Spider: A tattoo romance (Rough Ink Book 2)

by MV Ellis

  I exhaled the breath I’d been holding.

  “Like I said, I’m aware. What I need to know is how I can fix it.”

  “Ha! You’re asking me? Haven’t I made it clear that women are a total fucking mystery to me? I’ll remind you again that you were the one who had to rein me in when I was being a dick with Vivi. This is like the blind leading the blind. My best advice is to beg. And grovel. And I’m only half joking. Just be there for her, and let her be there for you. Be the man she needs you to be.”

  A sharp rap on the car window brought me out of my thoughts.

  Fuck, Emi was beautiful. I didn’t know if she got increasingly so each time I saw her or if it was because my memory of her never matched up to the reality, but she took my breath away more each time.

  I jumped out of the car and rounded the hood to open the door for her.

  “Hey.” I wanted to kiss her hello but hesitated, offering her a smile instead.

  “Hey.” She smiled in return, and I felt like a heavy spotlight was shining down on me, and I was basking in its glow.

  “Good to see you again. Jump in.”

  She got into the car, and I closed the door before making my way back to the driver side.

  “Okay, so are you going to tell me where we’re going?”

  “Nope. I’m just gonna take you there. Trust me?”

  She hesitated a little too long.

  “Oh, so it’s like that, is it?” I tried not to sound as put out at her lack of confidence in me as I was. Fact was, I’d earned her suspicion, and like Zed had said, I’d need to earn my way back into favor with her.

  “No. I trust you, or else I wouldn’t be here, but that doesn’t mean I’m not maintaining a healthy level of skepticism.”

  “Fair enough. But you’re good with me not revealing the location until we get there?”

  “Yeah, okay.”

  As we rode in silence, wending our way through the city, I could see Emi’s brain working overtime, more so as we hit Brooklyn.

  “Wait. We’re near the studio. Please don’t tell me we’re going on a date there. Maybe to do that cover-up you mentioned?”

  “Ah….” I shifted a little in my seat, saying nothing more.

  “That’s your idea of a ‘cool’ date? The place doesn’t hold happy memories for me, remember?”

  How could I ever forget?

  “I remember, but can you please just go with it for a few more moments? It’ll be worth it, I promise. Well, I think it will. I mean, I hope it will for you.”

  “Okay, but my skepticism radar is going nuts right now, so it’s not looking good.”

  “Noted. Thanks for hanging in there and giving me the benefit of the doubt.”

  “That’s not quite what I’m doing, but okay.”

  I pulled down a small alleyway and slowed to a stop.

  “Is this the part where you chop me up into tiny pieces, set me on fire, then throw the charred remains of my body in dumpsters all over the city?”

  “Ha ha! I thought you said you trusted me?”

  “I did. I do. Kinda. But that was before you drove me down a deserted alley. I’ve seen this horror movie.”

  I couldn’t help but laugh a little.

  “No, I’m pretty sure you haven’t.” I reached into the dash and pulled out a small back object.

  “What the hell is that? A Taser or something?”

  I pointed it at the windshield and pressed a button. As the roller door for the garage started to open, Emi’s eyes widened.

  “Chris”—I fucking loved it when she called me that—“I gotta tell you, this is giving me Dexter vibes big-time. Like when this opens, is it going to be covered in floor-to-ceiling tarps?”

  “Jesus, Emi. You really think I’m a psycho?”

  “Yes. I mean no. But neither did Dexter’s or any real-life psycho’s victims, so….”

  “Well, either way, you can relax. I’m not about to off you.”

  She snorted. “I’m sure that’s what all the psychos say.”

  “True, but if you’d looked in front of you instead of giving me side-eye to see if I’m about to decapitate you, you might’ve noticed where you are.”

  “Huh?”

  I tipped my head toward the windshield, saying nothing as I slipped the car into gear and slowly rolled into the garage.

  “What the…?”

  “See, I told you. No tarps in sight, right?”

  “Oh my God. This is… what is this?”

