“Who said I was worrying?”
“You don’t have to like the man, but you do have to respect him,” he replied, and I nodded an okay.
I didn’t want to be anyone’s puppet, and that was what it looked like from the outside. But regardless what anyone else thought, I was going to be fighting for me. And no one else. I couldn’t give a shit if anyone respected me, barring Bull. And if this was important to him, then it was important to me too. He’d given me a chance, a home, a place to belong. And just like he’d said, he and the club had slowly begun to form my life.
Bull slapped my shoulder, a confirmation that he had total trust in me to do this. I felt something in my chest come loose. He looked over my shoulder at Stone, who was standing by the gate watching us. “He shoving that shit up his nose still?”
“Not my beef, Bull,” I replied, and he glanced sideways at me.
“He’s our brother so this is everyone’s beef, and that shit ain’t good for him, or for the club. He’s been warned about it.” He shook his head, looking irritated. “He’s becoming a liability.” He sighed. “I’ll catch up with you later. Go get laid and get some rest.”
I didn’t bother to tell him that I already had done one of those things—didn’t really seem important at the time. Just goes to show that I didn’t know shit about shit.
I headed back inside, making my way through the main clubhouse. People were sleeping everywhere: the sofas, the floor, and no doubt in the bedrooms at the back. All but a handful had locks on them, as they were taken by men like me who classed this as their home.
Women were sprawled across sleeping men, some naked and not bothering to cover their dignity, others getting busy trying to wake their men up for some early morning fun. I passed the bar and grabbed a bottle of whiskey from the top, and forgoing any glass I headed down the narrow hallway to Sketch’s room.
I rapped my knuckles on the door and waited a beat.
“What?” he groaned from inside.
“Need some new ink,” I replied through the door. “You going to let me in or what?”
A couple of seconds went by before the door opened and Sketch stared out. His eyes were red-rimmed, his hair all over the fucking place. He blinked several times to get his eyes to focus properly on me and pounded his chest when a heavy cough tore up his throat.
“New ink?” he said, his throat sounding raw.
“Yeah,” I replied.
He wore a pair of stain-washed Levi’s with a heavy chain hanging down one side, and he tugged a pack of Camels out of the back pocket and lit one, staring at me through a haze of smoke. He was still drunk out of his face, and was probably deciding if this was worth it or not. Man had been up all night drinking and screwing and needed some sleep. But Sketch loved to sketch, and I was his human sketch pad.
He finally pushed the door wide open and jerked his head. “Come in, brother, and take a seat at the bench. Kelly, get the fuck out, I’m working.”
I walked inside, watching as a mostly naked blonde climbed off the bed and grabbed her clothes from the floor. “Will I see you later?” she asked Sketch.
“Maybe,” he replied, cupping her face in his hand and pulling her mouth to his for a long kiss that made her nipples harden. When he let her go she was breathless and staring at him all starry-eyed. “Go on,” he said, rubbing a hand down her waist.
She grinned and turned, stumbling out of the room. Sketch pushed the door closed behind her and we both made our way across his room. Sketch had one of the biggest rooms in the clubhouse, mostly because he did a lot of work in there. Bull had said he was going to set him up with his own shop when he was ready, but for now Sketch was happy in his shithole of a room.
“I really like that girl,” Sketch said, blowing out a mouthful of smoke. “Not sure what it is about her.”
I cocked an eyebrow when he turned to look at me. I shrugged. “She’s got nice tits.”
He let out a laugh. “Yeah, she does. Thinking about making her my old lady someday.”
“No shit?” I made my way across his room, passing piles of dirty clothes and overflowing ashtrays, empty bottles of beer and piles of women’s underwear. The room was disgusting and stank of sweat and a whole heap of shit I didn’t really want to think about, but as I pushed through to his workroom, the view became very different.
Sketch’s workroom was white, and clean—obscenely so. Every square inch of it was disinfected and covered in plastic. It looked like a kill room and was every murderer’s dream come true. I took a seat at his bench and stripped off my T-shirt.
“No shit,” he replied with another laugh.
Sketch went over to the large porcelain sink in the corner of the room and started to wash his hands, his cigarette stubbed out somewhere in the other room. Sketch took cleanliness very seriously. When he was satisfied his hands were clean, he wheeled over the cart that contained his tattoo things before sitting down in front of me.
“All right, so what we getting this time?”
“Whatever you want. Just don’t do a giant cock or some shit,” I said. I unscrewed the lid on the bottle of whiskey and necked it straight. Sketch was still staring at me in confusion. “What?”
“No flowers or shit this time?” he asked, dragging his dark hair back into a bun. “I can do whatever and wherever?”
