Chapter 12
12
NOVA
I wake up to Charlie sitting shirtless at the edge of my bed.
His pants are undone and low around his hips, a cup of coffee in his left hand. It’s a good look.
Unfortunately, it is also way too early.
“What time is it?” I slur. The room is still dark and my body feels like it was hit by a Mack truck. I am sore in places I didn’t even know I had. “Didn’t we fall asleep like twenty minutes ago?”
I usually don’t let casual sex partners spend the night, but Charlie passed out immediately after our last round, face down on my mattress with his arm flung over my waist. He looked so peaceful, and he didn’t wake up when I dug my finger into his rib cage, so I allowed it.
“Close,” he replies, voice low and raspy. It’s the same way he sounded last night when he had his mouth at my throat, asking me if I wanted to come. Fabric rustles and the weight by my legs shifts. “It’s early.”
I squint open one eye in interest and watch as he attempts to button his shirt. It’s horribly wrinkled, and he’s missing one in the middle, but he endeavors. I stare at the inch of bare chest I can just barely make out in the predawn light, legs shifting beneath my mountain of blankets when I see the hickey at the base of his throat. There’s an entire line of them all the way down his torso, two right at his hip. He had sunk both of his hands into my hair and watched me with his jaw clenched tight when I put them there, his entire body trembling beneath my touch.
Then I put my mouth on his cock, and he bit out my name like a curse.
Last night was…good. I am immensely proud of myself for the idea.
“I’m heading out.” He finishes with his shirt and drags his hand through his hair, a massive yawn tipping his jaw open wide. His body slumps and he rubs his palm over his chest. “But I didn’t want to leave without saying goodbye.”
“Bye,” I mumble, wiggling farther down in the blankets. I don’t remember putting the blue knit quilt on the bed last night. I don’t remember grabbing the pillows either. But I am sufficiently tucked in, everything just where I like it.
He huffs a laugh. “It’s like that, huh?”
I grin into my pillow. “Help yourself to some coffee.”
“Already made some,” he says, voice still rough at the edges. “I’m taking a cup.”
“That’s fine.”
“It’s my souvenir glass.”
I snicker into my pillow. “Bring it to the shop later and I’ll etch it for you. ‘Nova Porter rocked my world.’?”
He laughs again, louder this time, a rumble in the stillness of my bedroom. He leans forward and slaps my ass through the blankets. “Hell yeah, she did. Maybe that’s the tattoo I’ll get.”
His hand settles on the curve between my thigh and my ass, thumb rubbing back and forth as he yawns again. Everything is muted in the way early morning quiet always seems to be, geese squawking outside my window and the rickety creek of the iron gate on the side of my house that never quite latches right. The floorboards groan and my legs swish beneath the blankets, bare now, my thigh highs draped over the edge of the bed like an ad for debauchery.
“How are you getting back to the farm?” I ask, half into my pillow. I imagine Charlie trudging his way down the side of the long dirt road that leads to Lovelight, shirt unbuttoned and my mug of coffee in his hand. A very long walk of shame. “I can drive you if you need me to,” I offer.
“No, no.” He squeezes my leg. “I left my car at the bookstore last night. I’m gonna head over there now and drive back. Should be early enough.”
“Early enough for what?” I frown at him, but he’s busy looking for something underneath my bed. He emerges with his belt clutched in his hand, some of his dark hair sticking straight up on the left side. It’s unfairly adorable for a man who made my legs shake so bad I could hardly shuffle to the bathroom last night.
“To avoid your brother,” he explains. “He starts his work around five.”
“Oh.”
Charlie watches me as he threads his belt through the loops. “I figured you wouldn’t want anyone to know,” he says.
I shrug and shift beneath my blankets again, everything fuzzy and far away.
“That’s fine. Whatever you want.” I can keep a secret. But I’ve lost the will to hold on to this conversation. I’m exhausted. Bone weary. My eyes slip shut, already drifting again between asleep and awake. I listen as he moves around the room, collecting his things from the chaos we created last night. Socked feet against the floor. The metallic clink of his wristwatch. The gentle thud of the coffee mug against my dresser and a poorly muffled curse when he stubs his toe on the edge of it.
It’s a nice soundtrack. It doesn’t give me the itch that usually blossoms bright with someone in my space. I just feel…content, I guess.
Sleepy.
