by Kara Parker
The camera panned to Luke, and he retracted his feet from the table and stood, sliding the book back in his pocket. He smirked as he saw the angle the camera man had to tilt his equipment to reach Luke’s face.
Luke squatted down to the little girl’s level. “Hey Jacklin,” he said. “I’m Luke.”
The girl’s parents barged into the room past the cameraman, apparently sensing that their child was in danger. Luke rolled his eyes. They stayed back, at least. Jacklin wasn’t afraid. She shone a gap toothed smile on him.
“Thank you for saving Bubbles!” she exclaimed.
Luke bit back a grimace. “Bubbles?”
She nodded.
He leaned in closer to her, careful so that he wasn’t overheard. He whispered in her ear and she nodded her head heartily.
Leaning back on his heels, Luke shot a cheeky grin toward Jacklin’s parents. “So, Jacklin,” he said, though his gaze was directed at them. “Think I could come visit sometime?”
“I think he’d like that! And I would too!” Hearts all over the world were probably breaking. Well, maybe nothing quite so dramatic. He was certainly melting the heart of Jacklin’s mom, however. The ire he was getting from her dad made up for it.
“So there you have it,” said Shayla, dipping into the frame. “A kitten found, best friends united, and new friendships forged. All in just one day in the beautiful town of Templeton.”
Luke tried not to snort. He wondered if she had come up with that line on her own or not. He hoped for not, but judging by how pleased she looked with herself, that didn’t seem the most likely. Everyone had to have some sort of flaw. Maybe hers was just to err on the side of cheesiness and drama. She was certainly physically flawless.
He felt a tiny jab in his gut as the cameras shut off and Jacklin took Achilles away. That kitten was going to be one lazy and adorable cat one day. He was just sad that he wouldn’t get to see it. He wasn’t so sentimental that he would actually visit a cat he’d known for less than twenty-four hours, but it was tempting. If only for the reactions of Jacklin’s parents.
The cameraman followed Jacklin and her parents out, but Shayla stayed in the room.
“You okay little guy?” she asked.
The moment his eyes hit her, he saw that she had realized her mistake. Her eyes widened, lips parting ever so slightly. Luke Cinder was many things, but a man you could speak to with condescension was not one of them. If it had been one of his gang’s rivals, the guy would’ve been down for the count already. If it had been Sparky, or one of his own guys, they would’ve been on the receiving end of a stern glare and on thin ice.
Luke didn’t know how best to approach such an affront when it came from a girl, not least Shayla. He wasn’t talked down to often, and he most certainly was never talked down to by a woman who’d been giving him the eyes moments before. He saw the humor in it, and knew she meant nothing by it. But it was an opportunity to have a little fun, nonetheless.
“Say that again,” he challenged, his voice a low growl. He walked toward Shayla and she stepped back, pressing her slender frame against the wall and fixing him with wide eyes.
“I didn’t say anything.”
He smirked and crowded her, pressing his hands on either side of her body. She was trapped.
“I think you called me little guy,” he purred. “I just want to be sure I heard you correctly.”
He leaned down, inching his face toward hers. She smelled of flowers and something sweet, like honey. Or coconut. He’d never been great with smells. Whatever it was, it was drawing him in. And he desperately wanted to taste her.
But he couldn’t. Not yet.
He held her gaze, watching the pupils of her eyes as they dilated. Her arousal nearly caused him to break, to take her right there against that wall. But he couldn’t fuck up this job for her. He was rooting for her, after all. He always rooted for the underdog.
Luke let out an abrupt laugh and stepped back, watching the air fill her lungs again. Shayla came back to life, shaking her head and shooting him with a glare. “That’s not funny,” she said. “I was—”
“Turned on?”
“Scared.”
“Liar.”
She gave him an impetuous glare but didn’t respond.
Luke grabbed his coat from the table. “So where are you taking me for dinner?”
“What?” She furrowed her brow. “Dinner? It’s past midnight.”
“Do you have anywhere to be in the morning?”
“That’s beside the point…”
Luke slid his arms into his jacket and pulled it over his shoulders, giving the collar a flick. “I’m hungry. You owe me. Dinner. Questions?”
But Luke didn’t wait for questions. He swept out of the room like the wind, knowing full well that she’d be jogging along after him within moments.
Click, click, click.
There she was.
“Wait,” she said, coming up beside him. “What do I owe you for, exactly?”
He glanced down at her but didn’t slow his gait. She was tall for a woman, but even her long legs were having trouble keeping up.
“Your big break, of course,” he said. “Nothing’s for free in this town, sweetheart, and my favors cost more than most.”
Shayla groaned in frustration. “I never asked you for any favors!”
Luke reached out for the handle of the door back to the lobby, but angled his body toward hers and stopped. “Body language,” he said, dragging his eyes up and down her delectable frame. “Yours has been telling me all kinds of things. Earlier it asked for a little help.”
