Chapter 13

Tate

“And now your tattoo is officially, done.”

I smiled down at my handiwork, proud of the rich colors and shadows on her long, sexy leg.

She smiled up at me and then down at her leg, standing and pulling her long skirt to the side. She looked at the ink in the mirror, her gaze riveted on what she considered her newly beautiful leg. “I love it, Tate. You did a great job!” That smile, the one I saw in my dreams, flashed wide and happy, and somewhere in the distance warning bells sounded. But dumb fuck that I was, I ignored them and smiled back.

“That’s what I wanted to hear. That you love it.” I pulled her back flush against me, gliding my hand up her ink free thigh as I kissed her neck. “I didn’t think those legs could possibly get any sexier. Glad to see I was wrong.” She shuddered under my touch, shivered as my warm breath tickled her neck.

“Yeah well, you have been without a woman for a long time.” Deflection was something Teddy did a lot and always when it came to compliments, which was weird because she was as confident as they came. Except when it came to her scarred leg. “How much?”

I blinked, my lips still on the side of her neck, as her words sank in. “No charge. Consider it on the house.”

She shook her head and stepped out of my arms. “No way, Tate. Don’t be that guy, not right now.” She peeled a few bills from her wallet while she sent very creative curse words my way. “Three fifty should be enough. If it’s not, I expect you to let me know.”

She was so fucking beautiful, standing there with her toned arms on display as she fisted her hands at her hips. Her blue eyes blazed angrily, red hair wild and unkempt.

“Stubborn damn woman,” I muttered and reached for her, pulling her back into my arms so our bodies were pressed tight together. She was so soft and feminine, smooth and silky. I couldn’t get enough of touching her, she was so responsive. I smacked her ass and lowered my mouth to hers, a scorching kiss that left us both wide-eyed and panting. Turned on again, just like that.

“It’s one of my many charms, Golden Boy. I thought you knew.”

“Oh, I know, baby. Let me wrap that up for you or you’re going to get blood and ink everywhere. You need to keep it covered until tomorrow. And take some ibuprofen.”

She held her skirt up while I wrapped plastic wrap lightly around her leg. My fingers grazed her panties in an attempt to make her squirm. And it did.

“Tate, my leg is on fire and you want to go there?”

“Nope. I’ll let you heal. You like it?”

“I fucking love it! Thank you again.” With that mischievous smile, she waved goodbye and pushed through the glass door.

“Damn man, you’ve got it bad!” Lasso laughed and clapped me on the back, ignoring the glare I sent his way. “Not that I blame you, Golden Boy, because that is a quality woman right there. Beautiful and strong, independent and sassy. Perfect for an old fucker like you.”

I grunted a laugh at him, the way I always did when his Texas-isms got to be just a tad too country. “Glad you approve, Lasso. I can rest easily now.”

His smile brightened. “Hey, no problem man. Glad I could help you see the light.” The shop phone rang and I picked it up, still glaring at a laughing Lasso.

“GET INK’D, what can I help you with today?”

“Merry Mayhem, meet me there in twenty.” Cross said what he needed to say and ended the call, leaving me staring at the phone like it might bite. “I have to go out for a bit guys, I’m being summoned.”

Jag frowned. “Everything all right?”

I shrugged. “Hell if I know. He might want to chew me out just for being an asshole the past few weeks.”

“Months,” Lasso offered with a cough.

“Okay fine, months. Dick. Still.” Shit was fine now. I did my part at the club and even employed a few of the guys. What the fuck else did they want from me?

“Maybe don’t go in there wearing that face,” Jag offered diplomatically.

“This is my fucking face.”

Both of those fuckers laughed. “Try to look less like you want to rip someone in half, and more like you did when you were staring at your girl.”

It was on my lips to deny that Teddy was my girl. She wasn’t. We were thrown together by circumstances and mutual lust. “So you want me to ogle Cross? No thanks, he’s not my type.”

But I did take a ten-minute ride on my bike for a quick attitude adjustment. No good would come of showing up angry. I’d let Cross say what he needed to say, act appropriately, and then get back to work.

Merry Mayhem was near empty this time of day and I spotted Cross at one of the dartboards in back, a pitcher of beer on the table. He smiled as I got closer. “You came.”

“You summoned me,” I reminded him.

He frowned. “Is that how it is now? An invitation to hang out is now a summons?” His words were grave, sober and yeah I kind of felt like shit.

“I’m starting to wonder now if you still want to be a Reckless Bastard.” He looked at me, stroking several days’ growth on his chin as he assessed me. I saw every damn emotion flash in his eyes. Anger, frustration and disappointment were the clearest to see.

