“You know.” Giovanni traced a design on the bar counter using the condensation left there by his beer. “I’ve been hearing through the grapevine that there’s a studio closing down, not all that far from Thorn Tattoo.”

Antonio looked toward his youngest brother. Giovanni was halfway through his beer, more concerned with the art he was making than the drink the condensation came from. It was just like him.

“And?” Antonio asked.

“Well, with Luciano sticking around, we’ve got a lot of talent crammed under one roof. Riley’s been on my ass lately about maximizing profits, and she’s under the impression that we could be making a lot more if we divided our talent evenly between two studios. Something about maximizing floorspace and hiring on artists to catch the drip business. I don’t know. All of it means jack shit to me, but she seems to think it’s important.”

The din of the bar and the muffled sound of the classic rock through the speakers set the perfect backdrop for their conversation. Dim lights and the smell of beer left Antonio feeling at home. He’d been coming to the Lysander since he turned twenty-one. Back then, it had been called Hopps and more recently, it was the Twisted Oak. Porter, the owner, changed the bar name every few years, which was something Antonio couldn’t understand.

“I can see her point.” Antonio fiddled with his cuff link, thinking it over. Riley was a brilliant woman. Her business sense was as meticulous as her art. With three superstar artists in their midst, Giovanni, Riley, and Luciano, perhaps branching out made sense. They turned down a painful amount of business simply because there was no availability. If they owned another shop….

“You know she’s right about everything.” Giovanni arched a brow. “I doubted her once, and look where that got me.”

Antonio smirked. “What, married?”

“Exactly. Who would’ve thought that someone like me would ever settle down? I doubted her and she turned my whole life around. Unless you want to wake up changed, I’d suggest you listen.”

Antonio snorted. He’d taken Riley’s counsel on more than one occasion. It wasn’t the idea of running another shop that was so troublesome — it was investing the time to do it.

Antonio didn’t do anything half-assed. If he was going to take over a business, he was going to make sure that business was sound from the roots up. The building would have to meet certain criteria, the artists would need to be trained to operate in a certain way, the support staff would need to adhere to set standards, even the inventory and the displays would need to be set up correctly.

He didn’t trust anyone to do that but himself.

When he’d taken over Thorn Tattoo after their father died almost ten years ago, he’d done much the same while still attempting to keep some of the traditions his father had set up. Antonio liked to see it as a blending of the old and the new. That same blending was why he’d decided to share ownership in Thorn with his brother, Giovanni, and his wife, Riley. He’d offered to do the same with Luciano, as a means to get him to stay in Vegas but he’d declined.

Back then, Antonio had been excited that a family legacy was being modernized and the money simply from the family name was quick to come in. Everyone wanted a tattoo from a DeRose brother. Now that he was older and saddled with the additional responsibilities of his own burgeoning enterprises, Antonio didn’t think he had the time. The investment was tempting, but he wasn’t sure if it would be worth it.

“What studio is it that’s closing down?” Antonio asked.

“I don’t know. I hadn’t heard of it before. Some place called Ricochet?”

“Ah.” Antonio tightened his lips. “Well, we’d need to rebrand. If it’s going to be a child of Thorn Tattoo, I want it to be known. The names will have to speak to each other.”

He had no idea what the interior of Ricochet looked like. If the place was closing down, it likely needed some help. Antonio never assumed the best.

“I don’t know. Vine Tattoo? Maybe it’s too close to that website. Uh.” Giovanni frowned. “Leaf? Petal? Stem? Stem’s not so bad if it’s a new shop. Or maybe something like Bud. Too dank?”

Antonio shot him a glowering look. “Forget that one.”

Giovanni laughed. “Yeah. Figured. Well? You got any bright ideas blooming in that head of yours?”

The statement gave Antonio pause. He narrowed his eyes, looking Giovanni over. If he did go ahead and purchase the shop, if he did find the investment worth it, he thought he had the perfect name.

“I do, actually.”

“Then spill,” Giovanni said. He raised his beer and drank.

“Bloom Tattoo, like a flower opening its petals to the sun.”

Giovanni shook his head slowly, a smile on his face. “I don’t know how you come up with this shit. It’s perfect.”

It was only a hypothetical. Antonio didn’t think the shop would be worth his time. He knew his brother and Riley could handle Thorn Tattoo without any input from him but his other business ventures still required a certain amount of hand-holding. Was he really up for taking on a whole new project? Maybe if he delegated more of the day-to-day handling to his managers. Truth be told, while he didn’t have his brothers’ skills with the tattoo gun, he’d been a fairly decent artist growing up but had quickly transitioned over to business where he’d felt more at home making money instead of art. Every so often, he missed the buzz—literal and metaphorical—of a tattoo shop.

Hmm…maybe he needed to take a page from Riley and do this for himself. But did he really have the time? He would need to be there every day until he could find someone competent to run the shop.

“Don’t get your hopes up about it becoming a reality,” Antonio warned.

Giovanni shrugged. “Whatever you say, bro. Just know that Riley can be pretty persuasive when she sets her sights on something. You might be changing your tune over the next couple days.”

Antonio stared at his own beer. Opening Bloom Tattoo would be like taking out a new lease on life. At the very least, things would be far more interesting.