She crossed her arms of her chest. “You can’t call in your chips when the other players don’t know that they’ve laid down their cards.”
Luke opened the door, grinned, and gestured for her to walk through first. Shayla let out another groan and rolled her eyes, but went through without further protest.
“Word of advice, sweetheart,” Luke said. “Don’t lie to me. I’ll know.”
“Word of advice, dickhead.” She frowned at him. “Don’t call me sweetheart.”
Chapter Seven
Shayla had never understood adrenaline junkies. When she was eighteen, a friend from high school begged her to go bungee jumping with him, and she had agreed even though the thought made her feel ill. Everyone she knew who had done it claimed that it was worth all the fear, and that the rush they got on that long plummet was better than anything a person could experience with two feet firmly planted on the ground.
Shayla was no coward, so she went along.
The bridge that spanned the gulley was made of corrugated steel, and seemed quite sturdy. Walking out on it, though, Shayla had never felt more unsafe. She knew it was all in her head; that she was more likely to die on the drive home than while bungee jumping, but her mind’s logical processes seemed to have taken a vacation. She had walked forward with shaky legs, trying to keep her eyes on the little diving platform ahead and not on the sound of rushing water below.
Jackson had thought her quite brave for wanting to go first. Even braver for wanting to dive backward. In truth, Shayla had been doing everything in her power to get the dive over with as soon as possible, and she didn’t want to see where she was headed while she did it.
Standing on the ledge, with the wind prickling at her clammy skin, Shayla had said a silent farewell to the world. It was dramatic, sure, but with the way her pulse was pounding in her throat, all her instincts were telling her she’d never survive the fall.
Then, with her eyes screwed closed, she’d pushed off and careened toward the river.
It was the same feeling as a long drop on a roller coaster, but it didn’t end. She opened her mouth but there was no air to scream. They had told her not to hang on to the foam thing that covered the attachment to the rope, but her arms flung up and held onto it tightly, willing it to stay her movement.
And then the rope had snapped taut, and the relief that welled inside of Shayla was
the sweetest thing she’d ever felt. But it was short lived, because as soon as she stopped going down, she began to fly back up. While that sensation wasn’t as unpleasant as the fall had been, she knew that she’d have to go back down soon enough. And the dread was worse this time than it had been before she jumped in the first place, because she’d never factored in this part of the experience before. She hadn’t prepared herself for this loop of falling and soaring, and she didn’t know when it would end.
When she had finally finished bouncing, she swung lazily over the rushing river below as someone pulled her back up to the bridge. The instructor, a new age hippie with a crooked grin, had said, “See, not so bad huh?”
Shayla had merely glared at him.
That experience had shaped Shayla’s thrill seeking capacity ever since. She had kept to herself, never looking for more of an adrenaline rush than a good lead for a story or a designer sales event at her favorite store. Because it had been so bad. And she hadn’t felt, afterward, that bungee jumping had been worth it. It had left her shaken, upset, and frankly a little bit nauseous. Her time would have been better spent studying or writing.
She understood the romance of getting to experience plunging to one’s death without actually dying, but screw that.
So with that experience hanging over her, Shayla felt a certain trepidation as she approached a motorcycle with a giant of a man whose dark eyes were filled with even darker desires. Statistically, it was riskier than a bungee jump. Emotionally, it was more nerve wracking than her stumbling approach to the diving platform. But somehow, despite all that, walking beside Luke lit a fire inside of Shayla.
She was terrified, and she loved it.
What kinds of things could happen now that she’d left the station? What kinds of things could happen to her specifically? Luke looked like trouble, smelled like sin, and made her feel like her world was about to light on fire. And Shayla drank it up like a glass of water in a searing desert.
The night was cool, but not cold. Shayla’s blazer and jeans provided more than adequate protection from the chill. The summer sky was awash with stars, and a breeze from the ocean dipped through Shayla’s blonde tresses and waved them behind her. She crossed her arms over her chest, not from the cold, but to hide the way her adrenaline spiked hands trembled.
“Ever been on a bike before?” Luke asked, his voice light.
She shook her head. “Not really.”
He grinned at her. “Not really?”
“Not unless you count one without a motor.”
Luke laughed. “I don’t. No.” He pointed to where a black and chrome chopper stood a few feet away. “Want me to be gentle for your first time?”
Shayla had to bite back a gasp. The thought went through her again: What the hell was she doing?
But she knew exactly what she was doing. There had always been a thrill seeker tucked away inside of her; it was just that the thrills she sought couldn’t be found at the end of a bungee cord. She craved something darker. And, arguably, more dangerous.
“Give me all you’ve got.”
