Naz might have kept driving past the small roadside breakfast truck despite how hungry he was simply because he was loving the way Roz had wrapped her arms around his body, and was squeezing for all she was worth. He didn’t think it was from fear, either. He had comms set up in the helmets, but he’d kept them shut off. So, the drive had been quiet between the two of them. He didn’t really need words when he could feel her, though.
At the sight of the brightly colored food truck parked where it did every morning—never failed—, Naz pulled the sportsbike off the road smoothly. Even as he found a spot to park the bike, shut off the engine, and dropped down the kickstand, Roz still didn’t let him go.
It was only once he tugged off his helmet did her arms finally unravel from around his middle. He stepped off the bike, and turned to help her with her own helmet. Her mess of wavy hair spilled around her shoulders, and a bright smile lit up her face.
Naz laughed. “Fun, right?”
Roz made a noise. “I mean … scary might be a better word. At first, anyway.”
“I thought you weren’t scared of the—”
“I wasn’t.” She poked him right in the middle of his chest, making Naz laugh when she mock glared. “And then you had to go and pop up on one tire twice.”
“I had to hit the fuel! You know, to get the fuck out of the way of people trying to cut in front of us.”
She gave him another one of those looks. Naz only shrugged. He actually wasn’t lying. That was the thing about driving a bike on the highway. Fucking nobody looked for a bike. They just merged without looking, and a bike rider had to be careful.
Dress for the fall, not the ride.
There was a reason that whole saying had come about, after all.
“They don’t look for us, is all,” Naz said. “So, defensive driving it is.”
Roz sighed, and smiled but still looked away from him like she didn’t know what she wanted to do with him in that moment. Naz didn’t blame her. Half the time, he didn’t know what in the hell he wanted to do with himself.
So was his life.
Reaching out, he caught one of her stray waves of hair between his forefinger, and thumb. He curled the strand around his finger just because he could. Damn. He hadn’t realized how soft and silky her hair was. He had the strongest urge to just thrust both of his hands into those waves, grab tight, and fucking kiss her.
He didn’t know what she would think of that.
He settled for tucking the strand behind her ear, and then he pulled away. But not before letting his fingertips drift over the shell of her ear, and then across her cheek, too. It pulled a sweet, soft smile from her lips as her sky-blue eyes turned back on him again. Her teeth cut into those pink lips as she watched him for a moment.
“It was fun, though,” she murmured.
Naz smirked. “I know. Anytime you want a ride, baby, you let me know.”
He hadn’t realized how the words could be taken in different ways until they left his mouth, but hey, it was out there now. There was no fucking taking it back. Besides … it wasn’t a goddamn lie, either.
Roz’s cheeks pinked with just a touch of color. “Will do. So, are we taking a break for a minute before we get back on the road, or …?”
“Nope.”
“No?”
Naz turned so he could rest against the bike while Roz was still straddling the back seat. He pointed to the food truck just across the road from where he had parked. Famous for its sugary breakfast treats, the truck—one of several across the United States for this company—only made food from five till eleven in the morning, and then they shut down for the day. They were so popular, and the food was so good that they had a social media following that rivaled celebrities.
Already, there was a line of people for the truck going all the way down the road. People didn’t mind waiting to get their fill. Some even traveled quite a ways just to get a taste of whatever the food truck made.
And this particular truck? Well … Naz knew the guy. Old friends.
Roz gave him a look. “I thought you were taking me out somewhere to eat.”
He gave her a grin. “This food is better than sex, Roz.”
Her cheeks did that pink thing again. He wasn’t going to act like he didn’t like the sight of it because he did. He liked it even more that he was the cause. He wondered just how often he could get her to do that, and just how far that blush extended down her neck and chest when she was breathless, and so fucking close to coming.
Damn. Wow. His mind went there fast.
Naz’s grin deepened. “I mean, any sex I’ve ever had, anyway. I’ll let you know if that changes soon, huh?”
He didn’t miss the way her gaze darkened, or how her smile turned a little shy and yet still sly at the same time. He didn’t know how in the hell someone could manage that, but she did. Yeah, he was definitely going to make her do that more often.
“Well, I wouldn’t know,” Roz said, her tone coming out a little too nonchalant. “About sex, I mean.”
Naz glanced at her again, realizing what she was telling him without actually telling him. And shit, he hadn’t been expecting that at all. “Really?”
Roz shrugged. “Nope.”
A virgin.
