“Well, I never.” Ronnie blustered, almost like he wanted to clutch his pearls.
Poppy didn’t hold back her giggle as she continued to stare up adoringly at the man who’d come for her.
He’d chased her down.
She felt sowanted.
“No, you never. I did, pal. So fuck off.”
Tait dismissed him just like that and stepped forward almost bringing their noses together. “You are in so much trouble, swear to Christ, Poppy.”
“I know, I’ll take my punishment like a champ.”
“You are not running from me, Poppy. Not back here, not back tohim. You belong to me, I own you.”
“Well of course you do,” there were several gasps of shock from the crowd, she saw her mother standing with her father, no doubt ready to step in. “This is all just a silly misunderstanding, not of my doing, I might add, but I’ll explain.”
And she did.
While Tait stood there with his head hanging low and sexy on his neck, lips thinned and deliciously tempting, she told him about her dead phone, her frantic rush to the airport to what she thought was a bedside vigil, only to discover it was an ambush.
“I tried calling you a bunch of times.”
“Phone was off. I was on a plane,” he growled and cut a glance behind to her parents. She instantly rushed forward and pressed her hands to his hard chest, calming whatever he wanted to say to them. “It’s just us, Tait. It doesn’t matter what happened, I was coming home tomorrow on the earliest flight. Home to you.”
“Penelope, a word right now.” Ronnie piped in and this time it was Poppy herself who rounded on the man she stupidly thought she’d marry.
She must have used too much hairspray that day because it was a lousy decision, this much she knew. Thank goodness she had the balls to run away when she did because she’d run right to biker paradise.
Underneath her hands, she felt Tait’s chest start to rattle with warning.
It sent a flurry of heat between her legs.
Oh, wow, she loved him so very much.
“Honest to goodness, will you shut up, Ronnie, before Tait does something you’ll hate. He doesn’t care for people talking badly to me. You have your grandma’s ring back, I told you what a colossal mistake we were, go suck up my dad’s ass another way because you aren’t using me again.”
Another gasp spread through her parents great banquet hall.
“Penelope, you’re making a scene.” Her dad sighed and she cut him a glance too.
“Good, it’s about time I did. Please excuse me, father, while I talk privately with my man, you remember Tait Hunt, don’t you? I know you do, even though you’re doing your best bad manners impression to ignore him.”
She gave Tait a shove and that’s when he moved, by slipping an arm around her waist and situated her over to a corner.
Of course all eyes followed them, she didn’t care.
She just didn’t want Tait to get arrested for punching Ronnie, though she was tempted to ask him to do it.
“Little badass,” he amused in her ear and she beamed, clutching his chest. “I’d walk through fire for you, you have to know that.” A hand snaked around the back of her neck and drew her in until they were touching noses. His breath fanned her face and Poppy had to touch him, there was no other choice, she slid both of her hands around his waist.
“You came back to a place that didn’t treat you very well. And you did it for me. I think I get my importance, Tait.”
“I didn’t like thinking you’d left me. Not for a second.”
“I was coming back, I swear.”
He growled a torturous and sexy noise that was felt in every bone. She moaned and moved deeper into him. “I will always come after you, you hearing me, little girl? Always.”