A Kiss For You

by Rachel Van Dyken

  Preppy saw the flames from my mom’s trailer and pulled up behind the gas station.

  He took us home.

  He sang to her made up, profanity laced, lullabies.

  Max gulped down a bottle so quick she would pause to choke, and my heart skipped out of my chest every time she did it, but then she would keep going.

  I was so nervous. I was a single guy in my early twenties who’d never so much as been in the same room as a newborn before. I’d never even spent more than a couple of hours with the same woman.

  And suddenly, I had this baby girl to raise. It was the first time in my life that I can say I was truly terrified.

  I talked to her again and hummed some Zeppelin to her until she fell asleep on my chest.

  I covered us both up with a blanket and watched the fan spin around until I saw lights flashing through my front windows.

  Blue and red.

  “It turns out the convenient store had some pretty decent surveillance. Since I walked away without seeking help and I made no attempt to douse the fire or save my mom, they arrested me. Charged me with manslaughter and put me away.

  Max got sent to foster care right away since they couldn’t find Tricia. They wouldn’t release the baby to Preppy because he was a felon himself, not to mention he didn’t have a legit job on record, anyway. Grace was in Georgia, getting treatment for her first fight with her cancer at the time.

  “Do you know what ever happened to Tricia?”

  “No, but if she’s smart, she’ll never show her fucking face in this town again.” King sighed. “They took her from me. I was her dad for only three hours, and they were the three best hours of my fucking life. And they fucking took her from me.”

  “You’re still her dad,” I offered.

  “Yeah, I’ve been trying to be,” King said. “While I was away, I did everything I could. Filed papers. Hired lawyers. But it got me nowhere.”

  “Is there anything else you can do?” I asked. “There has to be. This can’t be it.”

  “There are two options left, at least two that I know of. The first one is a long shot.” King flashed a sad smile. “But there’s this guy, a big shot judge. A dirty fucking politician. Bear has ties to him through the MC. The senator thinks he can make him see things my way and rule for custody in my favor.”

  “So what are you waiting for? Do that!” I shouted excitedly.

  “It will cost me about a mil,” King said flatly, killing my growing enthusiasm.

  “Shit,” I cursed. “A mil? As in a million dollars?”

  King laughed. “Yes, Pup, as in one million green-backed American fucking dollars.”

  “Do you have that kind of money?” I asked.

  “I did,” King said. “I don’t anymore. We sunk everything into getting the granny operation going. Even if I sold the house, it needs work, and that costs even more money. And the market sucks right now, so even if I sold it I wouldn’t be able to come up with even half that.”

  “And if you do get custody, you need a home to bring her to,” I added.

  “Yeah, I’ve imagined building her a tree house in the big oak by the garage and turning my studio into her room, move my tattoo shit into the garage apartment.”

  “Then, where would Bear go?” I asked.

  “Home! Bear has a room at his pop’s place and a room at the clubhouse. He just likes to take up all the rent-free space he can.” King laughed.

  “I am so, so sorry, about all of it,” I said, tears spilling out onto my cheeks. He wiped them away with the pad of his thumb.

  “Don’t be sorry, Pup. I’ll never be the good guy in the story. I let my mom burn to death. I lost my daughter because of who I am and the things I’ve done. That shit’s on me. That’s my cross to carry.”

  The deep need to help reunite King with his daughter dictated my decision-making. I took a deep breath and grabbed his hands, folding them onto my lap.

  “What do we need to do next?”

  “We?”

  “Yeah.” I let the word sink in. “We.”

  “WE don’t need to do anything. I’ll figure something out.”

  “But wait. You said there was a second option.”

  King shook his head. “It’s a worst-case scenario, and honestly, it’s going to be bad whether I decide to do it or not. I can’t win either way.”

  “Tell me what exactly is it you’d have to do.”

