Chapter 25
Jordan
The motorcycle came to a stop and Ricochet reached around to help me off the bike.
I smiled as he unstrapped my helmet, then stowed it in one of his saddle bags.
The way he always looked out for me made my heart warm.
Who was I kidding? He’d had me giddy as a school girl for the last few weeks.
Just speaking with him each day was enough to have me singing in the shower each morning.
Badly. It was not a skill I possessed. And yet I’d wailed along with my playlist this morning as I’d gotten ready.
My smile had been permanently affixed to my face since I woke up. And now here I was. My heart skipped a beat as Ricochet ran a hand through his hair, looking between me and the sign welcoming us to the Tucson Zoo.
“I figured you liked animals, so…” he trailed off, uncertainty coloring his tone. “Then again, you sort of work at one.”
“I love the zoo!” I told him, grabbing his hand and yanking him toward the entrance. Seriously, how was someone so rough around the edges so sweet? He always seemed to take the time to think of what would please me and then made it happen.
His chuckle was fast becoming one of my favorite sounds.
He wound our fingers together as we walked.
We checked in on some of my favorite animals and walked the entire grounds twice since it was a cool day.
There were times, even though we were at the end of March, where temperatures could spike into the low nineties, but the cloud cover that had rolled in overnight gave the air a slight chill.
We spent the majority of our time with the river otters. They were some of my favorite animals and I loved to watch them dance and play. It didn’t surprise me that he liked the huge powerful animals like the bears and big cats. They were a lot like him.
“Where do you want to get dinner?” he asked as we were heading toward the exit.
“Do you trust me?” I asked, giving him a mischievous look.
His brows shot up and he gave me the sexy little smirk I was becoming used to. “Sure.”
I glanced around, then hung a right, down the path that would bring us over toward the big cats again. “Hopefully it’s here. Ah! There it is.” I hadn’t seen it the first time through because we’d been so intent on the animals.
“Shit, seriously?” Ricochet asked when he saw the small building sitting off to the side of the path. “I haven’t had Sonoran hot dogs in a long time.”
“How long?” I asked while we got into line.
“Years, at least six.”
“Well you’re overdue. They’re so good.” I licked my lips in anticipation of the treat that I loved to eat every few months or so.
You could order them however you liked, but they typically came with a thin layer of beans laid across a thick roll type bun with a bacon wrapped hot dog on top.
The toppings included avocados, tomatoes, onions, jalape?os, and zesty mayo.
“What do you like on them?” I asked, bouncing on my toes a little while I tried not to drool at the aroma in the air.
Ricochet laughed at my exuberance. “Tomatoes, jalape?os, and mayo.”
Giving him an affronted look, I asked, “No onions?”
“Not when I’m on a date,” he teased.
“Psft,” I scoffed. “Date, schmate. You’re not being spared the onions, my friend.” I rubbed my hands together as though I were a villain plotting her next scheme.
“I guess I can live with your selfishness.”
My jaw dropped and I shoved him lightly. “I am not selfish,” I replied in a haughty manner. “I just don’t think a person should have to give up a key ingredient of a Sonoran Dog.”
“Whatever you say, Sunshine. If Princess wants onions, that’s what she’ll get. Besides, there are plenty of places to kiss you other than your mouth.”
The man could make a girl swallow her tongue with words like that. A blush worked its way over my cheeks and I just shook my head at him while he laughed at how nervous he’d just made me.
How long had it been? How long since I stood in the sunshine on a simple date, about to eat hotdogs, with a man who made butterflies appear in my belly?
Far too long, if at all. I couldn’t remember ever being this excited to be with a man.
After everything Dan had put me through, I’d shut myself away, too afraid of being hurt.
Ricochet had taken the time to pull me from my shell, allowed me to take things at my pace, and now here I was…
falling in love. Remembering the conversation from last night, I tried to shove all the feelings swarming me back down, but the damage was done.
This man had me standing on the precipice.
I really needed to find out if my heart was safe with him before I did something stupid, like hand it over on a silver platter.
We took our hotdogs, churros, and drinks over to one of the metal tables and sat under an umbrella.
The days were warming back up and soon enough we’d be heading into the summer months.
As someone who enjoyed the heat, I was looking forward to it.
I was used to the mild winters and scorching summers. I wouldn’t want to live anywhere else.
I took a massive bite of my dog and groaned in pleasure as all the flavors mixed on my tongue. When my eyes opened, I found Ricochet, hotdog halfway to his lips, just staring at me with hunger churning in his gaze.
“Sorry,” I said, a little embarrassed. “This is one of my favorite things to eat. If I let myself, I could eat them every day for the rest of my life.”
“I like watching you enjoy yourself,” he replied, then did me the favor of taking his eyes off me.
It was hard to swallow when a man was staring at you like he had been. We were only about halfway through our meal when I decided to bite the metaphorical bullet. “Ricochet?”
“Hmmm,” he responded, wiping his chin with a napkin.
I wanted to lick the juice from the jalape?o straight off his skin. Oh boy, was I in trouble. Heat zipped through my system. Never had I felt for a man the way I was feeling now. “I want to be honest with you.”
Now I had his attention. He’d set his hotdog down and was watching me with a wary gaze.
“I really like you.”
The smirk was back. “I like you, too, Sunshine.”
His nickname for me made me all tingly. He made me tingle. “I need to know that I can trust you.”
His eyes narrowed, all semblance of a smile gone from his lips. “Of course you can.”
“I…I’m not trying to be insulting,” I added. “I just need to know what I’m in for if I decide to take you up on your offer.”
