were safe?” When he puts it like that.
“Hrmph,” is my only answer before I finally shrug him off and continue on with my shopping.
His deep chuckle follows behind me, which I ignore for the duration of my grocery shopping.
Declan is eyeing me like I’m some weird creature that he’s never seen before as I place all of my items on the conveyor belt twenty minutes later. Every now and again he wrinkles his nose and makes a disgusted face.
“What?” I finally huff out after the third time he wrinkles his nose in under a minute.
“Do you eat anything that tastes good?” He grouches.
I look down at all of my items and my forehead wrinkles in confusion. “What are you talking about? Everything that I bought tastes good.”
“In what world?” He scoffs.
I cross my arms and tap my Tory Burch flats against the floor. “This one, Declan. All of these foods taste good and are good for you. Unlike all that processed junk that you seem to like.”
His head tilts like a dog does when they’re confused. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
I point to the nasty bars that he’s still holding. “Just look at those. Instead of eating clean, unprocessed protein, you’re going to get that garbage. Why? Because it’s flavored like chocolate bar? When in reality it tastes like chalk.” I shake my head. “No, thank you. Everything that I’m buying is meant to taste great while being great for your body.”
“You’re one of those health food freaks?” His voice laced with disgust.
I roll my eyes and sigh. “I’m not a health food freak. I just pay attention to what I put in my body for the most part. You seriously can’t tell me that you don’t notice a difference when you eat like garbage and when you eat actual food.”
“I’m beginning to see why you’re single.” The jerk replies.
I bat my lashes. “Because all the men in my life are annoying?” I smile sweetly.
He points his index finger at me. “See, it’s that attitude that scares men away.”
I can feel my lips thin. “If my attitude scares them away, then I’m better off being single. That’s probably the same type of guy who’s scared of puppies.”
I hear a few snickers around us and feel my whole body flush. How I forgot that we were in the middle of the checkout line, I’ll never know. I look around and see one of the guys from the tattoo shop in town standing in the line right next to us. Honestly, if I wasn’t in a sort of lust/hate thing with Noah, I would be drooling over this man. Seriously, what do they put in the water around here?
“Darlin’,” Hottie biker or tattoo artist starts in a grave voice. “If you can’t find a man who will deal with your attitude, come find me. I know plenty of men who would walk on coals to talk to you.” He winks at me, causing me to go even redder, before doing a weird head nod thing to Declan. He grabs his bag and literally saunters off. I would feel bad about gawking at him, if I wasn’t one of like twenty women, of all ages, who were watching him leave.
Declan nudges me to the side and starts bagging all of my groceries. “Don’t even think about it.” He growls. “Bikers are off-limits to you.”
My eyes go wide. “What? Why?” I absolutely did not whine that part. Nope, not at all.
“Because you’re way too damn nice. He would eat you alive.” Dec huffs out.
“I could think of worse ways to go.” Our cashier states and has several other women around us murmur their agreement. I only give him a mildly triumphant look.
“Stop looking at me like that,” I tell the man who seems to think that he’s my big brother out of nowhere. “I have no interest in dating anyone right now.”
“Then why did you have the dopey look on your face?”
“Because oh annoying one,” I huff as I nudge him over to help bag everything up. “it’s nice to get complimented by a hot guy. Especially when most men that I seem to interact with around here either think that they’re my big brother,” I give him a meaningful look that he ignores. “or they treat me like I have the darn plague out of nowhere.”
He gives me a curious glance and I smile sadly. “Sometimes a girl just needs a confidence boost.” I shrug. I definitely don’t wish that Noah was the