18. Cole
COLE
Idon’t understand people who say rain is relaxing.
It’s not peaceful. It’s fucking loud.
It’s been hammering against the front windows of the shop since I opened this morning, a relentless tap-tap-tap that drills straight into my skull.
The street outside’s covered in puddles, which means walk-ins are dead.
No one’s braving a downpour for a random flash tattoo unless they’re drunk, and it’s too early for that.
So, I’m stuck doing all the boring shit that needs to be done around here, like tossing used razors into the sharps bin and wiping down everything with disinfectant.
I just want to ink skin, hear the buzz of the machine, and get lost in a design that makes the noise in my head quiet for a while.
I shove the drawer closed with my hip, pull my phone out, and open my banking app.
She hasn’t used the card in two days. Not for groceries, not for anything.
I stare at the screen for a second, my jaw getting tighter with every heartbeat banging against my chest.
I hope I’m just overthinking shit and that she’s fine, but the part of me that knows my father is a useless piece of shit is already running through worst-case scenarios.
I’d starve before letting my sister miss a meal, but I know how she is.
She doesn’t want to inconvenience me even after I’ve assured her a hundred times that she could never.
I lock my phone and shove it back into my pocket when I hear the front door open. Alex is managing the counter today, so I don’t bother rushing out.
But after a few seconds, I hear him laugh, and my brows tug together. Alex isn’t the laughing type. He’s quiet, keeps to himself, is covered in more piercings than I have tattoos, and absolutely not the kind of guy who giggles with customers.
Curiosity digs in, so I toss the towel onto the cart and head toward the front. I round the corner and my steps stutter, stopping me dead.
Alex is behind the counter, leaning forward over the glass, and on the other side of the front desk, with one hip tipped against the glass, is Aurora fucking Prescott.
“I think the outside of the thigh is classic,” Alex says, scrolling through the reference photo on her phone. “But the spine would look sick too. Up to you, obviously.”
She arches a brow, tilts her head just a fraction as she considers it. “I want it where I can see it,” she says. “Not tucked away on my spine for… whoever ends up behind me.”
Alex nods, swallowing hard, and I can practically hear the thoughts rattling around in his skull. Jesus, man, don’t be so obvious.
I almost scoff out loud.
What is it about Aurora that turns grown men into weak little puppies?
My jaw tightens as Halloween flashes in the back of my skull. Her hands climbing up my chest, making me beg, and me being the idiot who did.
Guess I fell for her trap, too. I let her sink her fangs in and pump me full of venom. That’s the only explanation for why she’s still in my head when I made it perfectly clear this shit between us was done. Over. Never happening again.
My dick clearly didn’t get that memo, because it gives a traitorous twitch in my jeans just from looking at her.
My fingers curl so hard my knuckles ache.
There’s a rational part of me that knows I don’t have a claim over her.
Knows she doesn’t owe me shit. But there’s another part that sees her with anyone else and wants to smash something, that wants to mark her in ways that never wash out, wants to make sure she remembers exactly who made her fall apart first.
I cross the floor, and they both glance up as I approach, but I try my hardest to keep my eyes on Alex.
“I’ll take her,” I say.
He blinks, flicking his eyes from me to her, then back at me, confusion written all over his face. “What? Dude, I’m—”
I hold his stare instead of repeating myself. His gaze cuts to Aurora, then back to me, and sighs, muttering something about taking a smoke break.
Aurora folds her arms, one brow arching in a way that does absolutely nothing to help the fact that all I can think about is shoving her up against the nearest wall. “I didn’t ask for you, Ellis.”
“Too bad,” I mutter, working my gum between my teeth as I turn and head for my workroom. “You’re stuck with me.”
I don’t bother checking whether she actually follows. She’d be smart to turn around and walk right back out, find some other artist who hasn’t had his hands on her before. Someone who doesn’t have a head full of memories he’s trying to drown.
But when I push the door open and step inside, I glance back and there she is, hovering in the doorway, like she’s debating whether walking away or walking toward me is the bigger mistake.
I lift a brow and jerk my chin toward the chair. “Sit down.”
She holds my gaze for a second, defiant as ever, then drops into the chair with a little huff, crossing one leg over the other.
I exhale through my nose, shut the door behind us, and move to my station, dropping into my stool.
