“What is that tattoo across your back?” she asked.
I quickly whipped around, tugging my jeans up. “It’s just some ink I added a while back.”
“Don’t you dare move, Axel Chadwick,” she commanded as she stepped closer, her hand resting on my back. I glanced over my shoulder to see the flashlight on her phone turned on as she shone it on my back.
Well, we’d both had secrets that were bound to come out at some point.
She read the words, her voice just above a whisper.
“‘That’s my Horse Girl, sitting up high. She shines brighter than all the stars in the sky. Soaring through the air, with strength and grace. Try to catch her, and she’ll put you in your place. She’s got big dreams, just watch her fly. In a heartbeat, she’ll pass you by.’”
I didn’t speak. I buttoned my jeans and leaned down to grab my cowboy hat before placing it on my head. I turned around slowly, because she’d stopped speaking.
“Axel.”
“Wren,” I said, mimicking her serious tone. “It’s not a big deal. It’s just a tattoo.”
“When did you get this?”
“A year ago.” I shrugged.
Her brows cinched together. “A year ago?”
“Yes.”
She crossed her arms over her chest, arching an eyebrow as she looked at me. “So a year after I left, you got a tattoo on your back of the lyrics you’d written for me years ago. And then you slept with a random tourist right after?”
“Correct, but the tourist came first.” I smirked. “The tattoo was second.”
“Why?”
“Why what?” I asked.
I reached for my tee, but she tugged it out of my hand and dropped it on the ground. “Answer the question, Axel. Why would you have sex with a woman that you didn’t know and then go and get a tattoo of the song you wrote for me. The song I still sing in my head before every practice and every competition. Hell, I sing it before I fall asleep every night just to comfort myself.”
I looked away, my gaze finding the slight ripple moving along the river. The sound of the water splashing against the rocks in its path made a soothing, rhythmic sound.
“I gave it a year, thinking you’d come to your senses and reach out. When that didn’t happen, I met a woman who was looking for the same thing as me. A no-strings-attached night together, and I thought it would make me forget everything. Help me get my mojo back, you know?”
“And did it?” she pressed as my gaze moved to see her nipples poking against the lace of her bra.
Jesus. This woman was going to be the death of me.
To say that I was physically uncomfortable right now was a massive understatement. I needed to get in the house and in the shower so I could wrap my hand around my cock and get some fucking relief.
“No.” I reached for my shirt again, but she slapped it out of my hand for the second time.
“Fuck, Wren. What do you want from me?”
“I want to know what made you go and tattoo those words on your back a year after I left.” She stepped closer to me, her chest bumping against mine.
“I had sex with a stranger, and it made everything worse. I fucking missed you. Is that what you want to hear?” I surprised myself with how loud my voice was. “I was fucking miserable,Wren. And I was afraid you’d never come back, so I inked a memory of you on my back.”
She reached for my wrist, where the wordsIn a Heartbeatwere written, before pressing her tattoo against mine, the way we used to. “You already have our friendship tattoo.”
“I wanted something else.” I blew out a breath. “It was a big fucking loss. Not just because we’d crossed a line the last night we’d been together. It was more than that. It was years of friendship. Years of sharing secrets and jokes and memories. You were the closest person in my life, Wren. And then you just left. And I struggled for a long time.”
Maybe until the day you walked back into my life.
