by Marie Harte
Most of the crowd went with him. Unfortunately, a few of the more aggressive types stayed near Sadie. Gear refused to answer anything more than the bare minimum, legally under a gag order, which sucked so much ass. He told them he’d left the show, had nothing to do with Sofa’s with the exception of enjoying their food, and that Sahara and B-Man deserved each other. Which set off more questions.
And that’s when all hell broke loose.
He gaped as two of the reporters in front of Sadie’s tent stood drenched in water. A few ice cubes littered the ground near them. Make that drenched in ice water.
“How dare you?” the mistress questioner yelled. “You assaulted us!”
“With water? Give me a break. Hey, I told you to move.”
“Three times,” Elliot added.
Sadie continued, “We have to keep the milk cold, you know? And that ice was melting. We can’t serve bad milk to customers, or we’ll get in trouble. We normally dump the water where you’re standing. It’s not my fault you two refused to get out of the way.”
“You throw water where customers would be standing, you stupid bitch?” the nasty female reporter screamed.
“Lady, there are kids around.” Sadie frowned. “Keep it clean, would ya?” She smiled and waved at a group of people gaping at the spectacle nearby while the reporters around Gear started focusing on the real story—bitchy Marsha Concannon getting the tables turned on her.
Sadie waved at the crowd. “Who wants bat cookies? Devil’s food cupcakes? Ooo, who wants to see a real witch? She’s right here!”
Gear couldn’t help chuckling as he walked quickly away, forcing the others to walk with him or lose a shot of him. He made it to his bike, confident Thor would find another way home. Then he hightailed it back to his place, wondering how the press would spin things.
That evening at home, he found out.
* * *
Thor sat next to him, both of them basking outside in Gear’s in-ground hot tub. Sadie had supposedly been too busy to meet that night. Gear still thought he scared her. But after seeing the hatchet job the news had done, he worried he might have scared her away for good.
“Oh hell.”
Thor turned up the volume on the tablet that he refused to leave inside. He had the thing propped up on a lap table right next to the tub. “This isn’t good.”
The woman Sadie had iced—Marsha Concannon, a real asshole, in Gear’s opinion—was ripping Sadie a new one. “Gear’s angry new mistress—I’m sorry, his angry friend—got violent today when approached about their relationship. She also had some very unflattering things to say about B-Man and Sahara. I’m sensing some jealousy issues.” Marsha tittered. “But then, who wouldn’t?” They flashed a picture of Sahara at her best, side by side with Sadie’s painted face, cobwebbed hair, and angry snarl.
“That has to hurt,” Thor noted. “I feel for you. But hey, if you want to see where this goes with her, she’ll have to get used to stuff like this.”
“Why? I’m leaving the spotlight, Bro. No more TV. I’m done with all that.”
“You wish. It’s going to take time to wind down, no matter how much you want to sweep it all away.” Thor turned off his tablet and slunk back into the tub. “Ah. Man, this feels good.”
“It would have felt better if I’d been sharing it with Sadie,” Gear muttered.
“Too bad.” Thor sighed. “Her brother seemed nice.”
“Who, Elliot? He’s cool. Funny. And he makes great cider.”
“He’s a cook?”
“He owns Sofa’s with Sadie and her sister. I guess he’s a cook. I mean, he bakes, but he also makes food, like catering and shit. Why?” He saw his brother’s flush, and he didn’t think it was from the heat. “Oh, hell no. You can’t be sniffing after Elliot. You’ll make things worse and screw it up for me with Sadie.”
Thor gave a harsh laugh. “Seriously? You think I’ll be the one screwing up your supposed relationship? And just what is that, anyway? Because the last I knew, you were off women forever. Then you followed that with a few choice names for Sahara. Followed by even more choice names for Brian. Though he really is an ass. I never liked him.”
Gear grunted.
“Well?”
