by Stacy Gail
“Ouch,” Mads couldn’t help but wince. That was something her father had once said about her own art.
“Exactly.” Payne nodded at her as if she’d said something profound. “It was a fucking embarrassment everywhere I looked, and not at all representative of the great art our tattooists are known for. So this year, this little rodeo’s going to be different. It’s going to look professional. Streamlined. So fucking perfect it’ll put actual art museums to shame. But to do that I need to be in control of every last goddamn detail. That means I need to actually see everyone’s projects turned in at least a week before the auction, just to make sure your work is up to the House’s standards.”
“And if it isn’t?” Talon wanted to know, jet black eyes flashing danger signals.
“Then it’s not going to be part of the auction,” came the flat reply. “And before you ask, no. None of this is negotiable.”
“So this isn’t about fucking frames or whatever bullshit Scout tried to spin for us,” Sage seethed, and Mads watched in alarm as his hands curled into dangerous fists. “You lying to us now, Payne? Treating us like snot-nosed kids you think you can manipulate? Like we don’t deserve fucking respect?”
Danger, danger.
“What I’m hearing from Payne is that he needs us to get our projects in on time,” Mads spoke up in what she hoped was a soothing voice. As she did, she curled a discreet hand over Sage’s tight fist and tried her damnedest to project all things good and calm through that touch. “I’m not wrong on that, am I?”
Payne’s attention flicked her way. “No, you’re not. On time, and high quality. I don’t want it to be one or the other. That’s not too fucking much to ask for, is it?”
“No, of course not. In fact, it’s good to have a definitive target date. What’s not good is how this date-change got dropped on us simply because things went bad last year,” she added, then forced herself to stand tall when Payne’s hard gaze flicked to her again. “I wasn’t even here back then, so I don’t know what all the problems were. I also don’t really know my fellow coworkers other than Sage, so I don’t know if they’re unreliable or not. I only know about myself, and what I know is this—I’d love to make this auction part of my annual holiday traditions here at the House. But I don’t want to go through something like this next year without having a fixed date for when the artwork is due, because drying and curing time has to be factored in. No one needs this kind of stress.”
“Nice,” Scout said, almost to herself, and Mads glanced over at the other woman to find her nodding. “Good to hear you’re planning on being here next year, Mads.”
Mads blinked. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Look,” Payne cut in, looking fierce, “maybe I went about this in a jacked-up, ham-handed way—”
“No shit,” Sage snapped.
“But,” Payne plowed on, pausing just long enough to give Sage a savage look, “I’m going to stand by the new delivery date for the artwork. This year I’m going to get a good look at what’s going up for auction, and I won’t be happy until each and every piece looks like something that should be hanging in a damn museum. That’s the kind of quality House Of Payne is known for, and every single artist here is capable of creating something of that caliber. But if you absolutely cannot make the new deadline and you’ve decided to have such a shit fit over it that you want to just walk, then…” He paused, glowering at Sage for so long Mads forgot to breathe, before he cussed under his breath and seemed to do a mental count to ten. “Then you can turn your projects in late.”
Mads breathed a silent sigh of relief.
Crisis averted.
“But I’ll want fucking updates on a daily basis, Sage,” Payne went on, and the snarl came back in a big way. “We’re talking multiple pics to show your progress, ETAs, maybe an in-person visit or two from me. And should you miss the new target date, your paintings are going to look like crap because they’re not going to have any frames on them. I don’t want to hear you bitching about how that’ll make your artwork look like shit compared to everyone else’s once the auction begins.”
“I don’t give a damn about that,” Sage gritted out, though when his hand relaxed enough to lace with hers, she breathed another sigh of relief. “The only thing I do give a damn about is being lied to. Lies equal disrespect in my book, so I don’t put up with that kind of bullshit. So fair warning—next time you want me to jump through a hoop, don’t be surprised if I tell you exactly what you can do with that goddamn hoop. We’re out.”
With that, he turned and stalked toward the door, Mads in tow.
Chapter Eleven
Sage was so lost in his rage he wasn’t even fully aware that he’d dragged Mads with him to his booth until he turned to shut the door, only to find her already doing it. Without a word, she flicked on the “Occupied” light outside that warned off anyone from entering, before fishing out her phone and typing in a quick text.
“There we go,” she said, apparently pleased with whatever message she’d just sent off. Tucking her phone away, she glanced up at him with a smile. “That should give us some much-needed breathing room.”
“What?”
“I just texted Scout to give us some space. No clients or other visitors will bother us, at least for a while.”
“That'll be the day.” Gnashing his teeth together, he paced the small cubicle, so caged by its confines he wanted to plow his fist through the inch-thick frosted glass walls. “This fucking place. It's all about the almighty dollar and the House’s reputation, and to hell with everything else. Maybe your old man was right all along, and Payne is just an underhanded motherfucker.”
“Sage.” Mads stepped into his path and laid a hand on his chest, her knockout, pale gray eyes looking earnestly into his. “Payne didn't really lie. Yes, he wanted to get everyone’s projects in a week earlier just to make sure they're done, but he also wanted them to look as professional as possible by getting everything framed. How is that a lie?”
