“I’ll take you.”
“What?” Shit. Not a good idea. Spending even a few hours close to him wasn’t a good idea. Kat was right, I was caving and it terrified me. “I don’t think that would be a—”
“Eme. Lego. Stop.” His short abrupt use of my nickname sent a jolt right through me. “We’ve been talking on the phone for weeks, now were going to talk in person.” He leaned against the counter, palms on either side of him resting on the marble surface. With his stance like that, it made his tatted arm muscles bulge and his chest to ... “Emily?”
My gaze darted away from his arms and up to his face. His eyes danced with mischief and I suspected Logan knew exactly how to make himself look irresistible. He’d never done that during the weeks in Mexico. Never flirted, never looked at me with anything other than cold steel eyes.
“I don’t like people around when I’m working so ...” Yeah, he so wasn’t going to take no for an answer.
“You’re not going alone. You don’t know who this guy is and it’s not safe. I’m not taking any chances.” Logan’s tone had turned calm and assertive. He was going to push this.
“Then I’ll take Kat.”
She held up both hands. “Sorry, Eme. No go. I have the farrier coming this morning and twenty horses getting trimmed and a deadline for the gallery for two more paintings by the end of the week.”
Shit. “Then I’ll call Deck.”
“Deck has better things to do,” Logan said abruptly.
Yeah, like hunt down guys like Raul and save girls like Raven. “I’ve been seeing clients’ horses for two years. I’m not changing now because you’re suddenly back and being overprotective. The guy is well known in the racing world and—”
“You’re not going alone.”
“Ugh.” I looked to Kat and she immediately jumped in. “Sculpt, you’re being ridiculous. This is her business now. She helps horses and—”
“Stay out of it, Kat. This isn’t overprotective, this is being cautious.”
I put my coffee cup down a little too hard on the counter and dark liquid spilled over the sides. “Fine.” Was I crazy? Yes. I had sucker written all over my forehead, but a part of me—okay a huge part of me—was excited about spending the day with Logan.
Ream strode into the kitchen looking just as bad as Kat. The tension went from about sixty to a thousand within seconds. Kat’s back stiffened and she glared at Ream who was avoiding looking at her all together. He did say morning though then grabbed a mug and poured a coffee.
Ream chin-lifted to Logan. I noticed his quick glance at Kat. “Where are Crisis and Kite?”
“Went to Avalanche last night. This morning ... passed out with chicks I suspect.”
Ream huffed. “Thinking I should’ve been with them.”
The scrape of the stool moving across the hardwood floors sounded then Kat took off to her bedroom. I noticed as soon as her back was turned, Ream’s eyes never left her.
Chapter 23
When Logan said he’d drive, I didn’t expect it to be on his motorcycle, I mean, I should’ve, but I didn’t think about it.
He stroked the handlebars, his long fingers a gentle caress like he was touching a woman’s back. My lips parted as I watched.
Damn it, I was going to explode before I even got on the bloody bike.
“You’ve been on my bike before, why do you look like I’m asking you to kick a kitten?”
“I just ... it’s been a while. I’m uncomfortable.” What woman wouldn’t want to ride on the back of a bike with someone like Logan. This situation is like a fantasy come true and another step toward what I was desperately trying to avoid.
“Uncomfortable? I assume it’s having your pussy tight to my ass that has you—uncomfortable.” His lips quirked upward, and it catapulted me back to when he’d been eyeing a bike at the corner store where we used to stop and get ice cream. His eyes had lit up like a kid on Christmas morning. He had a bike; I’d been on it, but it was nothing like the one we saw that day.
The owner came out of the store, and they chatted for a half hour about motors while I went and got us ice cream sandwiches then ate both of them while leaning up against his truck admiring his sweet ass.
“You remember that bike we—”
“Saw at the convenience store,” I finished. “Yeah. You had a hard-on for it.”
Logan choked back a laugh, and the sound sent a thrill of desire straight through me. “Eme. I had a hard-on for you. The bike was a bonus.” He picked up a helmet then gently slid it down over my head. He tucked in strands of hair then did up the chin strap. He leaned back. “You still rock a helmet, baby.”
I don’t know what came over me, but I hit a pose, putting my finger to my mouth and cocking my hip with my other hand resting on it.
This time he laughed outright, flashing his white, perfectly aligned teeth. I turned into a splat of butter sizzling on high heat. The guy was brooding and demanding most of the time. When he laughed, it was like filling me up with a rainbow.
He turned serious. “You still don’t get how hot you are, do you?”
No. I was fine with how I looked; I mean, I accepted what I was given.
“Your mother is a piece of work. She put you down to make herself feel better. You deserve better than a piss-drunk mother.”
“She had issues. And Logan, I think your father takes the ‘piece of work’ award.”
“Fuckin’ right he does. When we’re good, you’re meeting my mom and finding out what a real one is like.”
