At first I thought it was some kind of diner or café.
Then I looked up at the sign on the building.
Pat’s Tats.
I shot him an Are you insane? look of panic and hurried away. “No way in hell. That’s where I draw the line.”
He grabbed my wrist and hauled me back, smashing me against his hard-as-steel chest. “I vote yes. You made me play beer pong all afternoon. Now, it’s my turn to choose.”
“This is different!” I shrieked. “This is permanent. You don’t leave this place with a T-shirt. The T-shirt is tattooed onto you!”
He pulled me closer to the door, his hand resting on the handle. “Where is your sense of adventure, Miss I Want to Experience New Things?”
I tried to pry his fingers from around my wrist. “Back in all the empty Solo cups where I stashed my sobriety.”
“What’s the big deal?” he asked, amusement in his voice. “We’ll get you a nice tramp stamp. Or maybe a playboy bunny on your hipbone. Those must be popular among college students.”
He was able to drag me through the door and place me in front of a giant board of designs. I felt my stomach churning. The alcohol must have been early for its appointment with my toilet. Then again, the awful nauseous feeling could have been attributed to my distaste for needles.
I mean, who really liked being stabbed over and over again with a sharp, pointy object?
The whole tattoo practice didn’t make any sense to me.
“I don’t know about this, Dawson.”
He took me by the shoulders and turned me to face him. “Mickie, I dare you to get a tattoo with me.”
Dammit.
He knew my kryptonite.
I was a sucker for a good dare.
Well, I didn’t used to be. But I’d made the vow when I got to college that I would take any challenge on, no matter how crazy or stupid.
I was suddenly regretting my decision to tell him that.
I pursed my lips. “Fine.”
“And you’ll let me choose it.”
Yeesh. “You’re pushing it, Cruz.”
He just raised an eyebrow without responding. I sighed. “All right. But if I end up with a tattoo of a penis for the rest of my life, I’ll make sure that yours is permanently detached from your body.”
I was pretty sure I saw his forehead break out in a sweat. “Noted.”
An hour later, after a bout of nausea and a few tears, I was finally able to look in the mirror to see the new ink on my shoulder blade.
I’d read somewhere that it was one of the least painful places for a tattoo.
They lied.
It had still hurt like a bitch.
“Chinese calligraphy?” I screeched. “Are you kidding me?”
Dawson burst into laughter. “People your age get clichéd tattoos they have to live with for the rest of their lives. I thought it was appropriate.”
“What does it even say?”
The skin around the tattoo was still red and swollen, of course. But they didn’t look like the ugliest Chinese characters I’d ever seen. And at least they were small. Thank God.
“It says, ‘No soup for you.’”
My head whipped around, my eyes narrowed. “That had better be a joke.”
His brow furrowed, as if he was hurt by my comment. “I thought you said you liked Seinfeld.”
Oh, my God. Was he serious? I couldn’t tell. I didn’t want to hurt his feelings, but—
He laughed again, even harder. “Holy shit, Mickie, I’m just kidding. It doesn’t say that.”
He stepped closer and peeled off his shirt, revealing a white bandage over his breastbone. “I’ll give you a hint, though. Your tattoo goes hand-in-hand with mine.”
He stripped the bandage off where a similar-looking tattoo was etched onto his perfect olive skin, on his left pec. I traced my finger along the skin around the fresh ink, careful not to touch the sensitive area.
He sucked in a breath.
“What does yours say?” I whispered.
His eyes flicked back and forth between mine. “It says, ‘Always Mickie.’”
That was the moment I officially signed over the lease to my heart.
He owned it now. Free and clear.
And there was a no-return policy.
He was waiting for my reaction. “I thought it was just cliché enough, but it’s honestly how I feel. Hopefully it’s something you’re okay with?” It was a question, not a statement.
The corner of my mouth twitched. “That depends.”
“On what?”
“What does mine say?”
His eyes lowered to my mouth and he licked his lips. He raised his gaze back to mine when he replied, “It says, ‘Forever Dawson.’” He shrugged, grinning devilishly. “I took some liberties with that one—”
I grabbed him by the neck and pulled his mouth to mine.
He released a groan that started at the back of his throat and vibrated against my lips. I sucked on his tongue, his lips, tasting every part of him. Huh. Beer wasn’t so bad when it came from his lips.
He plunged his tongue into my mouth, which I met with fevered vigor. But I pried my mouth away before things got too hot and heavy in a smoke-filled tattoo parlor that could have doubled as a set from Pulp Fiction.
His eyes were glazed over with passion when he finally opened them.
I smiled. “Good choice.”
Chapter Nine
Dawson
“What the hell, man?” I angrily said to Mason over the phone. “What the fuck are you doing in Hagerstown?”
Mason sighed over the line. “Dude, I don’t know. I rode up here with a buddy, and the next thing I knew he bailed on me and left me at his brother’s place.”
I didn’t have time for this shit.
“So, have the brother give you a ride back to Baltimore.”
I held the phone away from my ear when he went into a coughing fit. More like hacking.
