Grabbing what I needed, I headed toward the counter and began pulling my money from my pocket.

“Pete home with her?” Joey asked.

I shook my head. “He’s over the road again, this time for a month.”

“Who’s he haulin’ for now?”

“Not sure,” I said, shrugging.

My marriage wasn’t a typical one. We were more like roommates than anything else, roommates who couldn’t be bothered with each other.

His job hauling freight cross-country gave us the luxury of living apart from each other while still appeasing our parents’ wishes: to raise our daughter together.

But Pete usually didn’t tell me what he was doing or where he was going unless it directly concerned me, and I didn’t care enough to ask.

“He’s with a smaller company now,” I added. “Hauling paper, I think.”

While ringing up my purchases, Joey nodded distractedly. “So, your folks got Teg?”

I snorted softly. The idea of my parents ever willingly helping me was laughable. On a good day they considered me an embarrassment, but on most days, a failure they wanted nothing to do with.

“She’s with Mary.”

At the mention of my older sister’s name, Joey grimaced, and my lips twisted as I fought the urge to laugh. Mary was no one’s favorite person. Like most people in Miles City, she was religious and a right-wing conservative, but she took it to another level entirely, talking down to people who didn’t share her viewpoints, incessantly preaching to anyone who would listen, and even those who wouldn’t. Needless to say, she wasn’t Miss Popularity, but she was the only real estate agent in town and so, whether they liked it or not, people were forced to interact with her.

“Poor kid,” Joey muttered, handing me my change. “Sick and forced to hang with Mary, Mary, quite contrary.”

“You gave me the wrong change,” I said, handing him back my receipt. “You still owe me three dollars, look—”

The shop’s doorbell jingled loudly, and I glanced over my shoulder half expecting to see Marty, the town drunk, stumble inside to beg for his morning freebies.

Instead, a young man dressed in military fatigues stepped inside the small shop. Carrying a large green duffel bag, he paused upon entering and pulled his kepi off his head as he did a visual sweep of the store. When his gaze reached me, my breath caught in my throat.

He was gorgeous. His eyes were a deep, brilliant shade of blue, his dirty-blond hair was cropped close to his head, and his features were hard and chiseled, tanned to a perfect golden hue. His figure tapered nicely from broad shoulders to trim hips. The man was absolutely gorgeous, and I was stunned.

Furthermore, I didn’t recognize him, and this was Miles City, Montana, a small town where everyone knew everyone. As far as I knew, we didn’t have any new arrivals.

“Bathroom?” He raised his eyebrows.

In answer, Joey pointed toward the back of the shop, and we both watched as he shouldered his duffel bag and started through the store.

“Stop droolin’, D.” Joey’s voice was pinched, as though he was trying not to laugh. “You’re lookin’ like a bug-eyed leprechaun. And it ain’t a good look for ya.”

My cheeks burning, I shook my head. “I was just wondering who he was, is all.”

“He’s one of Deuce’s. Transplant from the Wyoming Horsemen chapter, or so I heard. Name’s Jason Brady, and accordin’ to some of Deuce’s boys who work at the auto shop in town, he’s in the Marine reserves.”

Deuce’s boys.

Deuce, the president of our town’s local motorcycle club, was one of the most frightening yet intriguing men I’d ever met. And I used the term “met” very loosely; I’d had very little contact with the leader of the Hell’s Horsemen, only minor encounters here and there around town. Deuce was a very private person, but as far as I knew, he was a decent enough man.

Unlike his father, Reaper, the former club president, Deuce took take care of Miles City. He’d taken control of several failing businesses around town and brought them back from near bankruptcy, he constantly donated money to the public schools and library, and a few years back, when my parents’ neighbor had lost his wife to cancer and was about to lose his farm due to her exorbitant medical bills, it was Deuce who had picked up the tab.

Even so, there were rumors that Deuce was involved with business that danced around the law, but Deuce and his boys were good to us, so other than the rumors and the idle chitchat between the gossipmongers, usually no one gave it a second thought.

“Sell smokes here?”

Jason Brady emerged from the bathroom no longer looking like an American hero. Dressed in leather boots, leather pants, a tight black T-shirt, and his leather Hell’s Horsemen cut, he now looked like one of Deuce’s boys. Except he was hands down the most clean-cut biker I’d ever seen. And he appeared to smell good too.

