“I’m not touching youthere, you sicko,” she hissed.
The laugh that ripped out of him was wild, unrestrained, and so startlingly genuine it made her blink. It was rough, almost foreign, like something torn loose from deep inside him that he didn’t let out often. He turned his head enough for her to catch his grin, wide and wolfish, his dark eyes crinkled with real amusement.
“Nettie, if you ever touch methere,” he said, mocking her and still laughing, “I promise we’re gonna be facing each other and your hands would be much lower on my body than my abdomen—but for now, I need you to relax and hold my waist.”
Her stomach flipped at the implication, and her voice came out sharper than she meant. “You’re a creep. You know that? I swear, every time I think you have a decent bone in your body, you find a way to pulverize that thought.”
“Hands?” he said simply, still amused.
Mortified, she shoved the visor down with a snap, hiding her burning face. With exaggerated reluctance, she wrapped her arms around his waist and leaned forward. His body was firm under her hands, solid in a way that made her feel both safe and acutely aware of every inch between them.
The kickstand scraped up.
The bike rolled back.
Adrenaline shot through her like a lightning strike. Tate revved the engine again, and the machine vibrated beneath them, alive and hungry.
“Ready?” he asked, glancing back.
She nodded, breath caught somewhere in her throat.
The Ducati surged forward, slipping out of the parking garage and directly between two parked cars and out into the night. Wind snatched at her hair that was hanging out of the helmet instantly, dragging it free in a streaming banner behind her. The garage lights flicked past in sharp succession before they burst into the open air of the street.
The rumble beneath her, the pull of gravity as the bike leaned into motion, the sheer exhilaration of speed—it was electric. Her arms tightened instinctively around Tate’s waist, fingers curling against the fabric of his hoodie, and the warmth of him bled into her palms. His hair whipped around his head, dark strandstugged loose by the wind, and she realized that she was smiling inside the helmet.
He drove carefully, controlled, easing her into the rhythm of the ride. The city blurred around them until it felt like they existed in their own pocket of air and motion. When he turned onto a frontage road that ran parallel to the highway, her nerves transformed into something bright and reckless. She tilted her head back and let out a loud, unrestrained yell.
Tate’s laugh rolled back to her, barely audible over the engine but unmistakably delighted.
“Faster?” he called over his shoulder.
“A little!” she hollered back.
The bike leaped forward with sudden power, throwing her heart into her throat. She clutched him tighter, pressing closer without meaning to, as if he were the only tether she had to the earth. The rush of it all—the speed, the sound, the heat of his body beneath her hands—was dizzying.
She felt wildly free. Alive in a way she hadn’t known she was missing.
And it was Tate who’d shown her.
Nettie clung to Tate’s back as the motorcycle roared beneath them, eating up the night one stretch of road at a time. At first, she thought he was just taking the long way home, but after thirty minutes of weaving down back roads, dipping onto highways, looping past familiar landmarks, and then right back into her neighborhood, she realized what he was doing.
He was stalling.
It felt like he didn’t want the night to end—and neither did she.
The steady vibration of the bike hummed through her legs and chest, the wind tugging at her jacket and whipping strands of hair loose beneath the helmet. The world blurred around her. Headlights streaking, storefronts glowing, houses passing likesilent witnesses… but here, pressed against his back, everything felt strangely still.
No arguments. No bitterness. No ghosts of their messy history. Just the road, the dark, the steady thrum of the engine, and the warmth of his body anchoring her. For the first time in a long time, she could breathe.
When he finally coasted into her driveway, the reality hit hard. The magic dissolved with the crunch of gravel beneath the tires. She sighed, already missing the freedom of the ride, the illusion that the two of them could exist in peace, if only for a little while.
Tate cut the engine, the sudden silence pressing in on them. He sat still for a moment, gloved hands tightening on the handlebars, as if gathering courage. Then he turned his head just enough for his voice to carry back to her.
“Where’s your car?”
“At work.”
“Do we need to go get it?”
