From what little I knew about him, he seemed the strong, silent type, the kind who didn’t feel the need to say a damn thing because his presence said it all. But, like lots of guys like that, he was so fucking sexy and over-the-top in his attitude that you were never sure if he was an asshole or a complete sex machine that you needed to have right now. Mostly, I got the impression that he was the former.
It was part presence, the way he held a room and a gaze. It was also part physical. Wide shoulders and chest that snugged perfectly inside his long-sleeved button-down. Stormy eyes that went green or pewter depending on the light. Short brown hair swept back off his sharp cheekbones. A little dusting of a goatee. Hot and mean, all rolled up in a little ball of attitude.
Personally, I was torn between wanting to suck on the muscles at the side of his neck and punching him in his pouty mouth.
Which is probably why Lily took the lead.
‘Mister Montgomery,’ she cooed. Lily can really turn on the charm when she’s up against the wall. Sometimes it makes me laugh, but mostly I’m grateful for her people skills. ‘We weren’t expecting you. I thought you and I were meeting tomorrow.’
Wes was looking around the place like he owned it – which I guess, if you wanted to get technical, he did. Disdain in the curl of his lip. His fingers dragging over the spines of the books. Funny how two people can make the exact same gesture and one makes you dream of his running his fingers over part of you, while the other makes you want to slap his hands off your possessions.
‘Lily, no one ever expects me,’ he said, in utter seriousness.
I concentrated very hard on biting my cheek so that I wouldn’t break out in laughter. Clearly, he thought he was a superhero. Wes Montgomery, Superman’s nemesis. Imagining him in a pair of black and silver underoos and a yellow cloak actually made him so much easier to bear.
I glanced at Lily with my what-the-fuck gaze, but she was focused fully on Wes. If I didn’t know her better, I’d say she was eating him up. God, she was good.
He was walking through the aisles, Lily trailing him. I stayed where I was; I could see them clearly and being this far away meant I wasn’t going to try and clock him in the face with a book. I didn’t want to do that. Not only would it bode poorly for Leather Bound’s future, I liked my books too much.
‘Those picture windows are too gorgeous to be wasted with something like books,’ he said, clearly raising his voice to be heard by us both.
OK, now I was going to punch him. I took a step forward, but Lily caught my eye and shook her head, once. I stopped where I was, listening. My feet itched, trying to behave.
Lily went up to him and trailed one hand along the shelf near him, eyeing him carefully. To most people, her expression was coy and fully interested, maybe even a little flirty. But I knew her well enough to know she was listening carefully, trying to dissect the situation. ‘Were you hoping to talk about the rent situation now instead of tomorrow, Mister Montgomery?’
Without answering her, Wes continued to walk around the store, sizing everything up. My office door was closed and, from his lack of interest in that area, I guessed he didn’t know it existed. Which made me happy for reasons I couldn’t explain.
He did duck his head behind the velvet curtain, but it seemed perfunctory compared to the rest of his inspection. It was as though he was looking for something, but I didn’t know what. A reason to shut us down, maybe, so he could lease the place to someone who would pay more.
The only time he talked was when Lily tried to go off and do something else, and then he would call her back, acting like he needed something, when of course he just wanted her at his side, following him like a puppy dog.
After a while, he ended up back at the front of the store, in front of the register, where I’d been not so coyly watching the two of them.
‘It’s never about the money,’ he said as though he was picking up a conversation that had happened just seconds ago, instead of nearly an hour. He turned towards Lily. With hardly a pause, he reached out and put one hand lightly on the back of her neck. It was an intimate gesture, far too much so for their posture. I saw Lily’s spine straighten as she worked hard not to react. Then her hand came up slowly to take his wrist and move his palm away from her neck.
‘What is it about, Mister Montgomery?’ she asked. Her voice was lightly clipped, sharp, but not so sharp that it was offensive.
‘Power,’ he said. For the first time he looked past Lily and caught my eye. His expression was sharp, his lids narrowed as he watched me through them. I worked hard to keep my face impassive, trying to prepare myself for whatever he might say next.
