Inked: a Dark Bad Boy Romance

by Paula Cox

  The two take seats opposite of me as if they were in the principal’s office. Zeke doesn’t even bother waiting for me to sit behind my desk when he begins. “When I heard about the incident in the tattoo shop from Jimmy, I figured I should do some research. I went through the archives from when we last had a recorder, and I found a couple passages…” He fishes out a small brown, leather notebook from his back pocket and hands it to Anna.

  She reads from the page marked with the yellow post-it note. “December 9th: Killing on Maplewood today. Young tattoo artist affiliated with the club. Joey Davids. Detectives say that he was murdered by a gunshot to the head about ten minutes after giving the tattoo. His machines were still hot.” Anna turns to me and says, “This was eleven years ago.”

  “I remember it. I went to investigate with my dad. He was on the executive board of the club at the time and he had connections with the county sheriff. They had thought we had something to do with it since we had ties to the kid… my dad volunteered to go tell his girl about the killing.” It’s funny how those little things never seem to escape you—the voices of the detectives describing the killing as if it was just procedure, the smell of a body sitting out too long, the screams of a woman getting bad news…

  “But this was eleven years ago?” Anna cuts off my thoughts before they fall into that hole I don’t want to travel into. “Maybe yesterday was just a fluke or just one guy doing it.”

  Zeke lowers his voice as he replies, “There’s more too. I marked each one with a post-it note. And that was just in that year. I have six more books filled with post-it notes. The only connection is the tattoo.” Anna turns away from him and faces the wooden bookshelf I constructed myself. There’s nothing on it but a few journals I’ve kept and the logs from all of our business doings. Nothing in this office is something she could cling to for hope.

  Zeke again reaches over towards her and places his hand on her shoulder. This time, he catches my eye. The hand goes down as quickly as it went up, and he stands as he continues on, “So I called a guy that used to be a member of the Knights.”

  “What? Who the fuck do you know?” We don’t socialize with other clubs in the area, and we certainly don’t hold associations with old Knight members. We should have killed them all, but my dad took mercy on them and let them go free if they swore not to affiliate themselves with another Portland club again. This was the first I had ever heard of any of my guys getting hold of one of the past Knight riders.

  “He’s a friend, Mack. And now, he may be helpful. He knows more about what’s going on than what we do.”

  I’ve about had it with Zeke. I stand up, my hands planted flat on the face of my metal desk. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean, Zeke? You saying that I’m missing things? You calling me out for this? I just saved the girl!”

  “What does it matter!” Anna cries out, looking quickly between the two of us. Her dazzling blue eyes stop me where I am, almost pushing me back in my chair. “All I want to know is what the hell is going on and what’s going to happen to me!”

  I bite the corner of my lip, remembering my place. Control, Mack. Control. This is not keeping it together. This is losing it. She doesn’t need to see that, and neither does Zeke. Zeke is my biggest ally in the club and probably the only one who could convince the guys to get on board with the whole tattoo business, if it comes to that. With a small nod, I give him permission to continue while I find my place back behind the desk.

  “Henry said that the tattoo has meaning. Each line represents the people involved. The circle is the shield of the Knights. It’s like the patches they always had with the hunter green circle and the ‘K’ in the center. The first line represents the club member getting the tattoo. The line is unbroken and powerful. It’s part of the club, but it’s first and foremost. The second line is the target, the guy they’re going to kill first. The third is the tattoo artist. Each of the smaller lines are dependent on the first.”

  “So…” Anna says as she puts everything together, “If he came for me, he had to have killed someone earlier today. Maybe if we track down the murders in town, we can get a bit closer to who the guy is?”

  “That’s the thing, Anna,” Zeke says as he looks her over carefully. “There were no murders tonight. I’ve had the police scanner on for the last four or five hours since Jimmy came in with the news, and there’s nothing. There was a robbery about ten minutes from your shop, but that’s the only thing that seems club related, and frankly, I think that was one of our guys.”

  “You’re saying that they’re just targeting tattoo artists now? How does that make sense?” Anna doesn’t look like the girl that would be the target on anyone’s list. It has to be random that she got caught up in this shit.

  “The only thing that Henry knew about the current club is that to be a member, you have to have a kill, and the orders are coming top down from a guy named Ricky.”

  “Ricky Barber? From the Thug Shop? He hasn’t run anything since he got shot in Reno last year. No way you’ve got the right name there.”

  Anna shifts in her seat as she looks just past me, towards the shuttered window. Her face has gone white with splotches of pink around her cheeks and neck.

  Zeke pauses, his face contracting a bit. “No. That’s not his name... “ He pulls out a piece of paper from the journal Anna was reading from. “The guy’s name is Riley, Riley O’Connor. It’s a new guy, from all I’ve heard. He’s been riding around with clubs for the last few years trying to get memberships, but no one would take him since he was batshit insane.”

