More sirens filled the street. Shit. I hurried onto the bike and started the engine. Beside me, he straddled his BMW S1000RR and fired it up.
I rolled forward to the mouth of the alley and looked back. He hadn’t moved, his helmet pointed toward me, his body upright and still.
My chest tightened. I wasn’t ready to say good-bye. What if this was the only encounter we ever had?
“You coming?” I shouted over the pipes. The image of him coming curled my lips into an immature, hopeful, and probably goofy-as-hell smile. Good thing he couldn’t see it.
He studied me for a heated moment then lowered into a tuck against his bike and yelled, “After you. You can count on it.”
My smile stretched so far across my face, it hurt. I mirrored his lean, opened the gas, and squealed into the street.
Blue and red lights filled my vision on all sides. Most of the cops were in the process of detaining bikers, but several cruised up and down the perimeter. Like the one that just pulled in behind us.
I gave it more gas and tore away, Evader right on my tail. The Ducati had a faster top-speed than his BMW, but I didn’t have the balls to push it over 200 mph. Even now, our 160 mph speed scared the bejesus out of me. I half-expected him to pass me, but as the flashing lights faded behind us, we fell into a steady clip with me in the lead.
Adrenaline surged through my bloodstream as we blew through red lights and zipped the wrong way on one-way streets, weaving around traffic and narrowly missing oncoming cars. Breaking all these laws might’ve exploded my heart if I were alone, but having him with me, trusting he had my back, it was crazy liberating.
In fact, I kind of hoped he would try to pass me so I could show him the top speed of my bike.
A few minutes later, I veered onto the freeway. Figured it was the best way to escape the traps of downtown streets.
But where to now? Would he follow? Hope fluttered in my belly, and my limbs tingled. I didn’t know what I was hoping for exactly. To see his face? Fat chance. To hear his voice again? Yes, please. To fuck with our helmets on? Awkward, but I’d take it.
Watching his headlights in my side mirrors, I stayed on 290 until Ashland Ave and turned north toward Union Park. Plenty of baseball diamonds, tennis courts, unlit corners in the playground…yeah, unlit corners.
I swear, I hadn’t smiled this much since that time Collin secretly filmed Donny McKnight, my high school crush, taking a shower in the locker room. Damn, that boy had a tight ass.
When I reached Union Park, I slowed to a stop in an empty parking lot beside the basketball courts. Evader slid in beside me, and I struggled to keep my breathing at a normal tempo.
His long legs braced on either side of his bike, and his gloved hands rested on his knees. He didn’t speak, simply watched me from an arm’s length away. It was surreal to be this close to him. How many people saw him outside of the races? Who was he when he wasn’t shrouded in black and straddling a bike? And the question every woman in the city wanted answered? Was his face as viciously sexy as his body?
He rolled his neck on his shoulders and flexed his fingers. “Got a name?”
God, that voice. I bit the tip of my tongue as heat bloomed between my legs. “Yeah. You?”
“I’ve got a couple.” He lifted a boot, resting it on his frame slider, and perched a forearm on his knee. The movement brought his helmet so, so close to mine. “Why are you here, rich girl? All alone with a known felon? What do you want?”
The better question was, why would he follow someone like me? What did he want? I should feel him out, play the brazen hussy I was sure he was used to dealing with.
I leaned over my bike and propped my elbows on the gas tank, stretching out my body for his eyes. “I pegged you for a fuck-first, ask-questions-later kind of guy.”
His low, digitized chuckle sizzled my pleasure centers as he leaned his head back, revealing a shadow of stubble beneath the strong lines of his jaw. When his helmet lowered, he reached out and trailed gloved fingers along the back of my thigh, around my ass, my hip, then repeated the caress, slowly, torturously.
The angle of his helmet followed the shape of my body and the movement of his hand, the exploration lighting up my insides with an electric buzz. Did he like what he saw? My breath quickened. Did he want to see more?
He leaned closer, hooked a finger under my chin strap, and dragged my helmet toward his. “Show me your face.”