Welcome to Sugartown (3 page)

“
Can Elijah
have a milkthake too?”

“
If Elijah
wants a milkshake?”

“
Oh, Elijah
wants a milkshake.” He smiles and the dimples come out swinging. I
just wanna sit down and admire the holy mother of hotness that is
decrepit-bike-riding, tattoo-sleeved, dimple-popping, Elijah
Cade.

He’s staring
at me expectantly. It’s obvious he’s spoken and, in all my
fan-girling, I’ve completely missed it.

“
I’m sorry,
what?”

“
Vanilla. The
milkshake. Can you make it vanilla? It’s my favourite.” He winks
and shovels more pie into his mouth.

Without
another word I stalk back to the kitchen. My heart is in my throat,
trying as best it can to abandon this sinking ship. What the hell
was I thinking, flirting with a guy like that? He’s going to be
working for my dad, which means I’ll see him every day. And
probably sooner rather than later he’ll figure out that I tricked
him. He’ll more than likely hear the rumours about me. Maybe he
already has, and that’s why he’s coming on so strong. Elijah Cade
is the last thing I need.

I can hear
him and Sam talking out in the diner. The milkshake machine stops
whirring and the noise of Holly slamming down the metal cups on the
table in front of the boys reaches my ears.

“
There’s your
vanilla milkshake,” she snaps. Her footsteps pound toward
me.

“
Uh, thanks,”
Elijah calls after her.

“
My mumth a
huthy,” Sammy pipes up and I cringe and curse Holly under my
breath.

Chapter Two

Elijah

I don’t know
what the hell happened back there. One minute Ana was giving as
good as I gave and the next, she was flying out the back
door.
Maybe I came on too strong?
Nah, fuck it. Life’s short. She’s hot and she
might be just the thing I need to keep my nose clean while I’m in
this crap-hole of a town. Not that I’ll be staying long. I never
stay long.

After her
psycho friend almost showered me with vanilla malted-milk Ana comes
stalking out of the kitchen, grabs the kid by the arm and tells me
to meet her round back in ten minutes.

I watch her
usher the kid ahead of her through the kitchen door. She’s untying
her apron as she goes, causing the blue dress to pull against her
ass and ruck up a little higher. Holy shit, I’m headed into boner
territory. I tilt my head to the side and admire the view before
the swinging doors make it disappear completely. Next thing I know
I’m staring at 5’3 of pissed off waitress.

Aaaaaand
there goes my boner.

The friend,
Hannah, or Hailey, or something, gives me the double finger point
between her eyes and mine, universal code for “I’m watching
you.”

Crap, did
every girl within a 10 kilometre radius suddenly start PMSing the
minute I walked through the door?

I’m trying
real hard not to laugh, so when she vocalises what her hand
gestures apparently didn’t convey I bite down on my cheek hard
enough to taste blood. Chick’s like a shark, though. I swear her
eyes narrow when she scents my blood in the air.

“
Okay.” I
say, ’cause I know she’s waiting for me to say something and, to be
honest, that’s all I got.

“
I’m glad we
had this little talk.”

“
Yeah, me
too.”

Wait.

What the
fuck?

Did we even
have a conversation? This chick’s messing with my head. She’s also
kinda creeping me out, so rather than sit here and risk her boiling
my bunny while I wait for Ana I grab my helmet and my jacket, throw
a twenty on the table and head out to get my bike.

“
See ya
round.” I call as I’m exiting the pie shop.

“
Not if I see
you first, Elijah Cade.” She singsongs back and I repress the urge
to run for my life.

A minute
later I’m parked in front of her garage as Ana comes down the
stairs wearing jeans that cling so tight to her legs and arse that
I can clearly see all the places I want to put my mouth and hands.
She’s also rockin’ a barely there singlet top that I have no doubt
I could see right through if it got wet.

God, I hope
it rains.

