Chapter 22
Chapter twenty-two
Fin
With Ricky standing between my spread legs, I barely noticed how he set things up or the first scratch of the tattoo going onto my skin.
He put his clothes on, but it honestly didn’t help much.
The tank top had wide holes revealing a peek of his ribs and armpit when he reached to dip the tip of his tattoo gun in the ink.
Plus, I knew about the panties underneath.
“It doesn’t hurt,” I commented, my voice low but still easy for him to hear over the sound of the gun.
Ricky chuckled and I felt my dick twitch at the sound. “It gets worse when you start going over the lines again and with shading.”
“Are you going to be shading?” I asked, gripping his hip with my right hand. I’d have my left hand on him too, but he was tattooing the left side of my chest and I assumed he needed me to be still. Keeping my hands off of Ricky was starting to become a problem.
“No, I think I’ll stick to the outline today,” Ricky told me while focusing on the job at hand. “If you like it, I can go back in with shading and maybe some color.”
“Color?”
Our club logo had a wolf’s head looking straight ahead in white stitching over black. I wasn’t sure where color would be added.
“Mmhmm,” he replied without looking up. “Green. For the eyes.”
Hesitating, I remembered how his eyes flashed green when we had sex before napping. “Why green?”
This time, Ricky met my gaze with an almost shy grin I didn’t think I’d ever seen on him. “For your eyes. They’re green in human and wolf form.”
“They are,” I nodded and he dropped his focus back to my chest where a warm vibration radiated along with occasional sharp stings.
Did I dare ask what color his eyes were in wolf form? I had seen him shift hundreds of times over the years, and he would probably think I was stupid for asking. My wolf didn’t care about my possible embarrassment and insisted I speak.
“And your eyes…they go from brown to orange, right?”
“Uh, yeah. Of course. Just like my namesake,” Ricky added with disdain.
“Of course.”
So either I imagined the change, or it was something bigger. The main reason a wolf’s eyes change is when they’re mated. I saw it with Fowler and Ricky’s moms. When Fowler mated with Riley, he had never shifted before, but his eyes matched the Alpha’s. But they were all omegas.
Ricky was a beta wolf. I’d heard of alphas being with female betas, but never a man, so I had no clue if they could cause that change.
Why was I even thinking about this? Ricky couldn’t be my mate. How cruel would fate be to make me wait so long. He had been right in front of me his entire life. I would have known.
Mine.
Claim.
Mate.
Fuck.
Closing my eyes, I let my mind wander to the possibility my wolf was right. Fowler and Riley grew up together and didn’t know they were mates until a decade after reaching maturity. It wasn’t unheard of.
Rowen never wanted anyone until his barista waltzed into town and was put in my son’s path every day for months. But still, he was drawn to Cam from the moment they met.
Squirming in my seat that I’d somehow been harboring a crush on the younger man since he was a child, I felt dread hit my stomach like I swallowed lead.
“Hold still, unless you want this wolf to have a tail, too,” Ricky chastised and I took a big breath. My chest expanded and relaxed again before I felt his glove-covered hands on me again.
So I did what I always do. I considered all of the sides. One of them was comparing my feelings to the ones I had for my best friend most of my life. Was this crush on Ricky better or worse than the one I had on David?
My feelings for David King were unrequited, but at least he was my age.
We were best friends. It only made sense I’d develop feelings on him when I realized I was attracted to men.
He was straight, it was the early nineties, and I knew I never had a chance.
There was no reason to spew my emotions on him.
In that way, what I was developing for Ricky was better. He clearly liked me right back. At least physically. He was an unrepentant flirt, though. And not even thirty, yet. He didn’t want to be tied down to an old man like me.
Sure, Rowen found out and had mostly been supportive. He and Cam told me to go for it with Ricky. That didn’t mean Ricky wanted more than sex.
Ask, my wolf insisted, but I didn’t want to interrupt the moment we were having.
