The view through the window of the old fashioned, silver diner car wasn’t a place I’d have ventured to on my own. Harry’s Diner stood about a block up from the food bank on Beaufait Street, and its bright lights fused with the streetlights outside, making shady silhouettes of objects off in the distance. The surrounding factories, many of which looked to be abandoned, probably made it a great location in its heyday. Sometimes, Detroit reminded me of an old Norman Rockwell painting, a bit of old America lost in the destruction.

The interior of the diner probably hadn’t changed, at all, with the ragged soda shop stools lined along the faded wooden bar, and the ripped upholstery of the booths, where I sat across from Ty. The scent of fried food clung to the air, as though the deep fryers had never been cleaned in however many years the place stood.

Yet, something about it remained endearing, a pinnacle of light in the surrounding dark buildings that reminded me of an old noir film.

“My dad used to bring me here when I was a kid. Nights he didn’t feel like cooking, we’d pop in here. Sit for hours just shooting the shit.”

The way he sat, all kicked back in the booth and looking like the quintessential bad boy in his black T-shirt, sent a flutter to my stomach. He’d seemed edgy all night, though. From the moment he’d arrived at Jo’s apartment, his usual cocky charm had switched to restlessness.

“Well, I’m impressed. You took me somewhere I’ve never been before. I keep trying to picture you as a little boy. Little Ty.” Chuckling, I looked around again and sighed. “Your dad must’ve been laid back and easygoing. Must’ve been nice to have him to talk to.”

“He was. No bullshit with him. He just told you how it was. I miss that.”

“Your dad, he’s no longer—”

“Nah.” The curt way he dismissed it, with a wave of his hand, told me not to pry.

“So, I have a confession.” Sliding my hands beneath my legs kept me from fidgeting beneath the way he stared at me from across the table. “And … I’m a little embarrassed, but … you’re not at all what I thought. I totally misjudged you.”

“Yeah. You’re not what I thought, either.” His gaze trailed over the inside of the diner and back to me. Always looking around, like he expected to get jumped any second. “Hey, this place okay for you? I know it’s kind of old, but … I wanted to take you someplace special, so …”

“Mm-hmm. It’s perfect.” Scanning over the outdated interior, I smiled at the thought of him choosing a place so meaningful. “You took a shitty day and made it infinitely better than when it started out.” I leaned forward and sipped the Boston Cooler, served in an old-fashioned soda glass, complete with whipped cream and a cherry on top. “I haven’t had one of these since I was a little girl. My mom used to make them for me all the time.”

“How long’d you stay with your mom?”

“Until I turned nine. That’s when … the cancer … it’s a long story, but I was sent to live with my dad then.” I circled the straw in my cup, slipping into memories of nights we’d lain out on the lawn and talked for hours, while staring up at the stars. “My mom was easy to talk to, too. I could tell her just about anything. Even now, the things I’ve said and done. She’d never judge me for them.”

“What kinds of things?”

Gaze glued to my soda, I pursed my lips to keep from smiling. “Well, she’d have probably been proud of me for getting on a motorcycle with a stranger. For climbing down a chimney and nearly falling to my death. She’d have loved this place, too. Just because it’s different. Like you.”

The smirk on his face dimpled his cheek and lured my attention to the deviant glint of his eyes. “Think your mom would’ve liked me?”

“Not to sound Jerry Springer, but I think my mom would’ve probably told me, if I didn’t go out with you tonight, she’d do it for me.”

With a snort, he shifted on the seat and rested his elbows on the table. “If she’s anything like you, I think I would’ve liked her, too.”

The smile on my face fizzled with the memory of hers, the way her eyes would go wide with excitement, right before she’d do something crazy, like belt out a song in a crowd, or pull me away from whatever I was doing to dance with her. “She’s nothing like me. She was wild and full of life, and she did her own thing. She didn’t let anyone keep her from what she loved.”

“What makes you think you’re any different?”

