by Stacy Gail
“You know what? I think he was. And I’m proud of how this one turned out,” he added, nodding to the graceful curl of metal before them. “But I have a feeling my next project’s going to put this one in the shade.”
“I can’t imagine anything more beautiful than this.”
“I can.” He fished his phone out, worked the screen for a few moments, then handed it to her. “Check it out. It’s not finished yet, but I’m calling it Mads.”
Mads gasped and shot him a stunned look before looking at the screen. A long-limbed, clearly feminine figure seemed to be caught mid-dance, its arms raised heavenward. It was breathtaking even in its unfinished state, and the thought that he imagined she could ever be that graceful, the perfect, took her breath away.
“Sage, this is beautiful.” More touched than she could ever remember being, she at last looked up. It was crazy, how much she loved that his eyes were already on her. “I can’t tell you how amazing this—”
“Mads.”
She jumped when Payne suddenly appeared, a clumsily wrapped painting in hand and a tight-lipped Scout by his side. “Oh. Hey, Payne.” She sucked in a deep breath and pressed a hand to her heart, trying to wrestle that automatic wariness that gripped her whenever he was around. Brainwashing was a terrible thing, she thought wryly, even as some alarm in her sounded at the grim look on his face. “You startled me. Is there something you need?”
“Yeah, there’s something I need.” His grim expression morphed into a dangerous scowl. “You, in my office. Right the fuck now.”
“Whoa.” In a heartbeat Sage was in front of her, literally blocking her from Payne as if he feared the other man was about to attack. “What the hell is this all about?”
Payne turned a snarl on him. “Stay out of this.”
“Sage might as well be allowed to sit in, Payne,” Scout cut in, and her cold tone jarred Mads even further. She’d heard stories about Scout’s terrible temper, but she’d never seen the other woman be anything other than warm and kind… until now. “He’s just going to be a pain in the ass otherwise.”
“Fuck it. Fine.” Still holding onto the wrapped painting, Payne turned on his heel, an air of palpable fury radiating from him. “Let’s hash this shit out.”
Chapter Eighteen
The knots in Mads’s stomach tightened as she and Sage were marched into Payne’s office. When she’d been in school, she’d never acted out enough to be called into the principal’s office, but she suspected it felt a lot like this.
“Okay,” she said the moment the double doors to Payne’s office were closed. “You should know I’m trying really hard not to freak the hell out, but it’s not working. Why are you acting like I’ve killed someone?”
“Not someone. But you sure as shit put a bullet right through my trust.” Leaning the wrapped painting against his desk, Payne turned to face her, his arms crossed, his whole stance aggressive. “I’ll admit, I took a gamble on you. I might make a big-ass deal about making potential tattoo artists go through all sorts of auditions to win a spot here at the House, but deep down I pretty much know whether or not I’m going to hire an artist long before those auditions are over. It’s a feeling I get in my gut. When I saw your designs at InkCon this past summer, I knew I had to do whatever it took to get you to sling ink for me.”
This wasn’t helping her anxiety one bit. “Payne—”
“Of course there was a problem with you. No surprise there. There are always problems with tattooists. That’s the nature of the beast. If an artist has any talent and depth at all, it’s usually because that artist has lived through some serious levels of personal hell. I’ve long ago come to accept that any tattooist worthy of being at the House is probably going to have a shit-ton of poisonous baggage and is basically an emotional fuck-up from start to finish.”
“That’s not Mads,” Sage interjected, pulling her to his side. Never before had she been happier to have someone to lean on. “I don’t know what the fuck your problem is, Payne, but whatever you think is going on, Mads hates the kind of bullshit drama you’re bringing to the table now.”
“Bullshit drama? You think I should be okay with someone trying to pull a fast one on me? Do I look like a goddamn sucker to you?”
“A fast one?” Baffled and more freaked than ever, Mads stepped forward. “What the hell are you talking about? What fast one?”
Payne’s furious gaze sliced back to her. “You think I don’t know your father’s work?”
The floor dropped out from under her feet.
