Chapter 24 #2
His eyes darken. “I remember exactly what happened after that.” His thumb traces a slow circle on my hip. “You, spread out on my kitchen island. Best thing I’ve ever tasted.”
“So do I.” My fingers curl into the front of his shirt. “You’re hard to forget.”
His answering smile makes my stomach flip. This version of Jesse, unguarded and glowing with post-show adrenaline, makes my chest ache in the best way. He moves like the beat lives inside him, hands never still as they trace the curve of my waist, the flare of my hips.
“God, you’re beautiful.” The words brush hot against my ear. “This dress is going to kill me.”
“You like it?”
“I tried to help you out of it earlier, remember?” His hands slide down my sides, fingertips tracing the curve of my waist through the thin fabric.
“I won’t survive another minute wondering what you have on underneath this dress.
” His voice drops lower, rougher. “I want my hands on every inch of you, Joey. Want to feel you wrapped around my fingers.” His lips graze the shell of my ear. “Around my cock.”
“Well, if you’re a good boy, maybe.”
He presses his lips to my ear. “I can be a very, very good boy if that’s what you want.”
Jesse like this is dangerous. All that unguarded energy, that reckless joy seems to have slipped into my bloodstream.
I don’t stand a chance. I drag him down by the collar of his shirt and kiss him like the rest of the room doesn’t exist. The chaos presses in from every side, but his mouth moves against mine like we have all the time in the world.
Slow and deliberate. The kind of kiss that unravels something deep in my chest. The music and the crowd and the strobes all fall away until there’s nothing except the taste of him and the way my whole body hums when he pulls me closer.
“You have a hold on me, Joey.” His voice is low and rough. “Always have.” His fingers trace up my spine, leaving shivers in their wake. “You’re ingrained so deep in me. Under my skin.” He pulls back enough to meet my gaze, and the intensity there steals my breath. “Like a tattoo. Permanent.”
My throat tightens. Something hot and fierce rushes through my chest, settles behind my ribs, and refuses to let go.
I pull him closer, fisting the fabric of his shirt. “Permanent.”
“Come on.” His lips brush my ear. “I have an idea.”
The tattoo parlor sits wedged between a vintage record shop and a twenty-four-hour donut place, its neon sign the only thing still buzzing on the block.
“This looks sketch,” Tommy says.
“This was the only place still open.” Jesse stops in front of the window, studying the flash designs taped to the glass. His knee bounces. His fingers tap a rhythm against my knuckles that hasn’t stopped since we left the taco stand.
Tommy tilts his head to read the sign. “Permanent Damage Tattoo.” A grin splits his face. “I’m in.”
The shop is small but surprisingly clean.
Black leather chairs sit beneath industrial pendant lights, walls covered in framed flash designs and photographs of finished work.
A glass case near the register displays jewelry and aftercare products.
The sharp bite of antiseptic mingles with sandalwood incense burning somewhere deeper in the space.
Luke takes one look at the shop, then at Mateo. “We’ll be next door.”
“Getting donuts?” Stella asks.
“Mateo likes donuts for breakfast.” He winks. “Don’t wait up.”
“Tap that, Lucas!” Tommy hollers after them.
Luke flips them off over his shoulder without breaking stride. Stella whistles through her teeth and Jesse laughs against my shoulder, his arm tightening around my waist.
A curtain rustles, and the artist emerges.
The man is enormous. Six-foot-four at least, with shoulders broad enough to block the doorway and arms sleeved in ink from wrist to where they disappear beneath a black t-shirt straining across his chest. A thick beard covers the lower half of his face, dark and meticulously groomed, doing nothing to soften the hard set of his jaw.
He surveys our group with amusement. I can only imagine what he’s thinking.
“Can I help you?” His voice rumbles like gravel in a blender.
“We want tattoos.” Jesse steps up to the counter. A small placard reads HANK.
“Well I ain’t braiding hair.” Hank crosses his arms, thick as tree trunks.
Tommy sidles up beside Jesse. “I like this guy.”
Hank’s shoulders drop a fraction. “Cash up front. No refunds. No crying.”
“Define crying,” Stella says. “Because he teared up at a dog food commercial last week.”
“Hey!” Tommy points at her. “Even Hank would get misty over that three-legged dog.”
Hank glares at him. “What’re we doing tonight?”
Jesse’s already pulling me toward the counter where a thick book of designs sits open near the register. He flips through pages with the same restless urgency that’s carried him through the entire night, turning two and three at a time, scanning without settling.
“So what are you getting?” I ask.
“I’ll know it when I see it.” He flips another page. His free hand finds my hip, thumb tracing circles against my skin through the fabric of my dress.
“Hey, Stell.” Tommy doesn’t glance up from where he’s wandered to the other end of the counter. “Pick something out for me.”
Stella wanders over, peering at the book. “Anything?” Stella’s voice drips with dangerous sweetness now.
Jesse groans beside me. “Oh god, what have you unleashed?”
She abandons the book entirely and saunters toward the wall of flash designs, scanning the options with predatory focus. Her whole face lights up with unholy glee when she finds it. “This one.”
I crane my neck. A prancing unicorn with a flowing rainbow mane, surrounded by hearts and stars.
Tommy doesn’t even hesitate. “Done.”
Stella crosses her arms. “You’re bluffing.”
“Am I?” He meets her stare without flinching. “I’ll put it on my dick if you want to taste the rainbow.” He wiggles his eyebrows, and Stella rolls her eyes, but there’s a hint of amusement.
“I wish I hadn’t heard that,” I groan, turning to Jesse, who’s laughing.
Hank glances between them. “You sure about this, man?”