Holy mother
of whoring nuns she’s hot. Fuck! I haven’t just crossed the border
into boner territory, Mr Happy’s erected a tent from my jeans and
is setting up camp there.

I clear my
throat, shift in my seat and hope like hell she doesn’t notice the
raging hard-on before she gets on the bike. Once she’s positioned
behind me she won’t see a thing. Her hot little body will be
pressed into my back, her legs wrapped around mine … shit.
Wrong thing to think with a hot girl in front of
me, and a boner the size of Everest.
And
no, that’s not an over
exaggeration, my man meat is huge.

“
You okay?”
Ana asks. Shit. I hate it when I get so lost in my head I forget
what’s going on around me.

“
Yeah,” I
say, glancing down at the gravel beneath my bike to keep from
gawking at her. “Just tired. Been a really long day.”

“
Right, well,
let’s get you sorted so you can hit the hay.” She smiles, but it’s
nothing like the look she was giving me inside.
Did I offend her?
Crap. Why the hell
are chicks so hard to read? In an effort to make things right I
add, “Your pie is awesome, by the way.”

Fuck. That
sounded completely suggestive.

“
That didn’t
come out right.”

“
It’s okay.
My pie
is
awesome,” she says playfully as she backs away from me.
Something in her expression makes me want to chase her.

“
I have no
doubt,” I whisper, and then loud enough so she can hear, “Are you
getting on, or are we gonna play chasies all night, Ana no last
name?”

“
Oh, I have
my own ride.” She lifts the roller door to the double garage where
a beat up Holden, a Fat Boy on pits and a shiny yellow
geriatric-looking Vespa sits. Ana dons a matching yellow helmet and
buckles it beneath her chin.

“
That’s your
ride?” I’m having a hard time keeping the smugness from my
smile.

“
Uh-huh.”

“
Alright,
then,” I say, trying not to laugh. A massive grin breaks out on my
face.

Ana’s
scowling. “What?”

I hold up my
hands to ward her off. “Nothing. Just, you do know I have to meet
this guy tonight and not next week, right? Are you sure your little
grandma bike is gonna cut it out there on the open
road?”

“
Hey! This
‘grandma’ bike could run rings around your decrepit little
tricycle.”

“
Tricycle?” I
laugh at the righteous indignation on her face, the sheer
determination in her gaze that says she’d like to hand me my arse
on a plate. I kinda want to let her. I stroke my bike lovingly.
“This is a precision instrument of speed and t—”

“
Toy parts?”
she asks as she hops on her scooter, kicks out the centre stand and
revs the engine.

“
Baby girl,
nothing about me or my bike is childish.” I smile, but there’s an
edge to it.

“
We’ll see.”
She edges the Vespa forward so she’s directly in front of
me.

I rev my
engine, pull on my helmet and slam my aviators into
place.

“
And I’m not
your baby girl.”

Ana fishtails
in front of me, kicking up a cloud of grey dust and gravel in my
face. I shake my head and jet after her.
I’m gonna have that girl naked beneath me before the week’s
end.

Chapter Three

Ana

I look at the
clock once more. You know? Just in case someone miraculously
invented a time machine and I find myself somewhere back in time
before three am. The ceiling fan whirs overhead and the summer heat
has sweat sticking my PJs to my body. I kick the covers to the end
of my bed and resolve not to think about what it is I’m thinking
about: Elijah Cade.

Although, if
I have to think about Elijah, it’s kinda nice to remember the look
on his face when he finally caught up to me last night.

“
I take it
back,” he’d shouted over the roar of our engines. “That’s sure as
shit no grandma bike.”

The look on
Elijah’s face when I left him in the dust was priceless. I mean,
yeah, I drive a Vespa, but my dad custom builds and restores
Harleys. If he couldn’t get me on a “real” bike he at least had to
modify it so that I wouldn’t be a laughing stock. He souped-up the
engine one night while I was asleep, a fact I was not too happy
about as it voided my warranty, but I guess when your dad’s the
best mechanic in the state little things like null and voided
warranties never really come into play.

