Motorcycle Man by Kristen Ashley

adobe with a living room, dining area and huge-ass kitchen. I’d fixed it up exactly as I wanted it, even splurging on a fabulous kitchen including top of the line appliances and kickass countertops. There was a two car garage out back and a nice-sized shed. There was also a great deck. I had fantastic furniture in the house and on the deck, fabulous décor and a well-landscaped yard that looked good only because I spent a bunch of time in it.
    This was the one downfall of my house and if I had to do it again, I would buy a house with zero yard. I wasn’t a fan of mowing my yard and had quit my job before I’d purchased a riding lawnmower. Even though I had a kickass power mower, it still took me hours to mow my huge yard. This was not my favorite activity. Part of the reason my yard was well-landscaped and I spent so much time in it was because I was incapable of not having my surroundings be the best they could be. It gave me a sense of peace and if I had to work at that peace, so be it.
    Still, that didn’t mean I liked it.
    I was about to get up, make myself a cup of tea and peruse my cupboards for dinner ideas when the doorbell rang.
    I felt my brows draw together as I stared at my front door. No one came calling without warning unless it was some religious person wanting to help me find God (just as long as it was their God) or someone wanting to sell something which was both kind of the same thing.
    Damn.
    I took the laptop off my thighs, put it on the coffee table, pulled my ass out of my couch and wandered to the door. I opened the little, wooden baby door that had a wrought iron cross outside that gave me a view to my stoop and I stared at Tack.
    What the hell?
    “Hey, babe,” he greeted.
    “What are you doing here?”
    “Open the door.”
    “What are you doing here, Tack?”
    “Open the door, Red.”
    “Not until you tell me what you’re doing here,” I returned.
    “Darlin’, you don’t open the door, a minor injury might turn into a major one,” he stated.
    “What?” I asked.
    “I’m hurtin’ out here.”
    Ohmigod! He was injured!
    I threw the wooden baby door closed, unlocked the front door and pulled it open to see Tack wearing his uniform of tight tee (this one black), faded jeans and motorcycle boots. He was also carrying an enormous pizza box and a six pack of beer. What he wasn’t was visibly injured.
    I blinked.
    Tack pushed in.
    “What…?” I started and trailed off as Tack sauntered into my living room like he’d done it a million times before, dumped the pizza box on my coffee table then rested the six pack on the inside of his forearm.
    “Fuck, they don’t mess around at Famous. That pizza burned the shit outta my arm,” he muttered.
    I stared at him.
    Then I asked, “Are you saying the minor injury you were mentioning was a pizza box burn?”
    “ Yep,” he answered casually, rounded the coffee table, planted his ass on my couch, put the six pack on my coffee table (my wood coffee table which required coasters or some other protective accoutrement) and flipped open the pizza box. Then he ordered, “Come eat.”
    I stared at him again.
    Then I repeated his words in a question, “Come eat?”
    His eyes lifted to me still standing in the open door. “Yeah, come eat.” Then he tugged one of the beers off the plastic and snapped it open.
    I resumed staring and while doing this watched Tack take an enormous swig of beer.
    As he was swallowing, I started, “Tack –”
    He dropped his beer and interrupted me. “Red, close the door and come eat.”
    “I –”
    “It’ll get cold.”
    “But –”
    His eyes traveled the length of me and as they were doing this, he cut me off again. “Jesus, what the fuck you got on?”
    I looked down at my yoga clothes then back at him. “I just got back from yoga.”
    His eyes took their time sliding back up my body before they locked on mine. “You finish that Employee Handbook, you make that ,” he tipped his head to me, “the