“W-what?” she whispered.
“I make sure every person who works at House Of Payne is thoroughly investigated, to the point where I probably know them better than they know themselves.” Scout moved to a filing cabinet, pulled out a black folder and flipped it open. “Madelyn Marie Daniels, born in Chicago twenty-four years ago to Candace and Fletcher Daniels. The same Fletcher Daniels who worked for Payne years ago when we first started on the southside.”
Every drop of blood seemed to drain out of her, and all that was left for her to do was die. “You knew? All this time, you knew I was the daughter of Fletcher Daniels?”
“Of course we knew.” Scout tossed the file onto Payne’s desk before jamming her hands on her hips. “I thought it might wind up being a problem at some point down the road, but Payne’s gut told him you were perfect for the House, so he made it happen. Now here we are, right smack in the middle of the problem I figured we’d eventually run into.”
Never in her life had she been considered a problem. “That’s not fair, Scout. I haven’t done a damn thing that would warrant you calling me a problem. Hell, the first few months that I was here, I didn’t even talk to anyone because there was a part of me that felt it was disloyal to my dad.”
“Yeah? You sure that’s what held you back?” Payne wanted to know, aggression pouring off him in waves. “You weren’t just biding your time, looking for a weak spot where you could stick it to me and try to make me look like a fucking idiot?”
“What the fuck.” Again Sage stepped forward, looking so much like he wanted to put his fist through Payne’s face that Mads instinctively grabbed his arm and held on for dear life. “Trust me, you don’t need any help to look like an idiot, if you think that shit about Mads. You know what’s good for you, you mind your goddamn mouth.”
“I was never out to get you, Payne.” Hastily Mads dug in her heels, hoping against hope that Sage wouldn’t launch an attack if he knew he’d be dragging her along with him. “I’ll admit I’ve been keeping my eyes open for any sign of you stealing other artists’ works and claiming them as your own—”
“What?”
“—but I haven’t seen a hint of that from you,” she went on doggedly. “My dad may have insisted you were nothing more than a huckster who stole works from real artists just to look good, but I’ve seen your work. I know you’re an amazing artist, and you deserve respect for that. Thing is, I deserve that same kind of respect, so you’d better watch what you say when you talk to me.”
“You don’t like what I have to say? Fine.” Payne turned, hauled the painting he’d carried up to his office, and stood it upright on his desk. “I’ll let this piece of shit do my talking for me. What do you have to say about this?” With that, he tore the veiling paper off the painting. The frame was silver, and under the glass was a canvas slashed with bleak shades of gray and black, with a few random dashes of red thrown in. At the center, an almost cartoonish grinning skull that was on fire glared out at the world, with the bone structure making it look like the empty eye sockets were scowling. That was exactly how her father portrayed his skulls, something he repeated over and over again in his work…
Oh.
Oh, no.
You think I don’t know your father’s work?
“But… what…?” Baffled, she frantically searched around the edge of the painting and saw it, a lighter gray on gray signature.
Fletch.
Oh, no.
“What is this shit?” Sage stared at the painting in scowling confusion even as Mads’s stomach rolled greasily. Please, no, she silently prayed. Please, no…
“This is the painting Mads turned in as her one and only piece for House Of Payne’s auction,” Payne said, confirming her worst nightmare. “Only it’s. Not. Fucking. Hers. This is her father’s shitty work that she’s trying to pass off as her own, something no one’s allowed to do. This is a goddamn fine art auction that House Of Payne is sponsoring, don’t you get that? Fine. Fucking. Art. Each piece of art comes with a goddamn Certificate of Authenticity. But how can we give a legally recognized CoA to the highest bidder who wants to buy a genuine Mads Daniels painting, when she’s trying to pass off a work of her father’s? Fraudulent bullshit like this could ruin House Of Payne. Is that what you’re trying to do?” he went on, rounding furiously on Mads, whose world was crumbling around her. “Is this some kind of revenge that you and your crazy-ass father cooked up?”
“Payne.” Scout stepped closer, her eyes never leaving Mads. “Hold on a sec. I think we might have this all wrong.”