That wasn’t Naz’s usual style, at all. And yet … he liked it. Maybe because it was her, and that meant no one had come before him. No one had ever touched this girl. She was fucking perfect in every sense of the word.
That drove him even more crazy.
Like he needed that.
Roz’s cheeks were pink again, but she acted like they weren’t at all when she said, “Are we going to eat, or …?”
“Yep. Care to let me pick for you?”
She eyed the long line for the truck once more. “I think by the time you get us food, my stomach will have eaten itself from waiting for so long.”
Naz chuckled, and pushed off the bike before turning to face her. “Oh, Roz, I don’t have to wait. Not for this truck, anyway. My buddy owns it. Got him out of a scrape once. We’re friends, you could say.”
“What does that mean? You could say?”
It meant a lot of things. Mostly, his last name afforded him things.
That was another topic for another day. Today was not that day, as far as he was concerned.
“Can I pick for you, then?” he asked instead of answering.
Roz smiled. “Yeah, surprise me.”
“You got it, sweetheart.”
Naz darted forward, and dropped a quick kiss to Roz’s smiling lips just to see that pink hue color her cheeks again before he winked, and spun on his heels. Food it was …
His mind was on everything else but food when it came to Roz. But fucking food it was.
Naz damn near groaned at the sight of Roz taking the bite of waffle from his fingertips. Covered in powdered sugar, whipped cream, and drizzled with a mixture of chocolate, real maple syrup, and melted caramel, he thought the truck’s waffles were the best thing they sold.
Roz chewed the bite, and a soft moan escaped her lips. Between those little noises crawling out of her throat, the teasing grin on her mouth, and the fact she was still straddling his bike as he fed her … well, that right there was enough to test Naz’s very carefully maintained control.
Suddenly, he had no fucking control at all.
Not when it came to her.
“Okay, you’re right,” she said, “yours is good, too.”
“Better than yours was?”
Roz shrugged. “Pretty equal. They’re both basically diabetes on a plate. Do you eat this every morning?”
“Four times a week,” Naz returned easily. “It’s faster just to grab something like this when I’m up at all hours of the day on the go for somebody else. Anyone can call, and I have to go.”
Roz’s brow furrowed like she was about to ask him what he meant, but that was not a conversation Naz wanted to have right now, so he opted to just distract her. And by distract her, he meant using the pad of his thumb to wipe away the powdered sugar left over on her lips.
Also, maybe it wasn’t so much a distraction for her as the fact he really just wanted to touch her lips. Feel them, and fucking taste them.
Roz stilled as his thumb swiped over her lips with a soft touch, and then her tongue followed the same path as he pulled away. He couldn’t help but stick his thumb between his own lips to suck off the powdered sugar he wiped away.
Her cheeks pinked again.
Yes.
“You’re something else, Nazio Donati,” Roz whispered.
“Something good, though.”
That was most certainly his cockiness coming out to play, but it was what it was. He’d been raised by the best, and he was just born the fucking best.
Why pretend differently?
Roz leaned forward, and used her hands on the seat to keep her balance as she came closer to him. There was a glitter to her gaze—something sly and sweet that made him want to come closer, so he did just that by inching forward until the two of them were close enough that he could see the flecks of darker blue closer to her irises.
“Do you know what I expected for today?” she asked.
Naz tipped his chin down. “Not particularly.”
“I thought … fancy restaurant, the usual.”
“That wouldn’t have been bad, either.”
Roz shook her head. “Not at all.”
“We can do that next time,” he offered.
“Next time?”
“We’re just getting started here, Roz.”
“This was perfect. Really.” She smiled in that way again. “I should have known better than to expect the usual with you.”
“Why’s that?”
“You’re not at all a usual man, Naz.”
“I’m not anything spectacular, either.”
Beyond the whole genius thing, he was just a man at the end of every day. The same as any other man, he supposed.
Roz arched a brow. “You know, I doubt that.”
She leaned up just enough to catch his mouth with a kiss. She still tasted sweet like the powdered sugar on the waffles, but there was something far more sinful on her lips, too. This girl somehow managed to quiet all of Naz’s overactive thoughts with nothing more than a press of her lips, and the tease of her tongue sliding in to war with his. All the while, those eyes of hers stayed locked on his.
He was still kind of hungry.
Not so much for food, though.
He dropped what was left of the waffle just so he could get his hands on Roz instead. That’s what he needed.
Her.