Hot Ink

by Carrie Ann Ryan;Cari Quinn;Sidney Bristol

  Hospice implied finality, but it still made him pause to hear her say it. When he’d visited Mick that morning he’d seemed healthy, though he was laying in a hospital type of bed.

  “Has my dad come to see him?” Kit asked.

  “No, he refused. And he’s only in Houston.”

  That was news to Kit. He hadn’t spoken to his father except for a few times after he moved to send some stuff he’d left. It also just went to show what kind of family he’d left behind. Guilt ate at him. It wasn’t the first time Mick had reached out to contact him, either. He’d just caught Kit at a time when he was nostalgic for the time he’d been happy, with Renee.

  “How long are you here for?” she asked.

  “Not sure.”

  “Well, what’s your next event? You’ve got to have a lot of stuff going on after Tattoo King.”

  He grimaced. “Yeah, I have a lot of offers, but I’m not sure what I really want to do. I had a talk with last year’s winner at the finale, and he let them run him ragged. He’s just—done. I kind of want to do a few of the bigger conventions but, the traveling is getting a bit old. I’d like to just put down some roots, maybe open my own shop or something.”

  “That would be cool. Think you’d do it in California?”

  “Probably not.” As much as he liked the idea of having a shop on a boardwalk somewhere with an ocean view, it didn’t satisfy him as much as it once had. The California crowd was fun, but he didn’t fit there. Deep down, he was still a redneck kid off the bayou.

  “Well, I’ve got to get back to work pretty soon. What are you going to do while you’re here?”

  “Mick said to go through his house and see if I wanted anything.” The idea was awkward as hell, but Mick had told him he’d salvaged some of the things from when his parents split and there were some things from his grandparents. It was worth looking through.

  “Oh, just—leave the dining room alone, okay?”

  “What’s in the dining room?”

  Renee sighed and cradled her head in her hand for a moment. “The last couple of years Mick’s gotten really hooked on a couple of cold cases. Before he left the force, he copied all of his files and set up at home. Well, now that he’s in hospice he asks me to bring certain stuff in. It’s all labeled and in specific spots. I’ve been helping him with it. I’m not sure it’s a good idea, but it gives him something to do while he…waits.”

  “How long do they think he has?”

  “A couple of months? They can’t really tell us. He wants to be at home, but he can’t take care of himself anymore.”

  Kit gathered up his trash, staring at the counter top. Mick had never been anything except another source of emotional and verbal abuse in his life. So why did he feel like a tool for not being around for Mick? Was it because Renee had stepped in? Maybe he had it all wrong.

  “Want to hang out after I get off work?” Renee said, breaking into his thoughts. “I mean, don’t feel like you have to if there’s something else going on. It…would be nice to see you.”

  He glanced up. “I’d like that.”

  A smile spread across her face. She’d been the girl all the bad boys wanted, yet she’d smiled at him like she was smiling at him now, and the whole world was right.

  Chapter Two

  Renee pulled up in front of Mick’s house, as she had hundreds of times since he’d crashed her Thanksgiving dinner. Except this time she wasn’t going to see the old detective.

  A few lights were on, and Kit’s rental sat in the drive. Her heart fluttered, even though she told it not to. Kit would leave. His future wasn’t here. But what was the harm in reliving a bit of their past?

  She got out of the car and pulled her denim skirt down a little. He’d seen her in her work clothes, and while her wardrobe had toned down a lot over the last couple of years, she still had a rock and roll flare. She’d put on a pair of black leggings, her favorite denim skirt and a black tank top with golden crossed tattoo machines and the words Beauty Is Pain over her breasts.

  Renee crossed the lawn and opened the front door. She’d stopped knocking a long time ago.

  “Kit? You here?” she called out.

  “Renee?”

  “Yeah, I just let myself in.” She put her purse down on an empty table next to the door. Most of Mick’s things had been packed up, sold or given away, leaving behind family mementos and furniture he hadn’t wanted to part with yet.

