by Hazel Parker
“Hmm. Looks rough.” She says nonchalant, like she doesn’t care. She was headed to the self check out but I know she went to a register because I’m here. I get it. I’m a stranger. But I always thought I gave off okay vibes, nothing pervy or anything.
“I wanted to apologize.” It kind of rolls out of me before I think. The cashier gives me a funny look, but I ignore her. I know she knows who I am, too, and debates telling Isabell.
“For what?” Isabelle glances at me once, and goes back to watching her items be scanned. As if they’ll run away or something.
“I was rude. I shouldn’t have been. Even though I was right.” I kind of kick myself in the ass for that last part, but it’s true.
I know she rolls her eyes and tries to hide it.
I step closer to her, enough to inhale her scent again and to see the round softness of her face and cheek. Her nose is small and upturned, I now know it scrunches up when she is irritated. She doesn’t wear make up, at least I don’t think, and she has cute little freckles on the side of her cheek. I try to stop myself from memorizing her and etching her face to my memory, but it’s hard to.
“What an apology.” She laces her voice with as much sarcasm as possible and gabs her one bag. I follow after her, knowing how it may look.
“Well, it is one.”
“So I should just accept it and move on?”
“I mean it, Isabelle. No need to hold a grudge or whatever.” I start to get irritated. I mean, it is an apology after all, I don’t know what much else she wants. I don’t get women, and I’ve never had to beyond a high school sweetheart that went off to become a big time lawyer and small town girls who only want to fuck me because I’m in the club. So this is… new.
Isabelle stops at the door of her car, and makes a weird pause like she didn’t want to go there.
“I’m not. Thank you, for your version of an apology. But it doesn’t really matter to me. I don’t know you, you don’t know me.” She turns around to face me, her nose doing that scrunched up thing again. I fight the urge to tap my finger on it, pull her close and kiss her. “You said you don’t want me around, I’m not around. You’re coincidentally in the same place I am and I can’t help that. But you were very adamant about never speaking to me again, so what changed that?”
I stare down at her with what I know is a blank look. She only holds it for a moment before seeming to give up, and turning away from me.
“I shouldn’t have said that to you before. I was just worried. Seeing you there at the club.” I soften my voice, so she doesn’t think I am a complete asshole.
I don’t know why Isabelle has such an effect on me.
Why she even matters so much.
I have a natural inclination to her I have never felt before. Almost like riding my bike, on the open road. I’m standing in front of what is basically a complete stranger and I don’t even want to move.
“There were other women at the club.” She says with a matter of fact tone. I almost chuckle but don’t let it go through. I have her trapped between her open door and me, though, so she isn’t going anywhere.
“Yeah but not like you.” I explain. I know it isn’t much of an explanation but it is all I have at this moment.
How do I say none of them look innocent like her? That none of them are as beautiful and sweet? That none of them make me lose my fucking mind?
“Like me?” She says with an open breath, a scoff under her voice.
“Yes. Innocent. Clueless.” I wince at the last word, I keep saying shit I don’t mean to say. She isn’t a regular woman, I swear it.
“How many times will you insult me in twenty four hours?” Isabelle tries to mask the hurt in her voice but I hear it and it makes me wish I hadn’t said anything at all.
“I don’t mean—Jesus you just know how to twist my words?”
“It’s not twisting, you just called me clueless. Unless clueless means something different to you.”
“I mean that those other women come looking for trouble, wanting the danger. Expecting something to happen to them. That’s not you.”
She opens and closes her mouth quickly. Her eyes darting beyond me as she thinks. They focus back on me when I start talking.
“And I was right. Guys fight in the bar all the time, you could have gotten hurt.”
“Well I wasn’t. And I can take care of myself. Regardless.” She purses her lips up at me and for the hundredth time since I have seen her, I fight the urge to smile. Just crack into a stupid grin.
“I know that. I just… didn’t want you to have to.”
“Why, you don’t know me?”
“I want to.” I press my eyes closed as soon as that comes out because I wish I wouldn’t have said that out loud. I can’t take it back.
But I’ve decided to stop ignoring her. It just won’t work and it will make things worse in the long run.
I feel my jaw tightening as I think and open my eyes slowly. I haven’t felt them that relaxed in a while, I can tell, and I let the pressure at the edge of my jaw go.
“I don’t meet women like you around here, Isabelle. It doesn’t—I don’t know what to do with it.” I feel my voice shake and clear my throat silently. I think this is the most honest I have ever been with a woman.
“Well, you could mind your own business, that’s for one.” She crosses her arms and rolls her big brown eyes at me.
“Hey, I’m trying to be nice here.” I add as much humor to my voice as possible but it just comes out hurt.
“You should try harder.” She lets out one or two laughs and it’s the one thing that makes me chuckle, just a bit under my breath. But I feel her notice it.
“I will. If you’ll let me. Maybe we can start over.”
“So instead of meeting in a motorcycle club we’ve met in a grocery store?”
“Seems like as good a start as any. My parents met in a pub.” She has me in the habit of saying things before thinking them through. But I don’t even regret it.
