WINTER

Even though I hadn't worked Ivy's shift at the club last night, I still felt eighty years old the following day. I couldn't stop thinking about Finn or Ivy. I had a nightmare where I was having sex with Finn, and Ivy walked in on us. After I got up, ate a half a pint of ice cream and then went to sleep again, I had a nightmare I walked into my bedroom, and Finn and Ivy were having sex.

Rachel was the only one at Atra when I arrived early to check my duty sheet. I had three consultations, two I knew about and one new one—Adam Rees. I liked Adam, but he had been best friends with Finn since they were kids, so today of all days, I wished he wasn’t coming in. The last thing I wanted was to think about my love life, or lack thereof, while at work. I tried to focus on finishing the tracing outlines for two other tattoos Tucker would be starting—an intricate back tattoo featuring wings and thorns, and a skull head for a local biker.

"You look rough," Rachel noted.

"Bad night."

"Still covering your sister's shifts?" The question was asked in an offhand way, but Rachel wasn't the type to ask a lot of personal questions—that was Tucker—so it meant she was worried. And I was touched because Rachel wasn't the lovey-dovey type. Again, that was Tucker. He was always giving us hugs or even pressing a kiss into our hair, telling us how much he appreciated us. I chalked that up to him losing his brother so young.

And since Rachel asked, I gave her a more honest answer than I may have to someone else. "No, she was better yesterday, or at least she hadn't puked in the last twenty-four hours, so we counted that as a positive. Jimmy wasn't thrilled I showed up a second night."

She nodded thoughtfully and continued to rub her tattoo gun with a towel. "Well, if you need anything, holler."

"I will. Thanks, Rach." I pulled out my sketchbook and the notes Gig had taken for the first consult. It was a cop who wanted a full sleeve of chainmail. I hadn't done that look, but I'd seen others. It could be very cool, and with Tucker's skill with the gun, I imagined we'd get more than a few repeat requests later.

I had just taken out my pencil when Rachel cleared her throat. I looked up. She gave me a twisted, pained smile. "My mom was an alcoholic. She never kicked the habit, but she made a lot of promises that she would."

"Was?" I had a sick feeling what that meant.

"Died about five years ago at the age of fifty-two. Liver cancer, but I think we were all ready, including her. She was tired of fighting, and we were tired of living through the battle. You're pretty young yet, but it can wring you dry." She didn't say anything more after that, but she didn't have to.

I knew the feeling well, and was grateful Ivy and I were on the upswing of the fight. Tucker showed about twenty minutes later with bagels and coffee. Good thing he was making money because he spent a lot feeding us, not to mention the freebie tattoos he did. If you were former military, you got a deep discount, and sometimes it was even free. His brother had died in Afghanistan at the tender age of twenty.

Tucker Anderson was a law school dropout. Actually, that wasn’t technically correct. He’d finished law school and then opened a tattoo and body piercing business instead of joining his dad's firm.

When he found me, I was just out of community college working at a marketing firm proofreading ad copy. On a whim I’d entered a graphite sketch I'd done right after my parents died, into a local artist showcase. Tucker found it and contacted me. He'd just opened a tattoo shop and asked if I would be interested in doing commission work. I started out drawing designs on spec, but as knowledge of Tucker's skill with the gun grew, so did demand for my work. He constantly bugged me about apprenticing, but as much as I enjoyed the work, the idea of scarring someone permanently freaked me the hell out.

Still, I was tempted because I wanted to make Tucker happy. I loved my Atra family and would be devastated to lose them.

"No hot pants?" he joked, referring to my Riskie’s attire, after he finished laying out the goodies in the backroom. "If I could get you and Rachel to wear that uniform, I bet we could double our prices.”

"Why wear clothes at all, then?" Rachel mocked. "Let's go full on nude and charge three times as much."

"I'm all for that." Gig Benson waggled his eyebrows and leered. Full of tattoos and piercings, Gig was more metal and ink than flesh and blood. Tucker told him if he loved ink so much he should learn how to tattoo, and Gig took him up on the offer. Gig was our current shop bitch, or the person lowest on the totem pole who did all the tasks no one else wanted. He was apprenticing with Omar and had about three months left before he could do his own work. Those three months couldn't pass fast enough for Tucker because his waiting list kept getting longer.

