Chapter Seventeen
Rip
I held an ice cube to my ear and felt the relief of cool against the piercing Mars had just given me. “The pictures turn out?” I asked.
Mars flipped through the images on his phone while he nodded to himself. “Looking good,” he said. The needles and other supplies were spread out on the coffee table, and the gloves he used were tossed aside. “You didn’t even wince when I shoved the needle in.”
I chuckled. “I’ve felt worse. Although I got to say, I didn’t even realize this kind of piercing was in.”
“Tragus, it’s called,” he said distractedly.
“I just called it the flap of skin above my earlobe,” I joked. “But good to know.”
“And… posted,” Mars said as he uploaded the image to his social media. “I’m glad for all the clients this account is getting me, especially now that other people are tagging my work, but I didn’t realize how much time it was going to take to update my social media. People want new pictures constantly.”
I kicked back on the couch in Mars’s room, then dropped the ice cube in an empty coffee mug. “A lot of tattoo artists find their clients that way, too. I guess I’m old fashioned, though. I’m just happy to have a spot in a shop.”
Mars plopped down on the couch, then casually threw his leg over mine. “We’re making more money here than we did in Detroit,” he noted. “Maybe we’ll even get to upgrade to a bigger apartment.”
I paused, surprised to hear him say that. Usually, Mars just acted like he loved wherever we lived and left it at that. “I still need to help out Aunt Grace,” I pointed out. “She’s making progress, but I doubt she’ll be back at work soon.”
Mars shrugged, then leaned forward to clean up his supplies. As he worked, I watched the way his tight T-shirt clung to his muscles and noticed how nimble his hands were with the equipment. There was something so sexy about seeing Mars in his element. He was charming when he was joking around and flirting, but when his eyes narrowed with concentration and he handled the gleaming silver metal of his trade, I could get hard in an instant.
“Do you want a new place?” I asked. “Are you getting tired of living here?”
Mars turning, shooting me a smile. “What? No, Rip, of course not. You know I’m happy.” He made a gesture to the room we were sitting in. “I mean, it’s a little hard to bring a date back when I just have a curtain to separate me from the rest of the apartment, but we’ve been happy with a lot less, that’s for damn sure.”
I nodded. “Good,” I said.
Mars turned, then threw his leg over my knees again. He pulled himself a little closer and ran a couple of fingers through my hair, pushing it behind my ear. “Don’t worry, Rip,” he said. “I’m not going to run off now that I have a little change in my pocket.”
My cock began to stiffen from his attention and the way his fingers felt when they traced the side of my head. Mars placed his thumb gently on the edge of my ear and inspected the new piercing. “A silver stud for my favorite stud,” he joked. “It looks even better on you than I imagined.”
I laughed, then dropped my hands down to his hips. I rubbed the rough fabric of his denim and sunk my fingers into his flesh. A low rumble crossed his chest, and for a moment, all of my instincts told me to press my lips against his and to pull our bodies closer.
And then I thought of Clark. A vision of his face flashed across my eyes, a scene from when we had danced together to the White Stripes. My fingers tightened around Mars’s waist as I tried to shake the memory, and a strange sense of possessiveness rose up inside of me.
“Rough,” Mars whispered, laying his hand on top of mine. “Looks like you’re in a mood.”
I realized how tightly I was squeezing him and released my grip. My dick was still hard in my jeans, and I still felt a surge of desire, but I couldn’t bring myself to flip Mars onto his stomach and wrestle his pants off of him or slam our mouths together in a fast, wet kiss.
“Hey,” he said. “I didn’t say to stop.”
I shook my head. “Sorry,” I said. “Just a little distracted, I think.”
Mars shrugged, then pulled his legs back. Where his touch had been warm, my skin ached instead, and my body craved the things that would normally follow our flirtations.
“No problem,” Mars said. “I should get something to eat, anyway. You hungry?”
I shook my head, still dazed by the odd moment. I was just as horny and hard as a couple of minutes ago, but a confusing swirl of emotions was twisting my mind. I felt frustrated and angry, like I couldn’t have something that I needed. Like Mars was denying me, even though he was standing right there with the same smile on his face as always.
“Sure,” I said. “I should eat soon, too. Want me to heat up those leftovers while you finish cleaning?”
“If you don’t mind,” he answered as he pulled his case out and dropped it on the coffee table. “You sure you’re okay there, buddy?”
“Yeah, I’m good,” I said. I rose and started toward the kitchen, then paused in the doorway. Clark’s face was still dancing through my mind and twisting my emotions in weird ways. But I also remembered how much fun the three of us had together and how happy it had made Mars to chill with him.
“Do you have any plans with Clark soon?” I asked. “I thought we could invite him out to pool again.”