  “It’s a dark road to travel down, and I’m not sure it’s one I could ever come back from.” It was the lingering sadness in his voice that made my heart break for him and made me not want to press him further. “But it’s a worst-case scenario, so I’ll cross that bridge when and if it comes down to it.” King looked at me thoughtfully. “For now, I’m going to kick the granny thing in high gear and see what we can come up with.”

  “Let me know if you need my help. I’ll do anything.”

  “I’ll remember you said that,” King said, pulling me onto his lap.

  “I mean it.”

  “So did I,” King replied, squeezing me tighter. He buried his nose in my neck. “I might need you to stay with Grace a while.”

  “Why, is she okay? I mean…you know.” I stammered.

  “Grace is fine for now, but we might have some shit going down here soon, and I need you far away from it.”

  “The Isaac thing?” I asked.

  “Yeah, the Isaac thing. But don’t worry about it. Just know that when I say you need to go to Grace’s that’s where you need to be. No questions asked. No arguing bullshit. You got me?”

  “I got you.”

  “Can we talk more later, Pup? I feel like a fucking chick right now, spilling my guts to you.” King laughed.

  “Yeah, we can talk more later,” I said.

  I wrapped my arms around King’s neck and looked over the water. The bird that was the inspiration for my sketch sat on top of a crab trap buoy in the middle of the bay. His beak was down, searching in the water for his next meal.

  “So what now?” I asked, turning back to King.

  “Now? Now, we need to go upstairs, and I need to get you in my bed because I’m not even fucking close to being done with you tonight.”

  Doe

  “Get up,” King said.

  He took me by the hand and lifted me off the mattress. I was still half asleep. Knocked into a sex coma after King proved that when he said he wasn’t nearly done with me, he wasn’t lying.

  Heat coursed from his hand into mine and shot directly into my erratically beating heart, causing my breath to hitch in my throat.

  “Where are we going?” I managed to squeak out as I pulled on a tank top and my underwear.

  Looking down into my eyes, King slowly tucked an unruly strand of hair behind my ear, allowing the very tips of his fingers to brush against my skin.

  “Pup,” he said, his voice almost hoarse, “it’s time for you to stop living for who you might’ve been and start living for who you are now.”

  “I thought that’s what I was doing,” I said with a yawn. King’s grip tightened around my palm. He dragged me down the hall into his tattoo studio and switched on the light.

  “Sit,” he commanded, releasing my hand and gesturing to the chair in the middle of the room.

  “Why?” I asked becoming more aware as I slowly woke up.

  My palms started to sweat. “You want me in THAT chair?” I asked.

  King walked over to the iPod docking station, and with his back to me, he flipped through the songs. After a few minutes, the sounds of Florida Georgia Line’s STAY filled the room.

  When King turned back around and noticed I was still standing by the door, he narrowed his gaze and again pointed to the chair. “Sit, or I will come over there, pick you up, and toss you onto it.”

  His tone did not imply that I had another option. I reluctantly moved over to the chair and tentatively perched myself on the edge.

  “Take off your shirt.” His voice so suddenly strained, he h
ad to clear his throat. King sat down on his rolling stool and opened the bottom drawer of his tool box. He started sorting out materials just as if he were getting ready to tattoo a client, just like I’d seen him do many times over the past few weeks.

  “What? Why? What are you doing?” I asked, unable to hide the panic in my voice.

  “Because, Pup, it will be very hard to do this fucking tattoo with your shirt on. So, take the goddamn thing off, yeah?” King was demanding, but his tone hinted at a softness that wasn’t there when I’d first met him.

  “I already told you. I can’t,” I said. “You just don’t get it. I may want one, but I just can’t. I’ve told you this.” Then, another thought crossed my mind.

  He wouldn’t tattoo me against my will, would he?

  King stood from his stool and slowly approached. A menacing look in his eyes. He pushed my knees apart and settled his large frame between my thighs. He rested his forehead against mine in a gesture that was both intimate and new.

  “How many times do I need to tell you? You need to learn to do what you are told, Pup,” he growled, his cool breath floating across the skin on my cheek and neck.

