Tastes Like Candy (Lean Dogs Legacy Book 2) by Lauren Gilley Page B

man.”
                  “Okay…”
                  “Maybe there are women who want to be property. Maybe it’s easier not to have to think for yourself. But I’m not one of them. If I belong to him, then he has to belong to me. I’ll accept nothing less.”
                  “Damn. I take back what I said about you being a baby.”
                  She released a deep breath, tired now, eyes aching with unshed tears, wanting some sort of physical comfort more than ever. “Thank you.”
                  The wind pulsed quietly around them, a clean, crisp, desert wind that held no secrets, gentle against her face.
                  “Your Barbie’s probably still back at the Armadillo wondering where you went,” Michelle said, and hated the words immediately. Why had she said that? Why push him toward another woman?
                  Because you can’t handle him, or this situation , a small voice in the back of her head whispered.
                  His chuckle was low, dark. It lifted the fine hairs on her arms; sent a tingle of awareness chasing across her skin. “Ah, sweetheart, she’s not the one I want to bend back over my bike right now.”
                  Jesus…Christ.
                  Her pulse kicked into high gear. Desire surged in her belly, a sharp tug that left her weak-kneed.
                  He dropped his head over hers and leaned in close, close, closer. She smelled the Scotch on his breath, felt the faint prickling of nearness, his aura pressing into hers. “You’re right. I’m not chivalrous.” The words right up against her lips, close enough to taste. “And I’m so unbelievably fucking tired of Barbies. Watch yourself, little baby thing, because if you start something, I’m damn sure gonna finish it. And I don’t wanna have to tell Phillip I deflowered his only daughter.”
                  She wanted to sound sophisticated and brave, but her voice came out shaky. “You actually think I’m a virgin?”
                  “I don’t know what you are, but I’m way more curious than I ought to be.”
                  He stepped back, and the wind rushed up to fill the space he’d left, now sharp and cold. “Let’s go home.”
                  Michelle closed her eyes and took a deep breath before she followed.
     
    ~*~
     
    Candy
     
    When he went home with his, as Michelle had described them, “Barbies,” he didn’t let them ride behind him. So often women misread the closeness of the bike as some sort of deeper intimacy. So it was rare that he had a passenger, and he would have liked to blame his current electrified state on the novelty of riding double. Rather than the identity of his passenger.
                  Michelle had ridden her whole life, and so she knew how to hold tight, and how to move with him. Her hands were clenched up in his shirt and he felt the feminine shape of her against his back. All pleasant sensations, but nothing that should have turned his heart to a kettle drum, sent the blood thrumming under his skin.
                  He’d hoped a nice long conversation and hashing out of their disagreement would cool him down. Usually, when the women he went out with started talking, the desire started fading.
                  But Michelle was confident, competent, self-possessed, and so very British, the opposite had happened. By the time her façade cracked and he got a peek at the displaced, lonely, lost girl beneath her frosty rebellion, he was ready to tumble her down to the dirt and have her right there on the side of the road.
                  But he still didn’t understand why .
                  Yes, he could admit that he was tired of the silly just-sex kind of women. He could envision himself finding someone who was more of a