Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN
HOT SEAT
The drive to Moose’s shop took about thirty minutes, and no lies were told.
Bass thumped on the street from DJ Scratch cutting up inside.
Other businesses were still open on the block, too, but it looked like everyone was there for Ink Realm.
The Ruff Ryders anthem started when the six of them walked through the front doors together.
“Thank God you’re here.” His artist, Trinity, sighed when she stopped to greet him at the door. “There are four clients waiting back near your suite. Hey, Kong. Mozzi.” Trini turned her nose up at Moose’s little brother, and he looked her up and down without a word.
There was no warm welcome in her tone when she said his name either.
“Y’all can chill out if you want to.” Moose pulled his shirt over his head. “Drinks are in the back in the waiting room at the bar.”
“I want to come see you do your thing. Maybe you can give me something.” Inari simpered.
“You’re going to get a tattoo?” Ayla gawked. “Well, if you get one, I want one too.”
“Ohh, let’s get matching sister tatts!” Inari squealed.
“Yes!” Ayla agreed. “You got a book we can look at, Moose?”
“Yeah, follow me.” He led them to his booth in the back, where he chucked his chin at the people waiting in chairs outside his room.
Inari and Ayla flipped through the many designs while Mozzi, Kong, and Coast got comfortable in the back room.
Mozzi grabbed a tray so he could roll a blunt.
He took his cell out of his pocket along with the nine-millimeter he had tucked and set them both on the table.
Coast dropped into the seat beside him on the couch and whipped out her phone to check her social media shit.
A couple of hours went by, and soon, Moose had to lock the doors to keep more people from coming in.
He’d have worked all night if he hadn’t.
While he enjoyed the money and the art, he needed a break, and Inari was a welcome distraction. Trini peeped how she didn’t leave his side, even when he had clients in his chair. Inari sat there, and they chopped it up about any and everything, which piqued her curiosity.
She and Moose dated years ago but broke things off because Trini wasn’t one for being tied down too long, and Moose wasn’t in the business of keeping anybody around who didn’t want to be.
She regretted it almost immediately, but when she tried to crawl back to him, he rejected her and hit her with that ‘we can be friends’ bullshit.
She’d done it to herself and was beyond grateful he gave her a chance to work in his shop, but it didn’t stop her from trying to get back in his good graces so they could be together again.
Inari wasn’t his type. Her skin was blemish free, and she had this grown woman aura around her.
Trini guessed she was older by the way she carried herself and that ‘don’t fuck with me’ glint behind her eyes.
Her face card was lethal. She was on the heavy side, but not overweight, and every pound she accepted with confidence.
Trini didn’t know a lot of women that comfortable in their own skin.
It was Mozzi’s turn in the chair after Moose finished with his first clients.
He pulled his shirt over his head, revealing his chiseled back and abs, leaving Coast ogling him like a piece of meat as he dropped in his brother’s chair.
She leaned against a counter, drinking a milkshake she’d grabbed from the cafe across the street not long ago.
His back was already covered in different pieces, but there was one unfinished that she noticed as Moose switched out his needles.
Ayla and Inari sat side by side in two chairs against the floor to ceiling windows, viewing the side street, and Kong stepped in, holding a blunt out to Moose.
He rejected it, shaking his head and briefly stepping out of the room.
Most would assume he was going to use the bathroom or grab a snack, but he needed a minute so he could enjoy his other favorite pastime.
Pausing in the employee lunchroom, he popped open the top to the pinky ring on his finger and scooped the white crystal substance onto his pinky nail.
He brought it to his nose and inhaled quickly when Trini sailed into the room.
“Shit, I thought I was the only one feeling it. You feel like sharing?” She grinned, and he tapped his ring against the counter where they stood so he could spread a line for her.
He did another before pinching his nostrils and taking a break.
Replacing the cap to the ring, he checked his reflection in the mirror to make sure he didn’t have anything under his nose, and Trini knelt to suction her portion through her nose.
Getting high and fucking each other’s brains out used to be their thing. She couldn’t deny that she missed it.
“So, what’s up with you and the bougie one?” she kidded, watching Moose’s dark eyes land on her seriously.
“Stay away from that.”
“From what exactly?” she tittered. “Don’t tell me you’re actually considering pursuing it.”
“What business is that of yours, Trin?” Scowling, Moose turned to her.