  “Well, it struck a chord with me when you said you’d never been on a date before. I mean, that’s… well, it sucks, is all. So that gave me the idea to do something that was iconic first date material, and this was the thing I kept coming back to every time I thought about it.”

  “Okay, but this is….”

  “This is me using lateral thinking and bringing the mountain to Mohammed, if you get what I mean?”

  “No, I really don’t.”

  “Oh. Well, I started looking into it, and the nearest place to the city is about an hour and a half away, without traffic. I was all set to call it a road trip and take you there, but Mom pointed out that given that your son is at his first sleepover, you wouldn’t want to be that far out of the city in case something happened and you needed to pick him up for whatever reason.”

  “Your mom is a smart woman. But wait. You told your mom about Noah? And our date?”

  “Yep. I also told her how I fucked up at the funeral.”

  “And what did she say?”

  “She said I inherited my dad’s dumb-with-women gene and that I needed to fix it. The same thing as Zed.”

  “So this is you fixing it, is it?”

  “Well, calling you the other day was the beginning of trying to make things right, and yeah, this is part of it too. It’s a small gesture, but hopefully it’ll help.”

  “It doesn’t look like a small gesture at all. You did all this?” I’d been a little worried that she wouldn’t like it, or would think I was crazy, so the look of awed wonder on her face as she looked around was priceless, and made me smile just as widely as she was. It was totally the reaction I had been going for.

  “With a little help. But yeah, I did the bulk of it.”

  “For me?” She glanced sideways at me shyly.

  “Yup.” I popped the P.

  “In a week?”

  “Three days. But tomato, tomahto. Who’s counting?”

  “Me. This is… I can’t… I have no words.”

  “But in a good way, right? Not in a ‘he’s about to slice my body apart with a chainsaw, bag it, and throw it into the Hudson’ kind of way?”

  “Ha! Definitely not that way. In a ‘I just can’t believe that someone has gone to the trouble of doing this for me’ way.”

  “Okay, good. So you like it?”

  “Like it? I love it! It’s incredible. I’m in shock. How did you even come up with the idea? It’s so kooky and original.” As she looked at me, the smile blossomed again this time stretching right across her face. I made a note to work hard to earn that as much as possible in the future. I felt on top of the world.

  “I’ll be honest. I had a little help from Dr. Google. Even though I knew there were none in the city, after I ruled out the road trip, I kept looking for options closer to home. I found a few articles about a place like this that opened in the Village for like a nanosecond in 2007, and that’s what sparked the thought. So it’s not an original idea.” I gave her a small tight smile.

  30

  Emi

  “Don’t sound so apologetic. You created a drive-in theater in a fucking garage! For me. This is amazing. Did you do the paint job on the backdrop?”

  “I sure did.”

  “I thought so. It looks so great. I can’t even deal. You’re exceptionally talented.”

  “Thank you.”

  If I wasn’t mistaken, he was blushing a little. I loved that about him. On the one hand, he was more than a little dudebro, but on the oth
er, he squirmed when I complimented him. The light and shade in his personality really did it for me. He wasn’t just some one-dimensional caricature.

  “Of course. Credit where credit is due. So, where are we?”

  “Um… well, you were kind of right before when you said I was taking you on a date to my place of work. It’s the empty unit behind SK:eTCH. It’s owned by Arlo Jones, and he was going to—”

  “Wait. The Arlo Jones? Like from the Heartless Few?”

  “Yup. The one and only.”

  “Oh. That explains a lot.”

  “Such as?” He shot me a quizzical look.

  “Such as why that bonehead Tommy dragged me all the way here, bypassing about a thousand other tattoo joints on the way. He’s a big fan of the band, and he would never admit it, but he has a little man crush on Arlo.”

  “Ha! Is that so? Can’t say I blame him. Arlo would be my flavor if I ever jumped the fence.”

  She laughed. “That’s good to know. Anyway, I interrupted you, sor—” She winced. “Go on.”

