by J, Bella
“Jesus,” I gasped, placing my hand in front of my mouth, my vision hazy with unshed tears.
“It’s funny. I only saw the flames for a second, but when I heard her scream again, the fire, it disappeared. I didn’t care about the smoke burning my nose, threatening to suffocate me. I didn’t give a shit that I couldn’t even see my fucking hand in front of my face. All I cared about was her.” His voice cracked, pain leaking from every word. He sniffed, and when he looked back at me, I saw the regret well up in his eyes. “I had to follow the sound of her crying to find my way to her. I remember screaming her name, telling her I was coming. That I would save her. But I didn’t. I couldn’t.” Crouching down, he held his face in his hands, his jaw clenched as he tried to keep his shit together, to not break down. “The flames wouldn’t let me through. It wouldn’t let me get to her. Her cries were supposed to get louder the closer I got to her, but it didn’t. It only grew softer while the flames got angrier. The last thing I remember was the roof caving in, and I tried to crawl my way through the flaming debris, the searing pain on my back unable to slow me down. But I no longer heard her. Her screams died.” He looked up at me, a single tear slipping down his face. “And so did she. Mia died, and I couldn’t save her.”
“Ink.” I hunkered down to face him, and my chest tightened, my body erupting in chills. I had no words, only images of the horror he had to carry with him every day of his life.
Regret etched across his features as he stared at me. “I couldn’t save Mia, and I blame myself as much as my family does. They never forgave me, and I still haven’t forgiven myself.”
“No.” I shook my head. “It’s not your fault. What happened isn’t your fault.”
“I shouldn’t have fallen asleep. If I was awake, I could have gotten her out of there in time.”
Suddenly, all the pieces came together, and I frowned, searching his face. “That’s why you’ve been sneaking into my room, sitting with me while I sleep…isn’t it? You’re afraid to fall asleep.”
His brown irises swirled with grief as he relived the memories of his past, but he reached out and cupped my cheeks with his palms, his body a breath away from mine. “I can’t fall asleep thinking that you might need me, and I won’t be able to get to you in time.”
It all made sense now. Everything clicked into place. This was him. This was who he was, the kind of man he had always been. All the times when the guys got hurt, the time when Dutch got shot, and me, after what happened to me, Ink was always there. Always helping. It was in his nature to care for people who got hurt. Everything made fucking sense now. Finally, I saw the real him. Not the manwhore he pretended to be, or the hard-ass sergeant-at-arms of the American Street Kings. But the man with a fucking heart of gold.
I placed my hand on his chest, flattening my palm against his warm skin. He closed his eyes, as if my touch alone freed him. “I’m sorry, Ink.”
“No. You don’t have to be sorry.”
“Yes, I do. All these years, I…I misunderstood you. I didn’t know—”
His mouth crashed against mine, his kiss drowning my words. My heart squeezed unbearably, his regret and my torment laced together in a kiss so powerful I felt it melt through the ice in my blood, thawing my bones, reaching for the broken pieces of my soul.
His tongue glided against my lips, and I opened for him—invited him to deepen the kiss, allowing the moment to build into a connection I could no longer deny. My need to protect myself along with the memories that kept me captive weren’t strong enough anymore. And just like every brick that stood guard around my heart, I fell. I fell without thinking how I’d break if he didn’t catch me.
He wrapped his arms around my waist, pulling me against him—our bodies flush against each other, and on our knees. It didn’t hurt. It didn’t burn. And without the wall that protected me, I was able to let myself feel again. The shackles around my soul could no longer keep me from taking the leap, and as I folded my arms around his neck, finally surrendering, relief flowed down my cheeks one tear at a time, my body weeping, no longer tied to the past.
All too soon, Ink pulled back, rapid breaths escaping his lips and wafting against mine. “You and I, we’re the same. Our scars will never go away. It’s a part of who we are. We just need to find a way to see the beauty in them. Somehow. Together.”