  “So he went out and resurrected the Knights? What the hell do you think is going on there?” I try to ignore Anna, who has stood up next to the bookshelf, a finger to her face as she bites nervously on her nail. By the looks of her, it’s as if this is getting to be too much to take. Still, it’s important that she knows what we’re up against. This Riley character may be just some wannabe poser trying to get his own territory or he could mean real danger.

  “All I know about him is what I’ve said. Henry apparently got an offer to join the club again as some senior, old tribe guy to help mentor the newcomers. He didn’t think there were many, but the ones he heard about were scum of the Earth types. They don’t care about business. They care about power and prestige. They just want a name for themselves, and they think they can do that by bringing in guys who would do anything to get it done.”

  “So he’s a crazy person?” I ask, innocently, thinking about what the other side has to think of me. I’ve been in this club world long enough to know not to mess around like this. Keeping a low profile may not get you many accolades from the inside of a prison, but it means you get to live to ride another day and the police don’t hound your operation until it’s dust in the ground.

  “Psychopath,” Anna exclaims. “He sounds like a psychopath.” She sits back down again, looking more tired than ever. Her shoulders hunch over her chest like she has suddenly picked up the weight of the world. It’s hard not to feel sorry for the girl.

  “That’s all Zeke. You hear anything else, you bring it to me directly. We’ll address the guys later tonight, tell ‘em what’s going on and why she’s here.”

  “She’s staying?” Zeke asks with a raised eyebrow.

  “Yeah. She’s not going back out there, at least not tonight. She’s under our protection now and officially in hiding. I’m working out a deal with her to open a tattoo shop next to my sister’s as part of that plan to make us look like a real business. But if she continues to refuse, if anything, we can use her as bait to get to this Riley guy.”

  Anna closes her eyes tightly and sucks in air. She holds up a hand, as if to protest, but Zeke steps in before she can say another word. “You should do it, Anna. It’s going to be good money, and we can keep an eye out for you. No one messes with our club. And if you’re worried about the whole drug dealing stuff you saw back in the warehouse, it has nothing to do with you. We talked to our lawyers when we deci
ded to bring in Kimmy, Mack’s sister, into the fold. No fed or police can touch you as long as you don’t have any business within the warehouse, which you won’t.”

  “I can’t. I just can’t. I need to get out of here.” She stands again, this time more frantically. I get up too, blocking her from the door. With a nod of my head, I let Zeke slip by, leaving us alone for now. I still wait until he’s out of earshot to speak.

  “You can’t go, Anna. It isn’t safe out there. If this Riley guy is hunting you down for the fun of it, he’s not going to stop, and the more you move around, the more fun he’ll have with it. But if he knows you’re being protected by us, he may not want to mess with you. His club tried that once and failed. It took down almost every guy to pull that. They won’t try it again.”

  “You don’t know that… you don’t know Riley.” She says it as if she does. A strange pin peaks in me, but I let it go. She’s tired and worn out. Nothing is going to be settled tonight, not with her like this.

  “How about you head to bed and think about it. I’ve got an apartment upstairs. You can sleep there. It isn’t the Ritz or anything. Tomorrow, we’ll get you set up in the building and you can see how it goes. Just give me a chance to save you, and you can pay me back later.”

  Anna looks at me with tired, bloodshot eyes. Her body softens as she nods to herself. I open the door and lead her upstairs towards my apartment on the third floor. Downstairs, I can hear Zeke speaking to the guys in a booming, swelling voice. He slowly explains the rising of the Knights and the new leadership gunning for Anna.

  As his voice grows more and more distant with each step, I grasp onto Anna’s arm. The day has officially caught up with her and hearing that some crazed asshole is targeting her life sends her reeling again. She stops on the second to last step, falling to her hands and knees. I prop her up, promising that we’re almost there. Finally, I pick her up, carrying her the rest of the way inside. All along, I try to ignore the fifty-or-so pairs of eyes from below that seem to have locked onto us as we enter my apartment together.

  CHAPTER 6

  I’m not great at admitting when I’m wrong. My mom routinely calls me pig-headed and stubborn with a capital “S.” Call it making up for not being book smart or for having to really fight for what I want in life, but I just don’t like it when other people prove me wrong. And now that I’m a few weeks into managing and owning Crazy 9’s, my own tattoo parlor, I’ve got some pretty thick crow to eat.

  Just as Mack promised, the transition from working at Ian’s shop to owning my own was a snap. Ian, of course, didn’t take it well that I was more eager to get into business with a guy I had just met. But when we had his friend Jimmy tell him about how he found me giving a Knight’s mark tattoo to a new member, he understood. The guy has always been like a second father to me. The only thing he wants in this world is to make sure that I’m safe and making the best decision for my future.

  He even fronted me some equipment and ink while we waited for supplies to come in. In exchange for all his kindness and generosity, I named the tattoo shop Crazy 9’s. It worked out well since he decided to keep the shop open for another few years. “Retirement can wait,” he grumbled to me when I protested. “This is my passion, and I’m not about to let no snot-nosed little girl run my business better than me!”