But that was pure assumption on my part. Or maybe wishful thinking. Because for some reason, I really wanted to get close enough to give him a sniff.

“Name’s Brady,” he said, smiling over my head in Joey’s direction. “Jase Brady.”

“Joe Weaver.” Pointing at me, Joey said, “And this here’s little Dorothy Kelley Matthews, resident ginger midget.”

Jase’s friendly gaze dropped down to where I stood and he looked me over, an embarrassingly slow and thorough perusal of all five foot nothing of me, from my head to my toes and back up again.

I felt my face heat. Not only were my holey jeans and plain tee covered in the remnants from a full morning of cleaning, but my hair was piled on top of my head in a messy bun, and I was sweating from the midday heat.

“Nice meetin’ you, baby,” he said, his lips curving. The tip of his tongue appeared and he very deliberately ran it across his full bottom lip.

Then it wasn’t just my face overheating but my entire body. Feeling suddenly drugged and my thoughts muddled, I pressed my hand over my stomach and swallowed hard.

“You . . . too,” I whispered.

“You got a nickname, little Dorothy Kelley Matthews?” he asked. “’Cause that’s a fuckin’ mouthful right there.”

My breath shuddered from my lungs in small spurts of air. What was wrong with me? Why couldn’t I speak? Or move?

Jase’s lips split into a grin. “Not that I mind a mouthful of pretty girl . . .”

Oh dear God. How did one respond to that?

From behind me, Joey let out a loud and amused-sounding cough, startling me back to reality. Back to Jase and his knowing grin, fully aware of the effect he had on me.

“Excuse me,” I muttered. Snatching my purchases off the counter, I hurried quickly toward the door and pushed blindly through it.

What was wrong with me? I’d been flirting! And with a total stranger!

And worse, I was married. It might not be a love match between Pete and me, and he might be on the road more than he was home, but we had a daughter together and he took care of us financially. I should respect that, and yet here I was acting like a teenager with a crush, entertaining thoughts that I had no business thinking. I shook my head in dismay and let out a large pent-up breath that did nothing to calm my rapidly beating heart.

Reaching my truck, I tossed my purchases inside the open window, and was about to open the door when I felt a touch on my left shoulder. Startled, I spun around and came face-to-face with . . . Jason Brady.

“You forgot your change,” he said.

When I tore my gaze from his grin and looked down to his outstretched hand, I found three wrinkled dollar bills. But my focus wasn’t on my change, it was on the man standing in front of me. He was so close to me, too close, and watching me too intently for me to feel at all comfortable.

And yes, dammit. He did smell good. An understated, yet softly spicy bouquet wafted off his skin, and along with it, the faint odor of sweat and the crisp scent of leather.

Swallowing hard and with a slightly trembling hand, I reached for my money and when I did, his free hand came down on top, his hands caging mine, his touch freezing me in place.

“You should stop by the club and see me sometime,” he said, his eyes lazy, his smile filled with less-than-honorable intent. A smile that had my stomach flip-flopping.

I cleared my throat and managed to choke out, “I . . . I’m married.”

Jase’s smile never wavered. “Baby, I ain’t tryin’ to marry you.”

Releasing me, he held up his left hand and wiggled his ring finger back and forth. His wedding band, a thin band of platinum, glinted menacingly in the sunlight. “Got the battle scars to prove it too.”

I stared up at him as foreign thoughts infiltrated my brain, thoughts of him and me naked, sweaty, our bodies colliding. I saw heated kisses and furious groping and—

Instantly disgusted, more so with myself than at his audacity, I had spun back around and quickly jerked open the driver’s side door. Yanking it closed behind me, I’d thrust the key into the engine, slammed the truck into reverse, and hit the gas. As I had burned rubber out of the parking lot, I could see him in my rearview mirror, still standing where I’d left him.

Laughing.

What an absolute scumbag.

What an absolutely, perfectly sculpted, beautifully smelling . . . scumbag.

**•

Since I was young and unhappy in my marriage, it had only taken Jase a few months of pursuing me before I’d succumbed, and an even shorter period of time before I’d fallen head over heels in love with him. A love I’d chosen above all else—my marriage had ended and my family was lost to me, viewing me as an adulterer; the utmost disgrace.