by London Casey
Bella swallowed hard. “Holy fuck, Zayne. I think I’m in love with you.”
I laughed. I knew she was just messing around.
She grabbed my shirt. “I needed to hear that.”
“Good.”
“It still hurts, Zayne. He called me today. My entire life is back there. I have stuff in the apartment. I had a job. My boss fired me already.”
“What were your intentions when you started to drive away?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “Just find somewhere to hide.”
“And here you are, darlin’. Hide with me.”
“Hide with you? Are you…hiding? Did something…”
I ran my thumb across her lips to stop her questions.
I wasn’t going down that road with her just yet.
I sat back down and grabbed a fresh pair of gloves.
I got my needle together again, the colored ink ready.
“Keep talking, darlin’,” I said. “This is what we do here. We bleed it out. Replace that bullshit with what I’m putting on your skin.”
“I met Abby in college,” she said after a moment. “I actually have a degree in writing. Creative Arts. Abby was there for Philosophy. She was a party animal, and I was the calm one, always looking for my next book to write. But we clicked. We lived together on and off campus. When I met Parker, she was the one who said to stick with him. He was the big bad career-focused guy. But lately things just were off. I was working so much. Trying to keep up on my own stuff, you know? And he was working a lot, too. When I worked late, it was wrong. He got pissed because I was just a waitress. When he worked late, it was okay because it was for his career. He was going to be something.”
“You’re something, Bella,” I said.
“Thanks. But I don’t feel it, Zayne. Abby has a lot going for her. She’s wicked smart. She’s really pretty. She’s got that wild side that still comes out, too. She took her degree and then went back for some marketing classes and works privately for a couple tech companies, making really good money. She’s got everything. And I’m sure in some sick way, sleeping with Parker was just her wild side.”
“Parker?” I asked.
“That’s his name.”
“Right. Parker.” I stopped working for a minute. “I hope you realize what you’re worth, Bella.”
She turned her head and looked at me. “And what is that, huh? What exactly am I worth, Zayne?”
She was a little less drunk than she was an hour ago. I was as sober as sober could be. There were a lot of cliché things to say right then that would get me in her panties. It really wasn’t that hard. But to speak from my own experience and offer a sliver of my own twisted-up heart, that was something else.
I went with cliché, even though I did mean it.
“Bella, you’re worth everything.”
12
BELLA
“Okay, you’re all set, darlin’.”
His voice was smoother than whatever whiskey I had been drinking at that bar. My head was aching a little already. The room had a gentle spin to it, but I blamed the pain from the tattoo. Honestly, I didn’t understand how people got dozens or hundreds of tattoos.
I had been biting my lips and swallowing tears and pain for what felt like hours.
I felt his hand slide along my skin.
“Here, check it out,” he said.
He pushed back and rolled his chair along the floor. He started to clean up while I turned and looked down at my right hip. Sure enough, there was a tattoo there. The night had officially gotten that crazy. Which was exactly what I needed, all things considered. A guy as sexy as Zayne, touching me, tattooing me, kissing me.
And the tattoo…
“A butterfly,” I whispered.
“Yeah.”
“I love it.”
“You love it?” he asked.
“Yeah. I really do.”
“That’s what I drew for you,” he said. “Reminds me of you.”
“It does? Why?”
Zayne turned and leaned against his desk. He was so tall. Shoulders so wide. Muscles and tattoos spilling from his t-shirt. It almost seemed unfair that a guy could just throw on a black t-shirt and look as good as he did. But he was authentic. Genuine. Real. I believed him whenever he talked. And for whatever damn reason, I trusted him.
“It’s you, Bella. From what I’ve seen since I met you. Butterflies are all about transformation. About becoming you. About being free. You see a caterpillar on the ground, right? The fuzzy thing just moving along all slow. Just some bug on the ground. But then it rebuilds itself. It changes itself. It breaks free from the ground, taking flight. That’s you. Right? Look, I’m so sorry what happened with your boyfriend and best friend. There’s no justifying it and no making sense of it. But I think you’re better than that.”
I swung my legs off the chair and stood up. I kept my jeans peeled down my hip way too far. In my mind, I thought if something touched the ink, it would smush like a wet marker.
“You really think that about me?” I asked Zayne.
“Hell yeah I do, darlin’. I hope you keep flying. Find your way. Go wherever the fuck you want to go.”
“Well, to do that, I need my car back.”
I laughed, but Zayne didn’t. Instead, he rubbed his chin. “Yeah. Your car. Bella…”
I didn’t give a damn about my car.
I approached Zayne and pushed myself up on my toes so I could just reach his chin.
“Kiss me again,” I whispered. “Right now.”
Zayne touched my face. “Still wanting to do this crazy thing, huh?”
“Yes,” I whispered. “The night isn’t over yet.”
His lips brushed against mine. I felt the sexy tickle of his facial hair against my lips and face. His other hand slid around to my back and he pulled me tight to his body.
I groaned as we started to kiss. A real kiss. A wild kiss.
It broke just a few seconds later, though.
“Zayne…”
“Darlin’,” he said, “I’m fine with whatever you want or need right now. I get it… feeling so let down and feeling so fucking hurt. I can be your whiskey, Bella. I can take the pain away.”