“Key’s under the mat,” I slur, words heavy. I’m going to sleep for ages. “Lock up when you go.”
Warm lips brush against my forehead, fingertips chasing. My hair is tucked behind my ear and knuckles nudge once at my cheek. “You got it, Nova girl.”
And then I’m asleep.
?“You’re freaking me out.”
“Why?”
“Your face,” Nessa says immediately. “It’s doing something.”
“What is it doing?”
“I don’t know. This dreamy, stare-off-into-space thing.” She drapes herself against the tattoo chair she’s claimed as her own and contorts her face into something ridiculous. “Like that. You’ve smiled more this morning than that time Dad made four different types of pierogies for dinner.”
“Fuck, I love pierogies.”
“I know!” Nessa points at me furiously like I’ve just confirmed something. “Which is why you’re freaking me out.”
Charlie left a Post-it note on my coffee pot before he left this morning, a scribbled “Thanks for blowing my mind” with a smiley face that had me grinning into my mug, robe wrapped tight around my middle. I found my key in the middle of the hallway floor too, another note scribbled on the back of a receipt from Ms. Beatrice’s that he must have found in his pocket. This one said, “Stop leaving your key under your mat” with a frowny face. I guess he shoved it through the mail slot on my front door after locking up.
“I’m just having a good day,” I tell my sister. The marathon sex session last night certainly helped. My body feels boneless in the very best of ways, a pinching ache every time I sit. Probably from the last time, when Charlie bent me over the side of my bed and fucked me so hard I thought we might break the frame.
I press my palm to my cheek and glance over the top of my laptop. Thankfully Nessa is occupied by her phone. When I showed up to the studio this morning, she was waiting out front, sitting on the step. She said she needed something to do, and I said she could organize the tattoo stations.
Not that she’s doing that currently.
“Everything okay?” I ask.
She blows out a heavy breath and tosses her phone to the side. “Can I set you up with someone?”
“What?” I laugh. “Why?”
She tilts her head. “Because I need something to do.”
“Then organize the stations like I asked you to.”
“I need something better to do. Come on, Nova. Please? My life is falling apart, and this would make me happy. I promise not to set you up with a loser.”
“Your life is not falling apart,” I murmur. I scroll through my email without seeing a single thing. “And I told you. I don’t have time for a relationship right now.”
I’m stretched thin enough. I cannot make myself available for another human being. Relationships require work, time, and emotional availability. I am equipped for exactly none of those things at this point in my life.
The casual sex I had last night is all the intimacy I need.
I think of Charlie with his hand between my legs, and my entire body flushes hot.
“Fine,” she pouts. “Can I have a tattoo, then?”
I’m getting whiplash from this conversation. Nessa has never once expressed an interest in having a tattoo. “Of what?”
“Maybe some ballet slippers?” She traces two fingers along the inside of her arm. “Right here?”
I close my laptop with a frown. “You’re serious?”
She nods, eyes misty. “There were strict regulations about tattoos in competition, but I figure I’m not competing anymore. And everyone else in the family has your work. It’s about time I do too.”
“Ness.” I wander my way over to her and nudge her with my hip. I collapse on the tattoo table next to her and hope to god it holds us both up. I can’t afford a new one. “Did you make a decision?”
She nods and wipes her hand under her eyes. “Yeah. I formally dropped out of the competition circuit. I don’t even know why I’m crying. I’ve been thinking about it for a while.”
I prop my chin against her shoulder. “Because it’s a big change. And Nathan kind of forced your hand.”
She sighs. “Nathan sucks.”
“Yes, he does.”
“I’ll probably let you key his car.”
“Excellent. I’ll let Beckett know. He had some ideas.”
Vanessa shifts to look at me. “You told Beckett?”
“It may have been discussed in the sibling chat.”
“The sibling chat?” She narrows her eyes at me. “Is there a sibling chat I’m not a part of?”
There are multiple sibling chats with rotating members depending on who we’re talking about. I’m sure there’s a sibling chat that I’m not a part of.
“I’ll give you a tattoo,” I deflect. “But it can’t be today.”
Nessa frowns. “Why not?”
“Because I want to think about what I’m going to draw, and I want you to think about it for more than ten seconds.”
“Did Beckett think about any of his for longer than ten seconds?”
“No.” But I’m older and wiser now, and I’m trying not to depend on my siblings for things. Beckett invested a lot in me when I was younger, more than I deserved. I’m not going to make that mistake again. “I also have someone coming in for an interview in the next fifteen minutes.”