“It wasn't the whole truth, Which means it was as manipulative as fuck. My old man pulled that manipulative shit on me to keep me on a short leash, and I’ve never forgotten it.”
She frowned. “You mean that jerk who beat you up because you protected your mom?”
He made a sound of disgust. “That bastard was a user and an evil prick, but at least he never lied to me. The man I got dumped with when I was twelve was a goddamn liar right from the start, and as far as I'm concerned he never got any better.”
A wealth of compassion filled her eyes, and she settled down on the edge of the tattooing table. “What did he lie about? You can tell me,” she added with a wry smile. “I mean, you’ve met my dad. There’s nothing your father could have done that would shock me.”
“How about letting me believe he wasn’t really my biological father?” he shot back as the old, old wound throbbed anew. “How about making me feel like he could kick me out at the drop of a hat because he claimed he didn’t know if I was really his son?”
“Well, considering your mother’s rather unusual history, maybe he didn’t know what to believe when she left you with him.”
“Unusual history,” he scoffed, while that nightmarish time in his life once again spread its terrible rage inside him. “That’s putting it mildly. She never actually bothered to tell my old man that she was pregnant with his baby. To this day, I still don’t know why she kept that to herself. The night she banged on his door and told him to take me in because I was his… That was the first he’d heard about me.”
“Wow,” Mads murmured, wincing just a bit. “So you were a real surprise package, then.”
That was one way of putting it. “I don’t think either one of us believed her at the time. I do resemble him, so maybe that was why he kept me those first few nights. He may have allowed me to bunk on the couch, but he told me not to unpack, because I wasn’t staying. Then, about a week after I got dumped on him, he told me I could use the back office as my bedroom
, and that was it. That’s all he said. Nothing about me staying there permanently, and certainly nothing about us being related. He never even bothered to call me by my name, just kid, and he told me I could call him Charlie. Not Dad, or Pop, or anything like that. There was no claiming, no sense of belonging. It was like living in fucking limbo.”
There was a kind of pain mixed with understanding in her eyes that somehow reached out and soothed the restless fires raging inside. “Every kid needs to know where they belong.”
The fires eased even more. God, his woman was like magic to him. “As time went on, Charlie taught me everything he knew about cars so I could be his trained little grease monkey that basically worked for twenty bucks a week. And all the while, I kept waiting for him to send me away.”
“I can’t imagine what that must’ve been like, living with a sword of Damocles basically hovering over your head for years on end,” she murmured softly. “Was that the lie you’re talking about? That he never put your fears to rest about not getting rid of you?”
“It wasn’t that, though that would’ve been nice of him. No, the lie that was the last straw for me was finding a years-old genetic paternity test in his desk drawer.”
Her gasp was sharp. “No.”
He nodded bitterly. “When I’d first landed at his place, he’d dragged me to some doc for a physical so I could start at this new school. Or at least that’s the story he’d told me. What he’d actually done was gathered blood samples from me. Nowadays, that sort of test can be picked up at any drugstore, but back in the day he’d had to go through all these steps to get it done, and then waited weeks for the results to come back.”
She looked like she’d stopped breathing, “What were the results?”
“I’m his kid. Which would have been cool, except that assclown never fucking told me about it. By the time I found that report, five goddamn years of waiting for him to kick me out had gone by. If I hadn’t gone into that drawer looking for keys to the storage shed Charlie had told me to get for him, I still wouldn’t have had any idea we were family. How the fuck do you do that to a person?”
“I honestly don’t know how to explain why he did what he did,” she said after a moment, and the compassion in her tone filled the booth with soothing warmth. “Did you confront him with what you found?”
“You bet your ass I did. I don’t even remember everything I said to him—the only thing that’s crystal clear in my memory is the rage. I swear to Christ, I don’t know how I stopped myself from laying that bastard out then and there, right in front of some customers who wanted their tires rotated.” Then he frowned. “Kinda weird that I remember that, but I can’t remember what I yelled at him. I just remember yelling my damn head off.”
“You had every right, Sage. You were a kid living with toxic anxiety for literally years, and you were never given any official permission to think of that place as your home. You didn’t even know you were living with family, which is the most basic form of stability there is. I would have screamed, too, and then I would have… I don’t know. Gotten out of there for a while, just to keep myself from killing him.”
“I got out of there for more than a while,” he muttered grimly. “I spent the night at a friend’s place, and in the morning I realized I couldn’t stomach going back to live in that house another day. I just couldn’t.”
She made a sound of sympathy. “How old were you?”
“Seventeen. I was going to leave once I’d graduated high school anyway,” he added when she sucked in an audible breath. “I’d been saving every nickel and dime I could scrape together for years, and I’d started working part-time as a janitor at a tattoo parlor off the Strip. I wasn’t completely penniless, and being on my own was a damn sight better than letting someone else have fucking control of my life. I’m the one with the control now.”
She nodded, rolling her lips between her teeth. “Did you ever see your father again?”
