Samantha
rocked back on her heels. She promptly lost her balance and landed heavily on
her butt in time to see a biker on a beautiful, deep green Deuce with custom
stylized flame graphics ride straight up the ramp just inches away. He expertly
settled his front wheel between the guides on the dyno. He lowered his worn
boots to the diamond plate floor of the trailer and shifted the transmission
into neutral before he finally looked around and spotted Samantha on her rear
end atop the baking asphalt of the parking lot.
“You’re
not Dr. Doug.” He stated the obvious, as he removed his helmet and clipped it
on the back of his bike.
But
you are one big, gorgeous hunk of man. Samantha’s jaw dropped open in
surprise. Her eyes raked the man’s long, lean form from top to bottom. She
could tell he was tall by the bunching of his legs along the sides of the
Deuce, and his shoulders were broad from the way they stretched the fine black
leather of his Harley jacket. His hair was a mass of long, dark waves that
brushed against his collar. The brilliance of his periwinkle blue eyes sparkled
beneath a set of finely arched brows. He had a strong jaw edged by a neatly
trimmed moustache and goatee sporting just a trace of gray. His nose was a bit
off kilter, as if it had been broken at least once before. He wasn’t
classically handsome, but his rugged features fit together quite nicely and
lent his face a particular masculinity.
“No,
I’m not,” she said finally, coming to her feet with an embarrassing crack of
her knees. “But I can get your Deuce hooked up to the dyno and ready to run
when Dr. Doug returns.”
“No
offense, babe, but I don’t want you touching my ride. This is an expensive
piece of custom machinery.” He leaned over slightly to affectionately pat the
gas tank with its faint, ghosted silver flames. “Where’s Dr. Doug, anyway?”
Samantha
pursed her lips in annoyance. Of course she took offense to his words. As if
she didn’t know how expensive his customized Deuce was! As if she didn’t know
what she was doing with the dyno! And ‘Babe’? Not only was the term demeaning,
but so was his tone.
Samantha
sighed. His male chauvinist attitude was much the same as other men she’d run
into during the short course of her career so far dyno-tuning motorcycles. In a
deliberately even tone, she told him, “He’s checking on the bikini bike wash.
I’m sure he’ll be back soon. In the meantime, I’ll get your bike tied down and
hooked up to the computer.”
“Look,
baby doll, you must be confused about where you belong. The bike wash is at the
front of the shop. Now why don’t you be a good girl, put on your bikini, and
step away from my ride. Or, better yet, go find Doug. I’m a busy man and I
haven’t got all day.”
Samantha’s
eyes narrowed as she strode up to the front of the dyno. Was he being
deliberately rude or just incredibly dense? She ignored his stupid directive
and yanked the end of a tie down through the fancy cutouts in the motorcycle’s
front wheel. The man might be attractive, but his tone was arrogant and his
attitude sexist.
