It was a small miracle that Melanie showed up at opening the next day. Luciano still had the keys and was preparing to open the shop when he felt a hand on his back before her scent reached him.

“Hey,” she said softly. “Shouldn’t I be the one doing that?”

Melanie had never come across as sexy before, but in that moment, with her hand touching him and her voice sultry and quiet against the back of his ear, Luciano’s pulse raced as he sucked in some much needed air. The jolt of contact her hand brought shot straight to his dick, and he breathed in deeply to try to keep himself composed as she took the key from his hand and unlocked the door on her own.

They descended into Thorn Tattoo’s lobby together, but Luciano let her go first. Melanie didn’t have any of Cassandra’s killer curves, but she was gorgeous in her own way. Lithe. Long. Modelesque. He found himself wondering why she didn’t model. With a body like that, and a face like hers, she’d be a shoe in.

Instead, here she was at Thorn Tattoo, tempting him simply by existing.

He shook his head to clear his thoughts before she reached the bottom stair. He needed to get his head back into the game. This morning he was booked solid, and he knew it was going to be a busy day. He couldn’t afford to waste any time with his head in the clouds, fantasizing about a girl he could never have.

Melanie was his assistant. Even if he were looking for a relationship, he wouldn’t date someone he worked with.

“The cash was balanced last night, right?”

“Yeah.” Luciano followed her to the front counter. “Cash is in the safe, I left the change in the drawer. You just have to count it and make sure it matches the figures. It’s not too hard. Should take a few minutes.”

“Mm.” Melanie popped the drawer open and started counting her way through the change in each of the slots. “You know, I appreciate the mentorship, but I’ve done this before. I was the temporary manager for three days before I walked out.”

“I know.” Luciano hesitated. Why was he helping her? He’d already showed her how to do everything she needed to do to open, and beyond that, it was Melanie he was talking to. She always knew more than he did, anyway. He deflected his discomfort with sarcasm. “Just, with it being your first day and all since you walked out, I figured you’d need to be retrained. I know if I walked out of here, the first thing I’d do was go on a bender and forget every last thing.”

“Me?” Melanie looked at him incredulously. “Really? I’m a little too good-girl to do something like that.”

“It’s the good ones you have to watch out for.” Luciano leaned on the counter and watched her. He knew his time was better spent preparing the supplies for the day and making sure his station was set up, but he couldn’t help himself. After last night, he wanted to be around her. Something had awoken inside of him that needed Melanie’s acknowledgment, and it hungered something fierce. “I know your type. Beautiful, innocent, and demure on the surface. Then, as soon as you get behind closed doors….”

“What?” Melanie challenged him. She bit down on her lush lower lip, and Luciano found himself wanting to see the color on it smeared. Her makeup was always so perfect that he would have thought she had it permanently inked onto her but the changing colors she wore told him otherwise. Not even when they’d been roommates had he seen her disheveled like that.

He wanted it badly.

“What am I like behind closed doors, Luc?” she asked again.

“Untamed,” Luciano replied. “Sexually liberated. Ravenous. Dangerous.”

It might have been a trick of his eye, but he thought he saw the corners of Melanie’s lips twitch upward. It was the sexiest little smirk, even if it was momentary, and his cock throbbed.

Now that the walls were down, there was no building them back up again. A night of flirting at the restaurant had disarmed him, and now he was weak to her.

Luciano was surprised he didn’t feel guilt. Being interested in Melanie gave him a new lease on life and left the world crystal clear and radiant like it hadn’t been in a long time.

He hadn’t even thought of Cassandra’s car crash when he’d come in through the doors.

“Well. I guess you’ll have to wait until I’m behind closed doors to find out.” Melanie winked at him, and all Luciano could do to hold himself back was leave the lobby and set up for the day.

Those red lips of hers would smear if he kissed them hard enough.

The thought lingered with him for far longer than it should have.

* * *

Luciano’s opening appointment for the day was with Sarah. He’d tattooed dozens of Sarahs over the course of his career, and he thought nothing of it until Sarah Harris walked through the swinging doors of his tattoo bay.

Luciano’s mouth went dry.

“Luc!” Sarah exclaimed. Her eyes were a particularly vibrant shade of violet that morning—colored contacts, just like she always wore. She wore a micro skirt that hugged her hips and her fantastic thighs, and the little tank top she wore barely covered what it needed to. With her bleached blonde hair and her soft pink lips, she looked exactly like she had the last time they’d hit the club together.

Luciano didn’t know what to say, but Sarah filled the silence for him. “Oh, my god, I was so excited when I heard you were back in town that I had to come in. I was thinking maybe we could get something done on my ribs? Like, I don’t really want it to be visible when I’m out, you know?”

Luciano didn’t want to stare at her, so he dropped his gaze to his sketchbook, swept it off the desk, and clutched it against his chest like a flotation device. “Yeah.”

Without ceremony, Sarah sat on the client chair and looked him over. “You haven’t changed much over the last few years,” she remarked. “The last time I saw you… it was at Cassandra’s funeral, wasn’t it? There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t miss her.”

“I miss her, too,” Luciano replied. He couldn’t commit to the words. He was in too much shock to process what was happening.