Gear chose to change the subject, because he didn’t know the answer to Thor’s question. “Brian wasn’t lying when he told them it’s official. Though I should have been the one setting everyone straight.” He sighed. “I saw my lawyer again a few days ago. We finally came to a settlement the network accepted. I can’t talk about what happened—”
“What? That’s ridiculous!”
“I’m out all the way. I have no rights to Motorcycle Madnezz. But the bike and tools I brought to the show come home with me. And I still retain credit on the bikes I did while on the show, so I can have that to fall back on when it comes to prior work cred.”
“That’s it?”
“That and they bought out my shares in the company. It’s still not much, because they squeezed me out of the bonus shares I thought were mine, but fuck it. It’s done. Over. And anything that happens from here on out is no longer under their control. I can set up shop, work for someone else, leave the business altogether. It’s my choice. I’m done with fucking TV. No more appearances.”
He still didn’t know what to do with himself. The past two months had been agony, going into the shop to finish orders, working alongside guys who’d once been his friends. Only Smoke and Chains still talked to him. But the bitterness of all he’d endured stung.
Did he have it in him to start fresh with a new garage, new bikes? Should he do what he loved best and focus on the bikes alone, which would mean working for someone else? He’d been approached by a few custom places looking for a designer. Problem was he’d be losing control by working for a boss. He really didn’t want to do that.
“You need to find a new place to work. Your own,” Thor said as if reading his mind. “You can’t work for anyone else. You’re an asshole.”
“Hey.”
“Truth hurts. You’re just like Otis. You need to create, but it has to be your own thing, your own way. Why not use your current notoriety”—at Gear’s glare, he amended—“fame, and get a small place? Do everything your way. Iris will help you with a new brand. Screw Motorcycle Madnezz. Do something crazy. Like Cycle Junkies.”
“Oh, because that name has never been used.” Gear snorted.
“Or Motorcycle Gods. Bikes We Likes.”
“Just stop.”
“Or how about Manly Men and the Power Tools That Love Them?”
Gear had to chuckle at that one. “Okay, I get it. You think I should hop right back on the horse.”
“I would have said bike to make it a proper analogy, but yeah. You’re gun-shy now, because you got majorly burned. But you have your health. You have me and Iris. Mom and Dad too.”
“And…? Sweeten the pot a little, Bro.”
Thor splashed him. “Well, you might have Sadie too. That’s if she hasn’t seen tonight’s entertainment news feeds. And if you’re even in a relationship, because you swore you’d never have one again.”
Gear sighed. “She’s cool. I really like her. I didn’t want to. Didn’t plan on her. But she really rocked the Xena outfit. She likes beer and burgers. She says what she’s thinking, and she’s not all that impressed that I was on TV. That’s kind of nice.”
“There is that. You haven’t had to work for a woman in a long time. Especially not since the show aired.”
“Fame sucks. Trust me. I didn’t want it from day one. Brian talked me into it. And stupid me, I listened.”
“Okay, if the pity party is starting again, I’m done.” Thor walked out of the tub and wrapped up in his robe. “I need to head out anyway. A bunch of us are geeking out over some old-school D&D.”
“If only you meant Dances
& Dolls.” A popular strip club downtown.
“Plebeian.”
“Huh?”
“Insulting you is pointless when you start feeling sorry for yourself. I’ll talk to you later. I have a date.” Thor darted back into the house.
“With a board game and nerds,” Gear mumbled. Damn it. He did feel sorry for himself. He needed to go out. To think about something else. To see Sadie.
Gear groaned and rested his head back, staring at the starlit sky. He had the perfect backdrop for seduction. And no Sadie. He could call any of over a dozen women to join him for an easy fuck. But none of that mattered. He wanted Xena.
His warrior princess with her trash talk, her right hook, and her ice water–tossing, obnoxious self.
He grinned, remembering Marsha’s shock. That grin faded when he considered Marsha’s revenge. Shit. What if Sofa’s suffered because of that post? He jumped out of the hot tub, turned off the jets, and put the cover back on. Then he hurried inside and, after drying off, called Sadie.