“Oh. That’s fair. I guess you don’t want my bare ass on your table when someone walks in.”
“Bare ass? I thought you said you wanted it on your arm.”
“It’s a developing situation.”
I leverage myself up and off the chair. Nessa stays sprawled across it.
“Apparently.” I laugh.
My laptop pings from the table with an incoming email. I rub my palm across my forehead when it pings another two times, rapid fire.
“That sounds urgent,” Nessa calls.
I keep rubbing my forehead, ignoring the fuzzy spots at the edge of my vision. Lack of sleep and too much caffeine are pressure points for my migraines, but I took some of my medication before I left the house, and I’m chugging water like it’s my job. It should be enough to keep me functioning.
“Everything is,” I sigh. Everything is urgent. Everything is required. I’m still waiting on a couple boxes of supplies. I need to hire at least one person to manage administrative needs, and ideally, I’d like to hire another artist to take overflow clients. I need to finish doing the setup for the soft launch private party in a couple of weeks, and I need to figure out how to hang the damn sign in the back.
I crack open my laptop and hold my breath, certain I’m about to be reminded about something else I forgot. But it’s just an email from Charlie.
I click into it, ominously titled THE PLAN .
It’s a blank email with a spreadsheet attached. Color coded, of course, with all the businesses in town. I frown at it and fish out my phone.
NOVA: Did you mean to send me this attachment?
CHARLIE: Course I did. I told you I’d help with the business visits. Selene helped me with the color coding. Isn’t it nice?
NOVA: Selene?
CHARLIE: She’s my assistant.
CHARLIE: At work. I swear I’ve mentioned her before.
He sends a string of emojis, three little yellow faces with smirking mouths.
CHARLIE: Why? Are you jealous, Nova girl?
I scoff.
NOVA: Hard to be jealous when I can still feel you every time I sit down, Charlie.
CHARLIE: Fuck.
CHARLIE: Fuck.
CHARLIE: Nova, you can’t say things like that. Your brother is going to wonder why I have a boner while he’s talking about fertilizer.
NOVA:
“You’re making that face again,” Nessa offers from her chair. I slip my phone into my back pocket and try to rearrange my face into something that isn’t…whatever it’s doing. “And I think your interview candidate is here.”
I turn to look over my shoulder. Jeremy Roughman, recent Inglewild high school graduate and probably the most irritating teenager on the planet, is standing in front of my locked door. He’s wearing a full suit, briefcase in one hand, and his usually messy blond hair is combed back with what looks like industrial grade gel. He looks like a car salesman, or a…beleaguered divorcee.
“No,” I whisper.
Vanessa snickers. “Yes. Did he catfish you?”
He definitely didn’t put his legal name on his résumé, that’s for sure. He does not look like Megan Culver, Salisbury 2012 graduate, with extensive experience in customer service. “Maybe I got the résumés mixed up.”
Jeremy knocks again. I don’t know why. He can see right through the glass door to the both of us, staring at him. He gives a little wave.
Vanessa waves back.
I sigh.
“What am I supposed to do?”
“Let him in, probably.”
I shuffle my way over to the door and inch it open. “Jeremy.”
He clears his throat. “Ms. Porter.”
I frown at him. He’s never called me that in his life. “What can I do for you? Are you selling bibles?”
“No.” He thinks about it for a second. “Would you want one if I was?”
A smile twitches at my lips. “No, I don’t think so.”
“Cool. Okay. Well.” He adjusts the sleeves of his suit. It’s cut too small, his long arms poking out from beneath the cuffs. I also think the T-shirt he’s wearing beneath his button-down has a mermaid on it. Or something…mermaid adjacent. Jeremy tips his chin up. “I’m here for an interview.”
I lean my hip against the doorway. “Did you fake your résumé, Jeremy?”
“What? No! I haven’t even given you my résumé yet.” He pops open his briefcase and a store-bought bag of pens, a newspaper from three days ago, and a roll of Life Savers tumble to the ground. He ignores all of it and pulls out a sheet of paper. “Here we go.”
I take it from him, but don’t look at it. “How’d you know I had an interview scheduled this morning?”
He shrugs.
“Jeremy.”
“Yes?”
“How did you know?”
“Luck,” he offers, his voice a shade too innocent. “Perhaps the stars aligned?”