"Unfortunately, our zoning prevents complete nudity," Tucker said. You could take the lawyer out of law school, but you couldn't fully remove his incessant need to always be rigidly and technically right. "But hot pants and a tank should be okay."

“I'm game so long as you three wear the same getup." I waved my pen toward the two other men that came in behind him. "I bet Gig looks real good in shorty shorts. He has the ass and legs for it."

Omar blinked a few times and shook his head. "Thanks for that image, Winter. I'm going to need some eye bleach."

"Anyway, the shorts were Ivy's, and she was still wearing them when I left this morning." She'd come home late and must have passed out from exhaustion because she'd been sprawled on the sofa wearing her shorts and T-shirt when I woke up. She'd only managed to toe off her shoes by the doorway.

"I've put in an order for you, Gig and Omar," Rachel called out. "Pink. We'll even shave your legs for you." She waved a razor. Gig strode across the floor, grabbed it out of her hand, and then bent her back over his arm and pretended to bite her neck.

Omar came to Gig’s rescue as Rachel was threatening to shave his balls off. "He's three months away from finishing his apprenticeship, and if he doesn't finish, you'll be stuck tattooing the sorority girls for another year until we train another person."

That was a serious threat, not because sorority girls were bad customers, but because the number one tattoo they asked for was their Greek letters in small lettering somewhere on their hip. Rachel had once commented that she’d seen enough emaciated hipbones to last a lifetime.

Rachel pushed Gig away and went to turn on the music. When we were located on the south side in a rundown strip mall by the National Guard base, Tucker played indie metal rock that fit the truckers, bikers, and military guys who made up most of our clientele, but then we moved to the East Village. Sandwiched between a boutique that sold four hundred-dollar coats—Rachel and I visited once and then ran out and never went back—and a blow-out bar that charged sixty bucks to get your hair washed and dried, Atra’s new location had upped its prices and toned down its music.

Rachel, Omar, and Tucker had spent a week arguing what music we'd play while I hid in the corner and drew a bunch of tattoos to put in the look book. They settled on 60s funk: Marvin Gaye, Aretha, Otis Redding, Sly & the Family Stone, that sort of thing. Everyone seemed to like it, even the crowd from the old days who followed us here.

The cop turned up at nine sharp when the doors opened. It turned out that Ray Dorsey was actually a state trooper, not that it mattered, and he was only twenty-seven and very attractive with a head of riotous blond hair and blue eyes. Not as blue as Finn O'Malley's. Finn's eyes looked like the sapphires in expensive jewelry stores, and when he was emotional they turned almost black.

"Ray."

"Tucker."

They did the handclasp and half-hug thing that guys exchanged because it apparently preserved their manhood in a way a full-on hug couldn’t. Tucker motioned me over. I slipped the pencil behind my ear and joined them.

"Ray, this is my artist, Winter Donovan. She's the genius behind the Atramentum designs. Winter, this is Trooper Ray Dorsey. He works out at my gym and finally found the balls to come and get some ink. It's his second. He had a crap one done when he got out of the police academy, and now he wants to get some real art on his arm."

He ran his eyes over me in a swiftly appraising fashion and then flashed me a wide grin, showing off a nice set of white teeth. He must not drink coffee or smoke. I didn’t trust men with no vices. Like Finn. He was almost too perfect. That was a good reason to stay away from him. "I can see why Tucker's place is so popular."

"Because we do great work?" I asked innocently even though I knew he was making a comment about my looks. I braced myself for some reference to being foreign, and I was not disappointed.

"That and because everything is so exotic," he replied. His voice had dropped an octave. Behind him, Tucker waggled his eyebrows at me in mock amusement.

Sighing internally, I held up my sketchbook. "Tucker said you are interested in a chainmail sleeve, and I have a couple of ideas. If you’ll follow me, we can talk about what you had in mind and see if I can't come up with the right design."