She watched his face for a reaction, and Luke didn’t disappoint. His devilish grin grew, and his eyes filled with promise. She knew, right then, that he’d be giving her everything he had and more. It was only a matter of whether she’d be brave enough to take it.
Luke walked up to the bike and grabbed the helmet from the handlebar, thrusting it toward her. “Safety first.”
Shayla grabbed it from him, it's cool surface heaven against her fingers. Everywhere on her body was hot. She couldn’t wait to have the wind rushing past her. She couldn’t wait to have her arms around Luke.
“The important thing is to hold onto me real tight,” Luke said, flashing his teeth. “And just trust that I’ve got you.”
Shayla nodded. Trust. That was an interesting concept. Could she trust him? She wanted to. Mostly because her body was begging her mind to do whatever it took to allow her this glorious, sensual freefall.
Luke swung his leg over the seat and patted the space behind him. Shayla followed suit, sliding up until her thighs cradled his. He smelled like leather and smoke, and she leaned against him and wrapped her arms around.
A loud roaring echoed through the night air, but it wasn’t from Luke’s bike. Shayla craned her head over Luke’s massive shoulder to see that two guys on bikes were approaching, though they stopped before they entered the parking lot of the station. They just stared at Luke, their faces hard and angry. Who were they? And what the hell did they want?
Shayla opened her mouth to ask Luke if he knew them, when she saw that one of his hands had slipped into his jacket pocket. Did he have a knife or something in there? Her pulse pounded. A gun? Whatever it was, the other bikers revved up their engines and took off back down the road, leaving a cloud of dust swirling through the darkness.
“What was that about?”
Luke shrugged. “Tough guys trying to be tough.” He pulled his hand out and started the ignition on his bike. Shayla gripped him harder, and his chest rumbled with a low chuckle.
She found it hard to believe that the whole confrontation she just witnessed was simply a matter of “tough guys trying to be tough.” There was no show in it. No peacock feathers. Their presence had seemed, to her at least, to be more of a wordless threat than a display of dominance.
The first creeping of doubt began to trickle into Shayla. Perhaps not doubt about whether Luke was a good, safe guy. It was more doubt about the simplicity of perceiving him that way. There was a lot under the surface of Luke that she clearly didn’t understand, which wasn’t necessarily a problem in itself.
Who didn’t have skeletons in their closet? But, a guy who rode a bike and had tattoos like Luke’s might have more than his share. She was already walking a tightrope even getting on his bike. How would she feel about her adrenaline high when the stakes rose?
The bike roared, gliding forward through the parking lot. Shayla’s arms tightened even further now that they were moving, and she resisted the urge to close her eyes and shove her face in the back of Luke’s jacket.
She could do this. This wasn’t all that scary.
But it was a bit scary. Every time they turned, she felt their bodies angle down toward the ground. It told her instincts that she was near death and pain, and a wave of panic rose in her gut. But, once she got past that—or rather, overlooked it—Shayla enjoyed the rest of the ride.
It was like she was an animal, a monster, roaring down the streets at impossible speeds, experiencing the scents and sights of the world without the barrier of a windshield. Though the turns were scary, each one came with its own little dose of euphoria. It kept her alert and wide eyed, because even just holding on to Luke was a conscious process that she couldn’t afford to overlook. She was aware.
She could see why people loved it, and the vibrating seat wasn’t exactly strumming the wrong chord with her either. She could also see why motorcycle deaths were so gruesome. She was acutely aware, every second, that one wrong move from Luke could be their last. It would only take a moment for them to be wiped of the face of the earth. Or smeared across it.
Luke stopped at a diner on the outskirts of town. She hadn’t expected him to go to McDonalds or anything, but part of her had expected he’d choose some place a little bit less...family friendly.
A bell above the door jingled as they walked in, but there was nobody around to hear it. It didn’t appear so, anyway. But, sure enough, a call from the kitchen a moment later informed them to seat themselves, and that someone would be right with them.
The booths were green and white, with colorful menus perched on them. Shayla glanced around, unable to choose from so many options. That had always been a crux of hers. She could easily figure out her top choice between two or three options, but she couldn’t even pick a favorite color because there were too many.
“Where should we sit?” she asked, leaving it up to Luke.
He shrugged and walked
over to the table in the far corner. He slid off his coat and chucked it into the corner of the booth. “Here good with you?”
Shayla nodded, sliding into the opposite side. She pulled off her blazer and set it aside as Luke had done his jacket. Beneath, they were both wearing t-shirts. Shayla smiled.
“So,” she said. “Tell me about Trojans MC.”
Luke shrugged. “Not much to say. I started the club after high school. We’ve got a decent number of members now.” He grinned. “And we ride motorcycles.”
Shayla rolled her eyes, but smiled nonetheless. “And the club name—does it have anything to do with the tattoo on your arm there?” She pointed to the Greek script she’d been admiring earlier.
