Chapter 20
OLI
The last client of the day had left an hour ago and the autoclaves were humming in the back room. I focused intently on the piece of fake pale skin I’d stretched onto a wooden needlepoint frame.
“Don’t just look at it. Practice.” Ren shook his head from across the room behind the circular wooden desk near the door. The silver hoop that sat snug against his left nostril glinted.
“Yeah, yeah.”
The new tattoo parlor was amazing and I was a fraud sitting here.
Ren and his buddies, Wylie and Flint, had been able to convert the space faster than I ever would’ve imagined.
Instead of a vermin-infested nightmare, it was a brand-new clean client area.
The brick walls were matte black, but Wylie had started painting Revenge Tattoo on a spot near the door in bloody red letters that looked like they were going to actually spill drops onto the floor.
Below was the chalk outline of crossed swords that reminded me of a pirate flag.
I didn’t hate the theme. It was fun, and I could sort of see Ren as a pirate. He would look sexy in one of those flouncy shirts with his tattoos peeking through. Plus, he had no trouble being mean, which was a prerequisite for pirating.
Couches lined the wall to my right. In the middle of the main floor were four chairs and tattooing equipment—one for Ren and each of his business partners. Then, there was the one I was parked at.
“But what should I tattoo?”
He sighed, which made my stomach swoop unpleasantly. “Anything you want.”
“Fine.” I decided to start small. Ren had shown me how to use the tattoo gun “the right way” earlier—his words—so I began the black outline of a rose.
“Use a light touch. Too much pressure and—”
My needles punctured the stretched fake skin, and Ren howled with laughter. It was fucking annoying and reminded me of the way Barber had cackled at me when I’d tried to cut my own hair at his shop. He’d ended up needing to buzz it off so I could let it all grow in at the same length.
A pang of nostalgia had me sniffling.
I glared at Ren, but he kept going until he snorted. While he was winding down, I replaced my practice canvas and started again.
“Keep in mind, real bodies have curves and angles. You should wrap that around a weird piece of wood.”
“Thank you for your input,” I murmured icily, and he was howling again like an asshole.
He came over and threw his arms around me, still chuckling, and the funniest thing happened. I was irritated, but my lips began to quirk. Next thing I knew, I was giggling. I leaned my head back, and he bent forward to press his lips to mine.
Our connection sent a jolt of electricity racing around in my gut.
The door dinged as it opened, and Ren bolted upright. “Shit, man. Sorry! Closed. I forgot to flip the sign.”
I glanced up, then turned off my tattoo gun as my stomach went into freefall.
PD stood there, arms crossed, staring around the freshly remodeled room with his mouth twisted to the side.
When his gaze landed on me, he tipped back the brim of his bowler hat.
His lips pursed. Awkwardness crashed around me, and weirdly, I felt like a traitor as he pushed back his leather jacket and settled his hands on his hips.
I shot to my feet. “You said I couldn’t work for you! You don’t get to be mad now.”
PD gestured around. “Yeah, I said that so you would use your brain. Go to school. Put in a real effort. I don’t just run a tattoo parlor, I have an art degree. If things didn’t work out, I could go do something else. My eggs aren’t all in one basket.” He scowled.
“Well, I don’t have a degree and I’m stealing your clients just fine,” Ren snapped, and when I glanced at him my stomach wobbled again. His face was flushed and he was ready to breathe fire.
PD tilted his head. “Are you, though? I heard you tattooed an entire sorority house I turned away because we’re booked through till Christmas. We barely have any walk-in time.” He looked smug, and I guess he had a right.
Ren snorted. “Sure. That’s why they came here. You turned them away.” He shook his head.
PD tugged on the brim of his hat. “Believe what you want. I was actually coming over to see if I could recommend my spillover clients to you, but I can see you don’t want them.”
Ren sneered. “No, I don’t need your table scraps. I’m taking all your business.”
PD rolled his eyes.
My cheeks flushed and embarrassment crawled through me, though whether it was for me, Ren, or all three of us, I couldn’t say.
