CHAPTER34
That night,I study for two tests, one for school and one for my motorcycle permit. It’s not easy to concentrate. Zac and I only had that one kiss, but it hadn’t been a chaste kiss. Well, technically speaking, only our lips touched. There was no tongue involved, and his hands didn’t rove. I clung to him, though, and he had his arms wrapped around me, his hands coming up from behind me to rest on my shoulders. He clung to me as much as I clung to him, as if we were only alive to exist for this one moment, for each other, and it was the most emotionally charged kiss I’ve ever experienced.
Zac might not be willing to jump into bed with me, like Rob and Ace and Gabe—not that Gabe and I had sex in a bed yet—but that doesn’t mean Zac doesn’t know what he’s doing. I don’t know if he’s playing hard to get or if he’s guarding his heart, but he can’t be. Not completely. Not with his bringing me to his place that no one else has gone to.
I think Zac might be willing to settle down, and maybe he wants to do that with me, and if so, I don’t know what to do because I can’t give up Rob. He needs me, and I’ve needed him since the cruise ship. Ace challenges me, and I need that, and Gabe? He’s as damaged as I am, as the rest of us are, and I want to try to help heal all of them, and maybe that will help to heal me too.
After my afternoon classes the next day, Allie picks me up, and I take my motorcycle license test. I pass, thankfully, but honestly, as I’m giving my paper permit, it’s terrifying to think about being let loose on the road with a bike. I mean, with a car, you’re supposed to drive with someone else in the car. Are you supposed to have a passenger sitting behind you on the bike with your permit? Talk about added pressure! And if not, that’s still frightening. Maybe I didn’t quite think this through.
But it had been so fun to sit in front of Gabe. The wind directly blew at me with me in front, and it felt so freeing, like I was on top of the world.
“You ready to ride?” she asks once we head outside the driver’s license center.
“Sure,” I mumble.
She laughs. “Don’t tell me you’re nervous! You’ve been on how many bikes before?”
“It’s different if someone else is driving, and if I have to be the one responsible for my life and another’s…”
“No different than if you’re in a car.”
“Um, you’re far more likely to die in a motorcycle crash than a car crash.”
“So don’t crash. Simple.”
“Easier said than done!” I protest, throwing up my hands.
“You got this,” she says, and she shoves me toward her bike and won’t take no for an answer.
Thanks to riding in that field, I do know what to do for the most part, and it’s a lot of highway driving, which is both wonderful because it’s smooth but also terrifying because it’s higher speed and so. Many. Cars.
But I manage to shift gears smoothly the majority of the time, and we don’t crash, and I park at the diner.
“Not bad!” she cheers. “Why here?”
“I start a shift in an hour,” I explain as I climb off her bike.
“Cool. Want me to buy us a meal?”
“Allie, you don’t have to keep buying me food.”
“You’re a little skinny,” she says, reaching over to poke me in my stomach.
“But money—”
“You’ll be getting your bike soon, and I get the impression you need the jobs for more than just the bike. I don’t want to strap you for cash, and I have more than enough to handle a diner meal or two.”
“If you’re sure…”
"I wouldn't have offered if I didn't mean to go through with it. I'm a woman of my word." She laughs as she runs a hand through her short black hair.
“Thank you.”
I open the door for her and am about to follow her when my phone vibrates. I quickly check it.
“Oh, I have to take this,” I say apologetically.
“No sweat. I’ll get us a table.”