“Evening,” I answer.
His eyes make an obvious perusal of my body before landing on my face. “It’s not often you see lone travelers on the road anymore. Run into trouble?”
His posture is relaxed on top of the bike, and there are no visible weapons on his person. He seems to be low risk.
I shrug and give him the truth. “Car broke down a ways back.”
He glances around as if he might find evidence of my abandoned vehicle. “Fixable?”
“Not by me,” I say with a rueful huff of a laugh.
His fingers tap on his handlebars. “Where you headed?”
“Atlanta.”
“You military?” he asks as he inspects my jeans and t-shirt, then his eyes move to the leather backpack slung over my shoulders.
My gaze lingers as I try to interpret his expression, but it’s frustratingly blank. “Used to be,” I settle on.
He leans closer, and the glow from the headlight reveals a deep pitted scar on his right cheek. Frizzy, sandy blond hair is pulled into a knot on top of his head, and stubble covers the line of his jaw. There’s a flare of heat he doesn’t hide as he examines me with the same scrutiny.
When he finally breaks the silence, he nods southeast. “I’m headed towards the city. Staying in a place a little outside. I can’t take you there for safety reasons, but I could get you within twenty miles of the gates. It would save you a lot of walking.”
“That it would,” I agree warily.
This isn’t charity, and he isn’t offering out of the goodness of his heart.
“What will that cost me?” I ask.
His eyes dart down my frame again before locking on mine. “You can be creative with your offer,” he says with a shrug. "I’m not picky.”
My stomach tightens at the implication, though I keep my face neutral.
“I’m not fucking you,” I say, leaving no room for argument.
A smirk pulls onto his lips, tightening the scarred skin on his cheek. “There are plenty of other ways to please a man, pretty.”
My mouth opens, ready to turn him away out of sheer stubbornness. But my feet ache, and he could get me there in hours instead of days.
“Five miles, not twenty,” I say. “You’ll get payment when you deliver me and not a moment before.”
Thick fingers drag over his chin as he gives me another assessing sweep of his eyes.
He jerks his head behind him. “Climb on, then.”
I tighten the straps of my pack as I mentally prepare myself for being shoved against his unfamiliar body for the next few hours. My leg swings over the motorcycle, keeping what distance I can between us.
He glances over his shoulder at me. “I won’t bite unless you want me to, pretty. Hang on so you don’t fall.”
My teeth clench as my arms ring around his middle. His back is broad and shoulders wide, and I have to scoot close to get comfortable. Pine soap dulls the strangeness of having someone’s scent in my nose, and I’m thankful he’s clean.
He chuckles, amused but not unkind. The engine revs and I squeeze his waist to keep from flying backward. Wind whips through my hair, and my feet throb from walking all day, but eventually, I settle.
The night passes in a blur, and the light pollution of the city appears as a glow. Buildings come into view, nothing more than shadowed silhouettes on the faint orange dawn that licks at the horizon.
The bike slows as he pulls into a small cluster of trees, and my legs tingle from being in the same position for so long. Blood circulates as I climb off the back, causing pins and needles in my hands and feet.
Silence permeates the air as he kills the engine, interrupted by a metallic squeak as he uses his boot to shove the kickstand in place.