I waved an arm to the two chairs in the back that we used as our consulting space. Ray placed a hand on my back and escorted me over. It felt strange but maybe it was some sort of chivalry. Guys who opened a car door or pulled out your chair were rare these days. Finn had those manners. Old-fashioned, Ivy had deemed them, and not in a disparaging way.

I shook my head. I didn't want to think of Finn—not about his manners or his gem blue eyes. I smiled brightly at Ray. "Can I get you a water or soda?"

He looked stunned for a moment and blinked a couple of times before saying, "No, thank you. You have a gorgeous smile."

Not sure of how to respond, I offered up a feeble, "Um, thanks?"

My confused response made him laugh. "Okay, I get it. No come-ons in the workplace. Let's see what you have."

At his gesture, I opened up my notebook. "I heard you wanted it to look like armor. I wasn't sure if you had a time period in mind or even a particular culture, so I went with the popular medieval knight. There are about four main parts to the arm piece."

"Are you single?" I jerked my head up to see him smiling at me again. "Sorry, I know I said I wasn't going to hit on you again, but I have to ask."

"Yes, single."

"Do you eat?"

"Um, yes." I wrinkled my brow.

"Great, how about I take you to lunch?"

I glanced at Tucker, wondering if I said no whether I'd lose a three-thousand-dollar job for the shop. Unfortunately he was busy working on a back tat for our local celebrity, Devon Jones—a superior high school athlete now a Pro Bowl tight end on a Super Bowl winning team. Other than his size, though, you'd never know he was a rich and famous athlete. He still wore his John Deere cap and high school sweats around town.

Omar had an attorney in his chair. They were doing a koi fish on his arm. I couldn't remember his name. It was Sven or Eric or something suitably Norse in nature. Privately, I referred to him as the Viking because he was big and blond.

Gig was manning the front desk, selling body jewelry and rub-on temporary tattoos and making appointments.

I was on my own. "It's against work policy to date customers," I said as politely as possible. While Dorsey had a great smile, he didn't make any of my body parts tingle—not like Finn did. And even if I knew Finn was bad news, I wanted to be with a guy who made me hot and bothered when he just looked at me.

Dorsey shrugged, looking philosophical and not annoyed at my refusal. "It never hurts to ask."

"Still want to talk about the tattoo?" I held my breath.

"Yeah, tell me about the four parts and what the blank spaces are for." He spun his finger in a tight circle as he pointed to my sketch.

I managed to exhale without showing too much relief as to be offensive and started talking. "The gauntlet can cover the fingers and the wrist, but go higher. Then there's the vambrace that covers the forearm and the upper arm. You have the cowter, or elbow piece, and then the shoulder part which is called the pauldron. If you had true armor, there would be pieces that would go over the cowter and pauldron too, but I think that would look unwieldy in a tattoo." I moved my pencil over the different portions of the design. "And the blank spaces are for you to personalize. Maybe you want to put your shield on the pauldron so it covers the apple of your shoulder here and then down your upper arm." I pointed to his uniform-covered arm with the butt end of my pencil.

He looked amused at my attempts to not touch him, but I wasn't going to give this guy any ideas—or rather, any more ideas than he already had.

"I like it. I like the shield idea. I like all the different pieces and textures. I like having a word under the shield, maybe the Chinese word for strength?" He raised one eyebrow as if he wanted a cookie for guessing my nationality correctly.

I ignored his light flirtation. "Sounds good. Let me finalize the design."

"How long will the tattoo take?"

"Probably twenty hours."

His eyebrows shot into his forehead. "That's a long time."

"You don't want to rush a tattoo," Tucker said, appearing suddenly before us.

"And will you be doing the tattoo?" Dorsey asked me. "Because I think twenty hours of you touching me sounds like a pretty good way to pass the time."

A throat cleared and two heavy work boots entered my vision. My gaze ran along a dusty pair of blue jeans—nicely worn around the crotch—up past a tight fitting heather gray T-shirt to a thunderous pair of gem blue eyes.

"What are you doing here?" I gasped.

"I'm your next consult, baby."