  In one fluid movement, he yanked my tank top over my head and tossed it onto his toolbox. “You’re mine now. In every way. And I need you to know that if you regain your memory and remember who you are, you’re still going to be mine. If you have a boyfriend out there waiting for you? You’re still mine.” He paused. “And if you ever leave me to go back to your old life, just know that no matter who you are with, every inch of this beautiful body of yours will always belong to me.”

  Braless and feeling very exposed in every way, I made a move to cover my breasts with my hand. I looked down to the floor to avoid eye contact. I could feel his gaze on my body. The hair on my arms stood on end. My nipples hardened.

  King’s lips curled upward in a wicked smile. He leaned back into me and placed his hands over mine, removing them from my breasts, fully exposing me to his hungry gaze. He blew out a long-held breath. His tongue darted out, licking his bottom lip before sucking it into his mouth. After what seemed like a lifetime, he shook his head and lightly chuckled.

  “This isn’t about me right now,” he said. I got the feeling he was talking to himself rather than to me. “Lay on your stomach.” He snapped on a pair of black latex gloves.

  “You can’t. I can’t,” I argued.

  He sat down on his stool and rolled it toward me with his feet. “You said you wanted a tattoo, right?”

  “Yes, I did, and I do. But I can’t. I can’t because what if—”

  “No. Let me guess, you can’t because it may be what you want, but it may not be what SHE wants?” He didn’t wait for me to answer. Probably because he knew that was exactly what I was going to say. “But what you aren’t understanding is that you are her!” King roared, standing up so abruptly his stool slid back and hit wall behind him. “Don’t you see? You can’t second guess everything you want because you are afraid of remembering another life!”

  He paced the room and wrung out his hands, cracking his knuckles.

  “Fuck who you were!” King screamed, the veins in his neck pulsing with each of his ragged breaths. “Be you, this fantastic, amazing, fucking beautiful…” His tone softened, and he stopped pacing, lifting his eyes to meet mine. “We’re not just going to have a life, remember? We’re going to live.”

  He slowly approached me. Again, he moved my hands away from my breasts. He pressed his chest into mine. His hands circled around my lower back, his hardness to my softness.

  “I fucking love who you are, Pup, and it’s about damn time you learned to love her, too,” he said, placing a soft kiss on the edge of my mouth, igniting a sensation deep within that caused my entire body to shake.

  LOVE?

  I started to protest again, but the fog of desire wouldn’t lift, and instead, I just sat there with my mouth open, waiting for King to make the next move.

  Much to my disappointment, he sat back onto his stool and opened another drawer of his toolbox. He took out a sheet of paper that was almost see-through with colorful lines already drawn onto the page.

  “Here.” He passed me the paper, averting his gaze to the floor. “I made this for you.”

  I reached for the paper. It took me a minute to figure out what it was. The lines were all colorful, deep purples, pinks, and blues. The design was ornate, and at first, it just looked like beautiful vine work, but when you looked closely, hidden in the design was…me.

  Concealed in the design was a book opened to the middle with wings protruding out the sides as it perched upon a pink pair of brass knuckles. Further down and off to the side was a quote woven into vines, ‘I don’t want to repeat my innocence. I want the pleasure of losing it all over again.’

  My breath hitched in my throat, and I couldn’t form the words. It was completely me.

  I had to have it.

  Suddenly, nothing mattered anymore because this man knew exactly who I was. Not who I used to be, not some girl I was waiting for to return while putting my current life on hold in the process.

  I was tired of standing still. I wanted to move forward. All that mattered was what I wanted now, and what I wanted was right in front of me.

  “Where?” I asked, unable to tear my eyes away from it.

  “Do you trust me?” King asked.

  “Yes,” I said without hesitation. Because it was true.

  “Good. Then, lay down.” King took the paper from me, and with one hand on my shoulder, he pressed me down onto the table, placing his knee on the outside of my thigh. His face hovered just inches above mine. “Now, be a good girl,” he whispered on my neck, “and roll the fuck over.” A crooked smile on his lips.