  The truth of it is that business is booming! The first few days, it was just the guys from the club coming in for the twenty percent discount Mack and Zeke agreed was fair. Those on my mom’s house protection squad got them for free. But their word of mouth spread like wildfire and I was fielding reservations for months in advance.

  Like Mack predicted, I could walk away today if I wanted to—hire all new staff, find a pro bookkeeper, and enjoy some tropical vacation somewhere it’s safe for me to go. All I’d have to do is collect my check. But I’m not like that. I don’t run from hard work or chaos. I was learning that from Mack who seemed to manage his business and personnel almost seamlessly. Every day, he was there, putting in the effort, making sure everyone, including me, was where we should be.

  On top of his regular duties as president of his club, he, for whatever reason, decided to personally take over my security. The first few days with him were awkward and crazy. That night I spent with him in his apartment was just icing on the cake. Waking up next to a fully dressed man staring me down with wide, gazing eyes was doable. Having to deal with him always in my space, always questioning my decisions—including paint colors and upholstery on the tattoo chairs—and forcing me to eat with him was becoming a little too much to bear.

  I know I should be grateful. My mom reminds me of that every day. I don’t tell her the real story though. With Ian’s permission, I lied and said that Crazy 9’s belongs to Ian’s long, lost brother, and that Ian wanted me to run it so he could focus on slowly phasing out the original Crazy 8’s. It made sense. She knew about me being in line to run his shop anyways. This was just a different way of doing it.

  I thought I had blown our cover when she first stopped in the shop. She had managed to make it through security with Zeke, who had used the codes to get in. Slipping through the front door, she found her way to the office where I was bickering with Mack about couch options for the waiting room. She may have heard me say to him that he wasn’t the owner of my tattoo shop whether he owned the building or not. If she had, she certainly didn’t question it. She took his hand and took my hasty introduction of him as a potential investor without any question.

  Still, later that night, as we dined at Kimmy’s restaurant, she brought up Mack suddenly and suspiciously. “So, that Mack guy. He seems to be around a lot for an investor. I saw him at the house the other day, dropping you off. Is there anything I need to know about him?” Her eyes stayed focused on the clam chowder soup in the bowl front of her, as if she was worried I would leap out at her for that question.

  “Mom. Please. He’s just a business partner. We hang out a lot, I guess, because he owns the warehouse behind us. It’s hard for him to… uh… not be around. But that’s it. Nothing else.” I angrily rip off a piece of french bread and chomp hard. The rest of dinner has this strange tone around it where I actually feel like I am hiding something from her, but I’m not. There’s nothing to hide. My relationship with Mack is purely business and nothing more.

  I know that Mack’s been facing the same kind of questions though. I hear them occasionally when I head upstairs to his apartment to talk about my day’s plans. They whistle and jeer while I shoot them the bird. “So mature!” I yell back down, but that doesn’t mean I don’t hear it when we pass on by together. Mack’s Old Lady, The Tattoo Bitch, First Lady... ugh. I can only imagine what they say to him when I’m not around.

  That’s rare though. There are so many nights when we spend every second together. He helps me close up shop by helping sanitize everything and counting the cash in the safe. He locks up behind me, walking me to my car. In his motorcycle, he follows me back to my new apartment, about a mile away from the shop, and spends the night watching TV and eating whatever I come up with for dinner.

  I will admit that having him around has helped make this old, dingy place feel like an actual home. Believe it not, I loved living with my mom. There was always the sound of someone else’s feet on the floor above me or her music playing over the speakers. We cooked together and talked about our weeks when our schedules finally lined up on Sunday nights. This place isn’t the same without someone else there to call it their place.

  It’s an old safe house where they kept guys on the run. At the middle of the block, it has tons of eyes on it, making it hard to attack without someone in the neighborhood watch group catching it. The gate attendant is an added bonus, but Mack doesn’t trust the guy running it. Instead, he puts his own guys there and lets them handle who is coming in and out of the richie community. My mom and Roxy are the only other ones who know exactly where I’m living and have the codes to get in.

  Mack’s let me decorate, which is
nice of him. I’m sure he wasn’t a huge fan of painting walls of a safe house periwinkle blue, but I don’t care. If I’m going to be living here indefinitely with him sneaking in and out till midnight each night, it’s going to be my style. With the profits from the tattoo parlor, I’ve been loading it with furniture and rugs—something that Riley would have never done with me, but Mack seems to enjoy just as much as I do. It makes dealing with his need for total control almost livable when he’s doing it to please me and make me feel more like a real human.

  Having him around hasn’t made me forget about Riley. He’s in the back of my mind night and day from the moment Mack leaves my side until we see each other again. Some days I get updates on their progress of learning more about the new leader of the Knights and why they may be targeting me. Zeke is the closest to understanding the truth of Riley’s real connection to me. Just last night at our dinner with some of the club’s executive committee, he mentioned how there haven’t been any more tattoo killings. Only me.