  She followed the sound of Kit’s voice, but he wasn’t in the living room or kitchen where she expected him. Her stomach tied in a knot as she realized where he was.

  The formal dining room.

  Or, what would be the dining room in any other house. In Mick’s, it was his cold case room.

  She stepped into the archway, holding her breath. Kit stood with a file open, brows drawn down into a line. The walls were covered in corkboard with clippings, pictures and details about the one case Mick had never been able to let go.

  “What is all this?” He glanced up at her and did a double take. It was rather gratifying to feel his gaze slide over her body. Once, he’d stared at her with lust, and she’d encouraged him, losing her heart in the process.

  “It’s his last case.” Renee knew the details probably better than anyone, except Mick.

  “But it says she died in…2001.”

  “Well, I mean, it’s the last case he wasn’t able to close. He can’t let it go. As you can see.” She gestured to the walls, the timeline and everything else.

  “I knew her.”

  “What?”

  “Yeah, Jessica Smith. She was a year younger than me, but we had high school English together because the school she transferred in from was weird. I haven’t thought about her since…well, then. I don’t even think I knew she died.”

  Renee gaped at him. Kit had known Mick’s vic?

  “How’d she die?”

  “She was strangled.” Renee gestured to the timeline that took up most of the right side of the room. There at the end was her time and cause of death.

  “Someone did this to her?”

  “Yeah, but Mick’s never been able to figure out who. He was able to track her from a summer school program where she was taking college courses, to her house, to a bar. Someone saw her leave in a fancy car. The trail went cold there until she was found in the trunk of a car reported stolen a month before out in the bayou.”

  “Fuck. That’s—horrible.”

  Renee sucked in a deep breath. So much for feeling hot. Jessica’s murder was depressing enough, but knowing her killer was still out there was worse.

  “Why does Mick still have all this? I thought he retired.”

  “He did, but remember? Copies. All of it. He’s obsessed, but it gives him something to work on while, you know?”

  “Damn.” Kit closed the file and shook his head. “I feel bad I never wondered what happened to her.”

  “It was a big school. People came and went all the time.”

  “I need to get out of here. I started going through this hours ago, thinking I’d just take a quick look and—shit. Has it really been four hours?” He peered at his phone. “Fuck. Let’s go.”

  Kit almost barreled over her, ushering her toward the door and back out to her car.

  “Where do you want to go?” she asked as she buckled up.

  “Anywhere.” He pushed the seat back, adjusted the tilt and made himself at home. It was odd, yet nice, to have him sitting next to her, his hand on the back of her seat.

  “Hungry?” she asked.

  “I could eat.”

  “Do you have any interest in seeing the old shop?” There weren’t a lot of good memories of the place they’d met, but with him, she could only remember the good times. The cleaning wars, where they’d battled it out with spray bottles, and the young romance she hadn’t been ready for.

  “Yeah, that would be cool. Who is working there now?”

  “Oh, it’s closed. It’s actually a little café now. I
’ve been in a few times. Or at least, I think it’s still there. I don’t think I’ve gone to that part of town in over a year.”

  “What? Closed?”

  “Yeah, after Katrina it never rebounded.”

  “I…didn’t know.”

  “You weren’t here. A lot changed.” She shrugged off the pang of pain stabbing her in the chest.

  He blew out a breath and for a few moments they drove in relative silence. She didn’t know what to say to him, and he didn’t seem inclined to talk.

  Kit reached for the volume dial and turned the radio up. A familiar Bowling for Soup song was playing.

  He tipped his head back and sang along to the music, bobbing his knee in time and glancing at her, grinning like a fool. “It’s like a bad movie. She is lookin’ through me. If you were me, then you’d be screamin’, “Someone Shoot me!” As I fail miserably, tryin’ to get the girl all the bad guys want.”

