’re not gonna screw it up. Think about it, Calla. You didn’t know shit about planes but you designed that whole website for Wild in, like, four days.”

“That was just a website. And it didn’t mean anything.” My father ended up selling the company right after.

“Hey. It meant something. It was the first time I realized you had a big brain in that pretty head of yours. You impressed me.” He pauses, as if to let that sink in. “And you basically set up an entire charter plane company for us in a few months.”

“Agnes helped me.”

“She helped a bit, but no, it’s because you’re smart as hell and you can figure out anything if you put your mind to it. So, if this is something you want to do, then you tell Muriel that you’re doing it! End of story.”

I chew my bottom lip in thought. His confidence in me is bolstering. “I do know a lot about online marketing.”

“Probably a hell of a lot more than Emily or Muriel or anyone else in that room, I’m guessing.”