I’d given
Elijah a smug smile and he’d shoved his sunnies back into place and
sped off in front of me, copying my fishtail manoeuvre to a tee. I
was so not having that, and I’d let him know by overtaking him at
every possible turn. Of course, we’d been speeding and we’d
overshot the turn-off by about ten km, but it had been so nice just
to drive and play that I couldn’t have cared less.

An almighty
crack of thunder had made me glance up at the storm clouds
overhead, at which point I’d decided I didn’t want to get caught in
the rain and I’d let Elijah zoom past me, only to turn around and
head in the other direction when he thought he had me beat. It had
been a good five minutes before I’d seen him slip in behind me
again and maintain a steady speed. When we’d reached the river, or
as close to the river as the road would take us, I’d walked him
through the rocky, overgrown trail and down the steep sloping bank.
From the obscurity of the trees, I pointed out “Big Gay Bob” and
hightailed it out of there, before my dad or the dragon could see
me.

“
You’re not
gonna stay?” Elijah had said.

“
Nope.” I’d
called over my shoulder.

“
What if I
get lost?”

I’d turned
and walked backwards without any fear of falling or making a
complete dork out of myself. I knew that terrain like the back of
my hand. When I was younger the bikers would drag their kids along
to those bonfires. I knew every twist, turn and protruding rock of
that path. “Then you’ll have a really long trek back to your
bike.”

My reply had
been rewarded with a flash of dimple. For a moment I’d forgotten
just how dangerous Ole’ Melty Eyed Dimples was. “Thanks for the
ride, Ana No Last Name.”

“
Welcome to
Sugartown, Elijah Cade.”

Now, as I lie
in bed, I can’t stop thinking about him. I wanted to stop thinking
about him, needed desperately to stop thinking about him if I was
going to be any use at work tomorrow, but instead I found myself
tiptoeing through the house, grabbing the keys to the shop and
scurrying out into the rain in my singlet top and boy shorts to
make pies in the industrial-sized kitchen until the sun came
up.

And that’s
exactly where Holly found me at 9 am, with my head resting on the
flour-covered bench and twenty Triple Chocolate Melted Fudge pies
surrounding me.

Holly casts
suspicious eyes around the room and arcs her waxed-to-perfection
brows. “Rough night?”

“
The
roughest.”

“
Well,
considering there’s not some tattooed motorcycle god half naked in
this kitchen, I’ll take it as a sign your date didn’t go
well.”

“
Pfff, he’s
hardly a motorcycle god. Bespa” —yes, I named my bike, don’t judge
me— “ran rings around that little tricycle of his. And it wasn’t a
date.”

“
You sound
like your dad.” Holly rolls her heavily made-up eyes and dips her
equally manicured finger into the pie that I’d taste tested early
this morning, “Mmmm, delicious. Wait, did you change the recipe for
your surprise pie?”

“
No. This is
something different.” I rise and stretch out all the aches and
pains of spending the night in the kitchen, but not before I see
her brow arch and a knowing smile slip across her lips. I busy
myself wiping flour from the bench with a nearby rag.

“
Whatcha
doin’?”

“
Cleaning.”

“
No I mean
whatcha
doing
?”

“
I don’t know
what you mean.” I feign innocence but she sees right through it. I
am so busted.

“
What’s it
called, Ana?”

“
I haven’t
named it yet.” I work real hard at scrubbing the imaginary stain on
the bench.

Holly lets
out a gasp. It’s so loud, it has me jumping up on the chair,
thinking she’s seen a bluetongue lizard in the kitchen, “You sneaky
little slutsky! You totally made him a pie!”

“
I did not
make him a pie!”

“
You dirty
whore!” she shrieks as she picks up a nearby broom and starts
prodding my butt with the handle.

I swat at her
with my floury dishrag. “Would you cut it out?”