by Anthology
“Professionally step back then.”
Deacon snickered, and Harper swallowed back a biting comment. She had no reason to be jealous. None whatsoever, but Kate was getting a good deal more familiar with Deacon’s back than Harper had yet. The chick needed to step back.
Finally, Kate peeled back the large sheet of acetate that held the design sketch and the huge, purple network of lines left behind made her gasp. All of that was going to be etched into his skin?
She moved around to the front of him and met his steady green gaze. “Really? Your whole back?”
“He’s one of the best in the business. I trust him.”
Her eyes drifted down to the sheer perfection of his chest. The flat brown nipples that pulled tight, the even breaths that expanded his chest, the light dust of hair that made her want to touch. She curled her fingers around her phone until it bit into her palm.
“If you don’t stop looking at me like that I’m going to have a hard time laying on my stomach again.”
“Right. Sorry.” She sidestepped him to see what Kate was doing. When he reached for her, she skipped out of reach. She really couldn’t handle that just now. “Mind if I take pictures?” she asked Kate.
“Nope. I’m used to the camera.”
Crap. She totally forgot about the camera. It was totally rolling. She must have looked like a swooning idiot. That was just fabulous.
Harper took a few pictures of Casey Wilde’s setup: his bright green tattoo gun, the needles. So many needles. Better to not dwell on the needles. She focused a few more shots on Deacon then flicked out of Instagram. If she took any more, the entire world would figure out just how much she was obsessing about his stupid, perfect body.
She dropped back into her netted chair and flicked through the Twitter feed. The replies ran from the cool factor to the hot. After a solid three minutes of scrolling through replies about how delicious Deacon’s body was, her blood pressure was somewhere in the high one hundreds.
Yes, he is very attractive, thank you very much.
Now stop fucking looking at him.
“Overreact much?” she muttered and jammed her phone in her pocket.
Monster Arms McGee was scrolling through his phone as if he wasn’t trussed up on a table waiting for torture. Casey was talking to the camera, explaining what he was going to do and how excited he was to work on Deacon.
How the hell was she going to sit through this for four hours?
She cracked her knuckles and hopped out of the chair to sit below him again. “C’mon, let’s get out of here. I can guarantee I have a better idea of what to do for four hours.”
“You couldn’t have told me that before they transferred the design onto me?”
She glanced at the bottles of ink and the now two tattoo machines. Not to mention the compressor and the low hum of other people being worked on. “Woman’s prerogative.”
“Hey.”
Cutting her eyes back to Deacon she cracked her knuckles again. “What?”
“Relax. It’s going to be fine.”
“What? I’m fine. I’m not the one that’s going to have a needle buzzing into my skin at Mach thirty. Drilling ink into my skin permanently.”
“Harper?”
“What?”
“Breathe.”
“I am breathing. You’re just crazy. Did you see the size of the tattoo he wants to do?”
“Yes, I helped him design it.”
God, was the room getting dimmer? “Are you freaking insane?”
“Harper.”
His voice was low and calm. It was pissing her the fuck off. “What did I tell you about trying to handle me? Don’t.”
“Baby, you gotta breathe.”
“Don’t call me baby,” she gasped. “Oh, God.” She brought her knees up and put her head between her legs. He slid his hand into her hair, his long fingers slipping right through the strands until he got to the back of her neck and massaged lightly.
Deep, even breaths, Harper Lee.
“Okay, I’m good.”
He tipped her head up and she burst into laughter. His face was flushed from lying face down and his eyes were all bulgy, but they were worried for her.
“Nice,” he said with more growl than voice. “I’m trying to have a moment here.”
“I’m sorry.” She cleared her throat, but the laugh escaped again.
The sound of the gun was painful. She couldn’t imagine—didn’t want to imagine how it felt.
She scrambled out from under the table and hissed as a black gloved Casey dabbed some sort of ointment on the transfer then tugged Deacon’s skin taught and began. And her Deacon went from tapping and teasing to stone.
She watched in fascination as his chest—which previously took fairly deep breaths to fill up that monster rib cage—let out one long breath and then, it barely rose. The man went all Zen on her in less than twenty seconds.
She took a few pictures of Casey starting the work. At the first well of blood, she backed up and averted her eyes. Intellectually she knew there would be blood, but watching it bead up under the flat black ink was more than she could deal with. She flicked through the pictures she’d taken and uploaded the best of them to Instagram. She fielded texts from Simon and Jazz and busied herself with answering tweets.
When the music snicked on and One Direction blasted through the speakers, she finally laughed again. Casey’s face said it all.
Kate was going to die.
Now this she understood. The brother/sister dynamic put her on even ground. Harper couldn’t help but brush her fingers through the strands of hair that escaped Deacon’s stubby ponytail as she walked by.
To keep herself from going crazy, she took pictures of the studio. The huge lamps that shot perfect daylight through the dark room, the other chairs that were set up with more clients, the camera crew that was rolling. She even took a few pictures of the people that were behind the glass as they’d been a few hours before.
When she spotted Jazz in the front of it all, she grinned.
“See someone you know?”
Harper turned at Kate’s voice. “Yeah, Jazz is here.”