Vanessa snickers from somewhere behind me. I sigh. “Jeremy.”
“Fine! I saw her at the café, okay? Your candidate, or whatever. She was getting a latte from Ms. Beatrice and asked for directions to the tattoo studio. She said she was here for an interview.”
“And where is she now?”
He scratches behind his ear, a blush coloring his cheeks. “She had to leave.”
“Why?”
“Because I told her the interview was canceled.”
Vanessa guffaws. I’m glad one of us finds this amusing.
“Jeremy.” I sigh. “Why did you tell her the interview was canceled?”
“Because I need a job.”
“Aren’t you working at Ms. Beatrice’s place?”
My entire life, the cantankerous Ms. Beatrice has owned the café on the corner of Main Street. She specializes in coffee drinks that are, frankly, life-changing. But you have to endure her surly attitude to snag one. She has also never deigned to name the place. Most people either call it Ms. Beatrice’s or the café. I think someone tried to put a sign up once, and she had it ripped down by the next morning. The green-striped awning over the doorway still hasn’t recovered.
“I need a career,” Jeremy emphasizes. He shifts his feet, scratches at the back of his neck, and fiddles with the handle of his briefcase. “Also, unrelated, but she fired me.”
“For what?”
“For something I don’t want to discuss with a prospective employer,” he rushes out.
I tap his résumé against the palm of my hand. “Were you caught in the alley making out with one of the customers again?”
His cheeks flame pink. “It was one time,” he mumbles.
It was three times, and it was discussed at length during a town meeting. It also made the printed version of the phone tree newsletter. I stare at Jeremy. “Did you do something weird to the coffee?”
I hope not. I’ll never recover. I get lattes from the café three days a week.
He sighs and rolls his eyes to the sky. “I was giving out free drinks to people.”
“How many people?”
“A lot of people.” He scratches his finger behind his ear. “I might have been…writing my phone number on take-out cups.”
“Whose take-out cups?”
“Everyone’s take-out cups.”
“Ah.”
He hums, shoulders curved in. “Ms. B said I needed to stop shooting my shot with everyone who walked through her door. So she fired me. And if I don’t find a job, I won’t be able to afford my rent.”
“Don’t you live with your parents? Aren’t you going to NYU at some point?”
“I’m taking a gap year. And my parents started charging rent when I graduated. They said it builds character. Look, can I come inside? People are staring.”
One person is staring. Gus is standing in the open door of the fire station two blocks down, eating a bear claw and watching our entire interaction. He waves happily when I glance over at him.
I wave back. This town, I swear to god.
“You worked for my brother, didn’t you? You really want to work for another Porter?”
He shrugs, apathetic. “It was a good learning experience.”
According to Beckett, it was certainly an experience. “Why do you want to work here, Jeremy?”
“Because I have no idea what I want to do,” he says quickly, somehow sounding more like an adult than I’ve ever heard him before. “Because I’m tired of people thinking I’m some screw-up kid. I don’t even have to be a receptionist or whatever. I can do small things around the studio. Whatever you need help with. I just want—” He rolls his shoulders back and tips his chin up, confident. “I’d like to explore doing different things before I have to settle on one thing for the rest of my life.”
All right. Rest of his life seems a little dramatic, but I understand what he’s going for. “You want to explore reception work?”
He shrugs. “Reception work. Tattoo stuff. You know. All of it.”
I watch him carefully. He seems earnest enough. And I know what it feels like to be buoyed by all the excitement of graduation until you float down and you’re left with nothing but stark terror at the wide-open world in front of you.
“I’m also really good at social media,” he adds.
Yeah, I’ve seen what he does on social media. “Good” is probably a stretch. I step back and hold open the door. Jeremy’s whole face lights up. I hear a single clap somewhere behind me. Nessa again, letting her opinion be known.
I ignore her.
“We’re still going to have an interview,” I tell Jeremy. “And I’m still going to think about it.”
“Okay. That’s fine.”
“I’m going to want references.”
He winces but nods again. “That’s fine too.”
I sigh and let him the rest of the way in. Maybe this can be my good deed for the…year. Maybe this good karma will carry me right through to a successful launch. What did Vanessa say I have? A bubble-wrapped heart? Maybe this is the first step to unwrapping some of it.
“Do you think I could get some tattoos for free?” Jeremy asks.
I shut the door behind him. “Don’t push it.”