She flipped me off and stomped out the front door.
“Pleasure working with you!” I called after her.
A draft of balmy night air kissed my skin as the door slowly swung shut behind her. Today had been another scorcher, the sun unrelenting, the humidity high enough to frizz even my bone-straight hair. Summer was my least favorite time of year. The moisture-laden atmosphere turned everything sticky and smelly. All the concrete made it worse, absorbing the heat throughout the day and storing it up like a battery, expelling it at night, so it never cooled down. I couldn’t wait for autumn to arrive. I hadjuuustenough basic bitch in me that September would find me standing in line for my first pumpkin spice latte of the season like everyone else.
The door closed, cutting off the heat of the night, and I returned to the front desk to exit out of Ashley’s transaction. It was 9 p.m., and the tattoo parlor was buzzing. Literally, because of all the needles, but that sound was nearly drowned out by voices raised in conversation.
The shop was mid-sized with a simple layout. The reception area and front desk flanked the door. A hallway led deeper inside, with six individual tattoo rooms branching off of it. None of them had doors, and the cement floors made the acoustics echoey, so voices carried. The music tonight was upbeat and punchy because Elayne had tuned us in to an alt-pop station.
I grinned, feeling content, borderline happy. After nearly losing everything, I had made something. Something that belonged to me and me alone. With no help from anyone else, despite how much my parents tried to intervene in my life. I wasn’t ungrateful they wanted to help. The problem was that they’d already done so much for me (too much, really) that I was determined to do thisone thingby myself.
Was I terrified of fucking it up? Absolutely. Money was still tight because the business was new, and my inheritance was needed elsewhere, so I scrimped and saved where I could, making sure every dollar earned went to good use. I was a one-woman handyman, cleaning crew, IT specialist, and, on one disgustingly memorable occasion, plumber.
And it was starting to pay off. We had regular, returning clientele. Good online reviews. A growing social media presence thanks to my carefully curated pictures and videos. I still lost sleep some nights, worried that it would all go up in flames, but my fear wasn’t constant anymore, and on weeks like this, when we were in danger of being overbooked, it made me think that I might actually pull this off. That I might actually succeed at something for once in my life. And that was all I really wanted. Not just to prove that I could do it, but because this was what Iloved.
My gaze strayed to the Tiffany lamp next to the register. Mom was right. It looked perfect there. Okay, fine, so maybe letting them helpjust a littlewouldn’t kill me, but I drew the line at paying my rent.
A heavy footfall pulled me from my thoughts, and I turned to see Derrick, one of my tattoo artists, strolling out of the hallway. He was a rough-looking, silver-haired man in his mid-fifties. Tall, beefy, white, with a mutton chop beard and more tattoos than anyone else I knew. In his past life, he’d belonged to an outlaw motorcycle club down in Texas, but he’d had a falling out with its megalomaniac leader and hightailed it out of there before he wound up dead. I wasn’t even sure Derrick was his real name, but I didn’t give a shit because his specialty was realism, and he was fuckinggood.
My gaze shifted to the client following him, a towering young Black man whose face was turned toward his forearm, admiring his new ink. As he got closer, I saw why. It looked like something had clawed him, three long gashes peeling back to reveal a glimpse of a panther beyond. It was almost spooky how good it was, like his skin had been ripped open.
In moments like this, I wondered how the hell I’d landed Derrick. He was a world-class artist, regularly drew in famous clients, and could have worked anywhere, but for whatever reason, he’d shown up one day and applied. Hell, he was the half the reason I didn’t have weekly panic attacks anymore—that’s how much money he brought in. It made me wonder if one of my parents had gotten to him somehow. This wouldn’t be the first time they’d done something sneaky like that, helped me from the shadows even though I’d told them I needed to do this on my own. Whenever I hinted at it to Derrick, he expertly changed the subject or played dumb, and my suspicions only grew.
“That looks amazing,” I said.
Derrick let out an ambiguous huff, but his client sent me a blinding smile.
“Thanks,” he said.
I tried to pretend I wasn’t starstruck. “Will it have time to heal before training camp?”
He nodded. “Yeah, we don’t start until late September.”
“Good luck with the season,” I said.
His grin widened. “Thank you.”
I headed toward my booth before I did something stupid, like hit on an NBA All-Star.
3
Tyler
“A sex club,” I said.“We own a sex club.”
I turned to look at Nico “Junior” Trocci, my business partner in this venture. Dark hair, olive skin, Napoleon complex. The neck tattoos would be a problem if he ever tried to get a normal job, but since he’d been born into Mafia royalty, he probably didn’t have to worry about that.
He and I had a somewhat complicated acquaintanceship. I used to fuck his cousin, Aly, who happened to be engaged to my best friend, Josh, who I was beginning to suspect wasalsoJunior’s best friend.
The traitor.
Junior and I didn’t get along. I wasn’t sure if it was a territorial thing, or if we just rubbed each other the wrong way, so the fact that we were now in business together was the last thing I could have anticipated. Unfortunately, there’d been no way to avoid it.
He’d shown up at the ship party last week looking to buy someone’s debt off me, and we’d essentially blackmailed each other into a corner. He’d threatened to tell Josh about my gambling operation. I’d threatened to tell Junior’s dad (who was almost as bad as Josh’s) about his interest in this building. We’d ended up going halfsies on it, and now I was more convinced than ever that it was going to blow up in both our faces.
Junior scowled. “It’s actually called a play club.”
I eyed him. He really was a handsome sonofabitch. His dad’s dark features with his mom’s green eyes. Too bad he was also the straightest man on the planet and this tension between us couldn’t be... eased. People were much easier to deal with after they’d been fucked senseless.
