They rode up and down the air strip, Erin practicing finding Jack in her mirrors, riding beside another bike, braking and turning, starting from a cold stop. She had a scary moment when the bike’s wheel caught a crack in the runway’s cement, another when she gave it too much gas to get moving, but by the time Jack gave her a closed fist to signal a halt, she was vibrating with joy.
She pulled off her helmet and shook out her hair. “I am one with my bike,” she proclaimed, then laughed out loud.
“You look good out there,” he said, booted feet braced on either side of his Duc. “Comfortable. Confident.”
“Thanks,” she said, then turned to look over her shoulder at her rear end. “Did I tear your sister’s leathers?”
“No,” he said.
“Are you sure?”
“I’ve been staring at your ass in those pants for the last two hours,” he said. “You didn’t tear them. Keep them. Rose isn’t riding right now, and you’ll need them until you buy a set of your own. Let’s get you some city riding experience.”
She slipped her slacks and sensible librarian shoes into her backpack, then followed him from the air strip’s entrance to the highway, then into town. People stared from the windows of their cars as they waited at stoplights; another rider on a Suzuki speed bike lifted a hand in greeting. They roared through the college’s main gates and down the tree-lined drive to the library parking lot.
Never in her life had she been this cool, or this happy.
“My knees are jelly,” she said when she swung off the bike and pulled off her helmet.
“You’ll get used to it,” he said, keeping his bike idling, his helmet on. “You’ll get yourself home okay.”
It wasn’t a question. “Yes,” she said, self-conscious about the stares coming her way, knowing she couldn’t do anything more intimate than say thanks. “I just … I couldn’t have gotten over that hurdle without you, and Keenan. Thank you.”
His visor hid his face, but he reached out and patted the Duc’s scratched gas tank. “I knew you could do it,” he said. “See you around.”
Fumbling with her helmet, she bounded up the stairs to the library’s staff entrance, her legs both wobbly and supercharged. But the thing that stuck in her mind as she keyed into the building was the way Jack’s hand didn’t shake when he patted the gas tank.
Chapter Six
She was lit up like a city at night, her legs wobbly on the stairs to the library’s employee entrance, feeling both inordinately proud of her motorcycle gear, and terrifyingly exposed. The helmet banged against the doorframe on her way in, making everyone seated in the shared office space look up.
So much for avoiding attention.
“What on earth?” Carol said, her eyes widening.
“Hi,” she said with a quick glance at the clock. “I’m not … I’ll tell you later, after I get changed.”
She ducked into the bathroom, banging her elbows and knees on the tiny stall as she shimmied out of the tight leathers and into her slacks. Her blouse, fortunately, was a forgiving polyester blend, but the scent of leather and sweat and skin was unmistakable. She scrubbed her fingers against her scalp to give her helmet hair some lift, then peered at herself in the mirror.
She looked like she’d just had sex. Amazing sex. Heart-pounding, multi-orgasmic sex. Same flushed cheeks and throat, same bright eyes, same obvious but inexplicable energy vibrating in her skin.
The bathroom door opened and one of the work-study students walked in, her quick gaze taking in Erin’s face and hair, the helmet at her feet, the leathers neatly folded and tucked into her backpack. “Wow. Was that, like, you I saw riding up with what’s his name, the SEAL guy who’s lurking all mysterious and broody in the psych classes?”
She should have frozen. She should have lied. They were in a relationship, which was expressly forbidden by the school’s code of conduct. She should have felt ashamed, threatened, exposed.
“Yes,” she said simply. Chin lifted, gaze direct. It wasn’t about truth or lies. It was about claiming who she was becoming. “That was me.”
The student nodded, then slung her backpack down on the floor. “Cool,” she said, and walked into a stall. Erin bolted the second the door closed, shoving her backpack and helmet under her desk, then turned to Carol. “I bought a motorcycle,” she said.
“You did?” Carol said, eyes wide.
“A Ducati Monster 696.”
“Nice bike,” Terry the bearded electronic collections librarian said, peering around from behind his wall of monitors. Erin stared at him, because in the six months he’d been working at the library, he’d said not a single word not related to the job. “New?”
“A couple of years,” she said. “It’s in the lot.”
Just like that, everyone who wasn’t working with a student crowded back through the door and down the stairs to the parking lot to cluster around Erin’s new bike.
“Wow,” Carol said.
“Who put the scratches in it?” Terry said, fingering the gouge in the paint.
“I did, about two hours ago,” Erin admitted.
“Keep the shiny side up,” he said sagely.
“Working on it.”