“What?” she snarled on the second ring.
“Ah, hi.”
“Oh. Hi, Gear.”
He frowned. “You sound tired. Everything okay?”
“You obviously haven’t seen Facebook or YouTube lately. Congrats. You’re viral.”
He cringed. “I am so sorry. I didn’t think they’d find me. They must have caught on to the Camry.”
“Ya think?”
He felt awful. So of course he went on the attack. “Who the hell told you to throw ice water at those reporters?”
“She was a bitch. She deserved it.”
“Well, yeah, but—”
“And you should stop being such a pussy and defend yourself.”
“What?” Pussy? “I have,” he growled. “But no one listened.”
“Probably because every word out of your mouth is insulting to one faction or another. Well, I told the truth, defended your sorry ass, and I’m not sorry.”
“That’s two sorrys.” Great. Now he sounded like Thor.
“You know what? I’m going to drink, wolf down some pizza, and try to forget the verbal smackdown my brother already gave me. I can do without your shit too.” She hung up.
He swore and got dressed, then took his quieter bike, the one without the monster pipes, over to Sadie’s. No way in hell they’d end the conversation like that. It took him a good forty-five minutes to get to her place. Traffic in Seattle sucked worse every day, but he loved the city. His family lived nearby, and he’d made business contacts here—that probably wouldn’t last. But still.
Seattle, home to the Mariners, the Seahawks, and a damn good cup of coffee. It was home.
And the traffic still sucked ass.
He was grumbling to himself as he drove to Sadie’s apartment building. He parked down the street, hoping no one messed with the bike. It wasn’t his bling bike, more like a crotch rocket, but it blended and got the job done. He carried his helmet with him as he walked to her door, then realized he needed a key to get in the building. Shit.
A man exited, recognized him, and asked for an autograph, holding out an Entertainment Weekly magazine. Gear flushed. Who was he to sign anything? Still, he signed the thing, thanked the guy for watching, and felt good when the dude expressed sympathy for being screwed over. So one guy believed him. Then he was nice enough to open the door.
Gear hurriedly slipped through and soon found himself knocking on Sadie’s door. No way he’d call and give her a chance to ignore him again.
“Hold on, Elliot,” she yelled, opened the door, then tried to close it on him.
He pushed his way through and leaned back against it. “Now, we can talk.”
She glared. Was it wrong that he grew hard looking at all that fierce, feminine fury?
“You.”
He swallowed. “Me.”
“You did this.”
He kept quiet.
“I—You—Oh.” She stormed out of the entryway and back down the hall to her open kitchen and living area. While she paced, he took in more details. She liked blue, because he remembered pale blue on her bedroom walls. A neutral gray coated the living room, broken up by blue pillows, paintings, and a throw over the ugly-as-hell couch. Her kitchen was white. And no longer spotless. A giant pizza box, half empty, and a six-pack of beer with two missing sat on the counter. He saw a bag of chips and salsa, some Jujyfruits candy, and olives nearby.
“Are you pregnant?”
She stopped and stared. “What?”
“Olives and candy and chips? That’s weird.”
“That’s comfort food.” She flounced down on the couch, tapping her foot. “I’m so pissed right now.”
“At me?”
“At me.” She swore. “I have a temper, and as Elliot so kindly pointed out to me, this is the second time I’ve put us under the gun of a potential lawsuit. Though I don’t see how dumping our ice water at the park is hurting anybody.”
He felt for her. She looked miserable.
Sadie wore her hair down. Her cheeks were flushed, her pajamas barely hiding her braless rack and long, toned legs. He sat down next to her before she could see his erection and suspect him of coming over for sex. Which I did not, he reminded his cock.
“Look, Sadie, Elliot should remember that no one saw you punch Sahara but me. So you’re really down to just one lawsuit.”
“Thanks.” She blew out a breath. “I didn’t mean to go off on those cretins. But I can’t stand when the little guy gets stepped on.” She gave him a once-over. “Though you’re not exactly little.”
