by Raven Dark
Umpteen times in twenty minutes, I glance at the paper, then at him, then back again, chewing on the end of pencil. The bell above the door chimes and I look up.
The last customer is gone, other than leather-bod over there.
He gets up and walks toward the counter. I straighten and swallow, that heat spreading through me again. He stops at the counter, and I back up before I consider my actions.
I’m alone with a biker who belongs to a supposed criminal club.
Damn, damn, damn.
I’m not into cursing—really, I’m not. But the swear jar would be overflowing with quarters by now if thoughts counted.
His mouth moves but I don’t hear the words through the hammer of my heart. I’m being stupid, but I can’t help thinking that if he is a robber, he might have been casing the joint, waiting to get little unarmed me alone.
Except I’m not unarmed. Not totally.
He gets to within a foot of the counter. The words spill out of me before I think about them.
“My mother has a gun in the back.”
His mouth makes a beautiful Oh shape, then he laughs one of those husky laughs. His eyes go to the paper on the counter, which is still facing up with the robbery headline on it. The one he undoubtedly saw me looking at. He shakes his gorgeous head.
“Oh, fuck, beautiful, I’m not gonna hurt you.”
“Are you going to leave now?”
“Not yet.” He leans on the counter. “What’s your name?”
I still don’t trust that he’s not going to order me to empty the till. Or worse. I don’t want to tell him my name, but if he’s armed, I’m not about to piss him off.
“A-Anne. It’s Anne.”
I’m shaking, and he can see it, because he drops his big shoulders and opens his vest, displaying the pockets, and his waist, any place he would carry a gun. “Relax, Anne, I’m not here to rob the place. I’m not armed. If I wanted money, I wouldn’t hit a place that has a few hundred dollars in it at most.”
My head drops back. I’m such an idiot.
He puts out his tanned, well-shaped and tatted-up hand. There’s an intriguing spider’s web inked on the back of it. Every one of his fingers is gleaming with silver rings, all wicked looking skulls and snakes.
“I’m Vicious,” he says.
“I’m sure you are,” I croak out.
He grins. “You’re fucking adorable.”
I blink, confused. And then it sinks into my hotness-addled brain. He isn’t bragging, Vicious is his name.
The fear hammering into me flees, and I let out a giggle. “Your name is Vicious? That’s…”
His brow quirks.
I clear my throat. “Um…I’m sorry. That’s just…” I want to say its ridiculous, but the more I look at him, the less ridiculous the name is. It suits him, and it offers a hint of danger that ticks off yet another box. He makes the name hot.
“Sorry,” I mumble.
“I’ll let it go. I love your laugh.” He closes his hand around mine.
I look down. When had I moved close enough to the counter for him to do that? I’m standing against the side opposite him, leaving less than two feet between us. His palm is big and warm, enveloping mine. Electricity races up my arm.
For some stupid reason, I can’t bring myself to pull away. He smells so good, like leather with a hint of exhaust and something spicy I can’t identify.
“I do have to leave now, though.” His head swoops down and he cups my hand in both of his, his lips brushing across my fingers.
Oh my God, I could die. He’s too bold and arrogant for words, but his lips feel like heaven on my skin. I want to snap at him, but the words won’t come out.
Vicious raises those stunning blue eyes to mine. He’s still holding my hand. “What time are you done here, Anne?”
Holy crap. What the hell is happening here? I finally have the sense to pull my hand free, or maybe he let go of it.
“Are you kidding me right now? Are you actually asking me out?”
“I never joke about what I want, beautiful.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“Why the hell not?”
“Because! It makes me uncomfortable.” He can’t possibly mean it. It’s a line. Aside from his being hot as hell, he’s twice my age, or near enough. I’m the preppy girl-next-door, and he’s from a side of the tracks that are as wrong as wrong gets. This guy wouldn’t look twice at me if he didn’t want something. Something other than the obvious.
“Get used to it. You’re gorgeous, and I always tell my woman the truth.”