  Renee shook her head and laughed. She remembered when the album had dropped, and Kit had played it in the shop, earning a good razzing from the other artists who liked metal. Of course at the time she’d turned her nose up at it, while secretly loving him all the more for not giving a fuck.

  “I used to play this song over and over and over again, hoping you’d get the message.” He shook his head and stared up through her moon roof.

  “Well, I’m pretty sure I did, unless I made up a lot of shit that never happened.”

  He chuckled. “Oh no, I remember.”

  She shifted in her seat. She’d never forgotten either.

  “I was so into you, it’s kind of embarrassing.” Kit shook his head. “I mean, you must have taken pity on me for being so desperate.”

  “What? No. You were cute.”

  “Cute? Great, that’s just awesome.”

  “Hey, you were like eighteen.”

  “You knew?” He leaned toward her, eyes wide.

  “Not at first, but eventually I figured out why I was the only one giving you booze. Little jerk.” She’d been horrified at first by the age difference, but after a hot night spent over his knee it hadn’t seemed like such a big deal.

  “But a cute jerk.” He grimaced.

  “No, not like that. I mean, it was nice. Most of the other guys, if they liked me they grabbed my ass and told me to spin for them.” She rolled her eyes. “You were cute and sweet.”

  “Still—not helping.”

  “What? I’m serious. It’s not a bad thing.” She turned onto the strip that had once held tattoo parlors, bars and concert halls. Now, it was a hodgepodge of different establishments, none of which were holdovers from the old days except a bar that had seen better days.

  The old shop sat at the end of the strip, the windows dark and no one inside.

  “Oh no.” Renee parked in front of the storefront. A big Closed sign was taped to the cracked glass. Inside, shadows hid the same black and white tile floor she’d scrubbed a hundred times.

  “Damn.” Kit popped his seat belt and got out of the car.

  She turned the ignition off and followed him. They stood shoulder to shoulder, peering into a building that had at one time, been their gateway into a better life.

  “The bones are still there. Remember there used to be a little desk there? And the stations were on that wall?” Kit said.

  As he pointed it all out, she could remember exactly how Lucky Tiger had looked on her last day. She’d left in the middle of the afternoon. Katrina was a few weeks off, and she’d been ready for a change. Something new.

  “I wonder if that little apartment is still here,” he said.

  “Probably.”

  “Let’s check it out.”

  Kit led the way to the narrow alley between the two buildings. It was where they’d found Peaches, smoked a few cigarettes before deciding against them and a hundred other little normal moments that had stuck with her.

  The alley was just as she remembered it. Dumpsters on either side, trashcans and an overabundance of garbage. Kit stopped just under the fire escape, peering up in the darkness. He bent his knees and jumped, straight up, grabbing the bottom rung of the ladder. It screeched as his weight forced it down.

  He flashed a grin over his shoulder before he scaled it up to the landing. Her heart did a series of painful somersaults in her chest as she followed him up, but by the time she reached the top, he’d already jimmied the window open and slipped inside.

  She hesitated. It wasn’t the breaking and entering she was worried about, although she should be. This apartment was where they’d begun fooling around. She’d strung him along, knowing Kit had a thing for her, and somewhere on the way, she’d started to like him back. He’d worn her down with a persistence that was rather remarkable looking back on it.

  “You coming or not?” Kit called from inside.

  She pulled her proverbial big girl panties up. There were a lot of things and places they’d branded their own, and with Kit in town for however long he was, she was going to have to face the memories. It was just the way of things. If she had to work out her issues, well, she had a vibrator for those needs.

  Renee stepped in through the window. Kit had found a light, so she could see around. The apartment was more like a one-room efficiency, which had worked perfectly for visiting artists, sleeping off hangovers and their young hook-ups. The furniture was gone, and the kitchenette had seen better days, but in her mind it was all there.

  “I remember this place being so cool.” Kit opened the bathroom and stuck his head in.