Cocaine isn’t exactly good for your health.
I’d lectured my brother so many times about it, yet he still kept snorting that shit up his nose.
“He already left,” he wheezed. “And I don’t exactly have enough money for bus fare.”
“Because you spent all of it on your supply?” I snapped.
Silence.
Yeah, that’s what I thought.
I was about done with his addiction bullshit. I was always having to go out of my way to pull him out of whatever dumbass situation he’d most recently gotten himself into.
Mason wasn’t a bad guy. Not at all. Neither of my brothers were. We had just all dealt with the aftermath of our father’s beatings differently. Mason had his substances. Parker had his baseball and, occasionally, his temper.
I had…my anger?
Hell, I didn’t really know what I had. I never talked to anyone about my past. I didn’t want to burden anyone with my fucked up childhood.
So, I guess I had…my inner turmoil?
If you wanted to psychoanalyze that shit.
“I swear, it’ll be the last time,” Mason assured me.
I rubbed my temples, feeling a tension headache coming on. “Yeah, that’s what you said the last time, and the time before that. You realize I’m going to miss a full day’s work, don’t you? I’m not rolling in dough here that I have a full day to spare, Mace.”
“I know, man, and I’ll make it up to you,” he said, pleading. “I promise.”
I shook my head. “Fine. Text me where you’re at. I have to drop something off somewhere, but I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
Fucking great.
Now, I had to call my boss at the factory and explain that I had a family emergency.
Then go drop off my application to the police academy. I’d finally drummed up enough courage to do it.
Then I had to drive all the way to Hagerstown to pick up Mason.
This bullshit with him was all thanks to Salvatore Cruz. The stand-up father figure w
ho’d thought it had been more amusing to pound on his own sons with his fists than to actually raise us.
Verbal abuse. Emotional abuse. Physical abuse.
You name it, he did it.
And if he had been a better parent, I wouldn’t be going to pick up my coke-addicted brother from his drug dealer’s house.
Our mother Sandra had tried over the years, before she’d taken to her pills. She’d been the loving mother type when I was young, doting on her only son and husband. I had so many fond memories of her that Mason and Parker didn’t have. Would never have.
But after a few job layoffs, another child, and a detrimental cash flow problem, Sal and Sandra Cruz hadn’t been able to hold it together. Which resulted in alcoholism and anger management issues on Sal’s part, and pill popping on our mother’s.
Using us as punching bags had been Sal’s therapy for too fucking long.
I had tried.
Oh, how I’d tried to keep my brothers safe from Sal’s wrath. As their big brother, Mason and Parker had looked to me for protection. To save them from the boogeyman, who would be forever known to us as Sal Cruz. When they had gotten scared, they’d come to me to make it better.
And I hadn’t always been able to.
That continued to eat me up to this very day.
I hadn’t been strong enough to stand up to our father. Not until I went through a growth spurt and had actually been able to defend myself and them. But even then I feared him, to a certain degree. After so many years, I’d built up a serious pile of anger and resentment, and it was at that point that I let Sal know he would never touch us again.
But at that point, it was a little too late.
The damage had already been done.
And my brothers would forever suffer.
Because I had been too weak.
Chapter Ten
Dawson
She knew something was wrong.
Not only was Mickie extremely perceptive, but she knew me better than anyone else. Because I only let people know so much. She was always clued in when I was out of sorts, or if something was bothering me.
“So, we going to talk about it?” she asked.
There it is. I was surprised she’d lasted this long.
“Talk about what?”
We were at my bare-bones apartment, so even though I wanted some distance to work through everything that was swirling around in my head, I couldn’t have gone very far. It wasn’t much bigger than her dorm room, so there wasn’t a barrier between Mickie and the aftermath of one of my fucked-up family encounters—which I was currently experiencing.
I didn’t want her around this.
I didn’t want her to witness my anger, my frustration. My guilt.
She shouldn’t have to see any of it.
“Oh, I don’t know,” she said, sarcasm oozing from her words. “Maybe why you hardly said anything at dinner. Or why you’ve had a permanent scowl on your face ever since you picked me up tonight.”
I gave a pathetic attempt at a shrug. “Just had a bad day at work.”
Even though I’d never gone to work. I hadn’t told her about the Mason situation. And frankly, I hadn’t planned to.
My first reaction had been to take her back to her dorm after dinner. But I’d changed my mind at the last minute. For some reason I couldn’t explain, I didn’t want her to leave me. I didn’t want to be away from her tonight, to be alone. Which made no sense since I was having a mini anger meltdown that would completely scare the hell out of her when she saw the full force of it.
And she would run screaming for the hills. That was a foregone conclusion.
If she knew the level of anger I had coursing through me sometimes, she would never want to look at me again.
I couldn’t allow that to happen. I wasn’t going to lose Mickie. Not on top of everything else I’d lost in my life.
“You know you’re a terrible liar,” she said, kneeling down in front of me at the edge of my bed where I sat. “What’s going on, Dawson? Talk to me.”
