Coming Back To You
Read Coming Back To You Online
Authors: Donya Lynne
Tags: #contemporary romance, #steamy romance, #sexy scenes, #good karma, #donya lynne, #strong karma, #mark strong
Book 2
Published by Phoenix Press
Copyright 2014 by Donya Lynne
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Cover Art: Reese Dante www.reesedante.com
Contents
Connect With Donya Lynne Online
To those in search of true love.
No book can be completed without the assistance of a
team. I want to thank all my beta readers, critique partners, and
pizza-chomping brainstormers and juiceboxers. You know who you are.
Notably, thank you to Liz, Sue, Leann, Sandy, Laura, Jill, and Tia.
Without your feedback and support, this book would not be what it
is today.
To my readers, you’re the reason I do what I do.
Thank you for loving Mark and Karma as much as I do.
They say you never forget your first true love…that
one special person who touched your heart before anyone else, and
who, with just a thought, can still set hummingbirds to flight
inside your stomach. He will always be there, even though he’s
gone. He will always hold a special part of your soul. A part he
ripped from your body—because it belongs to him now—and left an
empty hole that rejects any attempt to fill it with a memory. A
place that aches so acutely and with such intensity that you feel
as though you will never be able to breathe deeply enough
again.
I don’t know who “they” are or how they came
to know such truths, but I know they’re right.
Part I
Letting Go
December 1
“Take off your shirt and get comfortable, mate.”
Mark loosened his tie, unbuttoned his
starched white business shirt, and placed both over the back of a
nearby chair. A moment later, his undershirt joined them.
The tattoo parlor was cold. It almost felt
like they had on the air conditioning instead of the heat.
With a shiver, he settled into the black
leather recliner that reminded him of the chairs in a dentist’s
office and waited as Razor, his artist, prepped his station.
“Is your heat not working?” Mark rubbed his
palm up and down his arm.
Razor glanced over his shoulder. “No, mate.
We keep it cooler in the shop.”
“How come?” He didn’t remember it being this
cold last time he was here. But that had been in October, when it
was warmer.
“Helps keep people from passin’ out.” Razor
set out a couple bottles of ink. “Y’see, people’s bodies heat up
coz of the pain. If the place is too warm, folks’ll be blinkin’ on
us right and left.”
Mark nodded once, understanding that when
Razor said blinking that he meant fainting. “I see.” He wouldn’t
pass out. The pain his first time around with Razor hadn’t been too
bad. Today should be a piece of cake. But other people might not
have the same tolerance for pain he did.
He stared at Razor’s slender back as he
prepared his equipment. Other than the mass of tattoos covering his
arms and neck, making him a walking billboard for his trade, the
guy didn’t fit Mark’s image of what a tattoo artist should look
like. He had imagined a biker type with long hair, leather boots
with chains, and a rough disposition. Razor was slim, dressed in
designer denim trousers, Doc Martens, and a heather red graphic
tee. He kept his greying hair short and tidy. He could have been a
banker.
Razor pulled on blue latex gloves, sat on
what looked like an ergonomic stool, and swiveled to face Mark.
“You ready to finish this sweet piece, mate?” He inspected his
previous handiwork on Mark’s left pectoral.
“Yes.” Mark had gotten the tattoo in October
but wanted to make a few enhancements.
Razor pressed his fingertips against Mark’s
chest and pulled on the skin. “This healed up nice.” He tilted his
head slightly to one side. “So, you want the glyphs and the
surrounding circle to be darker, right?”
“Yes, almost black. And I want some shading
around the glyphs. Something with texture that makes the tattoo
look more like it’s been stamped on my chest.”
“Easy enough, ay? Let’s make some magic then,
shall we?” Razor, a native Australian transplanted in Chicago, had
a reputation for being one of the city’s top tattoo artists, which
was why Mark had picked him in the first place. For something as
precious as this tattoo, Mark wanted the best.
