Chapter 42
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
PENELOPE
No matter how many times I’d told myself I was cool and calm and completely collected, I still stood frozen outside of Steele Ink with my heart in my throat.
The evening air, brisk and salt-tinged, chilled me as I stared at the front door like it might bite me if I reached for the handle.
The CLOSED sign was already flipped. The street behind me was quiet—nothing but the distant rhythm of waves against the shore that seemed to follow me wherever I went in this town.
I didn’t have to do this. I could turn around, walk back to the apartment, pour myself a glass of wine, and pretend I hadn’t spent the past three hours getting ready for something I kept telling myself wasn’t a big deal.
It was just a tattoo.
It was not just a tattoo.
It was letting him carve himself into my skin, and I couldn’t pretend that didn’t mean something. That we didn’t mean something. Not anymore.
Before I could talk myself out of it, I pulled open the door, the bell chiming to announce my arrival. Declan looked up from his workstation, and everything inside me stilled.
He sat on his chair, looking like he was posing for a Hot Guys with Tattoos calendar.
His hair was a little messy, like he’d been running his fingers through it all day.
His black Henley clung to him, the sleeves pushed up to reveal the ink on his corded forearms. Dark jeans molded to his powerful thighs in a way that felt indecent.
And for some stupid reason, I wanted to walk over and climb right into his lap.
He swept his gaze over me, slow and intense and laced with possession. That, combined with the front door clicking shut behind me and shutting us off from the rest of the world, made the shop feel suddenly, impossibly intimate.
“You showed up.” His voice was deep and rumbling, eliciting tiny pinpricks of awareness skating down my spine.
I curled my fingers into the hem of my cardigan and shifted on my feet. “You sound surprised.”
“I’m not.” He leaned back in his chair, his eyes sweeping over me once again. “I just wanted to see it.”
“See what?”
“How sure you were.”
The way he said the words—like he wasn’t talking about ink at all—made my stomach flip over itself.
I glanced away and took in the space—the exposed brick, the distressed wood floors, the rows of framed tattoo designs lining the walls. The pendant lights cast everything in an amber glow that made it feel less like a shop and more like a secret.
“It’s quieter than I thought it’d be.”
“I didn’t want any distractions.” His eyes didn’t leave mine. “Not for this.”
Something bright and fizzy skittered in my stomach and bloomed up to my chest. I took a tentative step toward him.
Then another and another, tightening my fingers on the piece of paper I’d been clutching since I left the apartment.
The sketch I’d found on the kitchen counter this morning, tucked beneath my favorite mug like it was nothing.
It wasn’t nothing.
I’d nearly lost my breath as I’d taken in the art. Not because it was beautiful—though it was, achingly so—but because it was me. Not the version I curated for the world to see, but me, with all my layers and nuances and diametrically opposed facets.
And he’d somehow woven them all together into something breathtaking.
The image was delicate without being fragile. Intricate in a way that felt deliberate rather than excessive. The kind of art that revealed itself slowly, rewarding anyone patient enough to really look.
I placed the sketch on his workstation. “You drew this for me.”
It wasn’t a question, but I held his gaze anyway, waiting with bated breath for him to acknowledge what this was.
Declan’s jaw bunched, just once—the little tic I’d grown to love so much. “You know I did.”
My stomach swooped so hard I had to lock my knees before they did something embarrassing. He didn’t look away. Didn’t pretend it was casual. And the fact that he wasn’t downplaying it made my pulse flutter even harder.
“When?”
He leaned back slightly, crossing his arms. “Which one?”
My breath caught. “There are more?”
“Been drawing you since you started leaving scathing notes on my bike. Didn’t start with the whole piece, though.”
I took a small step closer before I could stop myself. “What did you start with?”
“Your mouth,” he said evenly. “You make this perfect little pout right before you’re about to lecture me.”
Heat crawled up my neck even as butterflies erupted in my belly. “You’ve been studying my mouth?”
“Hard not to.”
“What else about me have you been studying?”
He held my gaze for a moment before opening the bottom drawer of his tool chest, and I sucked in a shocked breath at what he revealed.
Pages upon pages filled it—some scraps with torn edges and some full size. Some drawn in pencil, some pen, some charcoal. All of them sketches of…me. Whether literally or figuratively, they were all me.