Sarah was Cassandra’s best friend. Every Thursday night, the two of them would go out together to the clubs and take advantage of lady’s night. Every Friday night, Luciano would join them on the floor, along with all of Cassandra’s other friends. She’d been well loved.

“So I was thinking maybe it’d be really cool to do something to commemorate her, you know? I’d really like that. And if it’s on my ribs, it’s close to my heart. Can you help me come up with something? Cassandra loved seashells and sea life, so maybe something nautical but, you know, feminine and airy?”

Luciano scrubbed at his eyes. Cassandra. Since last night’s dinner date with Melanie, he’d forgotten all about her. The guilt hit him in waves, dragging him back beneath the surface of his depression. How could he have disrespected her memory like that? Luciano was better than that. He’d promised Cassandra his heart.

“I… yeah. We can do that.”

“Great!” Sarah grinned. “I knew it was the right choice to come see you. I got hung up for a while thinking if it was right or not, but you loved her, so I knew that it’d be perfect. No one could capture her essence like you could.”

For years, he’d been running from a confrontation like this. If he didn’t stay in one place for too long, sometimes he could forget she was dead. Sometimes, he comforted himself thinking about how one day, they’d be reunited.

Deep inside, he knew it wasn’t true. Cassandra was gone, and all he was left with was grief—but facing that grief square in the face? Luciano felt himself start to buckle.

“So,” Sarah said. Luciano set his notebook down on the desk, intending to start a sketch. “It’s been what, almost four years now? Have you started seeing anyone new? I’m sure a handsome guy like you doesn’t stay single for long. I bet Cassandra’s been rooting you on from heaven. You know she would be your wingman if things were different.”

Everything felt numb. Luciano shook his head, not sure if he opened his mouth if anything would come out. “No.” Even that one word sounded harsh to him.

“What?” Sarah asked, aghast. “Oh, my god, did you become a nun or something? I mean… well, I guess guys can’t be nuns. Are there guy nuns? Is that what the pope is? But there’s only one of him….”

The years hadn’t changed Sarah, either. All of Cassandra’s friends were a little air-headed, more concerned with their next party and how they were going to score free drinks than anything of substance. Cassandra had been light and airy, but when she was away from the party scene, she was a mellow, intelligent person.

Stomach in knots, Luciano picked up his pencil and started sketching. He knew he should have taken measurements and examined the canvas first, but he couldn’t bring himself to face Sarah. It was too much.

“They’re priests,” Luciano said. He hated how weak his voice sounded.

“Oh. Well. That’s boring. I bet you’d do something more exciting than that.” Sarah hopped off the chair and looked over his shoulder. “That looks kind of pretty.”

“It’s still just a sketch.” Luciano’s heart raced like he’d run a mile. His lungs screamed for air. Nothing about the situation made sense. Sarah and Cassandra were best friends—almost sisters. How was it that Sarah had moved on? How could she let such an important person become a simple memory?

“Well, I like it. I think we’re totally going to go with that when it’s done.” The enthusiasm in Sarah’s voice only made Luciano feel worse. “Can you do that today? I know the lady I was talking to at the front said that it’s one day for consultation and initial sketches, then after that depending on the size and the complexity of the tattoo it can take several more sessions, but that’s pretty small, right? Can you ink me today?”

With the way Luciano’s hand was shaking, he couldn’t ink anyone and hope for it to turn out well. There was no way he was going to risk it.

“No.” He wouldn’t budge no matter how she begged him. “We do the sketch today, then we’ll ink it sometime later. I never tattoo on the same day. It’s not a good idea.”

“That sucks!” Sarah whined. “Ugh. But I guess it gives me an excuse to see you again. Oh, my god, we should totally go out clubbing sometime! A lot of the girls have done boring things like get married or have babies since we all used to hang out, but there’s five of us that still hit the town all the time. We’d love you to come with us. It’d be good.”

“No.” Luciano dry-swallowed. “No, thanks. I don’t think that’s my scene anymore.”

“That’s what Sabrina said, too.” Sarah sighed. “Oh well. Your loss. But if you ever change your mind, you know where to find us. We still hit all the same haunts.”

Luciano didn’t want life to go back to normal. Cassandra had been his whole world, and it felt like everything she’d used to do, and all the people who used to love her so much, should have been rendered stagnant by her loss like he was.

That obviously wasn’t the case.

The encounter with Sarah jarred him, and he knew he couldn’t keep working when he was so strung up.

After their session finished and he saw her out, Luciano pulled Melanie aside. “I’m leaving for the day,” he said. “Something came up and I need to… I can’t. I’m sorry. I need to go.”

“I don’t understand,” she said, frowning. “What happened, Luc?”

He couldn’t bring himself to tell her everything going on in his head, especially not when she was part of his confusion.

For the first time since Cassandra’s death, he’d forgotten about her. He’d started to move on. The world wasn’t hung up on her passing, and he was the only relic of her time glued in place.

And Melanie had begun to unstick him.

There was nowhere he could run this time, and he knew it would be months until he could officially fly the coop, but until then, he needed an escape. Running was all he did, and he did it well. Tonight, Luciano resolved to run from his head.

He knew just the place to do it.