“Didn’t I tell you to go to bed!” Audiemar barked in the background.
“Mean Audi!” Kara squealed before Kyro snatched the phone and quickly disconnected the call.
Kong shook his head as Mozzi and Moose cracked up.
“You better make sure you send some of those cookies to the house before your nephew comes looking for you,” Inari warned, throwing her napkin on the table. “You know he don’t play about his auntie’s cooking.”
Moose peered down at his phone screen and tapped a few things in before sending a message and looking up at the rest of the table.
“What y’all on tonight? You want to come by the shop and get faded? DJ Scratch is in the building. I got a few clients coming through for some work,” Moose declared.
“Ayla, you love DJ Scratch!” Inari piped up, kind of tipsy from the three martinis she’d imbibed.
“Word?” Moose brought his glass to his lips and swallowed the last of his liquor. “Well shit, let’s roll. I’m doing specials tonight, so the shop is packed. Moz, you still trying to get that new ink?”
“Fuck it, let’s roll.” Moving to the edge of his seat, he stood tall and dug into his pocket for a few bills.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
HOT SEAT
The drive to Moose’s shop took about thirty minutes, and no lies were told. Bass thumped on the street from DJ Scratch cutting up inside. Other businesses were still open on the block, too, but it looked like everyone was there for Ink Realm. The Ruff Ryders anthem started when the six of them walked through the front doors together.
“Thank God you’re here.” His artist, Trinity, sighed when she stopped to greet him at the door. “There are four clients waiting back near your suite. Hey, Kong. Mozzi.” Trini turned her nose up at Moose’s little brother, and he looked her up and down without a word.
There was no warm welcome in her tone when she said his name either.
“Y’all can chill out if you want to.” Moose pulled his shirt over his head. “Drinks are in the back in the waiting room at the bar.”
“I want to come see you do your thing. Maybe you can give me something.” Inari simpered.
“You’re going to get a tattoo?” Ayla gawked. “Well, if you get one, I want one too.”
“Ohh, let’s get matching sister tatts!” Inari squealed.
“Yes!” Ayla agreed. “You got a book we can look at, Moose?”
“Yeah, follow me.” He led them to his booth in the back, where he chucked his chin at the people waiting in chairs outside his room.
Inari and Ayla flipped through the many designs while Mozzi, Kong, and Coast got comfortable in the back room. Mozzi grabbed a tray so he could roll a blunt. He took his cell out of his pocket along with the nine-millimeter he had tucked and set them both on the table. Coast dropped into the seat beside him on the couch and whipped out her phone to check her social media shit. A couple of hours went by, and soon, Moose had to lock the doors to keep more people from coming in. He’d have worked all night if he hadn’t.
While he enjoyed the money and the art, he needed a break, and Inari was a welcome distraction. Trini peeped how she didn’t leave his side, even when he had clients in his chair. Inari sat there, and they chopped it up about any and everything, which piqued her curiosity.
She and Moose dated years ago but broke things off because Trini wasn’t one for being tied down too long, and Moose wasn’t in the business of keeping anybody around who didn’t want to be. She regretted it almost immediately, but when she tried to crawl back to him, he rejected her and hit her with that ‘we can be friends’ bullshit. She’d done it to herself and was beyond grateful he gave her a chance to work in his shop, but it didn’t stop her from trying to get back in his good graces so they could be together again.
Inari wasn’t his type. Her skin was blemish free, and she had this grown woman aura around her. Trini guessed she was older by the way she carried herself and that ‘don’t fuck with me’ glint behind her eyes. Her face card was lethal. She was on the heavy side, but not overweight, and every pound she accepted with confidence. Trini didn’t know a lot of women that comfortable in their own skin.
It was Mozzi’s turn in the chair after Moose finished with his first clients.
He pulled his shirt over his head, revealing his chiseled back and abs, leaving Coast ogling him like a piece of meat as he dropped in his brother’s chair. She leaned against a counter, drinking a milkshake she’d grabbed from the cafe across the street not long ago. His back was already covered in different pieces, but there was one unfinished that she noticed as Moose switched out his needles. Ayla and Inari sat side by side in two chairs against the floor to ceiling windows, viewing the side street, and Kong stepped in, holding a blunt out to Moose. He rejected it, shaking his head and briefly stepping out of the room.
Most would assume he was going to use the bathroom or grab a snack, but he needed a minute so he could enjoy his other favorite pastime. Pausing in the employee lunchroom, he popped open the top to the pinky ring on his finger and scooped the white crystal substance onto his pinky nail. He brought it to his nose and inhaled quickly when Trini sailed into the room.
“Shit, I thought I was the only one feeling it. You feel like sharing?” She grinned, and he tapped his ring against the counter where they stood so he could spread a line for her.
He did another before pinching his nostrils and taking a break. Replacing the cap to the ring, he checked his reflection in the mirror to make sure he didn’t have anything under his nose, and Trini knelt to suction her portion through her nose. Getting high and fucking each other’s brains out used to be their thing. She couldn’t deny that she missed it.
“So, what’s up with you and the bougie one?” she kidded, watching Moose’s dark eyes land on her seriously.