“Jazz from Oblivion, Jazz?”
“Is there any other?”
“Holy shit. Where?” The previously unflappable Kate disappeared. The exact same light green eyes that her brother had were wide and a little panicked.
Harper nodded to the window. Jazz spotted Harper and waved frantically. “Can she—”
“Yes.”
“You don’t even know what I was—”
“Yes, she can come back.”
Harper cocked her fists on her hips. “Why, Kate Wilde, are you a fan?”
“No.”
The answer was way too quick and her eyes were darting around like a hummingbird on simple syrup. “I think you’re a fan.”
“Don’t let me say something stupid. Punch me or something.” Kate gripped her arm. “Seriously.”
“All right, all right.”
Jazz bounced into the room, an earbud in one ear, her ever present phone in her hand. Her hair was jet black with lime green and silver braids threaded through it. She wore a black tanktop, with a lime green bra crisscrossing her back and peeking from the sides. Black jeans were chopped at the knee and rolled up, hugging her surprisingly curvy body. Green and silver Chucks finished the outfit.
The girl was badass and frighteningly adorable at the same time.
Jazz stopped in front of her and looked her up and down. “Thumbs up, Chef Girl. That outfit is tight. Look at all the boob you hide under your apron.”
Harper grinned. “Jazz, I’d like to introduce you to Kate Wilde. She’s…” Harper wasn’t quite sure what Kate’s status was in the Wilde conglomerate.
Kate held out a hand to Jazz. “I’m Casey’s sister, pain in the ass manager, and the biggest Oblivion fan.”
“Oh, really?” Jazz stepped forward and enveloped the taller woman in a hug, then curled her arm arou
nd her back and shuffled her off. “I need you tell me all about this deal on camera. Think you can do that? I’d love to do a vlog about it for our YouTube channel.”
Harper had been hoping for a break in the nervous Nelly act she had going on, but as usual Jazz was in full social explosion mode. She was pretty sure Jazz had singlehandedly created the Oblivion phenomenon just with Twitter and YouTube.
It was impressive as hell.
She wandered back to Deacon and slid under the table. “How are you doing?”
“It’s not fun, but after a while you get used to the burn.”
“You’re insane.”
“Nah. Just determined. And it’s cool as fuck.”
She laughed. “Finally the truth is out.”
“I have my moments of ego.”
“Yeah, but you were embarrassed to yank off your shirt for the crowd of people. Who’s going to see it?”
“Oh, I strip on stage. Those lights are fucking hot. I just don’t do it as often as Simon. Usually by the end of a show.”
“Well then.” She hadn’t seen that when she’d taken a peek at the show yesterday. And she needed to eject that from her memory banks now. She was already riled up past the point of reason.
“Since we’ve got time to kill, tell me about Harper.”
“Harper is boring. Tell me about you instead.”
“Nope. You can find out half of my stuff on Google.”
She stretched out on her side and propped her head on her hand with a yawn. “I just got out of culinary school. Most of the chefs I know went for restaurants or bakeries and here I am on the road.”
“You could work at any restaurant. I know the stuff you feed us is way more simple than what you could be doing.”
“Yeah, that’s true. But I’m not all that great at dealing with egocentric chefs that are going to tell me that I don’t know how to slice a tomato.” At his raised brows, she laughed. “I worked in New York for one of my internships and you should have heard the things that came out of this guy’s mouth. When he slapped my ass on one of my shifts, I kind of…”
“Decked him?”
She pressed her lips together. A bit worse than that actually. “Let’s just say he had a bit of a limp and I had a pink slip.”
“Ouch.”
“Yeah. Misogyny doesn’t usually bother me. I’ve been on the road for as long as I can remember and have been called every derogatory name in the book—”
“That’s shitty.”
“Yeah well when you’re a female roadie you deal with other roadies, musicians that created the definition of grabby, and then there’s the fans that don’t like being told no.”
“I wish I could touch you right now.”
“Move and I’ll kill you, Romeo,” Casey muttered. “It’s bad enough I have to listen to sappytime stories and flirting.”
She sucked a laugh between her teeth and smiled up at him. Deacon wrapped his hands tighter around the makeshift handlebars at the top of the chair. Casey was working from the bottom up.
“Normal people could move,” she teased. “But you are one big road map of muscles. One move and everything moves.” It was hotter than hell. The few times she’d gotten her hands on him she could definitely prove that as a truth.
“Damn rowing machine.”
She slumped onto her back and covered her face with the inside of her elbow. Now she had rowing in her head too? Life really wasn’t fair.
“I have a question.”
“Okay, muffles. What’s the question?”
She rolled back into position. “What on earth are you doing with me? Shouldn’t you be looking for the next triathlete? I can barely run across the parking lot.”
“You’re full of shit. You’re in shape.”
She rolled her eyes. “Yoga and swimming when I can. I need to be small in the kitchen. You saw Mitch.”
He snorted. “That is one scary dude. He threatened to leave me in a downtown back alley this morning.”
“What?” She sat up. “No, he didn’t.”
“He warned me off of you.”
“Ugh.” She covered her face with her hands.
“Yeah. I told him I couldn’t do that.”
