Page 19 of From Air

“Seriously?” Jamie rummages through the kitchen on a scavenger hunt for ingredients to bake something. It’s her weekend MO, along with wearing a light-pink apron that matches her socks and looks like something from 1960. She wears her hair braided down both sides when she bakes.

Goddammit! I need to stop noticing so much shit about her.

“No joke. If you need something repaired, just send it to work with Fitz.” Will heads up the stairs.

“That’s some sexy stuff, Fitz.” Flour puffs into the air when she plops the bag onto the counter beside her mixing bowl.

“Sewing is sexy?” I navigate to the barstool at the counter. It’s weird, I know, but I enjoy watching her work in the kitchen. Also, I have to make sure she doesn’t put something in the baked goods to poison me.

“In and of itself, no.” She measures the dry ingredients on the scale she bought a few weeks ago. “But sewing your gear, then jumping out of a plane to fight a fire ...that’ssexy.”

“So we agree I’m sexy.” I can’t hide my wry grin.

She keeps her focus on the scale. “No. Smoke jumpers are sexy. You’re my roommate—a brother of sorts. You’re disqualified from ever being sexy in my mind. Separation of church and state.”

“So much for Will thinking we’re sleeping together.”

Clunk!

She drops the measuring cup onto the floor. “W-what?” Fumbling to pick it up, she then rinses it off and dries it.

“He thinks I’m giving you orgasms, and that’s why you’re being so nice to me.”

“Pfft ...”She tries to blow off my comment, but her cheeks flush, and she can’t focus on me for more than a second.

“We both know you’re being nice to throw me off.”

She clears her throat and wipes her forehead with her arm. “Throw you off?”

Is she sweating?

“Don’t think I’ve forgotten about your threat.”

“My threat?” She cuts the stick of butter into cubes.

“Payback’s going to be a bitch.Sound familiar?”

“Not really.” Vanilla fills the room while she pours it into a measuring spoon. “I’m a nice person.” She twists the lid onto the bottle.

“Nice people never have to say they’re nice people. They’re too humble to feel the need to put themselves on a pedestal by saying they’re nice.”

Jamie crinkles her nose like she has an itch before rubbing it with her arm. She mixes, scrapes, and lines the baking sheets with parchment paper. By now, she has streaks of flour on her face and hair.

I can’t turn away. I want to crawl onto the counter with a pillow and fall asleep while watching her. She could make a visual meditation app. This shit’s my crack.

“So you’ve been sewing this winter? Is that what you do in Arizona? Do they fly you all over the country to sew?” She ignores my previous comment.

She’s good. Too good.

“It’s not all I do. And no. We do prescribed fires in Arizona.”

An airy smile touches her lips as she stirs the ingredients. She’s up to something. “Don’t tell Will I let you lick the spoon.” She offers the spatula.

“Nope.” I hop off the stool. “I don’t want to lick the spoon.” Blowing out a breath, I shove my hands into my back pockets.

Jamie’s eyebrows lift into dubious peaks.

“Just do it. Whatever you’re going to do to me, just fucking do it, and be done.” I hate that she’s brought me to my knees on this, but I need some sound sleep again.

---