Inked Armor

by Helena Hunting

  Where the windows in Inked Armor used to be were black, gaping holes. A figure was hoisted up off the asphalt by a uniformed officer. The light from the streetlamp above illuminated his features as he was hauled off to an unmarked police car.

  “Motherfucker,” Hayden breathed. “I know that guy.”

  32

  HAYDEN

  For the fourth time in less than two weeks, I found myself back at the police station. Miller had taken us there in her cruiser because I wasn’t in any state to drive. This night was turning out to be the mindfuck of a lifetime.

  Tenley was with me when I identified Damen and Brett in two separate lineups. Brett was just as I remembered him, only older and haggard. He was short and already on the road to balding. His face was pockmarked. His teeth were fucked. But that’s what happened with an unchecked meth habit. It also made a person psychotic enough to rob a house with a stolen loaded weapon without checking to make sure the inhabitants weren’t home.

  Damen didn’t look much better and it was impossible to feel bad for him. Though Brett had pulled the trigger, Damen had been the spoke in the wheel. He’d provided the drugs, he’d planted the idea, and he’d unwittingly supplied the weapon. But the part that was messing with me most was that I’d worked for him for years and never known. It was the ultimate duplicity.

  As I sat in Miller’s office, I briefly wondered what had happened to Sienna. It would be karmic if Damen ratted her out. All her years of pushing drugs on her dancers until they were forced to solicit was criminal. What made it unconscionable was that she’d been through it. She knew what it was like to have no choices, yet still she screwed over the people who trusted her.

  Miller’s partner, Duggan, was perched on the edge of her desk. He was calm and collected, but Miller looked just as antsy as I felt.

  “Can I get you some coffee?” Duggan took a sip from his grungy mug.

  “Water would be good, please.”

  My throat was so dry, I was having a hard time swallowing. I was on the verge of panic; Tenley was the only thing keeping me together. She wanted to call Cassie and Nate on the way to the station, but I’d asked her to wait. It would have been too much like the first time I was here. I kept looking over my shoulder, waiting for Cross to show up and interrogate me again. It turned out I didn’t have anything to worry about.

  “Cross has been taken into custody,” Miller said, rearranging the pens on her desk until they formed a straight line.

  I stared at her.

  “I wanted to tell you earlier. I know how hard this has been on you—”

  “Why?” I finally asked when the short between my brain and my mouth fixed itself. “Brett Wilson is Cross’s half brother. The abridged version is that he covered up the murder to protect him.”

  “Sonofabitch.”

  “That about sums up my reaction,” said Duggan.

  Miller gave him a look.

  I rubbed my temples, where the dull throb had instantly become a pounding roar. The revelation explained a lot and nothing at the same time.

  “What’s the unabridged version?” I asked, uncertain if I could handle any more. I’d expected to feel relief in finding out the truth, but all it did was raise more questions.

  “Brett was a troubled kid. He had some problems when he was younger, but because Cross was on the force, it afforded him some leeway. Brett turned eighteen two weeks before the homicide.”

  “You mean before he murdered my parents?”

  Tenley slipped her hand under mine. I squeezed.

  “Are you sure you want me to go on?” At my nod, Miller continued, “Brett alleged he made two calls that night. The first was to Damen, the second to his brother. Around the same time, a call came through dispatch. Cross was the first to arrive on the scene. From what we understand, he either misfiled or tampered with the evidence, making most of it inadmissible. Some of the reports didn’t match up. At the time it looked like Cross’s partner had been the problem, but we know now that Cross had orchestrated it to look that way. The painting was the one thing he wasn’t able to dispose of. It was reported stolen. We believe he hid it with the intention of going back to dispose of it later. That didn’t happen, though. Lab reports confirm both his fingerprints and Brett’s were on it.”

  It took me a minute to process it all as the pieces fell into place. “Cross couldn’t go after Damen, though, could he?”

  “Not unless he wanted to implicate himself,” Duggan said.

  “Are they going to jail?” I asked.