“Your… Jesus.” Did he just call me his woman? Shit, that’s hot.
His smile gets huge. “Tell me when you get off.”
“Get off?” For some reason, my brain processes the words with a different meaning than he clearly intends.
He shakes his head. “Patience, beautiful, that comes later.”
Oh. My. God.
I really want to smack that smile off his heavenly face.
My knees are threatening to fold, and my nipples are jabbing at my shirt. “I…I…”
His eyes take on a wicked gleam. He likes that he’s rattling me. Great.
“Please leave,” I tell him.
“Not until you tell me when your shift is done.”
My thoughts scramble. I’m sure there are a hundred ways my mother would have gotten him out of here, but right now, I can’t think of a single one.
“Five o’clock, okay?” I hate that I sound a little panicky. “Happy?”
“Not yet. Be ready when I come to get you, and I will be.”
“I won’t be!” I squeak.
He takes my chin between his fingers—with just enough firmness to let me know he means business. “Yeah, you will.”
And then he lays a kiss right smack on my lips.
It only lasts a second, but it’s more than enough. My whole body melts into a puddle of heat and lust, every inch of me in flames. I whimper against his hot mouth, but it sounds more needy than angry. An ache flares between my legs, instant and almost painful in its intensity.
Oh, wow. Hotness overload. His lips make mine sing. When he pulls back and releases me, I literally sway on my feet.
“See you at five.” His voice is like rich velvet. “Later… beautiful.” He winks, and then, just like that, he’s gone.
Well, shit. As his motorcycle roars to life outside, and the sound of the engine fades to nothing, I try desperately to catch my breath and get a handle on the crazy that Vicious just made of my world.
Trouble on wheels just rode into my life, and I know I’m not going to get out of it easily. Worse, I’m not sure I want to.
2
Being Nice
If I thought the earlier part of the day had gone by slowly, the rest of it crawls by at a pace that makes morning feel as if it were going by at a breakneck speed.
My mother returns to The Eatery at a little after three, and that makes it worse. Visions of that leather-clad and tatted-up biker showing up while she’s here, keep playing through my mind, making my stomach knot. If she sees him, she’s never going to let me out of the house again.
When I’d started college last year, she had insisted I live with her until graduation. I hadn’t wanted to. I love my mother, but she doesn’t seem to understand that there’s such a thing as being over-protective. Unfortunately, there aren’t a lot of jobs out here, and living in this town is expensive. The money I make at The Eatery needs to go to tuition, so saving on rent was the only option. I refused to let her pay my way. Which meant I’ll be spending at least six months feeling like I’m living in a fish bowl when it comes to dating. If she caught wind of what had happened this afternoon, she’d lose her shit.
Which is why I don’t say a word about Vicious. And why I spend the hours until my shift ends praying that she won’t find some reason to look at the restaurant’s camera feed.
Oh, God. I serve up a coffee with shaking hands, trying not t
o look at the camera perched above the front door. Mom rarely checks the feed, since nothing ever happens here, but the bank robbery might change that. One look at him on the feed and she’d probably drag me out of here.
And the next day The Eatery would find itself on the market while my mother starts looking at houses in Alaska.
I glance at the clock. It’s almost four-thirty already. Damn it. Maybe I’d get lucky and he wouldn’t show. Yeah, that’s it. He’d been only playing with me, and decided he’d had his fun with the young waitress naïve enough to think he’d want anything to do with her.
Somehow, that thought only makes me feel sad. Loneliness creeps in, settling like a stone in the pit of my stomach.
Jesus, why? He’s bad news; I shouldn’t want anything to do with him. And yet every second my mind races with excitement at the thought of what will happen when he rides up.
“Mom?” I try for casualness as I wipe down a table.
“Hmm?” She looks over her shoulder while topping off the condiments at another table.