  “Oh yeah, so at one point, Arlo was going to turn the space into a recording studio, but then he found somewhere better, and for ages it was empty except for some leftover boxes from equipment we bought, and Zed’s mini gym setup.” I looked around again as he spoke, taking it all in. “For the past few months, Zed’s been using it for a project he runs for kids who need a creative outlet. I asked him if I could fit it out for the night, and he said yes right away. The kids can respray it on Monday, so it’s all good.”

  “I can’t stop staring at it, and every time I look around, I notice something new. The level of detail is incredible. The stars in the night sky, the concession stand, the other cars, the fireflies… it’s just so beyond perfect. Did you rent a freaking popcorn machine?”

  “Well, we gotta have popcorn, so yeah. Speaking of which, I’m gonna go to the concession stand now. What can I get you?”

  “What do they have?”

  “Pretty much everything you would expect—popcorn, candy, soda, chips. They can also do nachos or hot dogs. It’ll just be a short wait for them to deliver.” He waved his phone, laughing. “Thank God for Uber Eats, right?”

  “Okay, well, surprise me, and maybe we can get nachos and hot dogs later.”

  “Sure thing. BRB.”

  As he got out of the car, I chuckled to myself, still trying to wrap my brain around what he’d done for me. It was like something out of a movie. A lump formed in my throat when I thought about the fact that nobody had done anything even a quarter as thoughtful as that for me before. Ever. I was overwhelmed with gratitude that Chris cared enough, but deep sadness tinged my joy. To have made it this far in life and never have anyone who cared enough to do something big or sweet or both for me—not a parent, or a lover, or a friend, even—was heartbreaking.

  I swallowed past the lump and put the smile back on my face. I didn’t want Chris to think I didn’t appreciate the grand gesture, or that he’d done something wrong, when the opposite was true.

  He came back to the car loaded down as though he’d really been to the concession stand at the movies. I wondered if he’d bought the entire confectionary aisle at Key Food. He’d gone all out.

  “What’s the matter?” A look of concern flitted across his face as he turned to me.

  “What do you mean? Nothing.” It was fifty percent true, and I didn’t want to worry him about the other fifty.

  “I go to get snacks, come back, and you look sad. Was it something I said?”

  “I’m not sad. I’m smiling.”

  “Yeah, okay, but it’s different to how you were smiling before. It’s not reaching your eyes.”

  How the fuck had he picked up on that? And how could I even answer that without making myself seem like a crazy person? I sighed, choosing my words carefully while picking invisible pieces of lint from my black pants.

  “As kids, we grow up reading and being read fairy tales. At first we’re told to believe them, but then as we get older, we’re told and then shown that, though they’re entertaining, we shouldn’t take them at face value. Still, we see them every day: in movies, in books, on daytime TV shows. They’re everywhere.”

  I could see him struggling to follow my train of thought as I continued. So much for not seeming crazy.

  “I clung to the fact that they weren’t real, that it was all an illusion designed to sell something by making other people feel like their lives were inadequate or inferior. I told myself that because my life had never been a fairy tale and I thought it never would be.

  “But this”—I waved my hand in the air in front of me—“is you bringing me the fairy tale, and I—”

  I’d tried so hard to keep it together, but I lost the battle before I could finish, a grief-filled sob tearing from my body outside of my control, immediately followed by hot and heavy tears.

  “Hey, hey, hey.” He scrambled to unload the sodas into the cup holders and abandon the snacks on the center console between us, then reached out to wipe the tears from my cheeks. I managed to at least refrain from flinching that time, so I guessed I could say progress was being made.

  As he spoke, he swiped at my face with both thumbs, trying to keep up with the deluge.

  “Shit! I did this because I wanted to do something nice that I thought would make you happy, not reduce you to tears.”

  “No, no. I am happy. So happy, in fact. It’s just that this is the nicest thing that anyone’s ever done for me, and that fact makes me really fucking sad.”

  “I’m so sorry to hear that, but I wanted to tell you you’re wrong about something.”

  “What?”

  “This isn’t a fairy tale. It’s real fucking life, baby.”

  I shook my head, wiping away my tears with the heels of my palms.