  “There will be a trial,” Miller said.

  “Will I have to testify?”

  “Your testimony will be helpful to the case.”

  Reliving it all over again would suck—but I didn’t want any of them to get less time than they deserved.

  * * *

  In late February the case went to trial. Things moved a lot faster than I expected them to, which was both a relief and a challenge.

  Tenley adjusted my tie and smoothed the lapels of my suit jacket. “I think we’re ready.”

  I hugged her hard. “Whatever you hear today, please remember all of this happened a long time ago.”

  “And I want you to remember that whatever comes out during the trial isn’t going to change anything. I’m still going to be here, trying to remember not to leave my panties on the closet floor.”

  I smiled into her shoulder. “I love you.”

  “I love you, too. Never doubt that.” She took my hand and opened the door to the courtroom.

  I could have sat through the whole trial and listened to Brett and Damen and Cross give their versions of events, but it wouldn’t change the outcome. The only thing I wanted at this point was justice, in the form of incarceration. It was the reason I was taking the stand.

  My anxiety ratcheted up as we were escorted to the front of the room. I recognized a lot of faces: girls who worked at The Dollhouse and managed to move on, others who hadn’t. Some of Damen’s employees were among them, as well. They all sat together, united in their stand against the people who had wronged them.

  Sienna sat in the second row on the opposite side of the courtroom. She was hard to miss in the orange jumpsuit. She looked pitifully fragile and small. The scar on her face was more noticeable without makeup. It was likely orchestrated to make people feel sorry for her. She looked at me when I passed, her regret obvious. Damen had knocked her off her pedestal and then some. Beyond being subpoenaed to testify for this case, she was also up on myriad other charges. No matter how much she plea-bargained, she would do time for her offenses. I almost felt sorry for her. In her own fucked-up way, she’d cared about me once, but she’d never been what I needed.

  I was the only person to take the stand. Even though I’d been given an idea as to what I might be asked, the questions were still painful to answer. I kept my focus on the front row, where my family was. Cassie, Nate, Chris, Lisa, Jamie, and Sarah were all there, a wall of solidarity and support. In the middle was Tenley. She was the reason I got through it—because once it was over, I had someone worth moving on for.

  I didn’t go back to the courtroom after that. There was no need. While the trial lasted weeks, the jury was quick to reach a verdict. All three of them got time behind bars.

  33

  TENLEY

  Hayden looked up from his station when I entered the shop. “Give me a few. Nate and I are almost done.”

  “As in done done?” I leaned over the counter where Lisa was, dropped my purse on the floor, and gave her a one-armed hug.

  “You need to check it out,” Lisa said. “Cassie’s going to freak when she sees it.”

  As I went to take a peek, Nate put up a hand to stop me, and Hayden batted it down. “I’m shading in her face, you stupid fuck—don’t move.”

  “You’re not even working on this arm.”

  “Doesn’t matter. You move one appendage, the rest of your upper body shifts.” Hayden’s eyes stayed on the design but he pointed right
at me. “You. Stay where you are until I’m finished.”

  I took a step back. “Sorry, cupcake.”

  The tattoo machine lifted from Nate’s arm as Hayden raised his head to glare at me.

  Chris, who had been working on a client of his own, stopped what he was doing. “Did I hear that right? Did Tee just call you ‘cupcake’?”

  Lisa stifled a laugh. I went behind the counter and used her as a barricade.

  “I thought we agreed you’d keep that to yourself,” Hayden said.

  “It was a slip.” Sort of.

  “You’d better watch it. No one’s going to be around later to save your ass.” He went back to tattooing Nate’s arm.

  “Promises, promises.”

  I could see him smiling even though his head was down. His hair had grown out some since the trial ended. It was almost in his face again, as it had been when I’d first met him. I liked it a little longer, so he hadn’t gotten it cut.

  He took his time with the last few lines of ink. After he put the machine down, he spent longer than necessary checking it over. “All right. You’re good. I’ll want to have a look at it in a week or two in case it needs a touch-up, but we’re done for now.” Hayden’s satisfaction was evident.