I leaned my head down, his lips touching my forehead. “Somehow,” I whispered, finally ready to stop fighting whatever this was between us. “Together.”
13
Neon
The sting of the needle pulsed to the buzz of the machine. It took Red hours to draw the stencil and, with Ink’s help, get it positioned perfectly to cover the scars.
I didn’t look. Not once. When Red was ready to start, she wanted me to check it, but I just told her to go with what Ink suggested. I trusted him. I trusted his vision—especially after seeing the artwork on his back. If someone had told me a year ago that I’d be here placing all my trust in this man, I would have straight-up laughed. I never could have predicted Ink and I would one day share this kind of connection.
“How you doing?” He pulled up a chair and sat down in front of me.
“I’m good.” I wasn’t lying. The tingling burn on my back was nothing compared to what I’d been through. Broken leg, severed fingers, torn-out insides. Not even hell had the power to bring that kind of pain.
I placed my elbows on the back of the chair. “Do you know what started it?”
“Started what?”
“The fire.”
He looked over my shoulder at Red, who I knew was wearing earphones. When she set up everything earlier, she asked me how I felt about loud music since she couldn’t work her magic without it. Seeing that I’d be spending hours getting inked, I had to tell her the truth. Heavy metal music freaked me the fuck out. It was all those fuckers listened to while I hung from that ceiling with hooks pierced through my flesh. It was so loud, I felt the rhythm pound against my ribs. Paired with my screams and their maniacal laughs, it sounded like a mixed fucking tape of horror.
Red didn’t have a problem with it and simply took out her cordless earphones. So, while the redhead had metal blasting through her brain, Ink and I had total privacy.
He shifted in his seat, his palms stretching over his thick, denim-clad thighs. “It was the middle of winter. A portable heater caught fire.”
“Was the heater in her room?”
“No.” He brushed a palm across his short, well-kept beard. “It was in their room. They would turn it on a few hours before they went to bed.” He shrugged. “My brother left in such a rush, he forgot to turn it off.”
My anger level flared. “So, basically, he’s more to blame than you.”
“I shouldn’t have fallen asleep.”
“Your brother should have switched the goddamn heater off.”
He leaned back, eyes cast up to the ceiling. “It doesn’t matter who’s really to blame. Mia is gone. Nothing can bring her back.”
“But your family blames you, while your brother clearly needs to carry some of the blame.”
“He lost a child, Neon. My brother buried his two-year old daughter—a daughter he will never see in her prom dress, or graduate. A daughter he will never walk down the aisle. It was painful enough for him without carrying the blame.”
“So, you carry it instead?”
“I had my way of dealing with it.”
“Drugs?”
He nodded. “It started with a few vials of morphine at the hospital. I got caught eventually, fired. That’s when I turned to heroin, one overdose away from hell.”
I remembered when I started out as a waitress here, the stories I heard of Ink’s drug addiction. It was Granite’s dad who got him on the strait and narrow—just like he did with me.
I shot him a half-smile. “Seems like you’re not a dick after all.”
The smirk on his face gave me a glimpse of the cheeky, arrogant Ink I had known for years. “Don’t kid yo
urself, woman. I’m still a dick.”
I had to laugh, and when my shoulders moved, Red scolded me. “Seriously. Do you want this phoenix to have a lazy eye?”
Ink snorted, and I could not stop laughing. It took a full five minutes before Red could start again.
“What about you?” Ink sat back down. “You were an addict too.”
I stared at the laminated floors, thinking back to the time when I was nothing more than a lost girl who had lived a lie. “I guess you can say I was the classic example of a girl with daddy issues.”
“Did he hurt you?”
I glanced up at him, the creases on his forehead a sign that his mind had already wandered to the worst-case scenario most imagined when a woman brought up daddy issues.
“Not me, no. In fact, if there was an award for world’s best dad, he deserved it.”
