He barks out a laugh. It’s one of those nice, easy laughs he lets slip once in a while. “I wasn’t gonna say that. But now that you mention it…”
I bite back the desire that hits me at the idea of Decker’s dick sliding down my throat, the sudden urge to know what he tastes like and how much of him I could actually fit. Instead, I slam my fist into his shoulder.
He winces. “A woman your size should not be able to hit so damn hard. Happy to see that swing of yours has only gotten stronger with time.”
“No getting soft in this life.” I break eye contact and busy myself with his motorcycle. “But for what it’s worth, you didn’t deserve that first one. I was looking for someone to blame and you just happened to be there.”
He smirks “Right. Me and my punchable face.”
His cable is fixed. The work is done, but I move my hands over his machine anyway. Touching wire and metal and carbon fibre, checking nuts and bolts, poking at anything and everything.
Decker either doesn’t care or really is as bad in the garage as he implied and doesn’t notice that I’m tinkering with nothing.
“And maybe you didn’t deserve that second hit, either,” I say.
“Nah, that one I earned. If you’d gone for Sergeant Bag of Dicks instead, I don’t know that either of us would have come out of that in one piece. He’d probably have been a little tooliberal with those fists of his, and I’d have had to kill him for that.”
“What a shame that would have been,” I say with a smile.
He clears his throat. “Well, maybe I’m sorry for being a… what did you call me?”
“A fuck boy.” Snorting, I peer up at him. And I find I can’t look away. I can’t focus when he’s near me like this, when he’s looking at me like he wants to take a bite out of me.
A slow smile quirks up at the edge of his mouth. “Circling back to you on your knees.”
Head dropped, I sigh. “Really, Linc?”
His shoulders shake, face painted with wary amusement. “I’m kidding. Half kidding.”
“I thought I wasout of your system?”
“And I thought I was out of yours?”
I push up, skirt around him, and pick up a rag to clean my hands. The first notes of “Brown Eyed Girl” by Van Morrison filter around us, and Decker’s easy smile falls from his face. He stands and then quickly kills the music.
“Not a big Morrison fan?”
“I’ve heard it too many times.”
“Right.” I dip my chin. “Can I ask you something?”
His lips turn down in a sincere expression. “Sure. Shoot.”
“When you and Jack spend time together?—”
“We don’tspend time together, Grace. We’re not teenage girls.”
With a huff, I toss the rag at him. “Whatever. When youhang out. What do you talk about?”
He catches it easily and wipes his own hands. “I don’t know. Baseball, bikes, regular shit. Why?”
“He’s different. I’m just trying to understand him. I expected a little hostility from Axe. He and I have always been a little icy.But Jack doesn’t seem to want me here. Things just feel… I don’t know. Weird. Did something happen to him?”
He’s quiet for a beat, then he lets out a loud breath. “You’ve been gone a long time.”
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not really in a spot to talk about what they’ve been up to.”