I tug my gloves on, snapping the elastic at my wrist, and start opening the ink, checking the needle.
I focus on my job, not on the fact that the last time she was in here, I kicked her out because I couldn’t handle how close she was.
How all I could see was her on that stage in lingerie, grinding on my lap.
Now I’ve seen every inch of her. Fucked her. Tasted her. And I’m never doing that again. So yeah, I can do this. I can keep it professional. I can put ink on her skin without losing my mind.
I can hear my own pulse in my ears while I pull up the sketch I’d saved on my iPad from the last time she was here. I print it, cut the stencil, lay everything out on the tray, and then finally look at her.
“Do you need numbing cream?” I ask her. “Last thing I need is you whining before I’m even done.”
She scoffs, flicking a strand of hair behind her shoulder. “No,” she says, shooting me a glare. “I don’t want numbing cream.”
Of course she doesn’t. She’d rather die than show weakness.
I chew my gum, roll my chair in, and my eyes drop to her denim jeans. “You’re going to have to take those off.”
She keeps her eyes on me as she lifts her ass off the bed and tugs her jeans down, leaving her in a tiny black thong.
Jesus. Keep it together. I’ve seen plenty of women and men practically naked on my tattoo bed before.
This is nothing new. Except with every one of them, it was just a job.
I kept shit professional and didn’t give a single fuck.
But with her… I’ve seen what’s underneath that scrap of fabric.
Tasted it. Been inside of it. And I’m trying really hard to remind myself I don’t ever want to go there with her again.
I turn my head and sanitize my hands again out of habit, and when I turn around, she’s out of her jeans and has tugged the strap of the thong up her hip.
I chew harder, grinding my teeth, and slowly press the stencil against her upper thigh, smoothing it over her skin.
Goosebumps break out under my gloves the second I touch her, and I pretend I don’t notice. I need to stop noticing shit about her.
“You draw this yourself?” I ask, smoothing down the top along her hip bone.
Her gaze drops to her thigh, brows drawing together. “Yeah.”
“Looks cool,” I mutter.
She lets out a disbelieving little huff. “Wow,” she says, shaking her head.
I glance up, my brows tugging together. “What?”
“Did it hurt?” she asks, watching me with a smirk. “Giving me a compliment?”
She just can’t help being a brat who drives me insane, huh?
I arch a brow. “Just because I don’t like you doesn’t mean your art isn’t good.”
Her brows lift, some of the snark slipping for half a second, and instead of snapping back, she just presses her lips into a line and says, “Well… thanks.”
I peel the stencil paper away and study the ink left on her skin, checking the lines, making sure everything is clean and in the right position.
“Alright,” I say, rolling my chair back a little. “Go look in the mirror. Make sure you like the placement.”
She stands and walks over to the full-length mirror in nothing but that tiny pair of black cotton panties and a black top. I keep my eyes on my machine, pretending I’m not aware of every step she takes.
When I finally glance up, she’s turned slightly, studying her reflection. She doesn’t say anything, just turns around and walks back to the bed.
“Everything alright?” I ask her, rolling my chair back into position.
She just nods, refusing to give me even the slightest compliment. I just huff out a laugh and adjust her leg, stretching it out, twisting her slightly.
I move to her side, the familiar hum of the machine starting up.
“Last chance to run,” I say, looking up at her one more time. “This is gonna sting.”
She glances over her shoulder and holds my gaze. “I don’t run.”
I snap my gum and line up the needle, letting the familiar buzz roll through the room and settle under my skin. I love this part, love the way the ink bites clean into skin and marks it, love hearing the machine hum and everything else in my head quiet down long enough for me to breathe.
Today, though, it’s a fight not to notice every time my hand brushes her thigh.
My hand brushes the inside of her thigh as I position her, and the contact is electric in a way I hate. Her skin is warm. Too warm. And my brain keeps replaying other ways I’ve touched her, other sounds she’s made because of me—none of which are helpful right now.
I force my attention to the stencil, carving one line at a time but I glance up as she lets out a little noise when the needle digs into a tender spot, watching as she breathes through her nose, refusing to show that she’s in pain.
I wipe away excess ink and pause, sitting back a little, raising an eyebrow at her. “Need a break?”
She shakes her head too quickly. “I’m good.”