She peeked between her fingers. “What? Really?” That did sound more like Mitch than the guy that sent Deacon after her at the bar. “And you’re still alive?”
“He told me where you were, didn’t he?”
“Yeah, he did.” And that was a miracle in itself. Mitch had taken his role of watchful uncle to heart as soon as she’d gotten on this tour.
“Don’t look at me like that.”
“How did you go from threats of violence to getting my location, Deacon?”
“Sorry, state secrets.”
“Okay, Deacon,” Casey interrupted. “I need a stretch and we’ll set you up to sit for the next half of the session so I can do your upper back and shoulders.”
Harper slid out from the little nest she’d made under the table and stood. “Holy crap.”
“How’s it look?”
His skin was slightly raised with irritation, but the black ink was glossy with what she guessed was triple antibiotic ointment, at least she thought it was based on the mediciney smell. The art followed the line of his spine, and the knife-like precision of the lines was amazing. It was all male with a taste of tribal influence. The design was obviously made for his body. This was no page out of a book. And all of it made her want to touch and stroke each line.
So not like her. Tattoos were nice enough, but they didn’t invite her to touch—at least not until Deacon. Actually a lot of things were different when it came to Deacon.
“Harper?”
“What? Oh, yes…it’s gorgeous.”
“Good.” He took her hand and crossed the room.
“I thought he was only taking a stretch—”
“I don’t care. I need a few minutes away from everyone.”
“Oh. Well, I can do that. Want me to be the lookout?”
Deacon caught her around the waist and hauled her into the bathroom. He slammed the door shut by shoving her up against the steel door. She didn’t have time to do anything but gasp as his mouth slammed down on hers. She hooked her arm around his neck, fisting his hair.
With his delicious back currently off the menu, she was limited in what she could touch. She ripped her mouth away, her breath stuttering. “What the hell, Deacon?”
“I’ve been watching you crawl around that fucking floor underneath me for two goddamn hours.” He raked his teeth over her bottom lip and down her chin to her neck. “A camera watching my every move.” He curled her legs around his hips as he lifted her to meet his touch. “Having to stay still and listen to your husky laughter, trying not to react to the way you’ve been watching me, the way your mouth works…Christ, Harper.” When his tongue swirled low behind her ear, she actually felt her eyeballs roll back into her head.
Spikes of want that had been simmering since the bar were now off any seismic chart she could imagine. The fact that he’d been just as aware of her the entire time made the lust she’d felt in the bar pale in comparison to this. She could hear his heartbeat, could feel it pounding against his breastbone and thudding into her own. It matched her own jackhammer pace.
As lean as he was, he was still so much larger than her and her legs could barely hang on. He shifted until one hand palmed her ass and he tipped her just so. “Tell me to stop, Harper.”
Stop? Was he fucking nuts? She looked around at the graffiti art that gilded the walls in silver and gold over matte black. The mirror across from the door ratcheted up the sex factor to Fantasy Island the Return. He was actually grinding her against the door and she was loving it.
Well, she’d love it a bit more if she could just—oh, God. His hand slid into the back of her jeans, cupping her cheek tightly. She reached down and unzipped her jeans so he could bury those long, elegant fingers deeper. She watched his back muscles flow, the tanned flesh cor
ded with sinew and the tentacles of black art that crept up from his waist to his middle back. His hips dipped into a roll that made her insides liquefy. God, was that her making those keening noises?
Did she care?
The friction from the front, the long night of teasing, the days of wanting him, and his questing fingers shoved her from the honeyed buzz of warmth and fuzzy brightness to orgasm like a switch. The cool metal of the door on her ass as he finally managed to slip two fingers into her made her arch and fist his hair. The only way she could stop herself from screaming was to sink her teeth into the dense muscle where his shoulder met neck.
He hissed and caught her mouth as he rolled his hips ever slower, her name that same litany of whispered longing from before. Murmurs that matched the undulating rhythm of his hips until her orgasm faded out like a star at dawn. He smiled into the kiss with a low chuckle.
“What are you laughing at?” she asked on a wheeze.
“I kinda like that you branded me because I made you come so hard.”
She pulled on his hair, but his laughter was contagious. She couldn’t even care that she’d just dry humped him against the door. Not with an orgasm like that.
CHAPTER NINE
August 19, 3:48 AM - There's Tired and Then There's Tired
Finally Casey rolled his chair back. “Stand up for me and let me make sure it’s all cool.”
Deacon rolled his shoulders and stood.
“Arms out for me.”
He followed orders, clenching his hands into fists. “You’re killing me.”
Casey grunted. “It’s done when I say it’s done.”
“Does that mean sit back down?” He tried to keep the whine out of his voice. It really wasn’t manly.
“No more torture. You’re good. Go ahead and take a look before I bandage you up.”
Deacon headed right for the mirror as the two camera guys hopped up to follow him.
Casey handed him a mirror so he could check it out in full. “As you can see, it covers your back pretty thoroughly.”
“Shit yeah, it does.” The work was stunning. Deep blacks faded to grays making the original tribal design more three-dimensional. There were purple lines mixed in from the original design that had been placed.