Opening my eyes, I focused on the intent look of concentration on Ricky’s face. He was hot when he was grinning, and even more when he was coming apart in my arms, but I thought his serious face might be a new favorite.
He alternated between biting his lower lip and sticking his tongue out.
I wanted to suck on it and make him moan, but I was enjoying the view.
I’d never had a tattoo before, but I couldn’t help feeling like this one was more intimate than most. His touch was careful, reverent.
Every stroke of the needle was done with purpose and I marveled at his skill even without looking at his work so far.
Everyone saw Ricky as the fighter. The one you called when someone needed to be punched in the face or kicked out of the bar. But he was an artist. I wanted to help him grow, maybe get that license he joked about not having. Ricky deserved the world.
More than that, I could sense how much Ricky cared about me through his touch. He didn’t act like this was only physical, and that was what scared me.
Time got away from me while he was working, the pain releasing happy chemicals throughout my body until I was feeling sleepy, so I was surprised when Ricky stopped.
“Done.”
Glancing down, I could see the wolf in stark block ink with some pink around the edges. Stretching from just above my nipple to my clavicle was the outline of a wolf staring straight ahead. The edges weren’t done in extreme stark lines, with some fading out as if the wolf was coming from within me.
Ricky grabbed a small bottle from the open kit and squirted foamy soap over the art, obscuring it for a minute before he wiped it down using a paper towel. Next he added petroleum jelly to make it shiny before removing his gloves and packing the supplies away and giving me aftercare instructions.
“You should use only fragrance-free soap and no taking baths for a week. I’ll leave you healing ointment to put on a few times a day.
Mainly just keep it clean and don’t shift and it should be fine,” he told me as he zipped the kit closed.
“I can come back in with white ink to make it stand out, and do the eyes in green, if you want the pop of color.”
He was staring at the art instead of my face and I could tell he was nervous about my reaction. I didn’t want Ricky to ever feel nervous about how I’d react. I wasn’t his father and he should trust me to be a soft place to land.
“I think I’d like that,” I whispered and he finally met my gaze. “It’s gorgeous, Ricky. I love it.”
Letting out a ragged breath, Ricky’s lip quirked up, “Really?”
“Really. You’re an amazing artist,” I assured him honestly. He’d taken an idea and drawn it by hand before etching something beautiful on my body in a matter of a couple hours at most. Leaning forward, I hovered over his lips and added, “Thank you.”
Ricky moved the last inch and pressed his lips into mine. We kissed lazily, taking slower than we had before, and I had the crazy urge to tell him to stay. To let me thank him properly with my mouth on his body. But I needed time to think.
“I think we should get some sleep in our own beds tonight,” I started, and a flash of annoyance mixed with fear crossed Ricky’s face.
I put my hand over his mouth to stop the protest I knew was coming.
“I’m not pushing you away. I promise. We can meet up for lunch or dinner tomorrow to talk.
Whichever works for you. How does that sound? ”
“I’m off tomorrow,” Ricky answered after a pause. I was glad he didn’t argue, since he was so much more impulsive than me. “Lunch?”
“Sure,” I agreed, almost calling him baby instead of brat as a term of endearment. “I’ll text instead of calling, since that’s your preferred method of communication.”
“Whatever, old man.” Ricky rolled his eyes and I repressed a laugh. The age difference that used to creep me out was now endearing. “Tomorrow?”
Nodding, I pulled him in for another kiss, and he was careful not to touch my tattoo was the kiss lingered. “Goodnight, Ricky.”
“Night, Fin.”
He packed the tattoo kit into his saddle bag and moved to the door before giving me one last smile. When the door closed behind him, my wolf snarled in disapproval. He didn’t want Ricky leaving our sight.
Claim!
Yeah, I got it. Ricky wasn’t a casual fling. Tomorrow. I’d show him how I felt tomorrow. First, I had a couple calls to make.