Of course, with someone like Wes, it’s impossible to predict what’s going to come out of his mouth.
‘I’ll have this store, and everything in it,’ he said.
Then he turned on his heel, a gesture so full of grandeur and self-importance that I would have fallen over laughing if I didn’t feel so shell-shocked. When he walked out of the store, the chime gave a single short ding of good riddance.
‘What the hell was that?’ Lily asked.
I was still staring out the window, watching him walk away.
‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘But I think it’s time to skip the talk with our landlord and talk with our lawyer instead.’
‘Done,’ Lily said. ‘That man is just so over the top.’
‘If he was a villain in a novel, he’d be one of those ones who stood around telling everyone how he was going to rule the world,’ I said. ‘And then I’d send a book flying at his head and it would hit him right in the nose, and he’d get a concussion and when he woke up he’d be the nicest guy and he’d go around righting all his wrongs.’
Lily looked at me. ‘And I thought I read too much,’ she said.
‘Seriously.’
CHAPTER 12
I hadn’t heard from Davian since our rendezvous at L&L. It was odd how much time I spent thinking about him, a man I barely knew. Not just his body, although the image of him naked, my hands running over his chest, his mouth against mine, was never far from my mind.
But also the mystery of him; he kept so much hidden inside, and there was part of me that wanted to keep it like that for ever and part of me that wanted to see if I could crack him open, get a glimpse of what shone inside his tough shell exterior.
Trying not to think too much about him meant I filled my time by researching the hell out of the Keyhole Club.
Not surprisingly, I found very little. A few archaic references to a Freemason-type club way back in the ’30s, where the men and women met in the basements of local businesses to conduct sexy parties and have orgies. It sounded a little like what I knew of the Keyhole Club, but there was nothing else to tie the two clubs together. Clearly, whoever wanted the club kept secret had done a good job it, although I had no idea how that was even possible in this day and age.
I needed to know more. I was no closer to finding this book than I’d been when Davian walked in the door on that first day. But I had an idea. A dumb idea, but an idea nonetheless. I was going to get inside that door if it killed me.
Lily said she was staying late at the store to organise some books – something she did once a month or so. I think it was her way of blowing off steam. So when Leather Bound closed for the night, I left her to her book sorting and headed to the one place I really didn’t want to go: Kyle’s tattoo shop. If I was going to get into the club, then clearly I needed the right tattoo.
Stupidly, I’d worn little more than a wool dress, and it was pouring. As if even the world was trying to tell me this was the stupidest idea. Which maybe it was. But that had never stopped me before. I supposed I wouldn’t let it stop me now.
By the time I stepped into kInked, I was steaming and soaked, rain dripping off me onto the tiled floor.
I’d only been here once or twice, but enough to know that kInked wasn’t the kind of place where you got sailor tats or pictures of Marilyn Monroe. It was the
kind of place where they hired someone with expensive taste and equally expensive rates to do their décor. The tiles were alternating shades of cream and black, the matching couches and chairs carefully positioned to seem both inviting and private. There were no magazines on the tables, but rather stacks of beautifully bound art and tattoo books. The walls were lined with a velvety fabric in burgundy. It was the swankiest tattoo place I’d ever been in.
kIinked was also the kind of place where they had a red oak welcome desk that came with a drop-dead receptionist, a buxom blonde with a ’50s polka-dot dress and perfectly waved hair. Tats in bright colours decorated her arms and legs, an intricate painting that covered the majority of her pale skin. A beautiful green leather collar graced her neck, highlighting the green in her eyes and tattoos.
As if I didn’t already feel like the world’s most drowned rat. Or sheep, in this case. Now I had to face pin-up-girl perfection while wearing wet wool. Great.
The receptionist flashed me a ruby and pearl smile and pulled a giant towel from somewhere in the desk and brought it around to me without missing a beat. Apparently they either ended up with a lot of drowned rat-sheep-girls or, more likely, she was very well trained in customer service. I thanked her and then attempted to dry myself off, but somehow ended up with a still wet me and an equally wet towel.