“This is…” Beautiful. Earth-shattering. Dangerous. I bit back each of those words and lightened my voice. “Mildly unhinged. Even for you.”
“You were in my head.” He shrugged like that admission didn’t shake my entire foundation. “Had to get you out somehow.”
I swallowed and carefully slid the drawer shut before I did something embarrassing like drop to my knees and gather them to my chest, just so I could hold them closer to my heart. “So this is what you do when someone annoys you? Start a sketchbook?”
“Only when they’re loud about it.”
“I am not loud.”
Thumbing his bottom lip, he dragged his gaze slowly down my body and back up again, the heat unmistakable in his eyes. “You were last night.”
A shiver stole over me as flashes from our evening came unbidden—the alley when I’d had to be quiet, and then back home where he’d made sure I couldn’t be.
I ignored the flush on my cheeks and lifted my chin, pretending—poorly—that he wasn’t affecting me. “You could’ve just returned your books on time and parked in an actual parking space like an adult.”
His mouth twitched. “Where’s the fun in that?”
I glanced around at the cleared-out shop, then noticed the array of snacks he had off to the side…all my favorites. “You always go this all out for your clients?”
Reaching out, he slid his hand under my dress and cupped the back of my thigh, tugging me closer until I stood between his knees. “You’re not a client.”
He stroked his thumb over my skin as his words settled low in my belly, and the air around us shifted, growing taut with tension.
I cleared my throat and tapped the sketch in his lap. “So if this is going on me…”
He tightened his grip on my thigh, his gaze intent. “Yeah?”
“I want it somewhere not everyone can see.”
His hand stilled for half a second before he resumed the slow stroke of his thumb along my thigh. “Somewhere hidden.”
I nodded, suddenly hyperaware of how close we were. Of the warmth of his palm against my skin and how my dress brushed against his jeans and how, if he wanted to, he could lean forward and graze his lips over my nipple.
“Hidden,” I confirmed. “I don’t want it to be for everyone. Just me…and the person I trust enough to share it with.”
His eyes darkened, his focus sharpening. “Show me.”
My pulse sped at his gruff demand, my entire body coming alive just from the way he was looking up at me.
I hesitated for the briefest second before reaching down, gripping his wrist, and dragging his hand up the outside of my thigh.
He lifted my dress as I slid his touch higher, the material bunching at his wrist.
When he gripped my hip, his thumb brushing over the exact spot I’d been thinking about all day, I shuddered out a breath. “There.”
He glanced down at what he’d revealed, his jaw flexing once as he stared at the glimpse of panties and the space I wanted him to permanently mark with his art. “You sure? That’s not a place you can forget about.”
That was exactly why I’d chosen it.
This thing between Declan and me was supposed to be nothing more than a short-term arrangement. Something casual and convenient and—above all else—temporary.
Instead, it had become the one thing I wasn’t ready to lose.
“I don’t want to forget,” I admitted quietly.
He flexed his fingers against my hip, and when he looked up at me, his eyes filled with warmth and what I secretly hoped was love, I pretended he knew exactly what I wasn’t saying. And that he felt it too.
With a nod, he stood, his body brushing along the front of mine as he rose. He slid the hand under my dress around to the small of my back, settling his fingers along the upper curve of my ass, and tugged me tight to him. He cupped my face with his other, gliding his thumb along my jaw.
Then he kissed me. Not rough. Not claiming. Intentional.
He licked along my lower lip, and I opened for him, sliding my tongue against his. At the sound of his groan, I melted into him, fisting the front of his Henley as he held me even tighter.
It was always so easy to get lost in Declan’s kisses. In his mouth and his tongue and the uncensored sounds he made, proving exactly how much he enjoyed this. And if they hadn’t made it clear, the thick line of his erection against my belly most certainly would have.
When he finally pulled back, his forehead hovered close to mine, his breath warm against my mouth. “All right, rebel. Let’s make this permanent.”
At his words, butterflies fluttered in my stomach, my heart somersaulting in my chest. Because even though I knew he was talking about the tattoo, I could no longer deny I didn’t wish he meant so much more.
With a final, chaste kiss, he stepped away and moved through the shop with calm efficiency. He flipped the lock on the front door and shut the blinds, closing us off from the outside world.