Heather stretches her hand and pushes the envelope in my way. “I’m sorry, Mitch, but this is a petition from the citizens of this town for you not to open the tattoo studio and leave as soon as possible. We have gathered quite a lot of signs for this purpose, so you can say you’re not wanted in this town anymore.”
The meaning of the words hit me like a hard punch. “Am I kicked out from the town?” I mumble.
Heather doesn’t even reply.
Chapter 4
HEATHER
His eyes darken the moment I tell him what’s going on. I didn’t mean to sound harsh, but this is how things are. Mitch is an ex-convict, a dangerous man. He might be good-looking, with those bulging muscles and beautiful eyes, and I might miss seeing him run up and down the street, but this has nothing to do with me.
I have to think about my business. This is my life we’re discussing here. I’m sure he’ll understand if I explain it to him.
“Look, I know this is hard, but really, it isn’t about you.”
His face twists at the sound of my voice. “It isn’t? Are you sure you have any idea what you are talking about? Because I’m fucking sure that all that’s happened since I’ve got here, it’s about me. Me and my past.”
Mitch wasn’t moving but the tension of his body was making him seem larger, dangerous. My hair prickles as I see a vein on the side of his neck pumping. What in the hell am I doing? I have to run away; I have to hide.
But, when did common sense last work with me?
“You have to admit that going around shouting at people about being in jail wasn’t quite a tactic. Or opening a tattoo studio in a small town. People are here to get away from all these things, to shed the big city away from their lives. Think what the children are going to think.”
“I don’t give a fuck what a bunch of teenagers is thinking. I only came here because that’s the only place I’ve got since I came out of jail. Do you think I would visit this shithole of a place if it wasn’t for the apartment and the shop downstairs?”
Mitch sighs as he takes a step back. His hands are trembling; I can see them as they pass over his head, wiping his short hair back. My chest is feeling heavy. I know I’ve done the right thing, I know it.
So why does it feel like I’m in the wrong here?
“Look, at least you didn’t open the shop yet. You can take your things and start over in another town. If you don’t bring up anything about your past, then I’m sure they won’t mind welcoming you somewhere else.”
At that moment, I realize my fingers are aching; I look down and see them clutching in the edge of the counter, my knuckles white from the effort.
“Why did you mind, then? Why didn’t you give me a chance to prove I’m not the criminal you all make me be? What has you thinking that if I leave this place, I’ll have better luck somewhere else?”
He hunches over the other end of the counter, devastated by the news. I’ve never seen a man react so bad about a shortcoming in his life, especially a life-hardened one like Mitch. I step closer to him, my heart beating fast. What are you doing? He is emotional. What if he thinks you’re the one to blame?
I stop in my tracks and come up with an answer from the distance. “I told you, Mitch. It has nothing to do with you. I had to protect my business. Can you imagine a tattoo studio opening next to a small-town bakery? I certainly can’t. People in these parts don’t forgive or forget easy. When something is out of the bag, then it’s almost impossible to make it go back. But, if--” Suddenly, he straightens his back and with two firm strides comes to my side. “What are you doing?” I scream and raise my hands in my defense.
He grabs them and starts shaking me violently. “You have no fucking idea what I had to go through to end up here, Heather! NO FUCKING IDEA!”
My eyes get wet from fear. I shouldn’t have provoked him. “I’m sorry...I’m sorry. I... did not...God, I’m sorry.” My cries seem to put him to a stop.
He doesn’t release me from his grip, though. “I’m not a murderer, Heather. I’m a man in tattoos, an ex-convict that can’t read. All I have had in my life was my bad-boy behavior and my art, but it isn’t worth it anymore, not when it brings beautiful women like you to tears.”
Then, he kisses me.
All the rage from the previous couple of weeks, all the accumulated anger, explodes into a loud cry of agony. I shut my eyes again; I shut them and hold my breath.
I try to move my hand close to his face and I realize that he doesn’t resist. He’s still holding my wrists tightly, but he doesn’t stop me from moving. I cover the distance between us in moments. When I touch his stubble beard, Mitch snaps like he was in a dream.
But he doesn’t do a thing; Mitch is just staring at me with the eyes of a man that has been through hell and back. I’m scared of those eyes. Then why do I want to protect them? Why do I want to see them glistening in happiness?
I stare him deep in the eyes. His glance is sensual, a flame that’s drawing me closer, making me a moth ready to burn. I’m hanging on his words, my body void of a will of its own. If he wants to kill me, then now it’s the time.
***
MITCH
How did we end up here? I’ve been thinking of kissing her since I first saw her. I was wondering how her lips would taste. Vanilla and chocolate, I think. But that’s the least of my worries right now. Amidst my pain, I’ve done the worst thing I could think of; kissing Heather inside her shop.
