Chapter Three
Doing What I Love
Maverick
The shop is already alive when I walk in the next morning.
Machines buzzing. Voices low and easy. The faint smell of coffee and disinfectant mixing with ink.
House of Ink isn’t just a tattoo studio, it is a goddamn ecosystem.
Everyone has their place, their rhythm, their style.
I’m not quite part of it yet but I will be soon enough.
I drop my bag at the back booth they’d assigned me.
Clean counter, fresh disposable tubes, and boxes of needles neatly stacked.
Everything organized in a way that makes me itch.
I’m used to chaos. The kind of hole-in-the-wall shops where you wiped the dust off the flash sheets before you hung them on the wall.
This place feels like a machine, running smooth, everyone doing their part.
Which means if I screw this up, I’ll stand out.
Alistair is already at his station, ink winding up his arms like armor, focused and silent as he sets up for a sleeve.
Laine stands across the room, talking to a client with that calm authority that makes people lean in and listen.
Luke cracks a joke loud enough for the waiting area to hear, his laugh quick and sharp.
Abigail floats between clients like quiet water, steady and patient.
And Skye is everywhere, phone in hand, snapping shots, filming clips, already planning how to spin it into the next viral post.
And then there is Zora. Camera around her neck, dark hair pulled back, lips pressed in a thin line as she adjusts the lighting for Skye. She doesn’t look at me, not once. But I feel her there. Every nerve in my body is vividly fucking aware of her.
I force myself to focus.
My first client of the day is a guy in his mid-thirties with nervous eyes and a printout clutched in his hand. He stops dead when Laine gestures toward me.
“This is Maverick,” Laine said. “He’s your artist today.”
The guy looks me over like he isn’t sure he trusts me with a ballpoint pen, let alone permanent ink. I don’t blame him. With the scar down my jaw, tattoos up my neck, and the fact I didn’t sleep much last night, I don’t exactly scream “trustworthy.”
“What are you looking for?” I ask, keeping my voice low.
He hands me the printout of a lion, fierce and snarling. The kind of thing I’d seen done a thousand times, half of them badly.
“You want this?” I ask.
He nods quickly. “Yeah. On my forearm.”
I study it a second, then shake my head. “I can do better.” I know I’m good at what I do and I’m not afraid to show it.
His eyes widen, but Laine, standing nearby, just raises a brow. Silently testing me.
I pull a sketch pad from my bag, charcoal pencil in hand. The lines come fast and sharp, almost violent. The lion’s mane tangles into shadows, every strand detailed, eyes like fire, teeth gleaming in contrast so sharp it feels like it might bite. Dark realism. Brutal, honest, and alive.
When I turn the pad around, the guy’s jaw drops so hard I think it might dislocate. “That’s ... yeah. That. Exactly that.”
I nod once, no smile, and get to work.
The needle’s buzz steadies me. This is the one place my head goes quiet and my demons simply fade away.
The world narrows to skin and ink, black against pale.
My hand moves with practiced ease, building shadows, layering depth, pulling the beast to the surface one line at a time.
The guy flinches at first, but then he stills, staring as the image comes alive on his arm.
When I am finished, he can’t stop grinning.
“It looks real,” he whispers, turning his arm in the light. “Like it’s gonna jump off me.”
I strip off my gloves, toss them, and lean back. “That’s the point.”
Laine comes over and studies the work. His expression doesn’t change much, but there is the faintest nod. Approval. Alistair leans in too, eyes flicking to mine, a silent acknowledgment. Even Luke, cocky bastard that he is, let out a low whistle.
Skye is already snapping photos, practically vibrating. “Holy shit, Maverick, this is insane. Moody. Dark. It’s perfect. This’ll blow up online.”
And then, from the corner, I feel it. Her. Zora is watching from just outside my booth.
She didn’t mean to, her camera is raised, lens focused on the piece, but her eyes slide past the viewfinder, locking on me for just a fraction of a second. The air shifts and my chest tightens.
But her walls slam back up instantly. She clicks the shutter, turns away, and says something to Skye that makes the younger woman laugh. Like I’m not even there.
I tell myself I don’t care. But when the client walks out, grinning like a kid, when Laine claps me on the shoulder and mutters, “Good work,” when the rest of the crew goes back to their rhythm, I sit there staring at my ink-stained gloves and think about her.
About the way her mouth used to soften under mine, the way she used to trace the tattoos on my arms like they were secrets only she could read.
And I hated myself for wanting it all back.
I pack up and wipe down my station, the motions automatic. The shop noise swells again—Luke teasing Hailey, Skye’s phone buzzing nonstop, clients chatting nervously in the waiting area. It should have felt overwhelming. Instead, it felt like belonging.
Almost.
Because belonging means being whole. And no matter how good the ink looks, no matter how steady my hands are, one look at Zora reminds me I’m still a broken man chasing pieces I’ll never get back.
I scrub down the counter harder than necessary, my jaw tight. I tell myself to focus on the work, on proving myself here. On keeping my head down. But the truth is simple. Brutal, actually. I came back to Franklinton for a job. A clean slate. But already, I can’t stop orbiting her again.