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I didn't want to keep playing this game with her. I wanted to find out more. I wanted to chip away at those walls.
“Alright,” she said, drying off her hands on a towel, “everything is all cleaned up. Have you put all the chemicals back in their places?”
“Yep. All where they should be.”
“Great. I guess we can be on our way then. I’ll see ya later.”
“Hold up,” I said suddenly, not entirely sure what I was going to say to get her to talk to me.
“Yeah?”
Food. Everyone had to eat. “I'm gonna go eat at a killer Indian place on the other side of town. I know the owner's son, he went to high school with me. It's the best Indian joint in town. You wanna come with? My treat.”
I was totally expecting her to turn me down, to make up an excuse and leave as fast as possible as she always did. So, when she replied, I almost fell off my lab stool.
“Actually, that sounds great,” she said. “Let's go.”
Chapter Thirteen
Brooke
I stared at the motorcycle with a strange cocktail of fear, excitement, and anxiety. “I've never actually been on a motorcycle before,” I confessed somewhat sheepishly.
He smiled. “No need to worry. I promise I'll take it easy.”
“You'd better. Adrenaline rushes are not my friend.”
He laughed, but there was a little sympathy in his eyes. “Thrill seeking isn't for everyone,” he said. “And, there's nothing wrong with that. I know extreme sports and crazy activities are seen as the cool thing to do these days, but everyone should just do what they enjoy, rather than being into something for the sake of putting out some fake image that they think others will like. Just be yourself. If people don’t like you… their loss.”
I nodded in response. It was a surprisingly insightful opinion that I definitely hadn’t expected from Emerson. Truth was, I felt a little ashamed of myself for being surprised. It was possible I'd been a little too hasty to judge him based on superficial factors. “That's a refreshing perspective,” I added.
There was a hint of shyness in the way he smiled back at me. It felt as though I was seeing a side of him that he hardly ever revealed to anyone. Then again, I have been known to be wrong.
“You ready to get going?” he asked, looking as if he suddenly felt a little embarrassed and just wanted to change the subject.
I took a deep breath and gave the sleek bike a long glance. “As ready as I’m going to get.”
He handed me the spare helmet that had been strapped down to the back, which I immediately put on and secured tightly. Wearing it had a claustrophobic quality until I opened the visor and let some air in. Emerson climbed onto the motorcycle and started it up. Being right next to it, the sound was more intense than hearing it from the sidewalk at the apartments. And when he revved it, it roared. While this made me feel a bit more nervous, it also excited me. I wasn’t entirely sure if I found the rumble of the bike sexy or the man straddling it.
“Get on,” he prompted.
I climbed gingerly onto the back. The passenger seat was higher than the driver's seat. Emerson was hunched over the body of the motorcycle while I felt as if I was perched on the highest point, floating around in the wind.
“Uh, where should I hold on?” I asked, my voice muffled inside the helmet.
“Just lean forward, wrap your arms around my waist,” he said.
This was going to be interesting. “Alright.”
I slanted forward and slid my arms around him. Warmth flooded my cheeks and I was certain they glowed bright red as my hands fumbled awkwardly around Emerson's midsection. Thankfully, I was behind him and he wasn’t looking at my face.
I couldn't believe how solid his stomach was—pure steel, not an ounce of fat to be felt anywhere. Damn. The image of him answering his door clad in nothing but a towel flashed through my mind. I had tried to suppress that image. But at the moment, all I could think of was how much he had looked like a Greek god.
“You okay back there?”
I locked my hands together instead of pressing them against his hard abs. That would have just been a little more than I could take. “Um, yeah,” I replied, hoping he wouldn’t pick up on the discomfort in my voice.
“Okay,” he said as he clicked the bike into gear. “Like I promised, I'm gonna take it easy. But there will still be some surges in acceleration when I'm driving. This machine has a sensitive throttle. She can boost forward like a rocket with just the slightest input. So, hold on tight, alright?”