I couldn’t bring her down with my sob story.
Sunlight deserved to shine, not be snuffed out by darkness.
I shook my head. “Trust me, it’s nothing you need to worry about.”
I hated to see the disappointment on her face. “But it’s clearly something that’s upset you. Which means that whatever it is, it’s important. It’s something you care about. Tell me.”
“Let it go, Mickie. It’s nothing.”
I shot to my feet and stalked over to the window. Crossing my arms over my chest, I stared out at the night sky, wishing for so many things that could never be.
“When are you going to open up to me?” she asked quietly from where she still knelt on the floor. “When are you going to…tell me things about your life?”
I hesitated. “There are some things you never need to know.”
“Right,” she said, a bitter tone entering her voice. “Because why would I need to know your innermost thoughts and feelings? I’m only your girlfriend. Someone who loves you and wants you to be happy. Why would I care about what’s really going on with you?”
I ground my back molars together, keeping a hold on my agitation. “It’s not like that.”
“No?”
My back was facing her, but I could tell she’d come closer.
“Because I hate to break it to you, Dawson, but that’s exactly what it’s like. That’s what being in a relationship is all about. You talk to each other and confide. I’m supposed to know everything about you. You’re supposed to come to me when you have a problem.”
“I don’t have a problem,” I muttered.
“But you do!” I heard her footsteps move across the carpet as she paced. “I know, every time, when something happens. But whenever I ask about it, you do what you’re doing now and just blow me off, keeping everything to yourself. And who is that helping? Certainly not you.”
I whipped around to face her. “This is who I am! This is how I deal with things, how I always have. And it’s worked pretty well for me so far. I just need you to accept that there are things I’ll never be able to talk to you about. Things you’ll never know.”
A look of devastation marred her features, jarring me. Her entire face was an expression of hurt. And I never wanted to fucking see that on Mickie’s face. Especially not if I was the cause of it.
Water filled her eyes. “I’ll never accept that,” she said in a broken voice. “That’s not how I want things to be between us. But if you can’t change—if you won’t even try—then I guess this is as far as we go.”
Wait. What?
“What do you mean?” I asked, panic rising in my chest.
Tears fell down her cheeks. “I’ve told you everything about me,” she whispered. “I’ve told you things that have hurt me. Things I’m ashamed of. Things I’m embarrassed by. Things I’ve never told anyone else in my life. I’ve given you that because I trust you with it. I want you to have that part of me. All of me.” She wiped her cheeks, grabbed her purse, and turned for the door. “I just wish you wanted me to have all of you.”
There was a finality in her voice that scared me to my bones.
She was leaving.
She can’t leave.
I’d just found her. I couldn’t lose her now.
I lunged for her, clutching her wrist and holding her in place. “Mickie, wait.”
Her breathing picked up, but she didn’t say anything.
I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to figure out how to fix this. I couldn’t tell her everything…yet. But I hadn’t expected her to call quits on us, either.
“I’m not…good at talking about my emotions or…feelings,” I murmured. “I know that bottling everything up isn’t the best way to handle my issues. And I get why that bothers you.”
Her face was turned away from me, and she refused to look at me. So, I found solace in the fragrance of her hair as I stepped closer and breathed her in.
Some da
ys, it felt like that was all that offered me solace.
Breathing Mickie in.
The smell of her hair, her skin, her lips, her arousal. I needed her to assault my senses like that, so I could assure myself she was real and she was here and she was mine. Sometimes, inhaling her essence was the only thing that offered me calm.
“But I need you to be patient with me, Mick,” I said on a rasp. “I need you to help me open up, and take the bad with the good.” I swallowed, gathering my courage. “I’ve never been in a meaningful relationship before. Hell, I didn’t even know what that looked like until I met you. And you’ve already shown me so much. I need you to show me the rest. It’s just that some things may take longer to…process than others.”
I waited.
Waited for her to move or say something. Anything.
I couldn’t have her leave so upset with me.
Turn around, baby. Please.
She slowly shifted and turned, first one foot, then the other—yes—until she fully faced me.
I was relieved to see less anger in her features and more…love? God, I hoped that’s what it was.
“I need all of those things from you, Mick,” I said. “But more than anything, I just need you. Don’t leave me. Please.”
Her gaze stayed on my face for a total of two seconds.
Before she launched herself at me.
Our lips crashed together, and our bodies surged toward each other. I wanted her so badly, I didn’t think I could wait any longer. Three months had wreaked some serious havoc on my willpower and self-control.
But now I was running on empty in both tanks.
I wanted her under me, over me, wrapped around me. Hell, I’d take her any way I could get her.
She broke the kiss and met my eyes. “I want you,” she said. “Take me tonight. Make me yours.”
Hell. Fucking. Yes.
Chapter Eleven
Mickie
It was finally happening.
I was going to have sex.
I thought I would have been a little more nervous in the moments leading up to it. But surprisingly, I wasn’t.
Because this was Dawson.
Always Mickie (Cruz Brothers Book 3) Page 5