Catalina snorts. “Yeah, okay, pretty boy.”
Cupcake lets out a huff and lays her head back down, giving me a long, pitying look.
Carter throws a piece of his bacon under the table. “She’s got better judgment than you.”
“Debatable.”
I sit back in my chair, sunlight spilling across the table, everything too calm for the unraveling happening inside my head.
“I didn’t know she changed her number,” I murmur.
“Well,” Catalina chirps, “be lucky she hasn’t blocked you on this one.”
“Love that for me, Miss Cat.”
She shrugs, sipping her disgusting iced matcha. “Whatever, I want front-row seats if she decides to kill you.”
Carter raises an eyebrow.
“I’ll hold the camera, darlin’”
“Thanks, baby,” Catalina says, kissing Carter on the lips.
I groan, glancing down at Cupcake. “Y’all aresosupportive and fucking disgusting.”
Catalina leans forward, dead serious now. “Maverick, I’m not kidding, she’s been through a lot. You don’t get to play games with her.”
“I’m not trying to,” I say, quieter this time.
“Then don’t,” she says, her chestnut eyes piercing into mine. “Because if she cries, I cry. And if I cry, Carter ends up in jail.”
Carter smirks, gripping Catalina’s leg.
Cupcake licks my ankle.
And I, staring at Amelia’s name on my screen, the woman I haven’t stopped thinking about since I saw her last.
Like the absolute idiot I am.
I send the text.
amelia
. . .
Infinite Baths by Sleep Token blares through my AirPod in my right ear as my tattoo machine vibrates through my fingertips and up my forearm. The constant whir of the tattoo gun soothes the parts of me that I almost always keep hidden, only showcasing the sharp, jagged edges that still haven’t softened since the divorce.
First divorce underneath my belt at twenty-six years old, love that.
I sit perched on my stool with my boot nestled underneath my thigh. The latex gloves are tight on my hands as I wipe away at my client’s tattoo in progress. Her ribs rise and fall beneath the stencil lines; bold florals wrapping around her side, delicate petals curling over the curvature of her bone.
It’s going to hurt like a motherfucker.
“You still good?” I ask, not looking up.
She nods. “Yeah. Just… trying not to cry.”
“You can cry,” I say, “just don’t flinch.”