‘Welcome to kInked,’ she said when I’d stopped swabbing myself with the damp towel. ‘Do you have an appointment with one of our ink masters?’
Ink masters? I almost giggled at the pretentiousness of it. Nothing like taking yourself a little too seriously. Suddenly I felt better about dripping on their pretty tiles. I prevented myself from laughing at the last second, realising it was my own nervousness that was making me giggle-prone, and handed the towel back to her with a nod of thanks.
‘I was hoping to see Kyle,’ I said. ‘I don’t have an appointment.’ After a second, I added, ‘Yet.’
‘You mean Master K.’ It wasn’t a question. More of a sweet-as-sour-cherry reprimand.
I almost died right then and there. Kyle, sweet, adorable, laugh-a-second Kyle was now Master K? I wondered if my mouth was open, and if it would look stupider if I left it like that or if I just reached up and shut it with one hand.
‘I’m afraid you’ll need an appointment.’ Pin-up girl’s customer-service training was either failing her or else it was really kicking in. Her disdain for my lack of an appointment and my disregard for proper address was clearly evident in her voice. And in the whip-snap folds she was making of my wet towel. ‘Among other things.’
‘Other things?’
Her shiny black heels echoed on the tiles as she retreated to the safety of her desk. Now she did look me up and down, her ruby lips pursed. Whatever thoughts I might have had about her being sexy were quickly erased by her puckered expression.
‘I’m terribly sorry, but I don’t believe kInked is quite right for you, Miss…?’ This was a question but, before I could answer, she continued. ‘Perhaps you’d be more comfortable at another tattoo establishment. I’d be happy to offer you some suggestions should you need them.’
I so did not need this. No, no, no. I wiped my wet palms on my dress, which made them even wetter. And kind of fuzzy.
‘Listen,’ I said. ‘I’ve had a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.’
From her blank expression, neither the quoted book title nor my own anguish stirred anything in her. ‘Please just let me see Ky–’ I cleared my throat and managed to get the moniker out without a hit of hysterical laughter. ‘Master K. Five minutes. I’ll be fast.’
Part of me wanted to pull the pity-party thing on her, tell her just how bad my day had been and see if it helped me gain access. The other part of me, that new part of me that I’d just discovered and still didn’t know quite what to do with, that part of me wanted to try pushing her a little, see if I could discover a hidden submissive inside that snotty exterior. Either one was a crapshoot, likely to get me thrown out.
I was trying to decide in which direction to swing, or whether to just try climbing out through one of the large storefront windows instead, when one of the burgundy wall coverings shifted. It slid sideways to reveal what looked like a small room. Kyle stepped into the reception area and the fabric wall closed behind him.
Kyle took one look at me, and I literally saw his expression change from placid calm cool artist to what the fuck.
‘Janine?’ he said. As though he couldn’t quite place me. I wanted to punch him for that. It hadn’t been that long.
Except that he looked, oh, my God, so fucking hot. Hot like a guy always looks hot after you uncertainly break things off with him and aren’t really sure you did the right thing. But also hot as in wearing dark-blue jeans that fitted him perfectly and a teal shirt that made his eyes look like big, pure oceans. I wanted to suck the salt from him, lick the pale beaches of his skin.
What few parts of me had managed to stay dry in the torrent were now as wet as the rest of me. Which was exactly what I did not want. Not now. I needed to focus. I needed to figure this out and get it done and get out of here. I needed to not be in a wet wool dress, smelling like a rain-blasted sheep and getting hot and bothered about my ex-lover.
Kyle had a tattoo gun in one hand, the machinery looking so out of place among all the elegance that I fully expected Miss Pin-Up to yell at him for dirtying her space.
Instead she went all demure on him, even lowering her head a notch to acknowledge his arrival. ‘Master K,’ she purred. ‘I was just letting Janine know that she needed to make an appointment.’ So she was quicker on the draw than I’d thought. Having plucked from his stuttered question both my name and the understanding that Kyle and I had some kind of history, she was quickly changing her tone.
