I saw him wipe his eyes with a corner of his t-shirt sleeve as the barks of his merriment slowed, which took more than a few minutes. Minutes that I used to gather up all the paper, metal and plastic from our meal and take to the nearest trash can.
"Peeps?" he said with a chuckle when I sat back down at the table. "No, I do not think so."
Okay, he maybe one of the most gorgeous things I'd ever seen, and I admit that he seemed to have the 4-1-1 on how to keep a girl safe and out of the public eye, but he was really starting to piss me off. True, I hadn't trusted him at all, mainly because of his gender in the beginning. But at his words, that distrust had started to morph into good old fashioned shut-the-fuck-up anger.
"You don't believe me?" I asked with as much outrage as I could, considering, once again, he had caught me in a lie. As stated, I'm not a very good at the prevarication stuff.
His eyes again zeroed on mine and all traces of humor were gone from his face as he shook his head 'no'.
"Which part?" I pushed. I needed to know so I could back pedal as fast as my legs, erm, my mouth could work.
"All of it," he said finally after letting me stew and squiggle under his unwavering stare. "Let's start at the beginning. What is your name?"
"Ah…uhm," I began trying to remember what name I'd given him earlier. I always tried to keep the first letter the same, but I couldn't dredge up the one I'd given him before. Remy? Roxy? Reina? Rita?
"Look at me, please," he barked on a low note. "I asked for your name, which should not be a difficult question. Not for someone that just needs a place to sleep so she can call her people to resolve her 'problem'." The bastard even used his fingers for air quotes over the word problem.
I snapped my eyes back to his and saw his were guarded. He was on to me, and I couldn't shake him off.
"Your name?" he prompted, breaking the silence that had descended. A silence that wasn't comfortable in the least. "And the truth this time."
I stared at him, doing a bit of measuring and assessing myself.
Could I trust him?
I reviewed the hours I'd been with him, trying to find a chink or a crack in any of our interactions that showed me he was looking to profit from my 'problem'. The way he'd held me during my freak-out over the storm was the part that swayed me as well as the bit at the truck stop in hiding my hair.
While I couldn't trust him completely, I was willing to take a small risk.
"Reese," I said finally, and I felt the tension in my shoulders release a bit as I spoke. "I won't give you my last name, but my real, first name is Reese."
"Reese," he repeated and I loved the little burr on the 'R' when he said my name. The way he said it made my plain, old everyday first name sound sexy and mysterious.
"Yeah," I said, ducking my head and tucking my hands between my knees. This honesty shit was scary.
"Are you running, Reese?" he asked with a head tilt.
"Yeah," I admitted quietly, feeling my heart beat hard within my chest. I still wasn't 100% sure he wasn't working for him, even though Bayco was way better than any of the others that I'd had run-ins with before.
"Do you need help?" he asked, his voice almost a low growl in the quiet of the park. I turned my head and saw the baseball game was breaking up. This question was harder to answer than the other ones. But it wasn't me asking him for help. Rather it was him asking if he could help me.
A big difference.
Huge in the fact that for once in my life, someone other than my mama was trying to give aid. And it was a man who was doing the asking. In my life, in the few times I'd actually tried to request it, I'd either been laughed at or found that the male version of help only seemed to help them—never me.
I swallowed thickly before I nodded, crossing my fingers underneath the table.
He blinked slowly. "I want to hear the words, Reese."
"I need help, Bayco," I muttered.
"How old are you, draga?" he asked, his voice still quiet and deep.
"Twenty-one and what's that name you called me? That 'draga' thingie?" I answered and glanced at his face, catching his look of doubt. "What? You don't believe me? It's the truth!"
"You look and act so much younger," he said thoughtfully after a thorough study of my face. "Since you seem unsure of your name, I gave you one of my own."
I let what he said settle around me and felt my eyes narrow as I thought.
"How old are you, then?" I asked and felt my chin jut at my question, making it more like a challenge.
"Twenty-five," he answered without hesitation and without breaking eye contact.
It was my turn to be shocked. He was only twenty-five? No, that couldn't be right. I studied his face. Maybe it wasn't so much his looks that made me think he was so much older. His attitude? His calm, his control, in spite of everything?
"I, ah, I thought you were a lot older," I stammered. He lifted one eyebrow in question. "Not, like, old-old But you know, like thirty-old."
I got a dual eyebrow lift at my explanation. I decided to shut up since I was only making it worse as I tried to explain. At that, the lights, which had dimly lit our wooden rectangle, went out.
I heard him sigh from across the table as my eyes tried to adjust. All I could see was the shadow of him in the street lights that encircled the park.
"I am tired, Reese, although I need to get home quickly. We will find a place to stay and sleep for a few hours. Then we will continue our journey and our talk," he said and I could hear the exhaustion in his voice.
Hey, wait a second.
Who was he to be making decisions about what 'we' were going to do? As a matter of fact, when did the two of us become a 'we' anyway? I opened my mouth to disagree but before I could, he spoke over me and my mutinous thoughts.
"Please do not argue with me, Reese. I am tired and sore and short-tempered."
Although I wanted to say a lot more, I shut my mouth and simply followed him to the motorcycle. My arguments could wait for another time.
Dedication
As ever this book is dedicated to my progeny—you know who you are, especially for listening when mom starts talking about people that aren't even real!
And to Jennifer Guffey. A reader who took the time to email me and ASK for the Hellion Series after reading Hiding in Plain Sight. I can't thank you enough, Jennifer!
Hat's off to Laura Kingsley, my editor and Faustino Gaitan, my book cover designer. You two are helping me learn how to be a professional author instead of a girl that just types out some books about love.
And to you, dear reader. For taking a chance on a new author and sticking with her as she is still learning and growing. It really means a lot!
For those of you that have been with me on this journey, thanks for the memories!
For those of you still on your way, where've you been? My heart's been waiting for you!
Author Bio - J.A. Hornbuckle
Aren't we all curious about the person who wrote the story we read? I know I am.
Here's what I know about myself:
I love red wine
Live music gives me tingles no matter what style
Muscled, long-haired men are my own personal kryptonite
I can't deal with the cold which is why I live in Phoenix, Arizona
Of course that's just the tip of the ice-berg!
At first meeting me, people think I'm somber and a little stand-offish. I'm really not. It's a case of my outsides not matching my insides. Because there's a freaking party in my head almost twenty-four seven.
I'm old enough to know better but still young enough to do it anyway (...the best part of aging is that you know the CONSEQUENCES of your actions and weigh the internal scales accordingly!)
I love writing, especially romances but only where the 'man' portion is a part of the ro-man-ce word. And...I believe, really do have faith, that there are happily-ever-afters and hope you do too.
Feel free to contact me:
Ema
il: [email protected]
Website: http://www.jahornbuckle.com (Be sure to sign up for my newsletter!)
Facebook: J-A-Hornbuckle
Twitter: @JAHornbuckle
GoodReads: J A Hornbuckle
Other Books by J.A. Hornbuckle
Pole Dance
Human Hieroglyphix I
Tap Dance
Human Hieroglyphix II
Everybody Falls
Bewitchments
Hiding in Plain Sight
A Grantham Christmas
The Possibility of Trey
Reinventing Mel
Taking a Dare
Silo's Story (coming soon)
Taking a Dare - A Hellion MC Novel Page 27