Hard Charger: Jake & Sophia: A Hot Contemporary Romance (15 page)

He was far from the boy she’d had ten years ago.  He’d become a master, a man who knew exactly how to hold back on his own need in order to please his woman first.  He was employing that knowledge now, and moving precisely in a way designed to bring the pleasure inside her to a crescendo.  And when she peaked and cried out, her body shuddering as she hurtled into an oblivion of pleasure, he finally allowed himself to orgasm also, growing taut like a bowstring, then shuddering and gasping as it washed over him.

He fell heavily onto her, then rolled onto his back.  She cuddled up against him and wrapped her arms around him, her body still trembling and glowing with the aftermath.  He felt very heavy now, and she gently caressed his chest and carefully explored his bruises, even as her breathing slowly returned to normal.  He turned his head to rest it against hers, and she stroked his damp hair, his warmth a part of her still.

He slept then, his shivering completely gone.  She held him close and kissed his cheek every now and then, just to reassure herself that he was really there.  Above her the candles glowed brightly, their fragrant scent of cinnamon filling the room, then grew dim, gray, until darkness filled her bedroom.  The shadows slowly lightened as the first rays of morning sunlight crested the ocean, and he groaned in his sleep and shifted his body.  He drew her close to him, fitting himself against her and spooning up; and a moment of deep satisfaction filled her, a contentment of which she’d never known an equal. 

She gazed out the window at the wild pinks and purples that painted the sky, and told herself that this time, it would be different. He wouldn’t wake up and leave her.  And she wouldn’t spend the rest of her days wondering if she’d ever see him again.  Yes, they were stuck in the middle of a storm right now--a bad one--but they’d weather it.  Once it swept itself out to sea, they’d stand together as the rain stopped, and watch the sunshine break through the clouds.

This time, the ending would be one of
her
choosing.

Chapter Fourteen

The following evening, at
exactly eight o’clock, Jake was sitting on his bike outside Rowdy Ray’s Roadhouse.  He had on black motorcycle jacket and pants with the body armor sewn into the lining, heavy duty leather motorcycle gloves, and a full-face helmet.  Just an hour before, he’d carefully inspected his bike’s chassis, brakes, lights and fuel, controls, cables...everything.  He was ready to ride.  Hard.  His adrenaline was pumping. 

A few moments later, he heard it.  The low, threatening growl of a motorcycle engine.  A headlight came into view, and then the motorcycle pulled up—a Harley.  A dark-clad rider like himself dismounted and took off his helmet.  The Guardians’ distinctive knife and deer skull insignia decorated the back of his jacket.

Jake smiled.  “Alex.  Didn’t know you were joining us.”

“Luke gave me a head’s up.”  Alex nodded toward his bike.  “What do you think?”

“Looks bad-ass,” Jake replied.  He walked a quick circle around Alex’s bike so he could study it from different angles.  “Need to see it in the daylight, these streetlights suck.  Is she new?”

“First time out,” Alex confirmed.  “Bought it from a guy who needed to make some space in his garage.” 

“Looks like a Harley.”

“It’s a 2013 Forty-Eight with a couple of mods: a Breakout Bobcat two into one exhaust, stealth air cleaner, crankcase breather filter, bobbed rear fender.  Got rid of the front fender, too.”

“It’s gotta be fast,” Jake said.  “I love the vintage look.  Do you get a lot of crap and spray in your face without the fenders?”

“Hell, yeah.  Don’t take the fenders off if you’re going to ride in the rain.”  Alex petted the gas tank as if it were his favorite puppy.  “You’ll find out tonight how fast she rides.”

Just then, the roadhouse’s front door opened and Luke walked out. He too wore motorcycle gear, his jacket sporting the Guardians’ knife and deer skull.

“Hey, imagine finding you two here,” Luke said, the hint of a smile on his face, one Jake was glad to see.

“Yeah, we heard we’re gonna learn about alternatives tonight,” Alex replied, with a quick glance at Jake.  “Didn’t want to miss it.”

“Hell, no,” Jake agreed.

“Great.  Stephanie’s got the bar, my bike’s out back.  Give me a minute,” Luke said.

Luke disappeared around the back of the roadhouse.  While they waited, Jake and Alex talked about bikes, county routes, the weather, just about anything other than the Russian mafia and how the Rebel Guardians planned to deal with it.  The tough stuff, they’d talk about later.  Right now, it was all about the ride.  When Luke reappeared a few moments later on yet another Harley, Jake shook his head.