  Nate pushed up out of the chair. He was wearing a thin wife-beater; his button-down shirt and tie hung neatly on a hook by Hayden’s station. The first thing I noticed—but tried not to—was the outline of a steel ring at his left pec.

  “Is that—”

  “A nipple ring?” Lisa finished. “I did that for Cassie’s birthday a few years back.”

  “Those two are kinda freaky, aren’t they?”

  “You don’t know the half of it.” Her grin said it all.

  I held up a hand to stop her. I had no desire to hypothesize about any other metal Nate might have. “And I’m good with that.”

  Nate and Hayden had gone to the three-way mirror to check out the finished ink.

  “When’s your next session?” Lisa pulled at the neck of my offthe-shoulder shirt, peeking down my back at the mostly finished design.

  “I have no idea.”

  I’d been in Hayden’s chair four times in the past eight weeks; two more sessions and I’d be done. He was taking his sweet time with the shading because it needed to be perfect, and he still didn’t want to work on me for longer than two hours.

  I had a feeling he was prolonging it intentionally. It was the place Hayden felt most comfortable sharing what happened during his appointments with Beatrice, so I wasn’t in a rush to lose the time with him. With only two sessions left, I worried how we would achieve the same connection elsewhere.

  Lisa clicked the mouse and pulled up Hayden’s schedule. “How’s next Friday night work for you? He’s got two hours blocked off at the end for no reason I can see.”

  “That’ll be two weeks since the last session, which is perfect. He has no reason to say no.” Although he was pretty damn good at coming up with one if he wanted to.

  Lisa slotted me in.

  “All right, girls. Hayden gives the okay to look,” Nate called out.

  He angled his arm to give us an unobstructed view of the art. The likeness to Cassie was remarkable. The pin-up version of her was both demure and sexy.

  “It’s gorgeous. Cassie’s going to love it,” Lisa said.

  Nate smirked. “I’m banking on that. It’s been a pain in the ass keeping it bandaged so she can’t see it. I woke up twice last week to her sneaking a look in the middle of the night.”

  “What a shocker,” Hayden said drily. “Let’s cover that up. No friction for at least a few days, Nate. I don’t want to have a two-hour touch-up session.”

  “I’ll tell Cassie to be gentle.”

  “Dude, really? Don’t you have a censor?”

  “Have you taken Tenley back to see the house yet, or are you just partial to the garage?” Nate needled him.

  Hayden turned around, ready to fire off another dig. The color of my face was likely the reason he didn’t.

  Nate dropped back into the chair. “By the way, if you were thinking to take Tenley there to see it, tonight or tomorrow would probably be good.”

  Hayden raised a brow but didn’t look at Nate. “Yeah?”

  “Yeah.” Nate nodded, watching Hayden smooth the cellophane over the tattoo and secure it with medical tape.

  Obviously something was going on, but whatever it was, neither of them seemed inclined to talk about it while Lisa and I were hovering over them. I was glad Hayden and Nate had grown closer over the past months, but I didn’t like not being in the loop.

  “So,” Nate said as he pushed his arm carefully through his sleeve, “when is Jamie starting your pin-up?”

  “Uh . . . I, uh—we haven’t talked about it—” Hayden stammered.

  Lisa coughed to cover an expletive.

  “Pin-up?” I asked.

  “Oh, shit,” Nate said quietly.

  “Would someone care to share?” I crossed my arms over my chest and waited.

  Lisa was the one who answered. “Hayden’s been toying with the idea of getting another tattoo for a while. He has a design in mind, but he and Jamie are still working on placement, so nothing’s come of it yet.”

  “Why haven’t I seen it?” I asked.

  This was the second time I felt that I was missing something since I’d come into the shop. Even Lisa knew about the prospective tattoo.

  Hayden rocked back on his heels. “I wanted it to be perfect before I showed it to you.”

