Page 25

When I hand it back to him, he starts up the bike, and we take off.

The wind doesn’t affect me anymore. Only because I keep my hair tied up daily. The only time it’s not in a braided bun is when I wash it.

The clothes I wear are biker-approved and appropriate. Jeans, no matter if the heat’s still brutal, and a jacket. I never feel the need to take it off when I’m in the clubhouse because I like knowing I can walk outside at any moment. Even if it’s an illusion that I can just walk away.

But my nails? This is the first time they’ve been exposed to the bite, to the slices of wind on my open nail beds.

The pain needles at me to the point that I let go of the handlebar and grab Atom’s vest instead.

His head twists for a moment at the contact, but he says nothing as I lean in close for the first time and hold on to him as we make our way to the nail salon. I cradle my hands between us to cut out the sting of the world around us.

I let myself, just today, just in this moment, accept his warmth and let it seep into me, hoping it dethaws not only my hands, but maybe even a part of my soul that froze over the day I lost my first fingernail.

When we get there, we’re early. I don’t know where my tacos are. I must have tossed them on the ground or something in my rage back at the clubhouse when I showed them all the damage one of my tormentors did to me.

I didn’t do it for their pity. I didn’t do it to get them to understand. I really don’t know why I did it at all, other than I didn’t want to be tied to someone I hated. I don’t like getting my nails done. It hurts every time. I do it out of necessity. That’s it. Nothing more, nothing less.

When we go inside, Keiko is already waiting on me and ushers me to her back room. They set this up just for me when I started coming here. They saw how my hands made their other clients squeamish, so I was sent to the back.

The room is small, barely fitting us, but Atom doesn’t make a sound as he stands sentinel for the two hours it takes for each nail to be reattached.

When he pays the bill without a word and escorts me outside, I wait for him to get on the bike.

Only then do I give him something.

“When I left my family, they didn’t tell me to never come back. They didn’t tell me anything. They let me go, in their own way, but there was no warning as to where I could or couldn’t go.”

“Why are you telling me this?” Atom asks as he leans over his handlebars and crosses his arms.

I shrug, then shake my head. “Knew no one. Had no one. Only knew I needed to get as far away as I could. Did some research and ended up here.”

He nods. “Kansas City.”

I shake my head again.

“No. Here.” I look at the salon, then back at Atom. “I moved here because this was the only place that advertised that they could treat my hands outside of the West Coast.”

I watch as realization covers his face.

I didn’t come here for school or because of where it was in relation to my family. I came here for my nails. That’s it. Everything else was something I worked to get into.

“School scholarship?” he asks with a head tilt.

I get why he’s asking. I told Ruby the first time we met that I moved here from Florida because of a scholarship. That they took pity on an orphan.

“Lied. I had enough money to get in and applied my ass off to get whatever else I could.”

He hands me my helmet, which I usually secure to the back of the bike when we park. He has one too but rarely uses it. I don’t care if he does or doesn’t. I only wear it for the hair issue.

“Still want tacos?” he asks as I put the helmet on and get on the back of his bike.

“Sure.”

“Good. We’ll stop before we get back to the clubhouse,” he says, half shouting as he pulls out into traffic.

Awesome. Exactly where I want to go after the day I just had.

Just wonderful. Freaking grand.