“What happened to your Triumph?” Jake shook his head, bemused by all of the Harleys around him.

Luke flipped up his visor and smiled.  “I still have it.  This is the bike I ride when I’m on Guardians business.”

“You consider this business?” Jake asked.

“Yep.  We’re bringing a potential new member to the club, so it’s business,” Luke agreed.

“
After
we ride,” Alex added.

“Glad I’m getting a ride out of it,” Jake muttered.  “Although it feels good to ride together again, the three of us.  It’s been a long time.”

Luke nodded.  “Almost a decade.”

In the distance, Jake heard the rumble of another motorcycle.  Idly he wondered who else in town had decided to go on an evening ride.  “You guys ready?”

“We’re waiting for one other person.”  Alex put his helmet back on and mounted his Harley.

“Who?” Jake asked. 

The motorcycle growl grew louder, and a fourth rider pulled up.  Similar to Jake, he had on a dark motorcycle jacket and pants, and a black helmet with its visor down.   Jake didn’t recognize him, but he did recognize the bike—a Suzuki Hayabusa with a couple of obvious mods, and a few others he felt certain weren’t so obvious.

“Goddamn, never saw a Hayabusa like that,” Jake said, and waited for the dark rider to take off his helmet.

The new rider said nothing.  He simply nodded toward Alex and Luke.

Alex and Luke pressed the starters on their Harleys.

“Hey,” Jake said.  “Aren’t you going to introduce me?”

Alex and Luke put their bikes into gear and headed out of the parking lot.  The dark rider followed.  Seeing no alternative but wondering what the hell they were up to, Jake started his bike and left the parking lot too, turning left onto Shoreside Road.  He noticed that the dark rider’s jacket bore the knife and deer skull insignia.  Obviously he was a Guardians member too, but who....?

They road as a group onto Jersey Avenue and kept their speeds low, which quieted down the rumbling, too.  Once they crossed the railroad tracks and turned onto a county route, however, they let it out, pushing their bikes up past the speed limit as they streaked toward a road that led deep into the Jersey Pine Barrens.

Alex smoothly moved into the front of the group and effortlessly popped a clutch wheelie.  He held it for a good five seconds before letting his bike down.  Grinning, Jake watched as Luke, not to be outdone, popped his own wheelie and held it longer than Alex’s.  Before Luke could even put his bike down, though, the dark rider came up from behind and popped a spectacular power wheelie, holding it longer than either Alex or Luke, and streaking past them as he did so.  Jake laughed inside his helmet.  There weren’t many bikes that could outride a Hayabusa.  He didn’t even bother following up with his own wheelie—his would only look lame compared to the dark rider’s.  Curiosity burned inside him: who was this guy?

They raced through the night, and eventually reached the Pine Barrens.  Moonlight flooded down on them from a nearly cloudless sky, and Jake felt it, as he always did: the road.  The power.  The freedom.  Deep satisfaction filled him as the ride temporarily sloughed all of his worries aside.  For a little while, he wasn’t thinking about the mafia, the police, the trouble his mother was in, or anything else.  He had his knees hugging the gas tank and had become part of the machine beneath him.  Only it wasn’t a machine any more—it was an extension of his own body.  Through it, he felt the pavement, sensed the bumps and gravel and cracks, and experienced the raw power of the engine like a flood of adrenaline through his veins.

They practiced wheelies at speeds so high that Jake thought he was in an Apache again, flying close to the ground.  He knew what they were doing was dangerous, but he didn’t care.  Life was dangerous.  That didn’t mean that he should stop living.  He challenged himself to go faster, to hold the wheelie longer. 

Throughout the ride, the dark motorcyclist on the Hayabusa proved himself the faster rider, the better rider, the one more adept at stunts.  By the time they began to emerge once again from the Pine Barrens and head back toward Rockport Grove, Jake had started thinking of him as a kamikaze.  And so, when Alex signaled the group to stop for a moment, Jake was determined to find out the identity of the fourth rider.

They raced toward a convenience store parking lot.  Jake could see he was going to get there first, and so he progressively engaged the front brake and leaned forward, putting as much weight as he dared onto the front tire.  Just before his bike stopped, the rear wheel lifted up as he’d desired, performing a rear-wheel “stoppie” that never failed to get a double-take from casual onlookers.  He smiled as he brought his bike down, then flipped his visor up to watch Alex, Luke, and the dark rider pull up, too.