“I’ll lock up tonight.” The Eatery closes at five on Thursdays. “You must be tired after running around today.” I’m usually terrible at hiding things from her. Somehow, she’ll figure out what I’m up to, see it in my eyes that I have plans I have no business having.
“Are you sure, dear?”
It takes effort not to breathe a sigh of relief. “Yep. I’m good.”
She nods and takes off her apron. “Thank God. I’m bushed. Make sure you shut everything down in here before you lock up, okay? And be careful. Keep your phone on, and call me if you run into trouble.”
She’s thinking about the robbery. I want to roll my eyes and tell her to chill out, but this time, I get it.
“I will, Mom.” I hug her, surprised at the way she squeezes me back, as if she’s suddenly afraid to let me go. I almost feel bad for scoffing at her hovering.
She leaves a few minutes before five. Mom pulls out of the lot, and there’s no sign of a motorcycle engine, no flash of patches or leather.
I flip the open sign to closed, lock the door, and clean up the place, shutting off the appliances. Then I change out of my uniform, wishing I had something a little more stylish—not to mention more mature—to wear than a gray college T-shirt and a pair of faded blue jeans.
A whole new kind of nervousness eats at my insides as the minutes tick by. Vicious is a fantasy on wheels. It’s weird, but I can’t help thinking that when he sees me, he’ll change his mind. It’s not like I look all that different in my street clothes, but there the thought is.
I look at myself in the restaurant’s bathroom mirror and shake my head at my appearance. “This won’t cut it, Anne.” How come today my go-to ponytail makes me look like I’m twelve?
I yank it out and shake out my curls, trying to at least fluff them up. I dig into my purse on the counter and pull out my bottle of anti-frizz. Damn. Empty. I toss the bottle, then I add a little gloss to my lips and fresh mascara to my dark eyes.
“You still look like an eighth grader.” I sigh. “He’ll have to deal with it.”
The bell above the front door chimes. Mom must have forgotten something.
“Anne? You here, beautiful?”
My heart gives a giant bound.
Wait, how did he get in?
A smile pulls at my lips, and I can’t resist making him squirm a little. I keep silent, waiting a beat. Then another. It serves him right if a man as bossy and domineering as him has to work for it.
“Anne,” he drawls out slowly. I can hear his smile. “You wouldn’t be hiding from me, would you?” His boots make a soft clopping sound on the floor as he crosses the front room.
I cover a nervous laugh, practically feeling the impatience pounding off him even though I can’t see him.
His boots head for the storage room. Then back down the hall toward the bathroom. Oh, my God, he wouldn’t.
“You’d better still be here, Anne.” The promise of retribution in his voice makes me shiver with delight at the thought of what he might do if I push too far. I hear his smile outside the door to the bathroom.
Yep, he totally would.
The door opens. Vicious sticks his gorgeous head in. “Boo.”
“Oh my God, get out of here!” I’m half laughing.
He waltzes further into the room. He’s so tall he has to duck to get in, and his big shoulders make the small bathroom feel tiny and crowded.
Oh, wow. He’s even hotter than he was earlier. He hasn’t changed anything; leather still covers every inch, except those huge inked-up muscles on his arms and his tanned chest peeking out from his vest. His dark hair still falls over one eye, giving him a boyish sort of hotness. The flecks of silver in it offer a hint of distinguished maturity.
He’s pure heaven.
“Vicious, how the hell did you get in?” I try to open the door and shove him out. Trying to move him is like trying to shove a Mack Truck.
He holds up some kind of pick tool in his hand and smirks.
He picked the lock? Of course he did.
His arms capture me around the waist and pull me against him. Warmth and maleness and the smell of leather make me go weak in the knees.
“If you didn’t want me in here, then you shouldn’t have hid from me, beautiful.”
“What makes you think I was hiding?”
“Call it experience.” He nips the side of my neck. I shiver with delight. My pussy clenches with need unlike I’ve ever felt. “I should tan your gorgeous ass for playing with me like that.” His palm cups my ass, making me squirm into him.
