Page 14 of Gatsby's Starlet
Something in my chest shifted. “And that means?”
“It means you liked it.”
I swallowed, pulse ticking in my throat as memory flickered, the feel of his body beneath my hands, the heat of him, the way he’d covered my fingers with his.
“I don’t like letting go of things that feel good,” I said, softer this time, less impulsive and more aware.
He didn’t smile or make a joke to soften the moment, didn’t pivot into teasing the way he easily could have; instead he simply held my gaze across the narrow stretch of table between us and murmured, “Good,” in a tone that wasn’t playful and wasn’t light, but certain in a way that felt grounded rather than flirtatious, as though he had recognized something and chosen not to disguise it.
The diner noise carried on around us, plates clattering against counters, coffee being refilled into thick ceramic mugs, someone laughing too loudly near the register, the steady hiss of the griddle from the open kitchen, yet inside the booth the air felt altered, heavier without being suffocating, charged without tipping into urgency, as if something quiet and substantial hadsettled between us and was waiting to see whether we would acknowledge it or pretend it wasn’t there.
This wasn’t fast or reckless or bright in the way fireworks are bright, wasn’t a flare meant to ignite and burn out in a single night; it was slower than that, steadier, the kind of thing that gathers strength without announcement and builds in increments rather than sparks, requiring attention instead of impulse and intention instead of adrenaline, and the more aware I became of it the more I understood that whatever this was, it would not disappear easily once it had taken root.
That should have been my warning.
Slow things take hold.
Slow things matter.
And I had not come into his world with clean hands.
I knew that.
Knew it in the quiet part of my mind that had been carefully keeping score since the night Ruby suggested this meeting, knew that I was sitting in a booth across from a man who was offering so much without realizing I had arrived with an agenda folded neatly beneath my intentions.
And yet here I was with a man who had just said “Good” like I was a virtue instead of a liability, and instead of cataloging him the way I had intended, habits, tells, weak points, I was noticing just how perfect he was for me.
This was, frankly, deeply inconvenient.
And the worst part was that I did not appear to be correcting course.
CHAPTER FIVE
I WAS STILLthinking about Evie whenI headed down the hall toward the war room at the clubhouse, which was probably the last damn place my mind should’ve been wandering to a woman, but breakfast with her had gone so easy it kept replaying in my head whether I wanted it to or not.
Things had gone well. Better than well, actually, and when she mentioned she’d never been inside a biker clubhouse the offer had slipped out of my mouth before I’d thought about it too hard, Saturday night, I’d bring her by and show her around.
Not the bonfire.
Hell no.
That place got crazy on a good night and Evie Carter was the kind of woman who belonged in quiet antique shops and sunlit kitchens, not standing around a pit of burning pallets while naked women hung on half-drunk bikers arguing about dumb shit and somebody inevitably starts throwing punches.
I’d show her the calmer side. Still rough. Just not filthy. Evie wasn’t that type.
When I pushed through the door most of the brothers were already sitting around the big scarred table that had seen more arguments, blood, and spilled beer than any piece of furniture had a right to survive. Chain was leaning back in his chair like he’d been waiting for entertainment, and the second I walked in his mouth twitched like he’d just found it.
“How was breakfast with your sixties pinup girl?” he asked, not even trying to hide the grin.
Bolt turned in his chair, eyebrows climbing halfway up his forehead. “You took a woman to breakfast?”
“It’s nobody’s damn business but mine,” I said, dropping into my seat.
Gearhead snorted. “You don’t date.”
“Yeah,” Bolt added. “Not that we’ve ever seen.”
Spinner leaned forward a little, studying me the way he did when something caught his interest. “You said sixties,” he said slowly. “She into the same shit as you?”