  “Is it perfect now?”

  “Not quite, but I have a copy in my filing cabinet at home. You can have a look later.”

  “Sure.” I backed off, aware there was more to this with the way Lisa was twirling the end of her hair and Nate was overly interested in his tie.

  Nate tried to pay Hayden, but he refused to take the money. It was after nine by the time Hayden finished cleaning up his station. His first client the next day required one of the private rooms, so he took me with him to set up. I sat down in the tattoo chair and played with the recline lever while Hayden gathered ink and the various implements required for the session.

  “So, I was thinking.” He dropped down on the stool beside me. “Maybe you want to go look at the house tonight?”

  “So I can see the inside this time?” Cassie hadn’t stopped with the little barbs about that.

  “That’s what I had planned.”

  “I’d like that.”

  “Though if you want to spend a little extra time in the garage, I wouldn’t be opposed.” He rubbed at his bottom lip, trying to hide his smile.

  “Of course you wouldn’t.” I grabbed him by the shirt, pulling him closer, and nipped at his lip. “I know you’re keeping something from me.”

  He swung one leg over and straddled the chair, facing me. “You are far too clever for your own good. Haven’t you ever heard of a surprise?”

  “I don’t like that everyone is in on it but me. I’m supposed to be your person.”

  “You are my person.”

  He sat down on my thighs, bracing his weight on the backrest. His head dipped down, his teeth skimmed my collarbone. I felt his erection against my stomach. I couldn’t do anything but squirm since he was sitting on my legs.

  “Have you ever fucked in here?” I used the profanity on purpose. I’d discovered it turned Hayden on because I used it so rarely.

  “No.” He shifted, nudging my legs apart with his knee.

  “No?” Every time I was in his chair, I wanted to take off all my clothes and get him inside me.

  He shook his head while he settled between my thighs.

  “Would you fuck me here?”

  He stopped with the kissing and lifted his head to look me straight in the eye. “I don’t fuck you, Tenley. I have sex with you. Sometimes I even make love to you, but we don’t fuck.”

  I stared at him in open disbelief. That was completely untrue. On many occasions sheer need had superseded e
ither of our attempts for sweet and gentle. And that didn’t bother me in the slightest.

  I was about to call him out on it, but pointing out that he could love me and fuck me at the same time wouldn’t help my current plan. I was horny. He’d been so tired the last couple of nights, he’d passed out on the couch as soon as he got home from work. And my courses and my thesis were demanding a lot of my attention. We hadn’t had sex in days.

  “Fine. Will you have sex with me here?”

  “Right now?” his voice cracked.

  “We could lock the door.”

  “No.” His grip on the backrest tightened. “Not with Chris and Jamie and Lisa in the next room.”

  “If we were all alone, would you then?” I ran my hands down his back and slid them under the waist of his jeans. He was commando.

  His forehead dropped against my shoulder. “Fuck, Tenley. Why are you pulling this shit now?” His voice was muffled by my hair.

  “Because you’re awake and coherent and not at risk of falling asleep on me. It’s been days. I miss you.”

  He lifted his head and frowned. “How long?”

  “Too long,” I said, working to control my frustration. My nails dug into his ass and his muscles flexed under my fingers. I missed more than just the sex, though. I missed the feel of his body, the way he enveloped me, consumed me. I missed the connection we shared when he was inside me, both physically and emotionally. I craved it. Needed it.

  I could see him backtracking through time in his head, trying to remember the last time we had sex. His expression changed from doubtful to penitent. “Let me show you the house first; then I’ll make up for neglecting you.”

  With a wicked grin, he unhooked my legs from his waist and pushed out of the chair. Holding out a hand, he helped me up and pulled me close. “Just so you know, I’ve wanted to do you in that chair ever since I put the cupcake on you. So be prepared for me to follow through on that as soon as I have the chance.”

  When we arrived at the house, several sets of tire tracks were in the snow on the driveway. “It looks like someone’s been here recently,” I observed.