His threat pushes all the right buttons, buttons I didn’t know I had. I didn’t think I was into having a man’s hand across my ass, but I guess I am, because I’m getting wet just imagining what it would feel like to have his palm sting my skin.
He pulls back, brushing my bangs off my forehead. Out of the corner of my eye, I catch a flash of those badass rings that cover his long fingers. Those perfect blue eyes focus on my mouth, making my pulse speed up. “I was going to take you for a ride, but maybe I should just lock this door and not let you leave for a few hours.”
Holy shit. My mind runs rampant with all the ways he could make use of the cramped bathroom. My face burns and my sex clenches mercilessly.
“You wouldn’t.”
“You know I would, Anne.” He pulls me even closer, and the hard ridge of his cock presses into my stomach, making it clear exactly how close he is to making good on his words.
Gulp.
I’m not a virgin, but I’m not that experienced, either. Vicious has probably had plenty of women; I know enough about bikers to know it’s all about women and partying with them. The thought of him with another woman sends an irrational bolt of jealousy through me.
I lick my lips and focus on the hollow between his pecs, unable to meet his eyes. “I think we better go.”
It shocks me that my voice sounds a little disappointed.
His fingers tip my chin up. Amusement dances in his eyes, along with a heat that has my heart racing.
“We will. But not because you say so.”
“Then why?”
He sighs and rests his forehead against mine. “Because I promised myself I’d be nice.” A soft, shaken laugh leaves him. “That I’d be patient and not rush you.”
“Vicious…” My own breath comes out shaky. What could I even say? I had a good idea where this night would go if I gave it the smallest chance. Did I want to stop us from going there? Half of me wants to tell him to stop, but the other half… The other half is screaming for him take me, and the night, as far and as fast as he wants.
God help me.
He puts his fingertips to my lips like he knows what I’m struggling to say. That makes one of us.
“I’m not going to fuck you here, Anne. I want to do this properly. But you’re making me crazy. You’re making it difficult to follow my own damn rules.”
I need to break the tension that
’s building between us. “You have rules?” I tease.
It works. He grins and releases me, opening the door. The moment is gone.
“Not many, but I do have them.” He wraps my hand in his huge one and walks us out.
I’m not sure if I feel like I’ve missed something wonderful, or if I’ve escaped a disaster in the making. Maybe it’s both.
Outside, the light is fading, but it’s late August, so it won’t be dark for hours yet. It’s warm, but not too warm, just perfect for a date night out of doors. The whole night stretches ahead of us, alive with possibilities. Oh, so many possibilities. There’s part of me that knows this—whatever happens with Vicious now—is probably a train wreck waiting to happen. He’s all wrong for me, but right now, I can’t make myself care. I want to just enjoy myself with him. After all, I won’t likely get another chance like this.
I lock up the restaurant, and Vicious waits, standing against the brick wall with his ankles and his arms crossed. I can’t get over how hot he is.
My big biker fantasy in leather.
When I finish, he grabs my hand and leads me across the street. I gasp at the beast leaning on its kickstand at the curb. The motorcycle is all sleek and black and heavy looking, with red and orange flames painted on the sides. It looks just like him, total badassery.
“Wow. It’s gorgeous. But…” I bite my lip.
Obviously, I’d known he was going to expect me to ride with him, but somehow the idea hadn’t registered enough for me to consider what that meant.
“Scared, Anne?” His smile teases my insides.
I don’t bother with trying to be brave, instead giving him an unsure smile. “Terrified is more like it.”
He comes around the bike and takes my shoulders, and when he speaks, his voice is warm and low. “It’s not as scary as everyone thinks. I’ll show you want to do. Trust me, all right?”
I must not look convinced, because his hand moves to my nape, squeezing it gently.
“Listen to me. I’ve been riding since I was twelve. I know what I’m doing. You’re safe with me. I always take care of what’s mine, Anne. I won’t ever let anything happen to you. All right?”