“You hate injustice.”
“Exactly.” She grabbed an open beer in front of her and downed some. “Want a beer? There’s more on the counter.”
“Thanks.” He helped himself to one and kicked back with her. “I’m really sorry about all this.”
She sighed. “It’s not your fault. I mean, it is for getting into TV and all, but you can’t help those vultures going after you. I guess it could be worse. They could be camped out on my doorstep.”
“Don’t even think it.” He shuddered. “It started out slow, you know. The whole fame–infamy thing. We had a show about building custom bikes. I was all about making the motorcycles. I left Brian and Sahara to all that other bullshit. The acting bits. The unnecessary drama.” He drank some of his beer. “I think you’d like the shop the way it started. Some of the guys are okay. Or were okay. Who the hell knows what they think anymore?”
He would miss ragging on Smoke. Hearing about Chains’s latest foray into online dating. The guys were huge and dense when it came to women. But genuine and serious about bikes. Then again, maybe he’d been wrong about them too.
“It’s weird. We’ve been on for three years. On my way inside your place, some guy asked for my autograph.” He shook his head. “Me. Who the fuck am I? I just build bikes. Big deal. It’s not brain surgery.”
“Or rocket science,” she agreed a little too readily.
He turned to argue, saw her smirk, and relaxed. “So I’m forgiven?”
“I was never really mad at you. Sorry. You were an easy target.”
“I don’t know about easy.”
“Trust me. You’re easy.” She drank again. “I saw the hard-on you’re trying to hide. You put the e in easy.”
He groaned and held the bottle to his forehead to cool off. “It’s your fault for not wearing a bra. Seriously, I only came over to apologize. I swear I’m not here for sex.”
“Even if I want some?”
What did a guy say to that? No, because I want you to see me as more than a sex toy? Or hell yes, because I’m not right unless I’m with you. Inside you. Together.
So he did what men always did when unsure of the answer. He drank beer and refused to respond.
Chapter 9
How had she missed her opportunity? She’d had a sexy, repentant Gear all to herself, and Sadie had fallen asleep on him. At nine on a Saturday night.
I am so lame.
She stared up at her bedroom ceiling, Gear breathing quietly beside her on her bed. To her consternation, she still wore her clothes. A peek at him showed him fully dressed, minus his boots. They’d cuddled under her blankets together.
Sadie closed her eyes and turned, pretending she was still asleep.
He hugged her tight, murmured her name, and sighed.
And bam, her ability to withstand the guy sank to an all-time low.
She liked Gear. A lot. More than was healthy. For all her demands that they remain casual, she had feelings for the guy. And that was plain stupid. They’d really just met. And if that picture of her looking like something out of The Exorcist next to the gorgeous Sahara had taught her anything, it was that Sadie was so far out of Gear’s league, it was ludicrous.
She burrowed closer to him, melting when he held her protectively, keeping the world out while keeping her warm.
She tried hard to forget her brother cursing her out. Elliot’s rebuke had stung. Mostly because she knew he was right. Acting out, like a five-year-old having a temper tantrum, did no one any good. Besides, that nasty reporter had had the last laugh, making Sadie look like a total monster while Sahara once again came out smelling like a rose.
I hope Marcia, Marcia, Marcia gets a cold from that ice water, she thought nastily. Then she felt guilty for bringing The Brady Bunch into her drama.
Gear stirred, and she ran her hand over his chest, stroking lightly. He was so much more than a personality on TV. So what the hell was he doing with her?
“I know you’re up,” he said, his voice rumbly.
Busted.
“Come on. I want to take you somewhere. Let me clean up real quick.” He moved fast when he wanted to. Darting out of bed, he shut himself in her bathroom and emerged moments later looking fresh and clean, though that shadow of a beard was sexy hot. “Your turn.”
“Hnnng.” Which meant I’m not a morning person, even if I am awake.