  “No, it isn’t. Well, not my life, anyway.” It was true. This kind of stuff happened to other people. Lucky people. Happy people. Not me.

  “Maybe not your life before, but your life now.”

  I shook my head.

  “Yes, it is, now that I’m in it. That’s a promise.” His grin nearly split his face in two.

  “Who says you’re in my life?” I was yanking his chain, relieved to be able to lighten the mood.

  “I do.” He quirked his brow, laying down a silent challenge, just the way he had with his mom at the funeral.

  “But it’s not up to you.” I repeated the gesture. Challenge accepted.

  “I know that, but I get the sense that you want me in your life as much as I want to be in it.”

  “I don’t know….” Despite my confidence in challenging him, the truth was there was still some residual hesitance on my part. We were talking major steps for me. I wasn’t sure he understood just how big a deal it was.

  “I’ll take it. ‘I don’t know’ isn’t ‘no,’ and if slow and steady is what you need, then I’m here for that. I don’t want to pressure you, but I want you to know that this”—he mimicked my earlier movement, indicating the space around us in the garage—“is real life when you lo—”

  Nope. I wasn’t even close to being ready for that.

  “Oh, did I see you got Milk Duds and Red Vines? I love both of those.” I began rummaging in the pile of candy he’d bought, grabbing both packets. Anything to end the conversation before he said something he couldn’t take back. “Do you mix the Milk Duds with the popcorn? Tell me you do. It’s the best.”

  Chris was staring at me with his mouth hanging open, and I had a hunch it wasn’t due to my frankenfood choices. I didn’t care. I let myself prattle on about Lord knew what. I didn’t care, as long as it stopped him from mentioning the unmentionable.

  When I’d run out of steam discussing every weird candy or candy-plus-popcorn combination on the planet, he leaned toward me, reaching out to hook his finger under my chin and tilt it up to meet his gaze. I tried to avoid it, but in such a tiny space, it was pretty much impossible. The look in his eyes surprised me—they were flinty an
d hard. He looked determined.

  “You done?”

  “Hmm? Done with what?”

  “Trying to avoid the inevitable. Trying to run from me. Trying to hide from yourself. Trying to shut down what I was just about to say.”

  “No, I’m not done. You just said you wouldn’t pressure me, so don’t.”

  “You’re right. That is what I said. And I meant it. I won’t.”

  “I need time.” Terror rose in my throat and reared its ugly head in the shrill pitch of my voice.

  “And you’ve got it.” He sounded less than happy, but I knew I could trust him to keep his word.

  “Okay, good. Thank you.”

  “I can’t promise you all the time in the world, because if there’s one thing losing my dad has taught me, it’s that time is not ours to control or manipulate. Time marches to the beat of its own drum, and there’s not a damn thing anyone can do about it. Ironically, my dad used to say sometimes that ‘time and tide wait for no man.’ I think it was an army thing. I never took much notice, or really understood what it meant, until I’d lost him, and by then it was too late. The fact is, we’re all on borrowed time, and once it’s gone, it’s gone. But I’ll do my best to be patient for as long as I can.”

  “I appreciate that. And speaking of time, are we going to watch a movie? This drive-in is a little slow with starting the feature.”

  “Ah yes, sure.” He put on a faux British voice. “And tonight we have a collection of vintage and contemporary movies for the fine lady to choose from. If you open the glove box in front of you, all will be revealed.”

  I did as I was told, and sure enough, there was a piece of cardboard folded three ways like a small menu featuring a list of movies, both old and new. I opted for one of the newer titles, a suspenseful thriller that I’d been meaning to go see when it was first released but had never quite found the time.

  “Excellent choice, if I may say so, ma’am.” Switching to his regular voice, he continued. “Just so you know, first date etiquette dictates that I pretend to yawn and stretch, then ‘subtly’ slide my arm around you. Then at the first ‘jumpy’ part, you snuggle into me in mock fear, and we miss the rest of the movie because we’re trying to tick off as many bases as we can before it ends. Then we have to lie about the plot to anyone who asks us about it because we missed 80 percent of it.”