The words melted my heart as fast as my panties.
I kissed him. Harder. Faster. Breathing heavy, groaning into his mouth, feeling him commanding me with the slightest movement. I wanted him. I wanted him right there, right on the desk. Or the chair where he had tattooed me.
Anywhere. I didn’t care.
Just fucking take me, Zayne.
He stopped kissing me. “Bella. Let me get that ink patched up and get you home.”
“And then?”
He put his thumb to my chin and curled his lip. “And then you’re all fucking mine.”
It was fucking wild.
We were inside the apartment no more than two steps before Zayne grabbed me and spun me around. He kicked the door shut and threw his keys to the floor. I was then against the door, staring up at him for all of two seconds before he pinned himself against me, bending his knees, kissing me, scooping me up in his huge, tattooed arms.
He lifted me up as I groaned, the kiss getting hotter by the second.
Zayne turned and started to walk. We slammed into the table. It scratched against the floor. My ass hit the table, and my legs wrapped around him, pulling him tight against me. He thrust, his strength making the table slide against the floor again. The scratching sound made me cringe.
The kiss broke, and Zayne devoured my neck. His hands moved up my sides, his left hand against the bandages he used to protect the fresh tattoo. I wondered for a second how many times he had done this, tattooing a woman and then taken her home. But what the hell did I care? This was exactly what I needed. Something so crazy that I could never possibly regret it.
His hands were under my shirt, skin on skin, around to my back.
He kissed inch by inch around to the other side of my neck.
Then h
e broke away for a second.
“What?” I whispered.
“Nothing,” he said.
He pulled me forward and lifted me off the table.
We stared at each other as he walked me through his apartment. To my surprise, he skipped by his bedroom and walked to the spare bedroom I had been sleeping in. He kicked the door open with ease and took me to the bed.
Zayne dropped me down and grabbed my shirt again. He lifted it up over my head and threw it to the floor. I clawed at him, wanting his shirt off too. I climbed to my feet, breathless, seconds flying by too fast. I put my hands under his shirt and was treated to muscle-laced ridges that led from his stomach all the way up to his cut-from-stone chest.
Then in a move that was so him to pull, Zayne used one hand to rip his own shirt off.
I stared at him for a second, taking it all in. His tattoos ended around his shoulders. His chest was bare. Not a drop of ink. It sort of surprised me, but it was fucking hot. He looked wickedly delicious. The best part of his entire body was that he had his left nipple pierced. A bar went through it. I’d never seen a man with a nipple piercing before. Zayne was so far out of my league it didn’t even make sense that he was standing there in front of me.
He reached behind my back and unsnapped my bra without even really trying. No struggling. No breaking eye contact. Looking calm, cool, collected, and ready to screw my brains out.
My body shivered as my bra slid down my arms and fell between us to the floor. My nipples were harder than ever. His hands touched my shoulders and then went down. My back tightened, and I thrust my chest at him as his hands eased down and over my breasts. He touched me for only a second, turning me on even more. I wanted him to keep touching me. I wanted his mouth against my bare skin. I wanted him to taste me.
No, I want to taste him first…
I came forward and pressed my lips to his chest. His skin was so hard, so well built. I was shaking as I started to kiss downward. My lips touched his nipple ring, and I groaned.
He was so fucking hot.
His fingers touched my back. Very slowly, he started to run his fingertips up and down my back. I shivered because it felt good.
My tongue flicked against the nipple ring.
And that’s when it all came crashing down on me.
I should have just kept drinking to keep everything out of focus. Meaning…mindless rebound sex with the hot tattoo artist who helped me with my broken down car, let me stay in his apartment, and gave me a free tattoo.
Instead, I put my forehead to his chest and stopped kissing him.
The entire mood changed on a dime as I shut my eyes and felt his fingertips move down, up, and then down again.
Then he sealed the deal with a kiss to the top of my head.
And I burst into tears.
Zayne didn’t say a word at first. He kept doing what he was doing. I then put my arms around his beautifully built body. My breasts pushed tight against his torso as I turned my head to the side and rested it against his chest.
His right hand slid up into my hair, and his left hand stopped at the middle of my bare back. His fingers spread wide.
And that’s when I realized he was holding me. He was comforting me.
I had ruined the night. I had ruined the moment.
I had really fucked everything up again.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
“Don’t be, darlin’.”
I squeezed my fingers into the muscles of his back and then backed away. I covered my chest with my right arm.
“Zayne…”
He touched my cheek and smiled. “Why don’t you get in bed and get settled?”
He then turned and slowly fell to the floor, sitting on the floor with his back against the bed. He gave me privacy. Considering he had just been kissing me and his hands holding my breasts.
I pulled the covers back on the bed and climbed into it. I frowned as I covered up my body, knowing what could have been happening right then. I opened my jeans and slid them off my body, leaving me in nothing but panties. The truth was that I should have been wearing Zayne. He should have been kissing me everywhere. All the right and wrong spots. His tongue drawing shapes down between my legs…
I pulled the covers to my shoulder and reached out to touch his shoulder as he sat there. He turned his head and looked over at me.