I was taken aback by Logan’s casual mention of his mom and me meeting her. He was right, my mom was a bitch. She never gave a crap when I moved out and in with Kat and Matt. The only time I heard from her was if she broke up with a guy and needed money, which I rarely had. Since she knew nothing about the farm or where to find me, I hadn’t spoken to her in years.
“Eme?” He stroked a line down my nose. “You have that look. What’s happening in that non-stop thinking brain of yours?”
“Nothing.”
He slipped his hand into mine, and our fingers linked. The scent of his soap drifted into me, and I inhaled deep, closing my eyes. I couldn’t let go even if a train came between us. I wanted to cry for what I was slowly losing—myself. I was losing myself to him again, and no matter how much I wanted to keep him out, he was breaking his way back in. But he’d leave with the band again, and I’d leave his farm. Even though Logan had given me the ability to have my dream, it wasn’t my farm. I’d lived off Matt, now Logan. I couldn’t do it anymore. I wouldn’t. And soon, I’d have enough money to get my own place.
“Emily?” I met his eyes. “Let go of what happened for today.”
Did I have that in me? Could I let the old Logan I loved in for one day?
“Baby.”
The bike. The horses. Logan looking at me like I was the only woman in the world. All reminders. Could I trust him? No, that wasn’t the question anymore, I realized. It was could I trust myself with him?
I nodded, and the weight of the helmet slipped forward, and he grinned as he shifted it back. “Small head considering all the shit it carries around.”
I smiled. He was right.
He put on his helmet, and I slapped my hand on the top where the painted skull was. Underneath were the words Tear Asunder. “What does it mean? I mean I know it means tear apart, but what does it mean to the band? Why the band name?”
“What was done to us. The band voted. And since the band was also torn apart for a while, as well as you and I, well, it fit.”
He snapped the kickstand up then started the bike, revving the throttle. He nodded to me, and I slipped on behind him. I was in shock. It meant ... it meant Logan had seen what happened between them as being torn apart. Not him pushing me away. Or me escaping him. It was both of us—Torn apart. Forced. Ripped. Broken.
Did the band know the details of what happened? They had to know about Logan’s father and my kidnapping, but how much more?
The moment I slid up against him, my inner thighs next to his outer, my pelvis tight to his ass, I felt the scorching heat sweep through my veins. “Logan?” I barely said his name; it was a hint of a whisper.
“We were torn apart, because Eme—I’d never have stayed away from you any other way.”
I had nothing to fight with. Nothing. I felt like falling against him and sobbing for him, for us, and for what had been done to us both.
His hand rested on my thigh, and he squeezed. “Feet.” I put my feet up. “Need you closer. Arms.” I snuggled in, and then felt the rumble in his chest and what sounded like a groan. “Christ, how far is this place?”
“Logan?” I wanted to tell him ... to have him turn and look at me so I could tell him that I felt it too. We had been torn apart.
“Not now, baby.” He shook his head once. “How far?”
I relented. “An hour.” I wrapped my arms around his waist, my fingers interlocking. I felt the muscles of his abdomen against my forearms, rock hard and tense. He was breathing in and out rather quickly, and I bet if I reached down I’d feel the hardness a little lower. I bit my lip, swallowed, and then closed my eyes.
“Fuck.” Logan shot off, careening down the driveway as if the bike was part of him, and they were part of the road.
It took me five minutes before I relaxed into him. Then I raised my head that had been pressed up against his back and it felt like old times.
It was exhilarating.
The vibration of power beneath me took hold and refused to let go. I felt part of him again.
This was something he loved, which made me love it too.
The ride went by too quickly. Logan stopped the bike outside the gates to a long driveway lined with willow trees. Paddocks with thoroughbreds grazing on the lush grass lined either side. The owner had called me about a racehorse that’d been in an accident. The trailer had flipped over on the Four Hundred highway, and the horse had been trapped for hours. It took the Jaws of Life to get the stallion out, and since then, the horse panicked whenever he felt pressure on him. According to the owner, the champion racehorse also couldn’t go into a stall without a tranquilizer.
Logan rolled the bike up to the intercom and pressed the button. A male, heavily accented voice, asked if I was Emily. The gates opened as soon as I verified who I was.
I gestured to the long driveway. “Take it slow, rock star. Scare the horses, and I lose this job.”
The twitch in the outer corner of his lips appeared. “I like you calling me rock star, Mouse.” He turned back, revved the throttle then passed through the gates at a snail’s pace.
It took all of five seconds after meeting the owner of the estate and the racehorse before I had to stop Logan from knocking the guy on his ass. Tattooed rock star ex-fighter and rich developer didn’t mix; unfortunately developer guy Rob wanted his racehorse fixed, and supposedly, I was his last hope.
Blame it on the sweetness of my name—shit, I don’t know—but Rob took me in with his eyes, and it was clear he planned to have me in his bed by noon. Logan was juicing up his male testosterone, ready to slam his fist through Rob’s aristocratic face as soon as Rob’s eyes went from my face down to my toes.