“What?” he demanded, shooting her an impatient glare.
“I don’t get this,” Sage muttered, scowling in confusion, before he turned to Mads. “How did you…?”
She stared at him, horrified.
Oh, God, no.
Maybe she could understand Payne thinking she’d been lying in wait, scheming to double-cross him. Scout, too.
But not Sage.
Not her Sage.
“I didn’t do this. You have to know I didn’t do this.” The words jerked out of her as she stared at the painting—a painting that was proof of ultimate betrayal. Except the prospect of Sage believing she’d done this devastated her even more. “We wrapped my donation for the auction together, or don’t you remember?”
“She’s right.” Sage put an arm around her shoulders, though she was now so numb she could barely feel it. “Mads and I took the painting she’d chosen to donate to this auction and wrapped it up. This steaming piece of garbage sure as fuck isn’t it. I don’t know what the hell happened, but you need to apologize for accusing this woman of trying to torpedo you, Payne.”
“My dad happened.” The words came out sounding like she was experiencing an earthquake—all rocky and trembling. That made sense. Everything inside her was erupting with a kind of devastating rage she’d never felt before. At her father. At Sage. At everything that held her together. “That… God… damn… mother… FUCKER.”
She didn’t know she’d wheeled around to speed for the door until she was lifted bodily off her feet mere inches away from it. She let out an enraged howl designed to terrify whoever dared to stop her from murdering the one man who’d given her nothing but grief her whole life. She didn’t want to be stopped. She wouldn’t be stopped. That vile thing that was her father was going to fucking die and be put out of her misery, and it was going to be frigging glorious.
“You’re not going to kill anyone, baby, so just slow your breathing and try to calm down, okay? Shh, shh, easy. There we go.”
Sage. Sage didn’t want her to kill anyone. That meant she must have been speaking out loud what she needed to do, but that didn’t change a damn thing. “Sage, let me go. Everything in my life that’s ever made me feel like shit has come from that complete asshole, and I’m sick of it. I’m going to put an end to it once and for all, so let… me… go.”
“No can do, though I’m loving this pissed-off side of you. You’re seriously getting me hot, though that’s probably not exactly what you’re wanting to hear right now.”
“That’s a safe bet,” Scout remarked.
“He said no one would want my paintings except the visually impaired,” she raged, flailing hard as she tried to break free. She should have known that once Sage decided she wasn’t going anywhere, that was that. “He actually said that to my face, and I just frigging took it, without ripping his throat out or anything. Talk about an opportunity wasted.”
“Wasted,” Sage repeated, then locked his arms around her like a vise when she almost got free. “That sounds good right about now. Anybody got any hard liquor or drugs on hand? No stimulants.”
“I usually break out the Pappy Van Winkle’s Family Reserve for special occasions, but I think we can bend the rules this time around.” Payne poured out a couple fingers’ worth of amber liquid at his desk while Sage half-carried, half-dragged her to the low-slung black leather couch, then sat down with her half on his lap. “Before this goes another step, apologies, Mads. I lost my shit when I unwrapped that polished turd your dad left for us to find and just started firing away. Considering how pissed you are now, I think you can understand where I was coming from. Here,” he added, crossing to where she sat and handed her the glass. “Drink.”
“No, I don’t—”
“Lady, this stuff is about three Gs a bottle, so understand that I don’t offer it to just anybody. Drink up, and don’t stop until you’ve finished every last drop.”
Damn it. “I didn’t try to sabotage your stupid auction, Payne.”
“Yeah, I’m getting that loud and clear.”
“And I refuse to work for some asshole who thinks I’d ever do something so malicious, so fuck you. I quit.”
“Denied.” This came from Scout, who’d also crossed to where she and Sage sat, and took a chair near them. “You can have the day off, though. Nobody’s going to want a tattoo from someone who’s shaking with berserker rage. Though, honestly, I can’t blame you. In fact, I’m shaking with rage right along with you. We all are, honey. Okay? We’re all on the same side here.”