“My offer?”
“To be your old lady.”
He sat back in the chair, it groaned under the movement and his weight. He was a big man and these small metal chairs were old and sun worn. “It’s not an offer, Jordan.”
I frowned. “Oh. I thought… Have you changed your mind?” Embarrassment was starting to creep over me. “What has all this been for the last few weeks if-”
“No. I haven’t changed my mind. It’s not an offer because you already belong to me.” He shook his head. “Not sure how many times I have to tell you before you’ll believe me. I know this lifestyle is new to you. I’m…probably not the sort of man you’re used to.”
“You’ve got that right,” I told him, a little irritated, but also secretly thrilled that he was still pulling the caveman routine.
I shouldn’t like something so blatant and unforgiving as him just claiming that I was his, but I did.
How was a girl supposed to figure out her feelings when he kept saying things that elicited such gut wrenching responses from me?
I wanted to toss it in his face that I wasn’t his…
yet. But that was stupid. I wanted to be.
Shoving the conflicting thoughts to the side, I waited.
“This is the way I am. I’ll probably piss you off sometimes.” At my snort he lifted his brows and grinned. “Fine, most of the time. But I’ll always protect you. You won’t be safer with anyone else than you will be with me.”
“I want to believe that, but…” I used a napkin to wipe off my fingers. It was more to give my nerves a chance to settle than anything. “We were talking last night and the girls mentioned a few things. About the club.”
He nodded, as though he was expecting this.
“I planned to tell you myself. It just seemed important to give you a chance to get to know me before I told you about that. I wasn’t trying to be misleading or secretive, I just couldn’t have you running off.
” He was throwing a little teasing in to ease the tension—at least that’s what I thought it was, but he could be serious, knowing him.
“My club is complicated. We’re not your typical weekend kind of club. We have chapters all over the country and each has a little bit of a different vibe to it.”
“And what’s your…vibe?”
He tapped a finger on the table in front of us, watching me like my hawk liked to watch a rabbit. “We’re vigilantes. We help keep the crime down in our city.”
“Your city.”
“That’s right. Tucson and all its surrounding towns belong to us. We help watch over it.” A blank mask had fallen over his face. He was waiting to see my reaction.
“And by helping you mean?”
“Whatever we have to do.”
“Is it dangerous?”
“Yes.”
I swallowed hard and looked down at my plate. The meal I’d been so eager to eat was churning in my stomach. “That scares me.”
“Why?” He reached across the table and took my hand. “I wouldn’t let anything happen to you.”
My laugh was a little hoarse. “I don’t care about myself, Ricochet. You may not know me well enough to realize that yet. I’d rather something happen to me than those I care about.”
A muscle ticked in his jaw. “I get that. I’m the same way.”
“Then you can understand how getting involved with a man who actively goes looking for trouble isn’t something-”
“I’m not your ex,” he snapped, eyes blazing.
“How do I know that? You and your brothers-”
“It's not so much that we look for trouble, we just take care of it when it shows up. We do what we have to in order to help people. Sure, we get drunk. We take risks. We live life in the fast lane, but I would never put my girl and her elderly father in the line of fire. I take care of what belongs to me.”
He was biting off every word. I hadn’t meant to offend him, or call his honor into question. I was just worried about history repeating itself. The air around us was charged and the only couple that had been sitting nearby gave us wary looks as they walked away.
Needing to break the tension, I let out a small laugh. “Don’t you dare let my dad hear you call him elderly. He’s only sixty.”
Ricochet took a few deep breaths and slowly his shoulders relaxed and he loosened the death grip he’d had on my hand. “Sorry. Look. I know this is a lot to take in. It was years before Gwen truly understood why I chose to be in this club.”
“I think I understand that part,” I told him.
When he gave me a questioning look, I continued.
“They’re your family. And they understand what you went through in the military.
What you need now that you’re out. They get you.
” The girls had mentioned that all the men in the club had been former military, not just Ricochet.
“Pretty damn close,” he admitted. “It’s hard to put into words, but you got it. Give it a chance.” Our eyes locked. “Give me a chance. I can show you how good it feels to be a part of this group of people. How good it’ll be to belong to me.”
“I want that,” I whispered.
“Then say yes, and put me out of my fucking misery.”
“Yes.” I squealed when he leapt out of his seat and swung me up into a bear hug.
His lips crashed into mine and suddenly nothing mattered anymore. Not the people at the zoo. Not my many worries. It was just him and me, and this thing that had been simmering between us for too long. It wasn’t a slow flame any longer, it was a raging inferno.
He growled in frustration after he broke the kiss. My dizzy mind tried to make sense of it. “What’s wrong?”
“Everything is too fucking far away.”
“Huh?”
“Your house. My clubhouse.” He gave me a considering look. “A hotel would-”
I made a face, understanding he was thinking of taking me to a nearby hotel for our first time together.
I’d just consented to being his old lady.
My body was on fire for him, but that didn’t mean I wanted to make love to him for the first time in a place where who knew how many other people had done similar things. Bleh.
He sighed. “Fine. My place it is.”
“Mine is just as close,” I offered.
“I don’t want my sister crashing our party,” he told me, grabbing my hand. He was walking so fast toward the parking lot I could hardly keep up with his long legs.
“Slow down,” I called out.
He stopped in his tracks and did something that had me shouting and laughing at him in the same breath. He hauled me up over his shoulder. “Can’t slow me down now.”
“Ricochet!” My insides clenched, ready for what was coming next. I somehow already knew he was going to upend my world. I couldn’t wait.