I shrugged and sat back, as the waitress I’d come to know as Ronnie set our plates down. An enormous cheeseburger, toppling with pickles and ketchup and mustard, took up most of the plate, leaving little room for the shoestring fries, crisped to perfection.

“Anything else I can get you two?” Hands set on her hips, Ronnie shot Ty a wink I probably wasn’t supposed to catch.

We both responded, “No.”

Not wasting any time, I lifted the burger and bit into its messy goodness, my eyes rolling back at the explosion of flavor that danced inside my mouth.

Ty lifted his burger as if to do the same, then lowered it, watching me with a cocked brow.

“Sorry,” I said around a second bite. “I’ve been dying for a good burger. This is awesome.”

I’d never been known for being a dainty eater, but half-starved made me downright graceless as I went to town on the burger. Lost to the mercy of my taste buds, I almost didn’t catch Ty staring at me the whole time, his tongue sweeping across his lips between bites. Self-consciousness had never been my thing, but the way he looked at me, I couldn’t tell if he wanted to eat me, or confiscate my food. The natural intensity of his eyes hit like a stun gun sometimes, rendering me paralyzed.

Then he seemed to blink out of it.

“If you pursued art, what would you do?” he asked, shoveling four fries at a time into his mouth.

I set the quarter of the burger I’d literally tried forcing myself to finish onto the plate of half-eaten fries. “I guess that’s the problem when you simply love something. Sometimes, you don’t have a plan.” Sitting forward, I sipped the last of my soda, drawing up the final bits of whipped cream with an obnoxious gurgle, and washed down my food.

“So, when do I get to see this art?”

Good question. I hadn’t drawn much of anything in the last few weeks, for which I blamed school. Sitting for hours in classes I couldn’t have given a damn about killed my inspiration, and not even the erotic books, or porn, could coax me into sketching. “As soon as I get my mojo back I guess.”

“What happened to it?” He popped the last of his burger into his mouth, and my eyes zeroed in on his jaw, the smooth lines and muscles flexing with every chew. Mesmerizing. “Thought art was sex for you.”

“It is. And I’ve been deprived for way too long.” Stabbing the cherry, I lifted it from the bottom of my glass and sucked it clean as it dangled from the end of the straw. I popped it into my mouth, looking up to see Ty’s eyes, riveted on the act, and his Adam’s apple bobbed with a swallow.

Clearing my throat, I set the straw inside the glass and sat back on the seat. “I like cherries,” I said sheepishly, wondering if he felt as though he’d taken a toddler out for dinner.

“Yeah.” Head kicked to the side, he kept his eyes on me. “Hey, Ronnie!” he called to the waitress, who sat scrolling through her phone at the end of the bar. “I’ll take our check.”

* * *

Dragging me by the arm, Ty led me across Beaufait, to his bike parked at the curb. He didn’t bother to look back at me as he handed me the black helmet and climbed onto the bike. Confusion spun through my head like a record skipping on a turntable, replaying the last few things I’d said to him inside the restaurant.

My irrational side had convinced the rational half that he’d gotten turned off by watching me eat the burger, and if that was the case, to hell with him. I wasn’t one of those prissy birds who pretended not eat because she didn’t want to admit that a big fat juicy burger tasted pretty damn good, sometimes. Annoyed, I climbed onto the back and half-heartedly wrapped my arms around him.

Ty fired up the bike, and we took off down the street, into the shadowy neighborhoods of the east side—places I did my best to avoid whenever possible.

So stupid.

Much as I tried to distract myself with the scary ass block we’d driven through, I couldn’t let the restaurant thing go. It just seemed petty to me.

Unless, of course, it had nothing to do with anything I’d said, or did. After all, he’d been anxious from the get-go about something.

My head didn’t have a chance to settle, before Ty made a sharp turn into the cracked parking lot of a fire-gutted strip mall, and a whole new question mark popped in my head.

What the hell?