“I’m here, ain’t I? But that’s not enough, is it? I show up to Church and do my part in club business, but it still isn’t enough. What the fuck?”

Cross glared at me for a long moment before he turned to the board and fired out three darts, hitting two triple twenties and a bullseye. “This is us, Golden Boy. This club is our life, our family, our financial future. We do what we have to do to survive, we don’t do this shit because we feel like we have to.” He took an angry sip of his beer while I lined up my dart.

“It’s not a goddamn obligation, Cross. But being around everyone has been hard since I got out the pen.” I couldn’t really explain why it was, just that I didn’t feel as at ease with the club as I had in the past, and that shit pissed me off. Like Cross said, these guys were my brothers. My family. They had my back.

“That right there,” he pointed at me at first angry and then resigned. “That look that you get, the one that sometimes says you’re hatin’ on us. What the fuck?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I told him as I hit my third bullseye. “I don’t hate you or anyone else. I love the club.”

“You’ve been distant and I get that. Even though I’ve never served another man’s time, I get it. But the anger toward us, I don’t get that.”

Yeah, well, I didn’t get that shit either. “I don’t know what to tell you, Cross. I’m doing the best I can.”

“And that’s why I wanted to come and have a drink with you. I see you’re trying to get back into things, which means you want to be here. And I think I’ve figured it out.”

“There’s nothing to figure out, Cross.”

He laughed and shook his head. “Savior said we should’ve talked to you about it at the time, but I disagreed. You know those calls at the prison aren’t private unless you’re with your attorney.”

I gave a sharp nod. I knew it well. More than a couple inmates had been caught up with their own words. “Talk to me about what?”

“About the asshole who actually murdered Ricky Tran.”

The fucker who’d died shortly after his DNA had been identified under Ricky’s nails. With him dead though, the prosecutors had suppressed the information, or tried to because we’d gotten into a scuffle earlier that same night. “What about him? He’s dead now, right?”

Cross nodded. “As soon as we got the ID on that DNA evidence we went after him, Alan Baker. No affiliation other than he fucking hated Asians. We made sure he understood the ramifications of not coming forward. He chose the alternative.”

Both of my eyebrows rose. “A round with Savior?”

His face filled with evil happiness. “Jag. Figured if he hated people of color, he might appreciate the challenge. He did, but Jag did not.” He shook his head, a wistful smile of remembrance on his face. “He didn’t want to come forward. The asshole was more afraid of what would happen to him in prison than what we’d do to him. We proved him wrong.”

I nodded at what he hadn’t said explicitly and released three more darts, barely hitting the board. Singles all around.

“I’m telling you this so you know, Golden Boy. We had your back then and we have your back now. If I thought there was any chance of him coming forward to help, I would have dumped him in front of the cop shop myself. The fucker probably would have said you worked together, so we handled it. Our way.”

I appreciated it. A lot it turned out. “Wow, man. I was ready to tell you to go fuck yourself, that I wasn’t pissed at the club, but shit, maybe I was. Thanks for letting me know, Cross.”

I didn’t know what else to say because talking about my feelings wasn’t something I did regularly—and definitely not with Cross. “You know, I am a Reckless Bastard down to my fucking bones. And I know I’ve been distant. But only because I needed to get my anger under control. If I hadn’t fought with Tran that night, I wouldn’t have ended up where I did for six fucking years.”

“And that hot model you’re dating is keeping you in bed whenever she can?” He laughed, his eyes lit with teasing as his brows waggled.

“She’s a former model,” I corrected and took a long pull of my beer, grateful the tension was gone. My body felt lighter, less weighted down now and I was able to smile. To finally relax. “And we’re not dating.” We were fucking, plain and simple. Any and everywhere we could. Hard and fast, slow and tender, long and affectionate. Every goddamn night, too.

“It’s okay if you like her,” he said easily, his gaze searing into me to make sure I understood his words. “You deserve something good after what you’ve been through. I say enjoy it.”

I was enjoying it. Too damn much, if you asked me. There was no way I could give Teddy anything a woman like that deserved in life. She’d had a shit run of things as a kid and then after, she deserved a man who would bring her flowers and do romantic shit. And we couldn’t be more than what we were. “Yeah thanks, Cross. Want to curl my hair and paint my toes next?”

He laughed. “Nope. Just had a mani-pedi with Savior.” He wiggled his fingers in my direction and we both laughed, finishing another round of beer in silence. Like men should do. But it was nice now that the distance was gone. It felt like old times.

Finally, I fucking felt like I’d left that prison for good.