The Goodbye Ride
Authors: Lily Malone
The Goodbye Ride
Title: The Goodbye Ride
Cover: Wendy Johnston. Bright Eyed Owl.
Editor: Anita Weeks
Copyright © 2013 by Lily Malone
All rights reserved. No part of this text may be reproduced,
transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or
introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by
any means, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written
permission of Lily Malone.
This work is a book of fiction. any resemblance to any person, living
or dead, is purely coincidental. Actual places used in the book are mentioned
only in a purely fictitious manner. The author acknowledges the trademarked
status and trademark owners of various places/products referenced in this work
of fiction, which have been used without permission and is by no way sponsored
by the trademark owners.
www.lilymalone.wordpress.com.au
The Goodbye Ride
Lily Malone
Olivia Murphy is a woman on a mission.
Gracing the front lawn of a house in her Adelaide Hills hometown sits the
classic Ducati motorbike that once belonged to her brother, a For Sale sign by
the tyre.
Liv wants to buy the precious bike and
bring it back into her family, and she wants the ink dry on the paperwork
before the approaching holiday weekend. Tourist-mecca Hahndorf doubles in size
on long weekends—and most visitors have far fatter wallets than hers.
One person stands in her way.
Owen Carson likes rare and beautiful things
and he has the Ducati in his sights. Then he meets Liv, and finds his
heart captured by beauty of a far different kind.
What will Olivia do to make the Ducati
hers? And can Owen convince Liv he wants more than a holiday fling?
About the author
Lily
Malone is a journalist and freelance writer who discovered after years of
writing facts for a living, writing romance was much more fun.
The
Goodbye Ride
novella is her second release in 2013 and is
inspired by her husband's life-long love of Ducati bikes, 650 Pantahs in
particular!
Her
first full-length contemporary romance,
His Brand Of Beautiful,
was
released by Escape Publishing in March and has received great reviews from
Australian and international readers with Lily's dialogue and descriptive prose
getting special mention.
Lily
juggles writing with the needs of a young family, and when she isn’t writing,
she likes gardening, walking, wine, and walking in gardens (sometimes with
wine).
She
loves to hear from readers and you can visit Lily at
www.lilymalone.wordpress.com
or on
goodreads
With thanks to my critique partners and
beta readers Marion, Kylie and Kathy who helped
The Goodbye Ride
get
better and better.
And to the Facebook Club who cyber-drink
and celebrate the days when everything about my writing works, and who
cyber-drink and commiserate with me on the days when nothing goes quite right.
And to my long-suffering hubby who answers
questions about Ducatis with such certainty and good humour.
Table Of Contents
Olivia Murphy had brass in pocket. One
thousand dollars’ worth of brass to be exact—all hers and all hard-earned.
Technically, the money was in her handbag not her pocket, but Liv wasn’t about
to split hairs. The sun—for the moment at least—was shining, she’d given
herself the day off tomorrow, and her parents were in Melbourne. She had the
house to herself for four whole days.
Bliss.
The Lang’s place wasn’t
far—just another few hundred metres walk out of town along the Hahndorf main
street. She couldn’t see the glint of red, not yet. There were too many hedges
in the way, too many neat brush fences, and her prize was set back from the
road.
Luke’s bike.
Her brother’s Ducati Pantah 650. The bike she was
about to give Dean Lang ten thousand dollars to buy back.
If there’s one oak leaf
stain on that paintwork, Mr Lang, you better get ready to knock another few
hundred dollars off your asking price.
Liv checked over her shoulder,
just as she’d checked every thirty seconds since she’d left the bank carrying
ten hundred-dollar notes crisply folded in a plastic bag. The odds of getting
mugged in Hahndorf weren’t high, unless by a Japanese tourist who wanted his
photo taken. But why tempt fate?
She quickened her pace.
Her handbag bumped her hip.
Liv clutched it closed with her elbow and concentrated on where she put her
feet. Rotting autumn leaves made slimy passage underfoot and the pavement was a
twisted rollercoaster of treacherous roots.
On the opposite side of the
road, ahead near the sixty sign, a bright red utility pulled to a stop. The
driver braked hard enough to grind shining Mag wheels through the roadside
slush.
It was one of those big
bristling testosterone-fuelled boy toys—one with more aerials than a radio
station, mudflaps the size of a swamp, spotlights everywhere. A bull bar
covered in RM Williams’ stickers snarled across the front.
Liv figured the driver must be
heading up to camp in the backwaters of the Murray River for the Queen’s
Birthday long weekend, some choice spot where he could shoot pigs and suck
beers. He’d probably stopped to change CDs, throw
One Hundred Best Beer
Songs
of All Time
into the stacker.
“Neanderthal,” she muttered
under her breath. He’d be just the kind of arsehole who’d made her brother’s
life hell.
The driver-side door opened
and two feet eased out. Two feet clad in thongs.