We connect and our tongues start dancing in our mouths. For some reason, she doesn’t pull back. Instead, she responds to my kiss and we start making out. I feel her hot breath caressing the skin of my face, something I haven’t felt in a long time. Her lips are trying to dominate over mine, but I don’t allow for even a tinge of control. She’s mine now to teach her that ex-convicts are not as she imagines them to be.
All that sensation makes my dick grow harder in my pants. I’m sure that if she lowered her head now, she could see the struggling hard-on between my legs. Luckily, it’s late in the evening and the shop is empty. That and the people of this town don’t make late night visits to their local bakery.
However, I don’t feel comfortable having a massive window behind me while doing this.
We stop kissing; Heather is panting. She’s hungry for some air. “What in the world was that?” she whispers.
I don’t intend to reply to her. I have bigger plans for my mouth right now. I bend and cross my hands around her beautiful ass. With a quick push, I lift her on my arms.
“Put me down! Mitch, put me down!” she’s yelling, but I don’t listen to her.
I open the door to the kitchen with my back and get inside. I put her on a preparation counter. Heather is still in awe but not resisting. I cup her breast in my huge hand. My touch is rough at the beginning, but that’s because I haven’t been with a woman in a very long time. But quickly I adjust to a gentler caressing.
“I’m not a bad person, Heather,” I say as I lean closer to her lady parts.
“Mitch! Please stop. Please, I don’t--,” she sighs, but she knows one thing better than I do.
I’m not holding her back; she can leave if she really wants to. Instead, she chooses to stay.
I unbuckle her belt and pull down her pair of jeans easily. She’s in her underwear now, pulling me closer to her. I bend my head between her thighs and start wetting her panties.
She doesn’t talk anymore; only moans are coming out of her mouth.
I don’t stop teasing her; instead, I pull her panties to the side and creep my tongue in her labia. She's hot and wet. Heather has lied back now and is eagerly opening her legs for my tongue. She doesn’t want me to stop; she’s pushing her pelvis up and down. She does it rhythmically, fast.
I’m working my way to her clit. “Oh God! Yeah. Oh my...” she keeps saying, panting. I use both my hands to pull her even closer and penetrate my tongue in her vagina. It’s still tight, so I decide to use my fingers.
All the muscles of
her body tense; her pussy, clutching my finger, is more reactive than the rest of her body.
“Please...faster,” she begs me, “please oh...oooh!”
Her vagina starts dripping as her orgasm shakes her world. I continue sucking her labia and clit as she’s coming, wiping her clean. My dick is hard and I don’t think I can resist any longer.
I stand up and reach to my back pocket for my wallet. I find a condom and quickly tear it open. Heather hears the sound and lifts her head to see what I’m doing. She’s still dumbstruck from everything that has happened since we started kissing. However, she doesn’t stop me from continuing.
I pull down my pants and underwear, remove my t-shirt and put on the condom. Then, I enfold her ass with my hand and lift her in the air again. This time, though, I carry her to the other side of the kitchen, against a wall next to a big sack of flour. I lower her into my throbbing cock, red from anticipation. She gladly receives me.
“Damn it,” I hiss as the walls of her vagina rub my skin. “Things could have been so different between us,” I mumble, mostly to myself.
She doesn’t reply to me. She has closed her eyes, moaning, pumping on my cock like crazy. At a moment, Heather spreads her arms. In her right, there’s some metal tool I have no fucking idea what it's for. She tosses it on the floor and that, in its stead, drops the sack of flour.
The air suddenly fills with dust.
“Harder,” I hear her say.
I reply to her command with a hard thrust that makes her lose her breath. I continue for few minutes like that until I begin to lose control.
“I’m close,” I say. Heather is moaning so hard, I’m not sure she hears me. I open my eyes and see her lustful expression while she rides my cock, pleasure spreading all over her face every time my dick is deep inside her.
Her ruffled hair and the smears of flour all over her body make me even harder. I open my mouth and suck one of her soft nipples while I squeeze and rub the other with my free hand. It’s at that moment that Heather can’t take it anymore.
“Aaaaahhh!” she shouts again. Her vagina constricts around my cock, squeezing it tight inside her chamber. The pressure's too much for me.
“I’m coming,” I say, my voice hoarse and deep.
The sweet release comes a second later amidst moans and pants. As soon as I’m done, I pull my still hard cock out of her and gently put her down.
We’re both standing there for a moment staring at each other. I open my mouth to say something, but she’s faster.
“I think you should leave,” she mutters.
This time, her words hurt me worse than before.
“Sorry,” is all I am capable of.
Chapter 5
HEATHER
“Look, I didn’t mean to shout at you before...or have sex with you. Well, I did want to have sex with you, but not under these conditions,” he says.
“I don’t care, Mitch. I don’t want you anywhere near my shop or my life ever again. Do you understand?” I continue.
