Love or Luxury is now available at AMAZON so to celebrate, I’m sharing an exclusive excerpt! Enjoy!
“Can I get a coffee, please?” a man asked from a place at the counter only a few seats away.
Throwing the cloth in the sink, she poured a hot coffee and set it in front of him along with a menu. His face was vaguely familiar, but not enough for her to pinpoint how or why she recognized him. She smiled. “Do I know you from somewhere?”
He tapped the motorcycle helmet sitting in the seat next to him. “Already forgotten, huh? Do you have near- death experiences so often they don’t stick with you?”
The helmet under his hand—his rather large hand— shone a deep blue as the overhead lights of the diner reflected off its surface. Oh no, she hadn’t forgotten about him at all. How could she? One, he’d almost run her over in the middle of the crosswalk… Not exactly the best way to start her day. And two, he’d looked damned sexy straddling his motorcycle earlier.
Now, seeing him up close and without his helmet on, there was no way she’d forget his face anytime soon. His strong jaw and hint of stubble were a perfect complement to his deep brown eyes and sandy-brown, clean-cut hair. Add his chocolate-colored leather jacket and he looked as if he’d just walked into the diner off the set of a Hollywood blockbuster. He was not the typical hard- edged biker. This guy oozed class, his motorcycle a huge contradiction to his otherwise professional appearance.
“I haven’t forgotten almost being run over, no. That’s something that tends to stick with a girl,” she teased, twirling the watch on her wrist, the tarnished silver looking shabby chic instead of old, like it was. When she looked at it, she imagined it on her mother’s wrist instead of hers.
“I was at least a foot away when I stopped. You know you should look before you cross the road. Your parents did teach you that, didn’t they?” He smiled before taking a sip of his coffee.
Her fingers paused on the watch’s winding dial before she gave it one last turn and let go. He probably thought his comment was cute and playful, but little did he know, it stung deep. Her parents hadn’t taught her much of anything. No one had for that matter. Life had taught her everything she needed to know.
She raised an expertly tweezed eyebrow at him. “I’m aware of the rule, yes. Can I get you something to eat or what?” Damn. That hadn’t come out quite right. Why was she being so rude to a guy who was so incredibly hot? And possibly interested. He couldn’t know the sting of his words.
“I’ll take a bacon and cheddar burger, medium, and an order of fries.” If the curve of his lips revealed anything about him, it would be that her comment hadn’t bothered him as much as she’d thought. Resilient.
She scribbled the order on her ticket pad and snapped it into the metal clip above the food service window, rotating the circular ticket holder until his order hung on the kitchen’s side. Even with her back turned, she felt his eyes watching her. Was he looking at her ass right now? She shifted to the side, slightly sticking out one hip, knowing the position showed off her rear nicely in the otherwise boring black jeans. The familiar clang of a coffee cup banging against the saucer caught her attention.
She turned. Mr Motorcycle mopped up spilled coffee from the saucer under his cup. Accident or distracted? The way his eyes traveled up her body when he looked up from his mess made the answer perfectly clear. Distracted.
Good. She liked to be the source of a man’s distraction and the object of his undivided attention.