“Let’s do it.” Tommy drops into the leather chair with more confidence than his earlier door-eyeing suggested. “It’s what Sugar Tits wants to mark me with.”
Hank mutters something about hipsters and hating this shift.
Jesse turns another page and stops. His fingers go still on the paper for the first time since we walked in.
A half of a sunflower. Golden petals radiating outward from a dark center.
“Reminds me of the ones growing along the pasture fence at your place,” he says quietly. It’s sweet that he remembers. They’re my favorite flower. Reminds me of home.
“I’m not tattooing your dick,” Hank’s voice booms through the shop.
“Okay, how about my right butt cheek?” Tommy pats his ass. “Go big or go home.”
“Jesus fucking Christ,” Hank mutters.
Jesse snorts beside me.
Hank presses the stencil against Tommy’s skin, holds it, and peels it away. An actual unicorn on Tommy’s ass. Not that I want to be looking at him with his pants down, but it’s like a trainwreck unfolding in front of me.
The needle buzzes to life, the sound of permanence.
“Wait!” Stella’s voice cracks through the shop.
Hank freezes, the needle hovering over Tommy’s exposed butt cheek.
“Oh my god, you’re insane,” she says. “You can’t have a unicorn on your ass.”
“But you picked it.”
“I was trying to call your bluff, you idiot!” She shoves his shoulder. “I didn’t think you’d actually do it. Get up. We’re picking something else.”
Hank sets down the needle gun with a heavy sigh, clearly done with both of them. He turns to Jesse. “You ready?”
“Yeah.” Jesse closes the design book. “I know exactly what I want.”
Hank gestures to another empty chair while Stella drags Tommy toward the flash wall, their bickering fading into background noise. Jesse settles into the leather seat, rolling up his sleeve to expose his forearm. His leg bounces against the chair’s footrest, a steady, restless percussion.
“This half sunflower,” he tells Hank. “Right here.” He traces a line between his elbow and wrist. “With the word ‘permanent’ written down the edge,” he says while looking at me.
Something quiet and enormous moves through me.
Not a rush. Not a spark. Something tectonic and slow, rearranging the architecture of my chest. He wants to carry me on his skin.
Wants to look down at his arm every single day and see a piece of where I come from, a piece of what I love, woven into something he can never take off.
I cup his jaw and tilt his face toward mine, holding him there, studying the certainty in his eyes.
Hank nods, pulling out a sketchpad. The design takes shape in quick, confident strokes.
I climb into Jesse’s lap and kiss the tip of his nose. My dress rides up and Jesse’s fingers skim my thighs before gripping my hips. His hands settle against me, warm and steady, thumbs tracing slow arcs against the fabric like I’m the first thing all night that’s brought him back to earth.
“Don’t throw away the stencil. I want the same one on my hip,” I tell Hank.
“You don’t have to do that,” Jesse says.
I hold his face in my hands. “Every time I look at it, I’ll know you have the same one on your body.”
He kisses me. “You’ve completely undone me, Joey Morgan. And I don’t want to be put together again.”
Hank clears his throat and then points to the positioning of the tattoo.
Jesse looks to me for confirmation, and I can’t think of anything more beautiful.
“Perfect,” I say.
The needle buzzes to life and Jesse keeps his eyes trained on me. His free hand slides up my back to the nape of my neck, fingers weaving into my hair, tracing the line behind my ear, drifting down my spine and up again.
I press my lips to his and lay my head against his chest as we watch the sunflower come to life. The buzz of the needle fades beneath the sound of Jesse’s heartbeat.
“Hey Stell, why don’t you sit on my face while I get a tattoo?” Tommy calls from across the shop. Jesse’s chest rumbles with laughter.
When Hank finally leans away, Jesse examines the fresh ink with open reverence. The half sunflower vibrant against his forearm, with the word permanent trailing down the edge.
“It’s beautiful,” I whisper, tracing the space above the design without touching the tender skin.
Hank nods, already preparing a fresh station. “Hop up on the table. You’ll need to lift your dress.”
I hike my dress up, revealing the thin strap of my black lace panties as I lay on my side.
“Killing me, baby.” He presses a kiss to my hip.
Hank returns with a towel, draping it strategically to preserve my modesty while exposing only the patch of skin on my hip where the design will go.
Hank presses the stencil against my hip, holds it, and peels it away. The outline of the other half of the sunflower blooms against my skin in purple ink.
The needle buzzes to life and I flinch.
“Eyes on me,” Jesse says, his voice rough as sandpaper, and I turn my attention to him. “Just focus on me.”
Jesse leans down and kisses me. The needle bites into my hip and I gasp against his mouth, but I stay focused on him, like he said. His tongue slides against mine, distracting enough to turn the sharp sting into something almost bearable.
“That’s it,” he murmurs between kisses. “You’re doing so good.”
Another stroke of the needle and I wince. My hip is on fire. “That’s all you got, O’Donnell?”
I glance over at Hank, who seems in the zone, brow furrowed, needle jabbing me with relentless vigor.
Jesse shakes his head and then leans in close, hand in my hair.
“Such a good girl,” he whispers against my ear. “Taking it so well for me.”
The softness of his voice and the pain from the needle meld together until I can’t separate one from the other.
“You’re very distracting,” I say, smiling at him.
His free hand taps a rhythm against my thigh.
Hank wipes the area clean and leans away with a satisfied nod. “Take a look.”
I peer down at my hip where a delicate golden sunflower blooms against my skin, his other half.
Two halves of the flower making it whole. Permanent promises.
“Beautiful,” Jesse whispers, but he’s not studying the tattoo.