She opened her mouth to counter that with something smart and realized she didn’t have anything. Moose was right; it wasn’t her business. She couldn’t help herself. Working with him and occasionally partying together had become their norm.
“I’m still your friend, Moose. Damn. I care about you.” Disappointment laced her tone, her soft brown eyes drifting to the ground.
Moose sighed heavily before looking at her.
“As your friend, let me just say, a woman like that is not in your league. She’s so… mature. Way too mature for you. You’re still in that stage where life is a party. You don’t even wake up before twelve. She looks like she has schedules and routines. That ain’t you, baby.”
“You making a whole lot of assumptions, T.”
“Am I? Or is it the truth?” she shot back, eyes linking with his.
Moose didn’t blink. Some of what she said was true, but it didn’t mean shit.
He’d never have to change who he was to fuck with anybody.
There was nothing between him and Inari but a little flirting all night anyway.
Trini was right about one thing, he wasn’t used to an assertive, ambitious woman like that.
He fucked with needy bitches. Those Miss Independent types were controlling and always trying to fix something in you that they thought was broken.
He already knew he was fucked up and didn’t need anybody else pointing out his flaws.
Ignoring her, he grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge on his way back to his suite.
Soon as he stepped inside, Ayla jumped up with the book in her hand and walked over to him.
“We decided on the tattoos we wanted. Well, Inari claims she wants two.” Ayla glimpsed her sister over her shoulder as she tapped at her phone screen.
She was texting Dane to see if he was good.
“This is her first one. I doubt she will go through with it, though,” Ayla muttered, rolling her eyes as she pointed to the tattoo pair on the page.
Both had two hands with the pinkies locked together. Above one, it read, ‘in this life,’ and above the other, it read, ‘and the next.’ Moose bobbed his head, and Kong handed him the blunt he’d refused not long ago. Pinching it between his fingers, he brought it to his lips.
“I can do that. Where y’all want it?”
“On our wrists.” Ayla beamed.
“Cool.” Moose held the blunt out to her.
Ayla looked at it at first, the pungent aroma drifting up her nostrils. She loved her wine and an occasional tequila shot or two, but weed had never been her thing. She knew Inari indulged every now and then, though because she kept a stash.
“I’ve never smoked before.”
“Never?” Coast chimed in.
Ayla shook her head and nervously peered at Kong leaning against another counter space near the door.
“I tried to get her to come to the dark side once or twice. Told her she might like it here and gain a new perspective on life that I like to call ‘fuck it all’.” Inari crossed one leg over the other and sipped her margarita out of the red solo cup with a straw.
Mozzi snickered from the chair in the middle of the room, typing some shit in his phone while waiting for Moose to get to him.
“Take a puff or two,” Kong encouraged. “I won’t tell anybody.”
Ayla reached for the blunt and brought it to her lips. She pulled from it slowly.
“Now hold it,” Kong instructed. “One, two, three—”
She broke out in a coughing fit, and Inari laughed with Mozzi and Coast.
“Take one more.” Moose nodded with a grin, enjoying watching her devirginize herself.
Ayla had to recover from the first pull, beating her fist against her chest as Inari stepped up with her cup in hand. She took another hit, and this time, she managed to hold it for five seconds before passing the blunt to her sister and taking her cup, so she could sip her drink.
“Aw, you just made me proud!” Inari slung her arm over her shoulders. “Welcome to the garden zone, baby sister!”
Moose snorted and stepped past them to get to Mozzi.
He slid his stool up to the chair and picked up his needle, so he could get to work.
“Wake Up in the Sky” with Gucci Mane, Bruno Mars, and Kodak Black thumped through the bass.
Coast snapped her fingers and bent her knees while doing a little twerk.
“This my shit!” She twirled in a circle and threw her ass back, catching Moose’s attention. He laughed and shook his head. “Stop looking at my girl, nigga.” Mozzi shoved him.
“Be still before I fuck yo’ shit up,” Moose grumbled, leaning in closer as he worked on the piece on his back. “The fuck you doing with her anyway?”
Mozzi sipped Don Julio from his plastic red cup, and his eyes focused on the ground. Moose had comic strips on his floor, which was smart. People had to rest on their stomach often if he was doing work on their backside, so it gave them something to look at.
“Ion know,” Mozzi mumbled as his phone went off.