And it is how they met. Mom was travelling with her parents, who now don’t talk to her because she married a biker. I’ve never even met them.
Isabelle smiles and I am glad that I said it now too.
She takes a deep breath, my eyes fall down to the swell of her breasts in her sweater. It looks ratty and old as hell, but it looks beautiful on her.
“Okay… fine.”
I let myself grin at that, not so much her resolve, but the fact that I didn’t fuck things up completely.
“Uh, have you eaten?” I ask.
“What?” she makes a weird face at me and I scratch behind my ear in response.
“You know, food.”
“I—no.” She drops her shoulder, like she dropped some of her defenses too.
“Let me take you to dinner, then.” I clear my throat, even feel my heart flutter waiting for her response. I don’t flutter for anything, ever.
“Um…” she blinks up at me and licks over her bottom lip. That distraction drives me so mad I almost don’t hear her response.
“Jaxson?” she says my name so perfectly, I never want to hear anyone else say it but her.
“Yeah. Um. Let’s take my bike.” I nod over to where it’s parked.
“I don’t think so.” Isabelle widens her eyes and looks over at my bike like it’s a guillotine or something.
“It’s fine, I know a diner right down the road.”
She shakes her head and sighs.
“Don’t you trust me?” I ask her.
“Are you really asking me that?”
I shake my head at her.
“Yeah, I am.”
She sighs and steps closer, almost brushing her chest on mine. But she closes her car door behind her and the space widens.
“No, I don’t. But as long as you’re buying dinner.”
I nod and we set off for my bike, a considerable distance from each other. A family walks out of the store and she looks up at me, I glance at her and watch he
r slowly smile.
“You forgot your ointment.”
6
ISABELLE
I raise my voice as loud as normally possible and I know they hear me. Jaxson frowns at me but it only makes me smile.
First of all, I can’t believe I am getting on a bike with a total stranger. An asshole arrogant stranger at that. But with everything, I could tell he doesn’t normally apologize to people and that was big of him. I think.
He is also very, very pretty.
“I have a helmet.” He opens the seat of the bike and all I see is a bunch of clutter.
I clutch my purse over my chest and patiently wait. I feel my knees shaking from how nervous I am. I feel my body relax, but it’s my head that is reacting to him. I feel oddly comfortable around him, and I don’t know why.
“Here.” He finally finds it
He turns towards me and straps it on for me, his thumb brushes against my chin and my skin prickles at the contact. For a short moment, his eyes catch with mine and I swallow from the intensity.
“Hold on tight.”
He jumps on and I follow suit, minus the jumping. He starts the engine up and looks back at me.
His profile is as sexy as his front, his angular nose and chiseled jaw make it so.
“You have to scoot closer than that, unless you want to fly right off.” He has to shout over the engine.
“Come on, I don’t bite. Unless you’re into that.”
I gasp, but I don’t think he meant for me to hear the last part. I had scooted closer like he said, before he noticed. My thighs come around his, my inner thighs hit his hips and align with his legs. I lace my arms around his waist, it’s as hard as I imagined from his abs to the muscles at his side. I feel him breathing against me, when I lay my chest against his my body thrums to life along with the engine.
The more we go on, the closer I get to him, the more my body molds naturally. He makes me feel soft against his hard body. I struggle to keep my hands in a respectable place, on his lower stomach. But the dirty, currently sex deprived part of me wonders what would happen if I just reached for his cock. We would probably wipe out. No dick is worth dying for.
He was right about the ride being short, I even wish it were longer.
Jaxson parks, then he helps me off the bike as my legs wobble a bit.
“It’s like a leg workout.” I rub at my sides.
His lips twitch with a smile and we start off for the door, “you get used to it.” He gruffs.
“Well you must have powerful thighs.” I bite my bottom lip and scowl as soon as I say it. I keep saying the wrong things to him.
All he does in response is do his odd half chuckle.
When we walk in, Jaxson greets like five different people. I think a lot of them know him here, because of the club. The host is happy to seat him quickly but it could just be because she thinks he is hot. I guess if I go out with him, I’ll have to deal with that.
“You’re pretty popular.”
We get seated in a nice booth. The place is old fashioned, the tables are old wood and the booths faded red. The table has old fashioned ketchup and mustard on it too. I don’t know why I notice that.
“Not really.” Jaxson looks at me from across the table. He doesn’t look uncomfortable, but he looks out of place almost.
His body is imposing, taking up half the booth. His knees brush mine from how tall he is, if I move the wrong way.
“People just know about the club.”
“What is that like?” I ask quickly.
But the server comes and Jaxson seems glad for the interruption. We get started with water and I pick at the peanuts.
“So?” I prompt him.
He gives me a funny look and stops himself from rolling his eyes.
“I don’t talk about it much.”
I can’t even hide my disappointment. Here I was thinking that he liked me or something, that I was maybe the first girl on the back of his bike or that he’s apologized to. I guess I was wrong.
I figure I’ll just make it through this awkward dinner and forget about it.
If that is even possible.