I sat up on the seat, as he rolled the bike to a stop, suddenly wondering if he planned to drop me off there.

The moment he cut the engine, he slid from the bike, hands rubbing his skull while he paced. I could see the tight clench of his jaw, the pissed off angle of his brow, and hell if my pulse didn’t kick up another notch.

“Fuck!” he growled, still pacing beside me.

I tugged off the helmet, seriously clueless as to what the heck was bothering him, had been bothering him since he’d picked me up from Jo’s. “You wanna tell me what’s wrong?”

His bitter laugh only added to the confusion, and he came to a stop, standing akimbo. He sniffed and swiped arm across his nose, his nostrils flared with angry breaths.

Before I could ask if I was the source of his anger, he broke from his stance.

“Fuck it,” he grumbled, striding toward me. “I’m going to hell, anyway.”

He hopped onto the bike, facing me instead of the front, and yanked me toward him, setting my aching core to his bulge and my legs straddling his thighs. His dark gaze traveled over my body, swallowing it up into some unseen fantasy behind his eyes that had him licking his lips.

One hand latched onto his shoulder, I braced myself on his thigh, as I leaned in to kiss him, grinding against his lap.

Tongue spearing my lips, he slid his hands up the hem of my shirt, and peeled back my bra beneath. Both thumbs brushed over my nipples, and I moaned into his mouth, arching toward him.

When that didn’t seem to be enough for him, he skated his hands down to the waistband of my jeans, and unzipped them, tugging down the denim until it hugged low on my hips. Had it been anyone else, I’d have yanked them back up and demanded to be taken home, banishing the asshole from my contact list. After all, I wasn’t exactly comfortable with the idea of being put on display. Public sex just wasn’t my jam. Ty made me want to break the rules, though, and even if I was a damn fool for it, a small part of me trusted him. It wasn’t about him taking advantage of me, or conquering me, a bid for power, like Dane. With Ty, it was about letting go. He made me want to venture into the obscure corner of my mind and take a look around. To leap into a dark chasm of unknowns. I could be someone else with him—wild and crazy and carefree, like my mother, without the burden of expectation and appearances. I could be passionate and ravenous, seizing every moment as if it were my last.

Knuckles running over my already soaked panties, he kissed me harder. Angrier. As if eager to suck the air out of my lungs while drinking his fill of me. His kiss moved through me, the entire weight of his desperation bearing down on my lips. An exasperated breath blasted from his nose, and his groan vibrated across my teeth.

“Why do you have to be so wet? And so fucking soft?” His voice skated halfway between pissed off and frantic, the sound of it only heightening my lust.

“You make me this way.” I slid my hand higher into his hair, gathering what little of his trimmed cut I could clutch in my fist, as he pushed my panties aside for the bare flesh beneath. Fingers caressing my slippery seam, he pressed his forehead to mine, and palmed the back of my skull.

“What are you doing to me, Sera?” The sharp sting at my crown added a painful buzz, while his fist tightened around my hair. He didn’t give me a chance to answer the question, before plunging two fingers inside of me, the invasion rough with the angle of his hand and the bike, until he yanked down my jeans farther, just enough for a smooth slide.

I tipped my head back and closed my eyes, as a shaky breath blasted through my parted lips. Cool air mingled with the heat rolling off my skin, and the danger of our surroundings kept my muscles on a tight coil of anxiety, only adding to my arousal.

Ty sucked my bottom lip, dragging it between his teeth, while his fingers pumped in and out in long, agonizingly slow glides. Each time he withdrew, the sounds of my arousal admitted how much wetter I’d gotten.

“I thought … I said something wrong back there.”

“You want to know what’s wrong?” The husky growl in his voice, and the masculine heat pouring off his body, shot lust bullets to my core. “Watching you eat that cherry made me wonder how it’d taste if I sucked it from inside you.”

I didn’t even know if that’d be physically possible, but coupled with the work of his fingers, the visual of it put me one step closer to the edge of climax.