  He’d come to the shop one day with a bloody nose, courtesy of one of his parents. She’d never found out which. She’d taken him up here that day for the first time and helped him clean up. Neither of them had spoken, and the other artists hadn’t arrived yet. It was their secret, and after that day, things had changed.

  Was that where it had started? In a moment of compassion?

  “I want to see downstairs.” Kit opened the door to the shop and disappeared around the corner.

  “Is that a good idea?” She followed him, reluctant to relive all the memories.

  The floorboards squeaked as they passed, but there was no one in the shop to hear them.

  “You do realize we could get in a lot of trouble for being here?” she asked as they reached the shop proper.

  “What? We’re prospective buyers,” he said over his shoulder.

  “Ha. Ha. Ha.”

  Kit opened each closet and door, taking stock of what had changed and what was the same. To her, it was the same place she’d walked out of. What did he see?

  “I…kind of miss this place,” Kit said. He stopped in the middle of the floor. “You don’t, do you?”

  She blew out a breath. “No. It was different for me, especially after you left. The fact that I have a vagina meant I’d never be a real artist here.”

  “Things are changing. I bet if you wanted to go back it would be different. You are so good, Renee.”

  “I don’t want to.” She shrugged and wrapped her arms around herself. It was a lie, but she wasn’t willing to go back to that world and all the sacrifices she’d made to live a dream that shit on her. Besides, she had a mortgage to pay and the clerk job was steady.

  Kit stared at her, his expression unreadable, but she could feel his disapproval. He’d never understand because he had a dick and the golden hand. His script and outlines were—the best. Sure, his color techniques could use some work, but he had a great eye.

  “What if you did a tattoo for me?” he asked.

  “Don’t be silly. I haven’t tattooed in years. I don’t even have a machine anymore.” She turned in a slow circle. If she ever did tattoo again, her brother got first dibs anyway. She hadn’t finished a traditional piece with alligators for him, and she felt bad about it, but not bad enough to go back. Some things just weren’t worth the personal sacrifice.

  “You’re so good though.” Kit’s voice came from right behind her. She sucked in a breath, hiding her surprise, whe
n he placed a hand on her shoulder. She could feel the heat of his body against her back, and her body quivered.

  In her quiet, private moments, she still wanted that life. The tattooing, the drawing and inking for a living, the making your own schedule, creating tattoos for a purpose. But that wasn’t reality. Reality was hours of flash and doing reproductions of other people’s tattoos because all the cool tattoos were done by the men.

  Bitter much?

  “You don’t understand.” Renee blew out a breath.

  “I don’t know what happened to you, but I know it was wrong. I think you’re selling yourself short, though. The world is changing. Yeah, there will always be dicks that think because you have boobs you can’t tattoo, but not everyone. Fuck. Work with me. I’ll bust anyone’s nuts who says anything about you.”

  She laughed and he hugged her from behind. He’d do it, too. He wasn’t the lanky kid who hadn’t grown into his body yet. Kit was a man.

  “I can’t leave. I know I used to want to, but…I can’t.” If she left, who would sit with Mick in his final hours? Who would put flowers on her parent’s graves? Where would Remy go for holidays? She’d built a life here, and she liked it. The idea of living somewhere else just didn’t sound as appealing as it once had.

  He buzzed her cheek with a quick kiss, his beard tickling her skin. It was over as soon as it had begun, but she could feel the lingering sensation of his lips on her.

  “Come on, let’s get out of here.” He let go of her and nudged her toward the stairs.

  Renee gathered her scrambled wits. Maybe wallowing in her memories of what had been was a bad idea. She was in an awfully vulnerable place. Could she handle the broken heart he’d leave her with a second time around?

  She paused in the apartment, turning another circle, seeing it with her mind’s eye. The queen bed that had lain on the floor, the card table she’d dressed up with a tablecloth and a homemade dinner for Kit. Toward the end of their relationship, if she could call it that, she’d tried in all the small ways to tell him what she couldn’t say, that she loved him. She’d just been scared.