Hard to Handle (Love in the Balance 2)

And you, he thought but didn’t say.

Sadie moved her hand back to her lap.

“Axle had mentioned his retirement plan when I arranged the sale of the bikes. So a few months back, I called him up and asked if he’d like to train me in-house and sell Axle’s to me. He liked the idea.”

“You’re going to be the new Axle?” Sadie asked.

“Well, I’d be the new owner. To be the new Axle, I’d have to gain a hundred pounds of muscle and grow my hair long again, wouldn’t I?”

At the mention of his lost locks, Sadie’s eyes flared with desire. Or maybe he was projecting. Aiden had fond memories of her hands threaded in his hair while he kissed her into submission. Of the sound of her soft mewls, the feel of her pliant lips…He shifted in his seat and searched his addled brain for where he’d left off.

“Are you buying all five stores?” Sadie asked, thankfully steering him back onto topic.

“That was the plan. Until his three-year retirement was bumped forward to three months.”

“Three months!”

Aiden dropped the napkin on his empty plate. “Yeah. I’m a little shy on the down payment, and loans aren’t looking good, since I have no house.” He sent her a sideways smile. “And you thought I couldn’t get any sexier than the divorced, jobless thirty-year-old you met last year. Now I live with my dad.” He nodded, teasing to lighten the mood. “I’m a chick magnet.”

A small smile played on Sadie’s face, but she didn’t laugh. Aiden didn’t feel like laughing, either. At one point, he’d had more money than he knew what to do with. Enough to buy Harmony a booth at The Brink so she could spend all summer pretending to make a living weaving hemp into bracelets. Enough to build a bike collection he could be proud of. Enough to dump a huge portion of that money into the hotel and casino right before Daniel and Harmony had the affair.

Aiden had walked away from all of it. Had given Harmony everything she wanted in the divorce with barely a fight. Had walked away from the business he’d cofounded, the business that eventually buckled under the soon-to-be frigid economical climate.

The urge to get everything back didn’t just revolve around his motorcycles. Sure, he wanted them, but he wanted more what they represented.

Passion.

At some point, before Aiden went into business for the money and married Harmony for…God knew what reason, Aiden was passionate about his life. Losing his wife, his business, his mother, and Sadie…had sucked the passion, the life, right out of him. Until the day he was stamping holes into flat metal pieces at a rate of a zillion a minute at the factory. His mother’s final words to him, before she’d grown too weak to speak, hit him like a sledgehammer to the temple.

You’re like me, Aiden. You have this unwavering optimism. Never lose that.

Unwavering optimism. He had to sift through a mountain of refuse to remember what he’d been like before. What better way to honor his mom, to keep that part of her alive, than to find what he loved and make a living doing it?

“I have a plan,” Aiden said, his purpose renewed. “I just need to pitch it to Axle. If he turns me down, he’ll sell to the highest bidder…and I can assure you, it won’t be me.”

Sadie’s face went visibly pale. “But the Midwest contract…” She blinked, winced. “That was selfish.”

Aiden couldn’t help chuckling. “We signed you for a year, Sadie. You’ll be okay for a while.”

She didn’t smile. “Yes, but I have a five-year plan for Axle’s. Whoever takes over might not like Midwest, might not like me,” she added, her eyebrows bowing in worry.

“Impossible,” he muttered, meaning it. He couldn’t figure for the life of him why her weenie of an ex-fiancé had chosen her sister over Sadie. He’d choose her Lava-soap abrasiveness any damn day of the week.

She ignored his compliment, eyes widening. “What if you’re not there…What if Axle’s gets bought out by some corporate giant who already has a national contract with another supplier? Probably ‘Something’ Unlimited. Motorcycles Unlimited.” Her lip curled.

Aiden put a hand on Sadie’s wrist to halt her tirade on the woes of corporate restructuring. “All the more reason for you to help me convince him I’m the right buyer.”

She looked at his hand covering hers, then back at him, her expression hardening. “Okay.” She folded her hands together on the table and the sharp glint returned to her brown eyes. “Tell me your plan and I’ll tell you if it’s crap or not.”