“You like to tease me, Sera? Huh?” He plunged again, curving those weapons of pleasure higher inside of me. “’S’at how you get off?”

I circled my hips against him, wishing I could reach down and grab hold of his cock, but the angle of the bike put me at a disadvantage—and him at a massive advantage over me. At my nod, his jaw ticced, and he plunged again, deeper than before.

A moan leaked past my lips, my legs helplessly dangling at either side of him, while his fingers drove me closer to the edge.

“Why? I try to be a nice guy, and you push me.” His hand slid up under my shirt, to my still-exposed nipple beneath, the pad of his thumb caressing in maddening little circles. “You drive me so fucking crazy.”

“Is this … your mean side, then?” The sharp clench of my stomach and thighs, as I tried to hold it together, interrupted my breaths.

“It gets more fucked up than this. You shouldn’t tempt me the way you do.” Palming my breast, he rested his head against mine, and tugged at my nipple, adding a bite of pain to the pleasure his fingers had worked up.

“Then, you shouldn’t … ah, God!” The cresting orgasm had me arching my back, clawing at his thigh. I mindlessly circled my hips, unable to sit still, as each penetrating drive seized command of my muscles. “Shouldn’t make it … feel so damn good!”

“I should stop, then?”

“No! Please!” The sound that flew from my lungs was a cross between a mewling kitten and a braying donkey, as I sucked in a breath. Completely unattractive, but totally out of my control. I didn’t know why I wanted him to keep touching me, with my jeans half pulled down my ass, out in the open where some gang probably watched from the shadows, waiting to ambush us, but that was the thing about Ty. He made scary moments exhilarating. “Don’t stop. Please don’t stop!”

Faster and faster he pumped, my juices leaking into my jeans, soaking his fingers. I clamped my eyes closed, stomach tight, tighter—oh, fuck, tighter. My thighs trembled, trying to hold off what was determined to pull me under. I clawed and trembled, fighting to stay afloat, as liquid pleasure rushed through my veins at a dizzying pace.

“I could fuck you like this, Sera. Right here in this parking lot.” He licked my throat and gave a tug of my nipple that sent me over the edge.

With an upward thrust of my hips, I screwed my eyes shut to the blinding explosion shooting up my spine. “Oh, God, oh, God, oh, God!”

My body shuddered against him, as he continued to finger me, holding my swollen nipple captive in a tight pinch.

A glistening layer of my arousal coated his fingers when he finally withdrew them, the urge to come a second time vibrating my thighs as I watched him shove two into his mouth.

Trembling and weak, I sat forward, and Ty wrapped his arms around me, squeezing the breath out of me, as he pulled me in for a kiss.

His hand moved to the small of my back, seating me against his bulge, and I reached down to return the favor for him, but stopped short when his hand covered mine. “I should get you home,” he whispered.

I’d have ignored that and kept on, if he hadn’t shoved my hand off of him altogether and pushed to stand alongside the bike, before turning his back to me again.

Heat flared across my cheeks, the needling pangs of embarrassment churning the greasy burger in my stomach. I didn’t bother to say a word as I fastened my jeans and pulled the helmet over my head.

My mind fought to convince me that the whole experience of being finger-fucked in some dark and empty parking lot beside a fire-gutted storefront wasn’t even close to being sleazy. After all, he was the one who’d gotten me off. And Johns didn’t typically set out to satisfy whores. Still, I couldn’t help feeling cheap. Like he’d only done it for my benefit, to appease the scarred little horny girl.

By the time we rolled up in front of my apartment, I couldn’t even look at him while handing off the helmet.

His finger hooked beneath my chin, and he slanted his lips over mine, but his kiss felt hasty and impatient.

“Good night, Sera.” Unlike last time, he didn’t even wait for me to get to the door before he revved his bike and took off.

As though he couldn’t stand to be around me any longer.