“Um…”

“I got home, Lauren, went straight to you. After a month of wantin’ nothin’ but that, to be home and have you on the back of my bike, I go straight to you and you throw attitude at me and shit in my face. I said somethin’ that hurt your feelings and you busted my balls for two weeks. You treat me to that, what do you expect me to do?”

I gazed around in confusion, considering he’d been sweet to me for nearly two days, he got me safe to my family, got in Brad’s face for me on more than one occasion and gave me three orgasms. I’d already thought he’d forgiven me.

Perhaps I was wrong.

“Um…” I mumbled, not looking at him.

“Baby, get your ass over here,” he ordered and my eyes flew to him.

“Sorry?” I whispered.

“Get your ass over here,” he repeated.

“Are you going to throttle me?” I said it partially in jest, feeling the waters, partially seriously.

He moved fast, stepping toward me in a lunge, he caught my hand and stepped back, taking me with him and yanking my hand at the same time so I crashed into his body.

His arms curved around me and he looked down at my face. “Lucky you’re wearin’ those shorts and that top, Ace, all that skin, those tits, those legs, can’t stay pissed for long.”

“Maybe I should go shopping again,” I muttered.

“You plannin’ on pissin’ me off again?” he asked.

“Not intentionally,” I answered.

“Not exactly what I wanted to hear,” he murmured and started walking me backwards toward the bed, “but it’ll do.”

“Tate?”

“What?”

“If Neeta’s married –?” The back of my legs hit the bed and we both went down.

When we landed and Tate settled on top of me, his fingers slid into the hair at the side of my head but his eyes never left mine.

“It’s over,” he whispered.

“But –”

His lips touched mine and then he pulled back. “It’s over, baby.” He kept whispering. “It shoulda been over years ago but it’s definitely over now.”

“How could you –?”

“Because she’s Neeta,” he answered my not exactly asked question.

I shook my head and put my hands on his shoulders, not to push him away but also not to hold him to me. “I don’t understand.”

His hand left my hair and slid down to cup my jaw, his thumb moving out, the pad of it drifting across my lower lip as he watched and talked. “Years, she’s been under my skin. Took me that long to work her out.”

This was not the news any woman wanted to hear about another woman and I felt my body get stiff under his.

His eyes came to mine. “Laurie, it wouldn’t be for a few days that I’d feel the difference.”

“What difference?” I asked, my mouth moving under his thumb.

“Didn’t know it then, know it now.”

“What?”

“Two kinds of women get under your skin. The ones who do damage, they don’t feel good there but once you’re f**kin’ stupid enough to let them in you got no choice but to take the time it takes to work them out. Then there are the ones who don’t do damage, who feel good there, feed the muscle, the bone, the soul, not rip it or break it or burn it. The ones you don’t wanna work out.”

Was he saying what I thought he was saying?

“Tate –”

“You get me?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” I answered honestly but even I heard the hint of hope in those three words, probably because it was me who felt that hope.

“You will,” he promised.

Wow.

“Tate –” I breathed.

“Quiet, Ace, done talkin’.” And it appeared he was as his head was descending and his hand slid into my hair again.

“But –”

“Quiet,” he muttered against my lips.

“I –”

He kissed me and my hands at his shoulders slid around his neck, definitely to hold him to me as he tuned me right out of my mind and right into the vibrations he was creating in my body.

His lips slid down my jaw to my ear as his hands slid down my sides to my h*ps and around, to my behind where he pulled them up, fitting my soft ones into his hard ones.

The thin thread I was holding onto my mind with twinged.

We had a lot to talk about. I didn’t know him, hardly at all. He’d played professional football, for two games but still, that was huge and the fact that he played only that short time was heartbreaking. He had a bad knee and he didn’t act like he had a bad knee so I wondered if he still did. And if he did, I wondered if he should be running. He had an eagle tattooed on his back and I wondered if that had something to do with the football team for whom he played only two games. He had shit going on in his life but he didn’t tell me what that was and I figured, since it seemed we were starting something, I should probably know. He’d just worked a woman out from under his skin and I needed to discuss that a bit further. Was she entirely gone? Was there a little bit of her left? What happened to make them history? Was I there now? How deep was I?

Not to mention, I needed a very long, thorough lesson in biker slang so I didn’t accidently mess anything up again.

I held tight to that thin thread and I turned my lips to his ear.

“We should finish talking,” I whispered.

“Fuckin’ you now, baby,” he whispered back, his tongue touched my earlobe and his hand slid from my bottom to between my legs were his fingers slid into the inside leg of my pajama shorts and drifted feather-light across my panties. “We’ll finish talkin’ later.”

“Okay,” I breathed which was a lucky thing, since his tongue and fingers snapped that thin thread that attached me to my mind and it was a miracle I could speak at all.

* * * * *

Laurie, it wouldn’t be for a few days that I’d feel the difference.

My eyes opened and I saw the room was dark. We hadn’t pulled the curtains again and I saw the outside lights shining in, illuminating Tate’s painted shoulder in front of me. I was curled into his back, my arm resting on his waist.

I stayed where I was awhile, hoping sleep would come.

Seems I got a f**kin’ type.