PD zeroed in on me and shook his head. “I’ll keep all that in mind. Oli, you can do better. I see you’re getting serious now. Come back and we’ll talk.”
Ren stalked toward him with a real scowl. “Get out of my fucking business.”
PD chuckled as he limped out, nothing about his steady, unhurried pace indicating he was worried about Ren at all.
Ren spun on me. “Why didn’t you tell him to shut the fuck up?”
I gaped for a second, but he seemed to be waiting for an answer, so I blurted, “He’s part of the motorcycle club my dad belongs to. They helped me and my mom when I was younger. We’re friends.”
He made a face like he wanted to say something shitty about that—and perhaps a week ago he would’ve—but instead he just flipped off the door.
It was stupid that Ren being slightly less of an asshole should give me butterflies in my stomach, but it really did. I smiled at him when he caught me watching.
His face flushed, highlighting his sharp cheekbones, which was sexy. My heart raced faster. I couldn’t stop staring at him.
“You should be practicing.” He stopped at the desk and pressed a button, and the overhead lights went off.
Another button press made the metal blinds descend across the front windows.
The jewelry cases along the front wall went dark.
Last, he went to the door and flipped the sign to Closed, which tickled my funny bone.
All that tech and it still came down to a cardboard sign.
I was alone in the halo of light near my chair. My mouth watered as he arranged his cock in his jeans with a wink, then started toward me across the dark room. The sensation that I was being hunted was sexy as fuck. Part of me wanted to run, but I forced myself to stay still.
When he reached me, he cupped my neck and swooped down to own my mouth. I squeaked as he wrapped his arms around me and lifted me from my roller stool to the tattoo chair. The display of easy strength made my dick sit up and beg.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
He waggled his eyebrows. “Every ship needs a christening when it first sets sail.”
I bit my lip as he slid his hand up my thigh and prowled onto the chair with me. His phone buzzed in his pocket, faint but clearly audible in the quiet room. He ignored it, thank God, but his hand was almost to my straining, trapped cock when it began a new round of buzzing.
“Did you get an electronic dick or do you need to answer that?”
He sat back on his knees and laughed, a bright happy sound that made me warm inside. “The kitten finally shows some teeth today. Nice.”
I rolled my eyes as he fished his phone out of his pocket. His grin disappeared as he frowned at the screen.
“Hello?” He rested a hand on my shoulder as he listened. “Thank you. Yes, we’ll be there.” He was already hopping off the chair when I finally pieced together that something bad must be happening.
“What’s wrong?”
“Come on.” He grabbed my hand and nearly gave me whiplash as he dragged me off the chair. We were out the door and in Shakira speeding through early evening traffic toward downtown New Gothenburg in less than a minute.
“Will you tell me where we’re going?” I asked, grabbing the dash as he zigged around a car that was going less than the speed of light—unlike us. If he wasn’t careful, he was going to end up with a huge ticket.
“KC’s been in the hospital all day. The nurse who called only said where he was, not why he was there.” He shrugged, but his shoulders barely moved because he was so tense.
My stomach fell to my toes. “Oh no. But why did they call you?”
“Jealous?” he snarked.
I frowned at him as the headlights from a car going the opposite way lit up his face in sharp relief. “Why are you being a dick?”
He sighed and rolled his shoulders. “Sorry.”
“Wow.” I covered my mouth with my hand. “Did that hurt?”
“Shut up.” He smirked at me.
Arriving at the hospital was a blur. We parked in a garage and raced to the front doors and inside so fast I suspected he wouldn’t be able to find Shakira later, which would be a whole thing.
He talked to a man at the front desk, then before I knew it, we were in a room in the ER and I was dodging a nurse to throw myself at a sheepish-looking KC.
“Watch the IV!” Ren half shouted, but I was busy cocooning KC in my arms. His hospital gown was scratchy against my cheek.
“What happened?” I mumbled against his chest. He smelled slightly sour, which wasn’t right.
His warm breath gusted into my curls as he groaned. “I passed out on the field for a few minutes.”
“Shit, did you get your bell rung?” Worry laced Ren’s tone as he stepped up to our side.