“Once. The day after I found the paternity test I went back and cleared out my stuff. I wasn’t there long, because I took to heart what he’d said at the very beginning. I’d never really unpacked.”
“Damn,” she murmured with a shake of her head. “Did he apologize to you, or try to explain why he never told you about that paternity test?”
“You’ve gotta be kidding.” He clenched his teeth against the long-ago memories he’d thought were dead and buried, but were now chewing away at his insides. “That dumbass couldn’t figure out why I’d gotten so pissed. He claimed that he’d honestly had no idea I’d been living with the fear that he’d toss me into some orphanage for five fucking years, can you believe it? Said he thought he’d made it obvious that he’d accepted me as his kid by the way he’d allowed me to live with him. Apparently he thought I should’ve figured that shit out on my own by all the nonverbal hints he’d given me.”
“Nonverbal hints,” she repeated, and again she shook her head, this time in amazement. “Good ol’ Charlie didn’t exactly have the greatest communication skills, did he?”
“That’s putting it mildly. He kept saying I should’ve known I was his, and that it was obvious to anyone with a fucking brain in their head. By the time I had my shit all packed, it was like he’d talked himself into believing that my not knowing we were biologically related was somehow my fault for not being able to read his fucking mind.”
“Wow.”
Good. At least she got the unfairness of it all. “I remember I left without saying one word to him, because I… was… done. I’ve never been happier to put a person—a whole fucking chapter of my life—in the rearview mirror.”
She made a sound that could have meant anything, before sliding off the table to wrap her arms around his middle. “That’s why you hit the proverbial roof when you thought Payne had lied today.”
“I don’t think Payne lied. He fucking lied. Or at least he omitted, which is manipulative, and that’s just as bad.”
“Has it occurred to you that Payne might have been trying to spare the embarrassment of the various artists who made last year’s auction an apparent shit show? I’m assuming most of those artists are still here, working under this very roof. Considering how delicate some egos can be in our line of work, I can see how Payne might’ve wanted to avoid shining a spotlight on how some of the tattooists around here messed things up for last year’s auction.”
“That’s…” The fiery retort he could taste on his lips never got launched as her calm, perfectly logical words drilled through the anger still blanketing his brain. Damn it. As much as he wanted to hang on to his mad, he could feel it draining away. “That’s… actually not a completely off-base idea.”
“Let’s look at it another way. It’s clear to me that you don’t tolerate liars, right?”
“Damn straight.”
“Yet you told me you’ve been working at House Of Payne for years now.”
Even a blind man could see where she was going with this. “So?”
“So, I don’t think you’d ever be able to work for a man you believed was a dishonest, lie-spewing jerk.” Then she stopped short and laughed at herself. “Wow, listen to me. Here I am, the daughter of Fletch Daniels, defending Payne’s honor. Who knew today would be crazy upside-down day?”
“Crazy upside-down day or not, I’m getting your drift.”
“Great,” she said with that same self-deprecating laugh in her tone. “Could you be a pal and explain it to me? I grew up in a house where Sebastian Payne was second only to the devil himself, so my automatic defense of him is kind of blowing my mind.”
Reluctant amusement further chased away his anger. “You’re calling it like you see it because you’re an honest woman. Nothing wrong with that. Far from it. From where I’m standing, it’s the sexiest damn thing in the world.”
That made her brows slowly inch up. “The sexiest thing, huh?”
“You heard me.”
“So… seeing me naked didn’t turn your crank as much as my h
onesty?”
“Well,” he grinned, running hands down her back to cup her ass in his palms, “let’s not get crazy.”
“Dude, I’m just trying to keep you honest. Your rules, not mine.”
“Sassy. I fucking love that.” Gripping her hips, he picked her up to set her on the edge of the padded tattooing table. “Put your arms around my neck.”
“Okay.” Her smile was like sunshine as she did as he instructed, her face tilting up to his. “When I’m like this, all I want to do is look deep into your eyes. Is that okay with you?”
“Hell, yeah. I don’t want you looking at anything else. Open your knees.”
The hitch in her breath was more addictive than any drug. “So commanding.”
“I told you, I like being in control. I was minding my manners last night, but I’m ready to be everything you never even thought to dream about, but that means we do things my way. You’re good with that, yeah?”
Her eyes seemed to glow. “Will this lead to mind-blowing sex?”
“Count on it.”
“I’m in.”
And he’d thought she was skittish.
He’d never been happier to be so wrong.
Her knees opened as ordered, and when he moved to fill that space, her legs came around to lock him to her. The feeling of being totally wrapped up in her filled him in ways he couldn’t begin to explain even to himself. All he knew was that there was no denying the rightness of that moment.
“When we’re together like this, this is how I want you.” His arms around her tightened, just to let her know he was serious. “You, wrapping me up with everything you have. Understood?”
She nodded and tightened her arms as well. “Understood.”
“And no matter where we are, or what we’re doing, look at me the way you are now.”
“How am I looking at you?”
“You’re looking at me like you can’t wait for me to fuck you until it breaks you in a way you never want to end.” Again he let his hands roam over her back before moving under her shirt to unhook her bra. “You bought us some private time, yeah? How much?”