Rose laughed. “Not yet, but I’m going to have to start if I ever want babies around, I think.”
“I’m telling you, I think it’ll be Mitch and Paige.”
Rose wasn’t up for arguing the point any further, so she simply shrugged. But Paige was a nice girl and she was smart enough not to get mixed up with a guy like Mitch. That relationship would only lead to heartache.
Chapter Nine
Paige was going to have to learn to nail down the specifics where Mitch was concerned. “You didn’t say anything about a motorcycle.”
“It’s a beautiful day.”
What was beautiful was the man sitting sideways on the seat of his big Harley-Davidson, with his arms crossed so the blue T-shirt was pulled tight across his shoulders, and his ankles crossed, which emphasized his long legs.
“You said we’re going shopping,” she reminded him, flailing for excuses, because she was afraid getting on that bike was going to be the beginning of the end for her resistance.
“It has the saddlebags. And I’m not planning to buy her a pony or anything. It’ll work. Hell, if we find the perfect thing and it’s too big, I’ll go back in the truck or have them ship. And I have two helmets.”
She was out of excuses, except one, and she didn’t really want to tell him she wanted to take the truck so she could keep a safe distance between her body and his body. There was no distance on a motorcycle.
“Give me a minute,” she said before going back into her house.
She rummaged through her purse and put her keys in the left front pocket of her jeans. Then she slid her license and debit card into her back pocket. The rest of it she left on the table, since a purse on a motorcycle was possible, but not practical. Then she ducked into the bathroom and took a few minutes to pull her hair into a French braid, which was the only method she knew to combat helmet hair.
Mitch was still in the same position, looking like the poster child for slightly naughty boys-next-door, when Paige walked back out and locked her door behind her.
“Where are we going?” She took the helmet he handed to her and put it on, thankful she knew how to buckle it already and wouldn’t have to feel his fingers brushing along her jaw.
“Thought we’d cruise the back roads into the city. More lunch options and places to shop.”
And more miles with her thighs wrapped around his ass. “Okay. Do you have any idea at all what you want to get? Christmas being so close, and all.”
He laughed and stood up straight so he could turn and straddle the bike. Short of clapping her hands over her eyes like a child, there was nothing Paige could do but watch and try not to drool. Then he fired the engine and kicked the stand out of the way. Once he had it balanced, he gave a little come on gesture with his head.
Taking a deep breath, Paige threw her leg over the short sissy bar on the back, settled on her part of the seat and set her feet on the back pegs. Then she faced the big dilemma. Hold on to the bar behind her, which become awkward and uncomfortable fairly quickly, or hold on to Mitch, which would also be awkward and uncomfortable, but immediately.
He started to walk the bike forward, cutting the wheel to miss her car, and Paige realized it had been a little longer than she thought since she’d been on a bike. As he rolled out onto the street, she put her hands on his hips out of sheer nervous reflex and, when it didn’t seem to faze him at all, left them there. He gunned the engine a bit heading through town, showing off, and she hoped the helmet hid her face well enough so the entire population of Whitford wouldn’t know within five minutes she was on the back of Mitch Kowalski’s motorcycle.
All it took was a few miles of open road to make her forget all about whether or not people knew what she was up to. It was a beautiful day, with the sun warm on her back, but the rushing wind keeping her cool. She watched the scenery go by in a way she never got to from the driver’s seat of her car, and breathed in the scent of fresh country air.
Her nerves had settled, but she kept her hands casually rested against Mitch’s hips. She could put them in her lap—she’d ridden with one of her mom’s boyfriends almost every day and he hadn’t even had a sissy bar—but she liked touching Mitch and he didn’t seem to mind being touched.
He turned his head a little so he could be heard over the wind and the bike’s engine. “You okay back there?”
“I’m better than okay,” she yelled back. Because she’d leaned forward so he could hear her, her breasts pressed up against his back and heat flooded her body, making her even more aware of the way his hips pressed against the inside of her thighs.