I mean it’s Jaxson I’m talking about.
It isn’t until after we order that he decides to break the awkward silence.
“Motorcycle clubs aren’t what they’re made out to be. Most of the time.”
I sip my water. “Okay.”
He sighs and rubs at the slight stubble growing on his jaw.
“My dad started Kinsmen. We’re one of the few clubs that are private. Meaning someone else can’t tell us what to do.”
“So there is only one?”
“Two. Here and in Ireland, where he’s from.”
“That explains a lot.” I murmur, not really expecting him to pay attention to it.
“What?” he chuckles once, it’s that sound that makes me submit, it seems. I can tell that he doesn’t laugh or smile much.
“Nothing. You’re just brutish. And rude.”
He shakes his head at me, a crooked smile marring his face. “Fair enough.”
“So… have you ever been to jail?” I feel like I meant to ask something else, but my filter seems to be gone around him.
“What? No.” he says with a full laugh.
“I was only asking because I thought people in motorcycle gangs were all criminals.”
“It’s a club, not a gang,” he leans forward, setting his forearms on the table, “and no, I have not been to jail. Well, for more than a night. And most of us haven’t. We aren’t criminals either, we don’t do illegal shit.” He thrums his fingers over the table, the long, slender extension of his hands distract me. He has the most vascularity I have ever seen on a man, I want to trace his veins with my tongue and I shudder at the thought. I think I want to do a lot of dirty things with him.
“Okay. Sorry.” I lean back in the booth. I suddenly feel very hungry and tired. I would just be eating a sad frozen dinner, it’s what sold me on this in the first place.
“I get it.” He shrugs and then guzzles down half his water. “Have you ever been to jail?”
“No.” I giggle. “I live a very boring, simple life.”
“In grad school?”
“Yes, that’s why I came here.”
He nods once, holding my gaze before he looks away.
I survey the restaurant, half of them are looking at us, or Jaxson. The other half are just regular people; home from work or on vacation. I don’t know. It’s a really small town. I have a feeling I’ll see people more than once in different places.
“I don’t know much about school, but do people your age still use pink notebooks?” he asks out of nowhere.
I feel my cheeks turn as red as possible. If I had been paying more attention, I wouldn’t have bought my favorite color in notebooks. Geez, I must seem like a little girl to him. No wonder he didn’t want me in the club.
“Um, no. I just… like the color. Besides, it was more like… never mind.”
He does chuckle fully at that and I feel the blush spread to my neck. With that, I feel his eyes follow it too.
I want nothing more than for more than his eyes to follow my blush, but I just met him. And he does seem like trouble. That I don’t have time for and that I didn’t come here for.
I shove my overreacting aside and decide to just get through this dinner with him, and probably not see him again.
7
JAXSON
I keep staring at her. Subtly, of course. But I haven’t decided whether or not she notices how my eyes keep drifting right to her. How my brain is imagining how far her blush goes and what it looks like. I really need to relax, and I know that, but I just can’t.
Isabelle is so fucking beautiful to me and I don’t know why. She has a cute little crooked tooth on her left side, even cuter freckles and she isn’t all that thin. I love the way her thighs stretched around mine on my bike, how her soft midsection hit the hard muscles of my back. I haven’t seen an
yone around here with real impurities, real human features. At least, no woman in the club was like that. Isabelle is different and I know she is. I want to find out by how much more.
“Pink is okay. I think.” I roll back my shoulders and ignore how awkward that must have sounded to the food runner dropping off our food.
“I know.” Isabelle smirks. She has a pretty half smile that way. She eyes her plate of country fried steak and mashed potatoes like she hasn’t seen real food in months.
My own plate of steak and a baked potato probably isn’t that much better. But this place is arguably the nicest place around, unless you go into the downtown city.
“That steak looks subpar.” Isabelle says to me.
I frown at her in jest and she grins back, shaking her head once.
“You seem like a hard ass.” She murmurs with a mouth half full of food. I find myself intrigued by how she doesn’t hide her mouth with her fingers as she chews or pretends like she doesn’t eat like a regular person. I know it’s weird but most people do, women I mean.
“What?” I realize what she said and stop mid bite.
She giggles softly, “a hard ass. Like you never relax.”
“I relax.” I mutter.
She stops eating entirely and gives me a funny look.
“By doing what?” she asks, with an incredulous tone to imply that I never do.
I decide to make a little fun of it since she wants to be so mean.
“Fucking.” With a straight face, I stare back at her and watch her blink rapidly, see her cheeks flush even a little too.
“Oh.” She bites on her bottom lip and starts eating again, her fork clinks against the plate as she stabs her food too fast.
I want to tell her I’m only kidding but something tells me I shouldn’t.
That she almost liked the answer.
“What do you do?” I start eating again. I hadn’t realized how hungry I am, but I had a rough start to my day and last night was even worse.
“What, during sex?”
I nearly choke, “No.” I cough, “To relax.” I swirl the last of my food around in my mouth before I swallow and smile naturally. I knew she had this innocent and cute vibe to her, but I didn’t know it was this amusing.