Red moved toward my left side, and the burn elevated the closer she got to my ribs. By the time I breathed in deeply, closing my eyes and trying to ignore the pain, she moved the needle back, more toward my shoulder blade.
“I was sixteen when the feds busted down our front door, charging inside while we sat at the dining room table eating dinner.” I tucked a strand of violet hair behind my ear. “Turns out that my perfect little daddy got his hands dirty with child pornography.”
“Jesus,” Ink muttered, righting himself in his seat.
“At first, I refused to believe it, but then the evidence started piling up until it was something I couldn’t ignore anymore.”
“I’m sorry, Neon.”
“Yeah.” I glanced down at my hands, nervously tugging at my cuticles. “There’s something about witnessing your dad get handcuffed and shoved into a cop car that kinda messes with your head. And the fact that my mom up and left, disappearing into thin air, didn’t help much.”
“She just left you?”
I nodded. “I stayed with my grandma for a while, until the streets sucked me in, welcoming its newest junkie.”
Placing my chin on my arms, childhood memories flooded past the gates of my mind. As a kid, it was the kind of memories you’d want to bottle and keep forever—the kind that would get you through tough times when venturing into the unknown of adulthood. But when my dad eventually pleaded guilty, admitting to all his unforgivable sins, all those good memories oxidized, leaving nothing but traces of lies. There were so many lies, and it made me question every fucking second he spent with me.”
I sighed. “My dad broke my heart. And cocaine was the only thing that could make me forget how fucked-up he really was.”
Ink didn’t say a word, just staring at me with those cognac eyes—rich, intense, intoxicating.
“You know,” he smiled, “together you and I have quite the colorful past.”
“That, we do.”
Silence settled between us, the only noise the buzz as Red continued to work. If it was anyone else who sat opposite me, it would have been one of those awkward silences, the ones where you kind of hoped a bomb would go off and take out the entire fucking block…including you. But not with him. It felt natural, as if the silence between us had a voice of its own, a way of speaking without saying a word.
Lost in my own thoughts, a scary place if it wasn’t for the comfort of Ink’s presence, I hardly registered the pain from the needle anymore.
The machine stopped buzzing, and I glanced over my shoulder, unaware of how much time had passed. “I’m still good if you want to do some more.”
Red wiped her arm across her forehead. “You might be good, but I’m starting to see double. Three hours is where I draw the line and demand a break.”
“Three hours?”
“Yup. I’m guessing two more sessions and we’ll have this baby done.” She started wiping some salve on my back. “I don’t want to rush it. The shading on the wings needs to be perfect if we want to blend it with scars.”
I sat up while Red placed the protective wrapping on my back.
“Take this off tomorrow, and we can continue again the day after.”
The snap as she removed her gloves resonated in the room, and it almost sounded eerily quiet now that the machine was no longer buzzing.
Straightening, my leg stiff and achy, I grabbed hold of the chair to steady myself. Ink rushed to my side like a fucking knight in shining armor. “You good?”
“Yeah. Leg’s just a bit stiff, that’s all.”
“Okay, lovebirds,” Red chirped, and I immediately objected.
“No, we’re not, like, together. No lovebirds here.”
“Not yet.” The smirk on her face was complemented with a teasing wink right before she turned and sauntered out of the room.
Ink shot me one of his trademark cocky grins, and oddly, I didn’t feel like wiping it off his face like I usually did in the past.
“Thanks,” I started, “for doing this.”
“You never have to thank me for anything, Neon.”
“Yes. I do.”
One step, and he came within inches of me, the air around me gone as I sucked in a breath. The large slopes of his shoulders crowded me, the exotic and earthy scent of sandalwood surrounded me, cloaking me with his heavy yet welcomed presence. I never thought it would be possible for me to ever want another man’s touch again, but here I was thinking about feeling his lips against mine once more.
He lowered his head while I craned my neck as our gazes collided. With a gentle finger, he touched my chin. “I want to kiss you again.”