That barely penetrated the fury swamping her brain. “Denied? What the hell does that even mean? You can’t stop someone from quitting.”
“Yeah, I’ve tried that in the past, and it’s never gone well for me, so here’s what we’ll do. You can quit for a day. But then we need you back, because you have a loyal clientele and a waiting list that goes on for miles. If nothing else, think about them and how disappointed they’d be if you just up and quit.”
“Go to hell—”
“More to the point,” Scout went on calmly, clearly immune to any poison Mads tried spitting her way, “think about how delighted your pops would be, knowing he’d had a hand in making you quit House Of Payne. Who knows? Maybe that was what he planned all along by pulling this stunt—either Payne firing you, or you quitting.”
“That… bastard.” Clearly they weren’t going to leave her alone until she jumped through their hoops, so Mads chugged the bourbon Payne had given her without any appreciation at all for the woodsy, silky-smooth spirit. “There. See? All gone. Now let me up. I have murdering to do.”
Sage’s arms didn’t unlock. “Can’t let you get behind the wheel now that you’ve had a big belt of liquor. I’ll drive.”
“Why? Afraid I’ll go and conspire some more with my fucking asshole father, Sage?” she shot at him furiously, struggling against his hold. “Don’t deny that’s what you thought when you saw that painting.”
“I didn’t know what to think,” came the measured reply that made her want to scream. “I still don’t know how that bastard managed this, so I’m definitely going with you to get some answers.”
“Fuck you. The moment you thought I tried sabotaging this auction, you lost any right to be a part of this.”
“Wrong.”
Goddamn it. “Not to mention you have to work.”
“Not if I quit, too.”
“Shit,” Payne muttered faintly, looking heavenward. “Just what I don’t need, a damn mutiny right in the middle of everything. Fuck my life.”
Mads ignored him. “Listen to me, Sage. I’ve had it. Do you understand? This… this monstrosity,” she decided, tossing her head toward the offensive thing that was her father’s painting, “is just the last straw in an endless line of insults I’ve had to deal with my whole life, and I’m… fucking… done. I have got to put an end this, a
nd I don’t need you getting in my way. I don’t need you, period.”
“Well, I need you, so you’re just going to have to find a way to cope. I also can’t sit on you all day to make sure you don’t commit fucking homicide,” he added with a shrug, as if this were the only logical conclusion anyone could come to. “So the only thing left for me to do is go with you and deal with everything once and for all, starting with your father.”
“Hell, I’m tempted to go with you,” Payne said, and the snarl in his voice was enough to penetrate even the blind rage blanketing Mads’s brain. “Apparently good ol’ Fletch has been telling lies about me.”
“I’ll say,” Scout chimed in, looking like she tasted something sour. “Does anyone besides me see the irony here? The assclown who told Mads you were a guy who steals art from other artists is the same guy who stole Mads’s art. I mean, that little pissant’s hypocrisy is mind-boggling.”
Payne nodded. “That’s why I’m tempted to drop in on ol’ Fletch. In a business where you’re only as good as your reputation, having someone out there spreading lies about my work is something I don’t usually tolerate. But I’m not about to give that fucking knob-polisher the attention he obviously craves, so he can go suck a bag of dicks for all I care. You might want to try not caring as well, Mads,” he added, and the look he turned her way was a complex jumble of anger and compassion. “I know he’s your pops, and from a psychological standpoint that’s a big deal. But here’s the truth of it—Fletcher Daniels has always been a third-rate talent burdened with first-rate delusions of grandeur. He thinks the world has done him dirty by not acknowledging his greatness, when in fact the world’s done exactly what it usually does with mediocre hacks. It’s ignored him. You should think about doing the same.”
“He stole my painting, Payne.” There. She said it out loud, and as far as she was concerned it was the final nail in the coffin when it came to her relationship with her father. “If nothing else, I have to get it back for the auction. Not that anyone would notice that the one promised painting from the newest tattooist at House Of Payne is missing, but it matters to me. As of now, I don’t have one single art piece to show for the auction.”