Page 17 of Tempting the President (Oro Nero MC)
Dear Ashton,
I rode a bike for the first time in my life. Thankfully, I didn’t do it alone.
I don’t think I care to repeat it though. And kiddo – I’m warning you. You must never ever grow up to be a biker, okay? Bikers are jerks.
Love, Your Big Sis
HE brOUGHT ME TO DISNEYLAND . A darn amusement park. Because the jerk wanted to make me speak. Scream. Anything to have him hear my voice.
When the rollercoaster screamed to a stop, Kellion turned to me with a grin.
If I could, I would have barfed on him, just to get my revenge.
When we were back on the ground, Kellion asked cheerfully, “What do you want to ride next?”
I raised my foot and stepped on him hard. That was my answer.
He grunted in pain, but amusement twinkled in his green eyes. He looked around us, a thoughtful expression on his face.
Fearing that he was looking for another death-defying ride to take me to, I tugged on his sleeve. When he glanced down at me, I wrote on my board and showed it to him. I’m hungry.
It was a total lie, and the way Kellion smirked at me, he knew it, too. “I’ll feed you—-”
I started to sigh in relief.
“—-if you let me feed you.”
I ended up scowling instead. No.
Kellion rubbed his jaw. “Mmm...then what do you think we should ride—-” A tug on his sleeve had him raising a brow at me.
I showed him my board. FINE.
He took my hand, and this time I didn’t bother pulling away. It was just a waste of my effort, and that was all it was. It had nothing to do with the way I felt secure in his hold, the way I felt hot all over every time we were connected like this.
“How fake-hungry are you?”
I wrinkled my nose. Ha-ha.
“Hotdog or cotton candy?”
I flicked two fingers out, indicating No. 2 as my choice.
Behind me, I heard a girl gasp. “I think she’s deaf and mute.”
“What a waste,” her companion muttered.
When I saw Kellion’s face harden at the words, I automatically reached for his arm. Our eyes met, and I shook my head, scribbled on my board, and showed it to him. IT’S OK.
“It’s not.”
I DON’T MIND.
For a moment, he only gazed at me. Finally, he said, “You really don’t mind, do you?”
I nodded.
His grip on my hand tightened. “Strangely, that’s what I like about you the most.” His Greek accent had thickened, almost making his words indecipherable. “I like that you don’t care about what other people think.” His lips twisted. “Even me.”
I couldn’t look at him after that, and he didn’t press the issue.
We walked hand in hand towards the cotton candy stand.
Around us, most of the other patrons were either young families or kids on a field trip.
The few couples around were mostly tourists, and their words, made up of a dozen different languages, combined with classic Disney songs playing in the background, blended into a happy kind of cacophony by the time it reached my ears.
With the biker holding my hand, the world had become painfully vivid again. I tried not to notice it. Tried to pretend the world was still blurry, but it was impossible.
The sky was blue. The clouds were white. And , I thought painfully, everyone’s lips were a beautiful shade of red as they smiled genuinely happy smiles, smiles that showed they were alive.
“Aria?”
Hearing him say my name startled me, and by the way he looked at me, I knew he was wondering where my mind had gone to.
“What flavor do you want?”
I pointed to the bag of blue cotton candy. Bubblegum.
Moments later, and Kellion had the bag in his hand and was carefully tearing off a strip of cotton candy to feed me. “Say ‘ aah ’.”
I opened my mouth with a sound.
He grinned. “You are the most unromantic girl I have ever known.” He popped the strip into my mouth. As I chewed, he added, “Probably more unromantic than Bobby.”
I scribbled on my board. NO ONE IS AS EVIL AS BOBBY.
He laughed. “So it’s true then? You all think she’s the evil redheaded queen.”
LIKE MALEFICENT.
He laughed harder. “I should tell Leandro that. I think he’ll love it.” When he saw my eyes widen in horror, he said reassuringly, “Don’t worry. I just want to make him jealous.”
I cocked my head to the side. How come?
“You don’t know?” He popped another strip into my mouth before answering. “He’s jealous of Angelina Jolie because Bobby hero-worships her.”
My brows lifted up. Really?
“Yeah. One time, Bobby had to choose between celebrating...mm...I think it was their 8 th month together? She could either go out and have dinner with Leandro or attend a charity ball that had Angelina Jolie as the guest of honor. Guess which one she went to?”
I almost, almost laughed.
When I was sufficiently in control again, I turned to him and found the biker looking at me. He asked quietly, “Why don’t you want to talk?” When I showed no signs of answering, he said gently, “You do know that I can find out the truth, right?”
I blinked at him. I hadn’t thought of that, but now that he mentioned it, I realized it was true. He was Kellion Argyros, after all.
“But I don’t want to learn about you that way. I want you to be the one to tell me the truth, terataki .”
Tell...him...the...truth?
I scribbled on my board again. WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?
His lips curved at the way I deliberately evaded answering. He said finally, “ Terataki ?”
I tried not to sigh in relief when he accepted the change of subject. I scribbled again. YOU MAKE ME SOUND LIKE A JAPANESE DISH.
His smile widened. “It’s worse.” Before I could react, he had popped another strip into my mouth. We didn’t talk after that, our hands remaining entwined while he continued feeding me.
His phone beeped once, and Kellion took it out, his face impassive as he read the message before returning his phone to his pocket. When he ran out of cotton candy, he asked, “Shall we go?”
The question startled me. If I was honest, it disappointed me a little, the fact that he had said the words first. I looked at him and realized that he had changed. Without even me knowing, he had changed.
The man next to me had turned into a cold stranger, and an intimidatingly blank mask had fallen over his gorgeous face.
Why? I wanted to ask the words but I couldn’t. Did it mean he had lost interest in me? One moment he was warm and wicked, doing his best to tease me into reacting. And then all of a sudden, he was...not. All of a sudden he was everything I had feared someone like Kellion Argyros would be.
Unreachable.
Especially for someone like me.