His mouth is lying open, not moving; there’s nothing he can say or do to make me change my mind and he knows it. Still, he doesn’t leave.
“What’s wrong with you? I thought we just had the greatest sex of my life and you now want me to go away?”
“It isn’t about us having sex, Mitch. You barged in here and messed up my life. Up until yesterday, you were a criminal, an ex-convict. It was the only thing keeping me from falling for you, but now...God, now you had to go and make things even more complicated.”
My last word draws his interest. “Complicated? Complicated how?”
I sigh and walk to the other side of the kitchen. I pick up my clothes and head to the front part of the shop. Mitch does the same and soon he’s following me to the front.
I have to say something to him. One way or another, he’s going to find it out. “I...I’m the one that started this petition.”
His eyes open broadly. “What? Are you serious? Why did you do that?”
Once again, his veins start pumping. Is it me or is this the start of a fetish for me? I feel my parts getting wet again, even after I just came twice moments ago. I can’t continue seeing him.
“Mitch, I’m sorry but I can’t have you getting in the middle of my job. Your tattoo studio would drive away most of my clients. I’ve told you so many times already, but people of this town care about the appearances, they care about the past. And your past is dangerous to this town, to my business, to me. I can’t have you taking from me the one thing I love the most in the world.”
When my rant is over, Mitch is staring at me with the look of a man that has just fallen from the sky. Did he think that by simply fucking me, things would change between us? That I could snap my fingers and make this go away? Well, I can’t.
Mitch doesn’t talk again. He lowers his head and turns to leave the shop. His hand is on the knob when he stops and turns around. “You know, I have spent all my life being kicked away. I’ve been kicked away by my parents, by all the foster homes I’ve been sent to, even by the schools. I couldn’t read, I couldn’t afford a specialist to teach me how to read, and the only thing I had going for me was drugs.
“My life was revolving around drugs. Cocaine, LSD, heroin, everything that’s out there, I’ve probably done it twice. That’s until I got caught by the police for trafficking. I was in the bathroom of a club the night they raided the place and I was so high that I didn’t even realize what was going on until I was in the prison.
“From that day on, I decided that once I came out, I’d never get kicked out from a place ever again, not without trying my best to get clean. But then, I ended up to this fucking hell. All my life, people told me that I’m not worth a penny, but they didn’t know any better than me. You, though, you’re the worst of them all. Goodnight, Heather. I hope you have a good life.”
He hurls the door open and rushes out of the shop without looking back. Instead of heading to his apartment, though, he heads to his studio on the other side. I...well, I can’t move an inch after hearing his story. Tears rise to my eyes and my whole body is feeling like I’ve been knocked down by a raging bull.
But the pain isn’t physical; it’s sentimental.
“Oh God, what have I done? I’m so stupid. So, so stupid,” I say. I hit my head with my fists and let my tears start falling. People, like books, shouldn’t be judged by their covers. And I went on and did just that, all to “save” my business from the danger of the tattooed man. I should have known better.
With two swift gestures, I wipe my tears and walk firmly to the entrance of my shop. I turn off the lights and lock the door on my way out. When outside, I stop. I want to turn and give him one last glance before leaving, but I can’t.
I can’t because if I do, I’ll run behind him and ask for his forgiveness.
What the hell have I done?
***
MITCH
The cold air manages to bring back my focus a bit. I’ve never talked to anyone about my life before. People back in the neighborhood just knew. They somehow looked at me and knew what I was going through, what my hardships have been. The police officers read it in their files, the gang members found out after asking around, and everyone else just figured it out by themselves. But I’ve never said a thing to indicate that I was actually in pain.
Before getting to prison, I was used to getting hit hard by life. I knew that if I let my guard down, one of these days, life would toss a round-kick to my stomach and tell me to man the fuck up. Men don’t make art; men don’t cry; men don’t read.
But this woman managed to shutter my defenses with a glance. And now, I’m paying the price of not getting out of this place when I still had the chance.
I come to my tattoo studio and get inside. Everything was almost ready for me to open this little place, somewhere to start my life. The waiting lobby, the ink station, everything. I’ve put up almost all my money in this endeavor only to be shut down by people’s malice. But
I guess I should have expected that. “Heather is right, after all. People don’t forget or forgive. It’s easier to keep a grudge than to let go.”
I turn on the lights and search around for the buckets of color I have stored for later use. I find them and carry them outside. The physical exertion takes some of the stress out of my mind. Doing something is preferable than staying put after all. I have to do this one thing tonight and tomorrow evening I’m out. I won’t stay another day in this place, even though I have nowhere else to go to.
After some effort, I open the buckets. I don’t have anything particular in my mind yet, but my art has always been like that: raw and unpredictable. I start by drawing a long, red line, on the wall. The line keeps getting longer, and longer until it shapes up to a damaged heart.
Big Bad Billionaires [Volume 1] Page 52