“You okay, darlin’?” he asked.
“I don’t know. I’m so sorry I…”
“It’s okay,” he said. “I should have slowed that down a little. I should have known better.”
“No, Zayne. No. I want…I just…”
He nodded. “I get it. Believe me, I get it.”
“Tell me then,” I whispered. “What happened?”
Zayne sighed, his head still turned so he could look at me. “I just get what it feels like, Bella.”
“That’s why you’re here,” I said. “Not really working at St. Skin. This apartment isn’t your real home, either. This is you just…being here for a minute.”
“Maybe,” Zayne said. “Maybe not.”
“I wish you would tell me,” I said. “You know, it might help me.”
Zayne laughed. He then turned around, on his knees, in front of me. “It might help you, huh?”
“Yeah. To know I’m maybe not alone.”
“Darlin’, I can give you something that would blow your mind away.”
“Then do it.”
“You need to get some sleep.”
“Oh, so you’re going to punish me for not sleeping with you?” I asked.
“No, Bella. I would never do that to you. Think what you want about me when you see me, but I’m not that kind of guy. Get some sleep.”
He leaned forward and kissed my cheek.
I watched as he stood up and went to get his shirt.
He was fucking gorgeous. I could stare at him for hours and not care about anything I’d miss in life.
“Zayne, thank you for being so sweet,” I said.
He paused at the door and looked over at me. His lip curled. He was a total tattooed hunk.
“Sweet? Just for the record, darlin’, I would have done things to you tonight that would have you blushing for weeks.”
My mouth fell open, and Zayne slowly shut the door.
I pulled the covers to my mouth and bit down on them.
What had I done? It made me hate Parker and Abby even more. I let them get to me when I was trying to get over them. And now I was alone in bed.
The kisses may have dried on my skin, but when I lifted the covers, I saw the bandages from the tattoo.
It made me smile and blush.
Zayne seemed like my kind of crazy…but I had no idea where he wanted to take this…and I was going to find out real quick.
13
ZAYNE
I sat at the kitchen table alone, with the company of a beer and the wedding invitation. I kept looking toward the hallway, thinking about Bella. Not that I’d encourage someone to drink too much, but at least this time, it helped her loosen up enough to tell me about her boyfriend. Well, her ex-boyfriend. Even though she was still hung up on the guy. And why not? Shit, she found the guy in bed with her best friend. Was there anything worse than that?
I glanced down at the wedding invitation and curled my lip.
“There could be,” I whispered.
Bella was the only one I could trust. She was the only one who could understand and help me out here. From the second I met her, I knew there was something about her that sucked me in. Her heart was broken and confused. Not that I should have been the one adding to it, but maybe I could help her. I’d eventually have to show her my heart, but not tonight.
Tonight, I needed to drink and think.
I put my middle finger to the wedding invitation and slid it to the edge of the table. I grabbed it and stood up, sticking the stupid thing into my pocket and walked with my beer in my hand.
It was my own fault that I got the invitation. Bec
ause I let her know where I lived. This apartment was supposed to be my hiding spot. My temporary holdover place until I got my shit sorted out. But the days turned into weeks and weeks into months. I liked working at St. Skin. I didn’t mind the town. This was definitely a place to settle, but I wasn’t in the mindset for settling. I tried that once, and it took everything from me.
Then again, it just wasn’t with the right person.
I paused at the door and looked down the hallway again. Venturing for a little walk, I went to the room where Bella was crashing. I opened the door enough to let the light from the hallway spread across the bed, showing me that she was already asleep.
Taking a deep breath, I thought about what the night could have been. I didn’t mean to push at her that hard. She was just so…kissable. Fuckable. Everything-able. Her lips tasted like whiskey-laced honey. They were temptation mixed with fire. Feeling her body was like grabbing a piece of heaven and holding it tight. Even when she finally let herself go and started to cry, I was touching her and holding her to my chest to let her cry—I didn’t do that kind of shit. I wasn’t the comforting type of guy. But I did it for Bella. There was so much bullshit I could have said to her in that moment to get her to calm down and open her legs, yet I didn’t think twice when I told her to get into bed and fall asleep.
I stepped into the room and toward the bed.
She hadn’t moved an inch.
She was out cold, the booze definitely helping her. She definitely got lucky I pulled her away from the bar when I did. She’d wake up with a headache, but it was better than getting sick all night.
I crouched down and touched her shoulder. I grabbed the covers and pulled them up even more.
Damn, I really felt sorry for her. To give up her dream for someone else and then have that blow up in her face. And this guy had the balls to come back at her and try to tell her it was her fault? That she’d done something so wrong it brought him and her best friend together? Maybe there was more to the story than she let on, but I believed her. I actually believed her.
Bella was knocking over walls inside me without realizing it.
I stood back up and left the bedroom.
I went into my room and tossed the wedding invitation on the dresser. No more hiding the fucking thing. I was going to need it for morning. Then I opened another drawer. My hands hesitated as I thought about what to do. Well, I knew what I wanted to do. I’d come this far with Bella, and there was no need to turn back now.