Looking around my shop, I couldn’t help but grin.

It was finally all done, and the Ink Stain was open for business. Officially. The black, red and white décor was modern and vibrant, exactly what I was going for when I found this corner shop. A quick look at the day’s schedule showed a few appointments for bigger tattoos, but there were always a few walk ins with Belle Musique being so close to New Orleans.

Speaking of walk ins, the wooden chimes above the door sounded and I looked up to greet the customer, only to pause when my gaze landed on the oddest character in town.

“Aunt Mae, what brings you by?” I tried calling her just Mae, but she insisted that I, along with the rest of the town, call her Aunt Mae.

She flashed a flirtatious smile that had me taking a step back. Mae laughed. “Don’t worry Mason, you’re too young for me to do anything other than look ‘atcha, but I do love to look.” To punctuate her point, light green eyes gave me a thorough perusal from top to bottom, and all the way back up again. “Such a handsome boy.”

Magenta’s laugh rang out from the back room, but I chose to ignore her. “What can I do for you, Mae.”

Hands on her hips, which were encased in a hot pink dress that never seemed to stop moving, she jutted her chin out, matching pink lips parted. “I want a tattoo.”

Okay. It wasn’t so surprising, actually. In this line of work, I’d tattooed elaborate images over mastectomy scars, fiery eyebrows over a burn victim once, and even a tramp stamp on a seventy-year-old widow.

“What do you want, and where?”

Her face brightened when she realized I wasn’t going to turn her away, and she reached inside her bra for a sheet of paper, which she unfolded and slid across the counter. “This. I want this.”

This was a whimsical romantic style fleur de lis that was very eye catching. “It’s beautiful. Do you have time now?”

Mae shook her head energetically. “Oh no, not today. Next week. On the seventeenth,” she clarified with certainty. “That’s a good day for me, according to the spirits.”

Yep, old Aunt Mae was as crazy as she was kind. And I had yet another casserole dish in my fridge to prove the latter, because she insisted I couldn’t find a woman if I lost my muscles. “Okay, the seventeenth it is. Afternoon or evening?”

She thought about it for a second, tapping her chin with a long red-tipped finger. “Late afternoon or early evening. Let’s do five.” I penciled her in the appointment book, giving her one last chance to back out.

“Five is on the books, Mae. The seventeenth at five in the evening.” I smiled at her, watching the blush suffuse her face. “Let me know if you change your mind.”

“I won’t.” I didn’t think she would, not with that self-assured tone and the stubborn set of her shoulders. “And Magenta, honey?”

“Yeeaaah?” My sister’s voice floated from the back room.

“I have just the thing you need for what ails you. Come see me tomorrow.” With those cryptic words, Mae sashayed out with as much flare as she’d entered.

When the coast was clear, Magenta walked up front to join me, green eyes just two shades darker than mine were wide with shock. “I can’t decide if I want to be like her when I grow up, or if I fear her. Maybe it’s a little of both.” She laughed and crossed her arms in a protective gesture that made me wonder what exactly ailed her. Then she turned with mischief in her eyes. “So, what’s up with you and Trish?”

I groaned at the question, surprised it had taken her four whole days to even ask about Trish. Her curiosity had been lit after the encounter in the bakery, but she surprised the hell out of me by keeping her mouth shut.

“Nothing.” It wasn’t the whole truth, but it was the truth.

“Yeah, right,” she snorted, giving me that familiar O’Malley stare in an effort to break me.

It wouldn’t work. “Nothing,” I said again and turned back to the appointment book.

“I don’t believe you,” she said pointedly, stepping closer until all I could see was her face. “You told her she’d look hot if she did something with her hair? Are you out of your damn mind?” She shook her head, incredulous. “You’re only an ass like that when you like a chick.”

“Am not,” I said the same way I used to when we were kids, just to goad her.

Her purple painted lips twitched before breaking into a wide smile. “Amber Tremaine ringing any bells?”

Yeah, it did. “I never told her to get a nose job.”

“Maybe not, but you did tell her that she’d be the hot friend if her nose wasn’t so big.”

Dammit, I had said that. In my defense, though, “I was sixteen years old, Mags.”

She shrugged. “Then maybe it’s time you improve your game, big brother. Insulting grown women only pisses them off.”

Another good point. “I would if it wasn’t so fun getting a rise out of Trish. She’s uptight as hell. It’s entertaining.”

“Now that I believe,” she said, voice and expression smug, like she knew something I didn’t. “But you like her. Don’t bother denying it, Mase, I saw the way you smiled at her. All that sexual tension sizzling in the air between the two of you. You totally like her.”

“No, Mags. What I like is annoying her.”

She snorted again and shook her head like I was a lost cause. That was just fine with me. “Whatever you need to tell yourself, kid.”

“Don’t you have work to do around here?” She’d come down to Belle Musique last month after a breakup, claiming she needed a change of scenery and I was happy to have her. Until she started meddling.

“I do, actually. Three sorority girls from Tulane are coming in to get their Greek letters tattooed on them. A hundred bucks say they’re all getting tramp stamps.”

“Pass. You take that one.” I had no doubt Mags was right, but I didn’t have the time or the energy to deal with oversexed college girls who pretended to be bad girls, but were really good girls in disguise. “In fact, I think I’ll head out before they get here. Want anything to eat?”

That evil grin was one I knew well. She’d worn it when she put hair removal cream in my shampoo, and when she left itching powder in all of my sneakers. “Yeah, I think I’ll have that Italian veg sandwich with pesto. It was delicious.”

“You’re a gremlin.”

“Love you too. And don’t forget my sandwich,” she called out with a wicked laugh.