“Leandra-”
“I know that, Dalton,” she said, cutting me off.“I know how important a tattoo is.”
“If that’s the case, then come back when you’ve given it more thought and know what you want,” I told her.“If you’re insisting on one now, I can’t help you.”
Her blue eyes looked wounded as she asked, “You’d really let someone else give me my first and possibly only tattoo?”
As much as the thought pained me, I was not about to let her emotionally blackmail me.“Yes.”
“Seriously?”
I nodded.“I am not giving you a tattoo until I feel like you’ve given it proper thought.”
Leandra didn’t say anything for a long minute, but when she finally spoke, it took everything in me not to cave.“Then I guess I’ll just go somewhere else.I wanted the best, but...well, beggars can’t be choosers, right?”
“Or you can wait,” I pointed out.“If you really want one, then where’s the harm in waiting a couple of more weeks?”
“Because I want it now,” she replied stubbornly, proving my point.
“Spoken like a true entitled brat,” I retorted.
However, before she could say anything to that, Lynne was peeking her head into my workstation, saying, “I have some free time, Leandra.I can give you a tattoo if you want.”
I shot her a look, and though I knew that she wasn’t offering to step on my toes, I still didn’t appreciate her getting between me and Leandra.“Oh, really?”
“Would you rather she end up at Chaps or Inkers?”she shot back.
Now, while there was nothing wrong with Inkers, the artists there had a tendency of talking their clients into designs thattheypreferred, not their customers.Yeah, they turned out exceptional, but that went against what we stood for as artists.
As for Chaps, the artists there were also good, but the place had a shady reputation for not sanitizing their workstations and supplies.They’d already been shut down twice for health code violations, and so you only went there if you were tight on money.
“She needs to think about it some more,” I told her, refusing to back down.
“She’s a grown woman, Dalton,” Lynne pointed out.“Plus, it’s better than getting her banned from this place.”
Lynne wasn’t joking about that.If our conversation was getting loud enough for Lynne to feel as if she’d needed to interfere, then it was safe to say that it wouldn’t have taken long for it to get back to Ricki, possibly getting Leandra banned from this place altogether, and that wasn’t anything that I wanted for either of us.Even though Leandra knew better than to venture to this side of town on her own, I had too much respect for Ricki to intentionally cause drama in her shop.It was also quite possible that she’d ban Rya just to be on the safe side, and I refused to let that happen.
“Thank you, Lynne,” Leandra said, though she was looking at me.“I’d really appreciate that.”
“You’re making a mistake, Leandra,” I told her.
“Actually, I’m not,” she replied.“And if you’d just quit treating me like I’m stupid, you’d see that.”
“You know what?Get the damn tattoo,” I told her bitterly.“Just don’t ever say that I didn’t try to warn you.”
Her blue gaze looked wounded again, and it was so hard to keep up with her sometimes.“Are you serious?You’re really not going to do it?”
“Fret not,” I huffed.“Lynne’s more than capable of scribbling on you.”
“You’re being a dick, Dalton,” Lynne said, the reprimand clear in her voice.
“Well, I needed to go stretch my legs anyway,” I lied.“So, I’ll leave you both to it.”
If I were a lesser man, the look in Leandra’s face would drop me to my knees.She looked like I was abandoning her in the woods to die, and it was killing me.However, I wasn’t going to give her a tattoo, no matter how upset she looked.She was making an emotional decision, and I wanted no part of that.I mean, even though I was shit at showing it, I did care about her.
“Look, how about we go get something to eat, and then you can tell me more about this tattoo that you want,” I said, relenting a bit.
However, because Leandra would rather be stubborn than wrong, she said, “I know you, Dalton Summit, and you’re not offering to talk about it, you want to talk meoutof it.”
