Who knew having Jake between my thighs could make me feel so good? Oh, right. Everyone.
I wondered idly how many women he’d charmed the pants off of with a motorcycle ride. Then decided it really didn’t matter. I was here now. And for however long this lasted, I was going to soak it up.
We drove for another few miles, passing horses and buggies to the outskirts of Lancaster and then into the city itself. Jake took his time maneuvering the streets until—too soon in my opinion—he backed us into a spot on the street. He cut the engine and pulled off his helmet.
“We’re here.”
I slid off the back and yanked off my own helmet. I shook my hair out and heard a thunk and a muffled curse.
An early twenty-something had tripped over an easel sign in front of the frozen yogurt shop. He set it back up and hurried off, casting glances over his shoulder.
“She’s all mine,” Jake called good-naturedly after him.
“Jake!” I hissed.
“What? He saw you do the slow-motion hair toss out of a helmet and walked smack into the sign. It was fucking hilarious.”
I shoved a hand into my hair. It still felt appropriately poufy, and I hoped it wasn’t standing on end.
“He did not.”
“Totally did,” he argued. He took the helmet from me and lashed it to the bike. “You hungry?”
Looking at him in his leather jacket, his boots, his well-worn jeans, I was suddenly starving.
“I could eat.”
He reached for my hand and pulled me into him. His eyes were more serious than I was used to seeing them. “You look real good, Mars.”
“Thanks,” I said lamely. “So do you.”
He grinned and leaned in nice and slow. When his lips landed on mine, it was with a slow, sexy burn that had me insta-melting. Yeah, this Jake Weston wasn’t worried about getting anywhere fast. He was more interested in having fun along the way.
He pulled back, a cocky grin on his handsome face. “Come on. I’ll feed you.”
He fed me tacos from a truck parked in a courtyard between a coffee shop and a music store. We laughed and flirted our way through a couple of gourmet tacos and split a cold soda on a park bench. Food gone, we walked a few blocks around the downtown. A lot had changed since I lived in the area. A revitalization had slowly but surely claimed entire city blocks. Now there were co-working spaces and kitschy clothing stores nestled between farm-to-table restaurants and hip small businesses.
“You’re good at this,” I told him after he negotiated with a guy selling flowers from a sidewalk stand.
“Here,” Jake said, shoving the fall bouquet at me. “Appreciate these before we get back on the bike. Good at what?”
“Dating,” I said. “A motorcycle ride, a taco truck, and now flowers? A-plus.”
“It’s not as hard as I thought it would be,” he admitted, taking my hand. The sun had dipped behind the buildings, and the streetlights were flickering to life. “I just did what you told me. Thought about what you’d like to do and then did it.”
God, he was so…everything. He walked down the sidewalk with a sexy swagger like he owned the city. He looked like a model out for a casual, sexy bad boy photoshoot. Don’t think I didn’t notice every double take from every woman and several of the men we passed.
And now he was being thoughtful and sweet?
I came to a halt on the sidewalk outside of a yarn store when the realization hit me. I was grooming Jake to be the perfect man. For someone else.
I’d go back to frantically polishing my resume, landing jobs that weren’t quite the right fit, dating guys who also weren’t the right fit. Meanwhile, Jake would meet a nice girl, fall in love with her, and spend the rest of his life making her very happy.
I wanted to throw up my tacos.
“Something wrong?” he asked.
“Nope,” I lied. “Everything’s great.”
“We should probably head back. Bonfire’ll be starting soon,” he said. “You done appreciating those?” He nodded at the flowers.
I took one more sniff. “Done.”
He plucked them from me.
“Excuse me,” he said, dragging me up to a woman in her fifties chattering away on her phone. She was wearing sweatpants and clutching a grocery bag in her free hand.
She stopped mid-sentence, her jaw working as she took in the gloriousness of Jake Weston.
“Yes?” she breathed.
“These are for you,” he said with that damn devastating grin.