  “Yes, sir,” I said, no longer able to contain my own smile, my belly doing flips as I thought back to where those beautiful lips had been not long before.

  “Good girl. Now, you’re learning,” King praised me, sealing his compliment with a smack on my ass as I did what I was told and rolled over.

  He shuffled around, preparing his tools. The tattoo needle started to hum, and shortly after he applied the template, I felt the first sharp sting on my skin, followed by a scratching sensation.

  It didn’t hurt as bad as I thought it would. In an odd way, I welcomed the pain. I closed my eyes and lost myself in the sensation of the needle across my skin.

  The sensation of taking over my life and making it my own.

  The needle stung and scraped its way across my back and shoulders. At the same time, I said a silent goodbye to the girl I’d been protecting for months.

  I wasn’t going to miss her.

  As King branded my skin, I embraced the girl whose life was just beginning. I embraced life.

  My life.

  King filled me so completely. Not just my body. My heart. My soul. My life. I didn’t give a shit if I ever got my memory back.

  Because with King, I knew exactly who I was.

  I was his.

  King

  Tattooing Doe was the single most erotic moment of my life. Marking her perfect, pale skin with a tattoo I’d designed for her made me so fucking hard I had to adjust myself every thirty seconds in order to concentrate on my work.

  When I was done, I handed her the hand mirror, and she walked over to the full-sized mirror that hung on the back of the door, like she’d seen dozens of my other clients do before. When she held up the hand mirror, she gasped.

  “What?” I asked in a panic, hoping she didn’t already see what I’d hidden in the tattoo. I was an asshole for putting it there. I was an asshole for tattooing her in the first place.

  I was just an asshole.

  But I couldn’t help myself. My name needed to be on her. It wasn’t enough just to call her mine. I needed to mark her as well. So hidden in the vine work under the quote I found that I thought was perfect for her, was my name.

  KING was woven into the design. In order to see it you had to
tilt your head or otherwise you wouldn’t notice it. But it was there.

  I would tell her eventually, of course, but I wanted it to be my secret for a while. She’d stopped being my possession a while ago, a lot longer before I cared to admit it, but I still felt the need to mark her as mine.

  I still liked the idea of owning her.

  Only now, she owned me, too.

  She didn’t notice the name. Tears filled her eyes. She stood there staring at the hand mirror in just her panties. Little cheeky ones where her ass hung out of the bottoms. Her tits were only inches from my face. Her tears of happiness made my dick twitch. Although her sad tears evoked the same response.

  My dick wasn’t partial to which kind of tears he liked.

  I took the mirror from her hand and lifted her up onto the counter. “You like it?” I asked, pushing her panties down her legs.

  “I love it,” she panted, wrapping her legs around me, drawing me close. Her wetness soaking my boxers. I pushed them down with one hand. I’d been hard for three hours, the entire time I’d been working on her, and couldn’t wait any longer. I pushed inside her tight, wet heat.

  We both moaned at the contact.

  “You love it?” I asked, needing to hear her say it again.

  “Yes, I love it!” she said as I thrust up into her, hard. “I love it. So much. I love you.”

  I froze when I heard the words, and when I did, her eyes flung open.

  “I didn’t mean—”

  “Shut the fuck up.”

  “Oh my god, I have that word vomit thing. I’m sorry. Shit, I just meant that—”

  “Shut the fuck up!” I demanded, thrusting hard to get her attention. She closed her eyes, and her head fell back. “That’s fucking better. Now, keep that pretty mouth of yours shut while I fuck you.”

  “Okay,” she whispered, breathless.

  “Shut up,” I said again, and she closed her mouth. “Shut up so I can fuck you…and show you how much I love you.”

  She nodded and although her eyes stayed shut, a tear rolled down her cheek. I sucked it off her chin before it could fall to the floor.