“No, nothing with a story that good to tell,” he mumbled.
“Well—” I bolted upright. “—what happened?” I searched for bumps, bruises, or bandages, then frowned when I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary, other than the IV.
“He’s been drinking about a gallon of protein smoothies a day, which is not good.
” A confident feminine voice slid into our conversation.
She was an older lady with silver-threaded black hair and a friendly smile that made laugh lines stand out on her face.
“I’m Doctor Mansfield. And in my line of work, we refer to that as overkill.
” She glanced around at us. “I asked for you two to be called in at the request of my patient. Now we’re all here.
” She sipped from a cardboard coffee cup and winced.
“We can have this intervention the easy way or the hard way.”
KC surprised me when he slapped his hand down on the bed and scowled at her. His cheeks flushed as red as his hair, and for the first time ever, I spotted anger blazing in his pretty blue eyes. “How do you know it was my protein smoothies?”
“You drink way too many of them,” Ren said immediately, crossing his arms like he was getting ready to withstand a tornado.
“I knew they’d tattle on you.” Dr. Mansfield smirked at Ren, and KC groaned, rubbing his face as it went pinker, which couldn’t be healthy.
She stared me down and made my heart hammer harder than a judge might’ve if I was on the witness stand.
“What about you? Do you think he drinks a lot of them?”
I tilted my head and nervously cleared my throat. “I can’t actually remember the last time I saw him eat a meal.” I glanced at Ren in surprise. “But he always has a smoothie.”
She beamed at KC, whose eyebrows dipped.
“I already knew that, thanks to years in this ER and a couple of blood tests. You have to knock that off or you’re going to destroy your kidneys by the time you’re thirty.
I know that seems far off now, but trust me, it isn’t.
” She frowned at KC as he covered his face with his hands, then peeked between his fingers at all of us.
“My trainer recommended them.”
“There is no way your trainer told you to drink that much.” She sipped her coffee and raised her eyebrows.
“But maybe I should get you a seventy-two hour hold for a psych eval so I can make sure you rest and hydrate properly for the next three days. What do you think? Are you delusional? Hearing voices telling you to drink too many smoothies?”
“No,” KC groaned. “No, don’t do that. I thought drinking more of them was a good thing! If two is good, six must be great?” He tried to smile at her but caught Ren glaring and attempted to shuffle back into his raised bed. There was nowhere for him to go.
“You weren’t trying to kill yourself with this regimen?” She gestured at him with her coffee cup.
“He will stop.” Ren’s tone was dangerous and he only had eyes for KC.
“Perhaps I should call Quain?” I said softly.
“No!” KC nearly bucked me off, he jolted so fiercely. “I had them call you two for a reason. Pa can’t know about this or football will be over for me.”
“You’re an adult. He can’t stop you from playing,” Ren said with a frown.
“Scared parents can be highly motivated.” Dr. Mansfield patted Ren’s shoulder.
“You promise to lay off that protein powder? You do realize it’s almost impossible for the average American to not reach their protein quotient for the day,” she said with a small flutter of her eyelashes that seemed to stand in for an eye roll.
“You need to hydrate. Your kidneys will thank you.”
KC covered his face with his hands again. “Yes.”
“You better watch him,” she directed at me with a smile. “I’ll start the discharge paperwork.”
My instincts were to tell a real adult what was going on, and for some reason I didn’t feel like Ren quite qualified. “Your dad would want—”
“No, please,” KC said, tugging me down to hug me.
I burrowed close and luxuriated in the warmth radiating off him. “Okay.” My stomach twisted. KC had a dad. A dad who loved him. Talked to him. Lived with him. It seemed wrong not to tell him KC had gotten hurt. “I’m worried about you.”
“Don’t worry too much.” Ren rubbed my back and stared KC dead in the eye. “This will never happen again.”
KC shivered, and as fucked up as it was, I felt better with Ren looming and growling. He really wouldn’t let anything bad happen to KC. I bit my bottom lip. And perhaps that meant he felt the same way about me.
I hid a smile against KC’s chest.