Alex just brought his bike to a stop near Jake’s and then turned to watch Luke and the other rider.  Luke attempted a stoppie but ended up fishtailing wildly before he caught the pavement.  Jake was expecting big things from the dark rider, and he didn’t disappoint.  The dark rider engaged the front brake and shifted his weight expertly to send the bike up onto its front wheel even more smoothly than Jake had.  But the maneuver didn’t stop there.  He shifted his weight, and then the bike was spinning on its front wheel, going around once before gently falling onto its back wheel.

“Holy shit,” Jake murmured, awestruck.

Alex laughed softly.

“Who is this guy?” Jake asked.  For a moment he thought about his Uncle Martin, but then quickly dismissed the idea.  His uncle didn’t have balls like this.  He nodded toward the dark rider.  “Am I going to get introduced, or what?”

Luke smiled, too.  “No introductions needed.”

The dark rider settled his bike into neutral and casually straddled it, his boots on the pavement.  For the first time Jake noticed how thin the guy’s legs looked, how delicate.   Frowning, he studied the small hands, and watched as the dark rider undid his chin strap and lifted his helmet up.

A waterfall of long, dark silky hair spilled from the dark rider’s helmet.  Electrified, Jake stared as the dark rider shook her hair out and pushed it back, then fixed a pair of challenging green eyes on him.

“Sophia,” he breathed, his heart giving a giant thump, and then settling into an uncomfortably fast beat.

She laughed, the sound like the tinkling of a bell.  “Hi, Jake.”

He shook his head, bemused.  “I can’t believe it.”

“What can’t you believe?  That a woman can actually ride a motorcycle?”

“That one could ride it so
well
,” he admitted in hushed tones.  “Where did you learn to ride like that?”

“You’ve been gone for what, ten years?”  She lifted one dark, winged eyebrow.  “Well, for the last ten years, I’ve been riding with my big brother.  He’s taught me a lot, and the rest?  Well...”  She shrugged.  “I taught myself.  I guess you could say I have a knack for it.”

“Jesus God Almighty.”  Suddenly felt Jake pure, cold fear enter his heart as he remembered those wheelies she’d been popping, and that final 360 degree stoppie she’d performed.  “You gotta be careful, Sof.  These things aren’t child’s play.  One wrong move, and you’re dead—”

“Hey, take it easy,” she said, holding up a hand to stop him.  “I know what I’m doing.”

“She knows what she’s doing,” Alex affirmed.

“Yes, she does,” Luke added.

Jake frowned.  “I don’t like it.”

The other three riders burst out laughing. 

Jake’s frown deepened.  He realized he was standing up at this point, his butt not even touching the seat.  Worry for her was tightening around his chest like an iron band. He didn’t know what he’d do if she ever hurt herself, if she somehow fell off the bike and the worst happened.  What would his life be, without her in it?

He stilled, the pain sending him a message that he simply couldn’t ignore any longer.

He loved her.  Deeply.

He slumped back down into his seat.  Why the hell hadn’t she told him?

“Let’s go to the clubhouse,” Alex said, his voice kind.  “We can talk there.”

Jake shot a glance at Sophia’s jacket.  He noticed the Guardians’ insignia on it for the second time, and a fresh jolt went through him.  “My God, Sophia...are you a member of the Guardians, too? Can women even
be
members?”

“Didn’t think you were a Neanderthal, Jake.”  She snapped her visor down.  “Today, though, you’re changing my mind.”  With that, she started her Hayabusa and took off down the road.

Jake convulsively gripped his bike’s hand rests.  All at once he remembered the facts he’d heard about a Hayabusa: world’s fastest production bike anyone could buy, over 1.300 cc engine capacity, 170-plus horsepower, a crotch-rocket extraordinaire, one like no other.  He turned to glare at Alex.  “How could you let her ride a bike like that?”

“Who can stop my sister from doing anything?” Alex countered, and then he too roared down the road.

Luke shrugged.  “We’d better get going, bro, or we’re gonna miss the party.”

“Wouldn’t want to do that,” Jake replied, and then he and Luke were trailing after Alex and Sophia, their route taking them past Rockport Grove to a scrubby area on the outskirts of town.