“Peel back the bandage and let us see it!” Quinn says excitedly as she shifts to the side of the hotel bed and reaches down to touch the corner of the gauze Liam covered my tat with.
“Not yet!” I swat her hand away. “I can’t … Josh has to be the first to see it.” I feel a little protective and maybe superstitious. “Plus, I don’t want to know what it is … not until it’s the right time. Like the wedding day.”
“Aw! Okay, that’s so sweet,” Britt says, laying on her tummy with her feet in the air.
They’re lounging in the hotel room watching sitcom reruns.
“Yeah,” Quinn agrees. “We forgive you. So what’s next? Any more envelopes?”
“Josh said there’d be more, but I don’t know when. I do know I’m seriously ready for breakfast.” I check my watch. “Then at ten-thirty I have to pick up the gowns from the bridal shop and then swing by the florists. You all still in?”
“Still in!” they agree.
“Let’s find somewhere with good omelets.”
***
“You know, it’s not too late to change your mind,” Ryder says very seductively.
I throw my head back, laughing. “You’re crazy!”
“Yes, I am.”
“Josh would kill you.”
“Correction. Josh would want and try to kill me.” I can hear the smile and challenge in his voice.
After the girls and I ate breakfast and went to the bridal shop, we found Ryder waiting there for me to fulfill more of Josh’s scheme.
“Do you ever give up?” I remember our first meeting when he held my hand close to his mouth after he kissed it—in front of Josh while he was introducing us—and he told Josh he’d better watch out.
“No way, beautiful—I don’t stop until I obtain what I’m hunting.” His deep, rough voice reverberates through the motorcycle’s communication system.
I get it. As a bounty hunter he travels all over the country, the world for that matter, if the price is right, recovering some of the law’s most dangerous fugitives and bringing them back to justice. He’s dark and dangerous on so many levels.
Of course he’d never do anything to hurt Josh, or me. He’s just being … Ryder. He flirts with every woman he talks to—taken or not—he couldn’t care less. And if he starts a fight with someone, all the better for him. Yeah, he’s a loaded gun, always looking to fire.
Now I’m sitting on the back of Delilah, his beloved motorcycle, wondering what his envelope from Josh said and where he’s taking me.
“Since when do you listen to pop music?” I tease.
He’s playing Blurred Lines over the radio of his BIKE. I get the subtle hint. He’s totally messing with me…
I think.
“Just sending out a message, sweetheart,” he drawls. “Take it or leave it.”
I start laughing again and this time he does too. I like when rough and tough men can laugh and make light of themselves.
“I gotta change this shit or I’ll never hear the end of it from the guys.” He chuckles as he quickly turns the pop to Five Finger Death Punch’s “Wrong Side of Heaven.”
He steers the bike down a closed off street. The buildings are in various states of disrepair and surrounded by demolition and construction vehicles. Orange cones and bright yellow caution tape warn us back.
Obviously, he couldn’t care less because he pulls over at the corner of the cross street and parks.
“And what is it that we’re doing here?” I ask, taking off the helmet and looking around.
“Sorry, gorgeous, can’t answer questions.”
“Right … because you’re known for living by the rules and doing what you’re told.”
“Hey, hey! Fight fair.” Ryder puts up his large fists and protects his face. “My man tells me what he needs, I’ve got to accommodate.”
As he speaks, he’s interrupted by the click of a megaphone. “Axman, take cover.”
“You know them?!” Now I get what he meant when he changed the music.
“Come on.” Placing his hand on the small of my back, he guides me ahead of him to the building behind us, opens the door and moves me inside. Before the door fully closes I hear the rumble of machine engines coming to life across the street.
We take the elevator to the fifth floor and stop at the large picture window at the end of the hall. The bright afternoon sunlight fills my eyes. Looking out across the street I watch as the two tall, steel cranes on either side of the building pull back their gargantuan iron wrecking balls.
And that’s when Ryder takes the gold envelope from his leather vest.
My heart literally thrills at the sight of it. I feel the warm smile spread across my face as I reach out to take it.
Quickly, he snatches it out of reach.
“Hey!”
“You love him, right?” he asks, his face full of concern. “Because I’ve never seen Josh North scared before,” Ryder confides as he sets the letter in my hand. “I did last night when he thought he might lose you.”