My gaze dropped to his mouth, a slight trace of a cupid’s bow on his top lip.
“I want to kiss you again, Neon.”
I looked back up to his eyes.
“But I’m afraid I won’t be able to stop, and I’m not sure if you’re ready yet.”
The way my insides fluttered and my skin burned for his touch, I wanted to say I was ready. I wanted to tell him it was okay if he kissed me and never stopped. But I wasn’t sure myself. Right here, right now, I liked having him so close, having him touch my face so softly. I liked the idea of him kissing me again, feeling his tongue dance with mine. But what if the memories came crashing down on me, obliterating a moment that should be cherished and enjoyed between a man and a woman? What if I freaked out, and the two steps I managed to take with him ended up being three steps I’d take farther away from him?
“Ink,” I placed my hand on his arm, his skin warm under my touch, “I want you to kiss me. I liked it when you kissed me before. But what if they come back, Slither and his men? The memories of what they did to me?”
He cursed, his jaw ticking. Just by looking in his brandy eyes, I could see the anger he felt. “I should have been there,” he said through clenched teeth. “I should have stopped them. If I—”
“Don’t. Don’t start with the what-ifs. We’ll be here all day if we have to start going down that road.”
His body went rigid, the muscles in his arm pulling taut.
“Ink, what I’m trying to say is, right now, I…eh…I”—biting my bottom lip, I struggled to say the words—“right now, I need you, and it scares me thinking I need someone as much as I need you. But what scares me more is that the monsters in my head will take control while I’m with you.”
He placed a palm against the side of my neck, his thumb tracing circles below my jaw. “I get it, Neon. I do.”
“No, I don’t think you do.” Tears welled up, and I had to swallow to stop them from escaping. “I’ll hurt you. I’ll end up ruining what we have here, and I don’t want to do that, because the truth is…I don’t know what I’ll do without you.” With my last word, a single tear trickled down the side of my face. For so long, I kept fighting him, kept turning him down, never seeing the man with the scars. But now that I had, now that I caught a glimpse of the man he was inside, I realized how much I needed him.
A hint of a smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. “Do you know how long I’ve waited for you to say that?”
I scoffed. “What? That I’ll hurt you
?’
He shook his head, sucking his bottom lip. “That you need me, and that you don’t know what you’d do without me.” That smart-ass grin of his appeared along with a slight glint of mischief in his eyes. “Just…just let me soak that up for a few seconds.”
“Oh, my God.” I shoved a hand at his chest. “You’re an asshole, you know that?”
“Coming from you, I’d take that as a term of endearment.”
I had to laugh. It was clear what he was doing, playing down the heavy so I could breathe again. No one knew me as well as this man, and he knew talking about my feelings was about as hard as gnawing through wood.
He lifted a dark brow. “Want to go get a drink?”
“God, yes. I thought you’d never ask.”
Taking a step back, he held out his hand. It was more than an invitation for me to place my hand in his, it was him asking me to walk out of this room with him…together. It was a request to make whatever this was between us official so everyone would know who I belonged to. Him.
I licked my lips, my heart beating so fast with just a sliver of excitement bubbling in my gut. It was probably the closest I’d ever come to having the metaphorical butterflies every soppy love story talked about. The ones that made the heroine do stupid shit, all in the name of love.
Slow and hesitant, I reached out, my hand hovering above his, every second stretching for an eternity. A war raged between the beat of my heart and the screams of monsters in my head. Closing my eyes, I took a deep breath, willing my heart to win the battle—and the second my palm touched his, it did. My heart won, and the monsters had to retreat. I just prayed they stayed away…for good.
14
Ink
I didn’t care what anyone else thought or said. All I cared about was holding this woman’s hand and never letting go. Something shifted between us. The open disclosure of our pasts, the stories behind our scars, connected us on some deeper level. Something I knew in my heart wouldn’t be broken easily.