Thongs!
Liv pulled her
jacket tighter across her chest. Didn’t Mr Muscle Car know it was June?
No sense. No feeling.
Those feet were attached to a
muscular pair of legs in black cargo shorts, and from there to a sculpted torso
in a tee-shirt that looked a half size too tight.
The driver shoved his
sunglasses to the top of his head, checked left and right, and his weight edged
forward.
Fear iced Liv’s spine.
The brute had parked opposite
Dean Lang’s house—directly opposite
her
bike—and now he zeroed in on the
Ducati like a heat-seeking missile.
Guys like that don’t want
650 Pantahs.
It was a
strangled scream inside Liv’s head.
Guys like that drive utes!
Utes
with a cabin for bonking their bimbo
girlfriends.
Utes
with a tray in the back so they could throw in a swag
at the end of a big night out.
Dammit.
Where was a Greyhound bus where you needed
one? Not to hit him, mind. Just to slow him down a little. Okay, maybe wing
him.
Liv missed her step, skidded
on an ice-rink of acorns and her legs slid like a new-born foal’s. It took a
few seconds to regain her balance and in that time, the driver loped across the
road and up the embankment. Liv lost him behind the neighbour’s hedge, but she
was almost level with the Lang’s driveway now. Almost there.
Then the earth moved.
She had just enough time to
thrust out her left hand before she hit the ground. Pain shot through her palm
and it felt like a sledgehammer whacked her hip. Her handbag catapulted from
her shoulder to the pavement, scattering lip-eze, a pack of chewing gum, and a
mobile phone. Her precious plastic bag of cash skidded out late, like the last
girl asked to the dance.
“Whoa! Are you okay? Hold on.”
Liv heard a
flap, clap
sound and thought for a second that some arsehole was applauding her fall.
Dimly, she looked for the arsehole, ready to give him a piece of her mind. She
tried to push herself up and turn over but before she could attain either goal,
a muscled arm reached down and a dark shape blotted out the tangle of branches
over her head. His bare arm cushioned her shoulders while his voice cajoled her
to sit.
“You’re wearing thongs in the
middle of winter.” It was all she could think of to say. He chuckled and she
heard comfort and warmth in the sound. Then again he tried to propel her
upright. “Give me a sec. My head’s spinning. I need to get my breath.”
“That was some fall.”
She examined her sore, scraped
hands, aware of a damp spot spreading on the butt of her jeans. Somehow, she
got her feet beneath her. “I’m fine. Thank you.
Really.
”
He picked up her handbag,
lipstick and phone. Then she saw him reach for her money
.
“I can get it,” she said,
bending, stretching for the plastic bag.
The earth spun again. She
ended up with her hands on her knees and her head at her thighs. His big
knuckled fingers rubbed her back and at some stage, her pink wool beanie fell
off her head and landed on top of his bare toe. That toe looked wild enough to
crawl into the nearest cave and hibernate. Most male toes she’d seen in her
twenty-four years didn’t look like that. Her brother had forgotten more about
pedicures than Liv had ever known.
Loss spiked her chest.
Luke.
Liv sucked two quick breaths
and stood. She was here to buy Luke’s bike from Dean Lang, not think about
pedicures or toes or caves.
“Here,” the guy said gravely,
picking up her cash and hat, stuffing one in her handbag and the other over her
head. Eyes the charcoal side of black seemed to click with hers and it was as
if she heard a little voice inside her head sigh:
Oh, hello.
Olivia Murphy didn’t listen to
little voices sigh. She was far too sensible for that.
“Thank you,” she said, pulling
away.
“Hold still. Let me get this.”
His callused fingertips grazed the skin at her temple. His hands smelled of old
rope and leather. They weren’t dirty, but his fingers were ingrained with
stains, like motor oil maybe, or earth. Whatever he did for a living, her guess
was he worked with his hands. Like she did.
He doubled the front of the
wool beanie and rolled it once to clear her eyes, then pushed a chunk of her
dark fringe to the side. “Good as new.”
Liv let out a breath. Judging
by the dizzy feeling in her head, it was the first to go in or out for a while.
“Well, if you’re all in one
piece…” His voice trailed away and she realised he was waiting for her to tell
him her name.
“Olivia,” she supplied
grudgingly, before she remembered he’d helped her and she should probably be
nice. At least, nicer. “Liv. Liv Murphy.”
“Owen Carson.”
It wasn’t a name she knew.
Owen held out his hand and she
shook it. His palm was rough, his grip firm but not crushing. “Good to meet
you. You live around here?” He gestured with one arm at the universe in general
and Hahndorf in particular.
“I’m on Church Street. Near
the school.” Her eyes drifted to the ridges of his chest, his biceps. His
nipples were hard studs under that tight tee-shirt, his arms smooth and strong.
He had the type of torso that would make a nun flush, and Liv was no nun,
although sometimes lately it felt like it.