‘I’m on my way home,’ he said.
‘I just need five minutes,’ I said. God, it killed me to plead like that, not just in front of Miss Pucker-Face, but in front of Kyle too. I needed to know if he’d help me, though, and I didn’t want to give him too much time to think about it.
‘Two,’ he countered.
I nodded.
‘Thanks, Cece. I’ve got this.’
He flashed her a smile. I wondered, briefly, if they’d slept together, and felt a pang of something in my stomach at the thought. It wasn’t jealousy so much as a hope that, if he was sleeping with anyone, it was someone I could warm up to a little more easily. Miss Pin-Up was cute, but she hadn’t exactly charmed me so far.
Cece nodded once, glancing at me over her shoulder, as if to remind me that I was still in way over my head and might be better off at one of those other establishments. I resisted the urge to flip her off.
‘In my office,’ Kyle said. He was looking in my general direction, but he wasn’t looking at me. His gaze kept sliding off to the side as though he couldn’t bear to keep it on me. Oh, this was going to be fun. What had started out as a clearly bad idea was now moving into the realm of ridiculously stupider idea. Times twelve.
He slid the wall panel and ushered me inside. The room behind the door didn’t look like an office so much as someone’s favourite reading room. It was surprisingly small after the spacious entryway and equally surprisingly cosy and private. A mocha-coloured leather recliner held centre stage, while tattoo equipment, books and art rested on either side on long cream-coloured shelves. Candles flickered around the room, filling it with the scent of cloves and oranges. Under that, the barest hint of sanitisers and, of course, my own lovely wet-wool scent. The walls were lined with tattoo images, most of them mounted and hung with simple black wires. Everything about the room said money and elegance. It was like no tattoo place I’d ever seen or even dreamed about. Kyle’s old shop was a rag-and-bone kind of place, build with a love of art and not very much in the way of funds. What had brought him here?
Kyle slid the door shut behind us. It locked into place with a heavy click. I wondered if it was soundproof. After all, in a lobby like Miss Pin-Up’s, it wouldn’t
do to have the sounds of distressed clients flowing out.
‘Thanks for rescuing me,’ I said, once he’d turned to face me. I tried to keep my voice light. ‘I thought she was going to eat me.’
‘Who, Cece?’ He set the tattoo gun on the shelf without looking at it. He wasn’t looking at me either, though. He mostly stared at the floor. ‘Don’t mind her. She’s just a little … overzealous.’
‘Overzealous?’ The bite in my voice was more obvious than I’d meant it to be. Calling her overzealous was like calling a mother bear a little protective.
He lowered his voice. Maybe those doors weren’t soundproof after all. ‘Why are you here, Jae?’
No one called me Jae except Kyle. It hadn’t been that long since I’d heard him say it, and still the sound made a lump in my throat. I had to swallow around it in order to speak.
I swallowed. And then realised I had no idea what I wanted to say. I hadn’t made a plan beyond step one, which was to find Kyle and ask him some questions. I just didn’t know what questions to ask.
‘I miss –’ I clamped my teeth down on my tongue, hard. That was not what I’d meant to say. It certainly wasn’t why I’d come here. Not even in the most hidden recesses of my brain had that been my purpose in coming here. And it wasn’t fair. He was moving on. I was too. Yes, I missed him, but I needed to say something, anything, else.
‘I’m serious, Kyle.’ My instinct was to reach and touch his arm, to connect with him, but I forced my hands to stay at my side. He looked at me finally, straight at me, those green eyes intense. I’d always liked them, how they darkened slightly when he was aroused, how they looked almost white in the sunlight.
‘I need you,’ I said. Headsmack.
‘You need me?’ He took a step back, as though I was less ex-girlfriend and more poisonous viper material. ‘I don’t want to be an ass. But you kind of dumped me, Jae. Right after I asked you to marry me.’
‘Not right after,’ I said. ‘And I think it was kind of a mutual dumping.’
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