Читать книгу The Rich Man's Baby - Leah Vale - Страница 10

Juliet Jones pulled in a soothing breath of warm, early-June air and leaned back in the lone wooden chair on the balcony above her family’s store. After another long, boring day spent waiting behind the cash register for the rare customer to wander in, she ached clear to her bones. With a weary sigh, she slipped off her worn Keds and propped her bare feet on the peeling white railing.

She settled the cold beer bottle on the front of her frayed jeans shorts, closed her eyes and wished for the millionth time she hadn’t promised Grandpa before he died that she would keep his store going. But she’d promised, so here she was watching her life slip away like the waters of Oregon’s McKenzie River running steady and silent on the other side of the two-lane highway their little store hugged.

She was just twenty-one, but she felt as old as dirt.

If only Richard Gere would drive up in his Lamborghini looking just for her.

The deep growl of a motorcycle shifting down interrupted her snort at the ridiculous thought, and the sound of gravel crunching under wheels brought her eyes open. One look at the man leaning low over the green racing motorcycle as he pulled up to the store’s rusting gas pump and she was a goner.

He could have a face like a butt under that black helmet and she wouldn’t have cared. He looked like some mysterious warrior to her starved imagination—his black leather bomber jacket, faded blue Levi’s, and trashed black cowboy boots his armor.

Juliet couldn’t tell if he was looking up at her or not, so she kept staring when she would have normally looked away. She watched him settle both feet flat on the ground, turn the engine off, then reach up and flip his tinted visor up. She nearly jumped out of her skin. He was looking straight at her with beautiful, soulful eyes beneath full, dark-blond brows.

His gaze was as powerful as one of Shakespeare’s love sonnets to her lonely heart.

He pulled the helmet from his head.

Juliet gaped and yanked her feet from the rail, starting a paint-chip blizzard. He was the most gorgeous man she’d ever seen. A dream come true, in fact. His straight nose and square jaw, roughened by dark-blond whiskers, held such masculine beauty she was too stunned-stupid to quit staring at him. What was a man like him doing in her world?

His gaze still on her, he hung his helmet on one of the handlebars and ran a hand through his thick, wavy, golden hair that brushed the top of his collar in the back. “Does this pump work?” he called up in a deep voice that hit her like gravel wrapped in velvet and turned her bones to liquid.

With a weak shake of her head, she croaked, “No.” Clearing her throat, she needlessly added, “Though there’s probably enough gas still down there to one day blow us all to kingdom come.”

His smile was lopsided and unmercifully sexy. “Then you better hop on and let me take you far away from here,” he offered, patting the back of his bike.

She laughed in an idiotic, high-pitched way. Man, she’d never made that noise before. Her face heated, and she wished she could disappear. So much for this fantasy coming true. The Adonis on the bike sure as heck wouldn’t want to mess with a bubblehead on a balcony.

But instead of slapping on his helmet and roaring away, he lowered the kickstand with the heel of his boot and swung a long, thickly muscled leg over the bike and got off. “Well, if I can’t top off my tank and you won’t let me whisk you to safety, can I buy myself a beer inside and join you up there? I’m sure the view is something I wouldn’t want to miss.”

The suggestiveness of his tone and his masculine magnetic pull flustered her so much she started to ramble. “We haven’t been allowed to sell beer since that incident with those darn thirteen-year-olds a couple years back. And as far as the view goes, the blackberry bushes and ash trees on the other side of the road have grown so much you can hardly see the river anymore.”

He grinned up at her, and she actually felt the earth moving. But instead of making her feel wild and out of control, her heart rate slowed and everything became crystal clear. For once she knew exactly what she wanted. For once she was willing to take a risk.

She leaned forward in the chair and rested her elbows on her bare knees, with the neck of the full beer bottle caught between her fingers. Looking at him through the crooked railing, she said, “I can’t sell you a beer, but you’re welcome to share mine.”

An intense, almost desperate look replaced his grin. “How do I get up there?”

She shook her head, sending her long, sun-streaked brown hair slipping off her shoulders. The peace of certainty made her feel powerful. “I’ll come down.”

“Good. Because in case you haven’t noticed, that balcony has a definite lean to it. I’m not sure it’s any safer than the gas pump.”

This time she laughed for real. “I know. But it’s my balcony.” Thinking of her older brother’s homemade racing motorcycle, she grinned and added, “Hey, if you like bikes, there’s something you’ve got to see out back in the shed.” As she rose from the chair, Juliet fought to control the surge of excitement pumping through her veins.

For the first time in her life she might actually get what she wanted.