“How long do you think this will take?” Mark
glanced toward a nervous blonde in the chair on the other side of
the room. She winced and had a death grip on the arms of her chair
as another artist hunched over her ankle, a buzzing tattoo gun in
his hand.
Razor prepped his gun. “Not long. Maybe
thirty minutes. Forty-five if I really get into it.”
A pained squeak drew Mark’s attention back to
the blonde. Her artist was a spiky-haired twentysomething with
trails of ink up and down his arms and round plugs that looked like
small, black wine corks in both earlobes. He glanced up at the
girl. “You doing okay?”
The girl nodded briskly as she exhaled and
sucked in several small breaths. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.”
Razor chuckled, pulling back Mark’s
attention.
“Got a cherry over there.” Razor bobbed his
head toward the girl and the other artist. He spoke quietly and
rolled closer. “First tattoo, and she gets it on her ankle. Ain’t
that somethin’?”
“Why? What’s wrong with getting your first
tattoo on your ankle?” Mark knew next to nothing about Razor’s
profession except a good tattoo artist raked in top dollar.
Razor poised his gun over Mark’s tattoo. “The
foot and the ankle are the most painful parts o’ the body to
tattoo, mate.” His mouth curled in amusement as he glanced toward
the girl again. “But that’s what she insisted she wanted. Wouldn’t
let us talk her out of it.” He turned on the gun, and Mark sucked
in his breath as the needle penetrated his skin at blurring
speed.
Mark forced himself to relax and take steady
breaths. A few minutes later, he turned to check on the girl. She
didn’t look good. Sweaty and pale.
“We’re almost done,” her artist said.
“Okay.” The girl winced and clenched her
teeth.
Why would she put herself through that much
pain for the sake of a little ink?
Mark turned toward Razor. “Why did she insist
on her ankle if it hurts so much?”
Razor shrugged. “Personal choice.” His voice
took on a more somber lilt. “She lost her mum to cancer and wanted
a tattoo to remember her by. Said it had to be the ankle coz she
and her mum shared a birthmark there. So, the tattoo we drew up
incorporated it.”
Mark glanced back at the girl who couldn’t
have been more than twenty-two years old. That was too young to
lose a parent. “That’s awful.”
“I know. We hear a lot o’ sad stories in this
business. Sure, some people want a tattoo coz it’s cool or coz they
want to look tough.” Razor’s Aussie accent stroked each syllable.
“But more often than not, a tattoo holds special meaning. Each
person’s ink tells a story. A tattoo is a piece of custom art that
stamps that person’s story on their body forever. Or maybe it just
holds a memory.” Razor’s gaze flicked to Mark’s before turning back
to his needlework. “Everyone has a different reason for why they
put something this permanent on their skin, mate.”
Mark picked up on the unspoken question. He
had never told Razor the reason behind his tattoo, but he could
tell Razor knew he had one.
Razor’s silent nudge caused Mark’s thoughts
to snap to Karma.
Karma Mason.
The woman he’d spent the summer with.
The woman he’d fallen in love with.
His reason. His story. It was her name
tattooed on his chest in Asian glyphs. He’d stamped her name on his
body like a brand declaring ownership. Because, in her way, she
owned him. He willingly admitted that even if he didn’t fully
understand how she’d found her way inside his guarded heart.
Since leaving her in Indianapolis in
September and driving back to Chicago in a conflicted mess, he’d
gone back and forth in his mind countless times about whether he
should call her, return to Indianapolis for her, or leave well
enough alone. He loved her. Of that much he was certain. But was
that enough? For him, maybe. For her, though, he didn’t think
so.
Karma deserved a man who would not just love
her but marry her. And if Mark had learned nothing else from his
past, he’d learned marriage wasn’t in his cards. No matter how much
he loved her, he couldn’t get past the roadblock in his brain that
gave him a case of the shakes every time he thought about standing
at the front of a church waiting for her to come down the
aisle.
Then again, he couldn’t imagine a future
without her, either. To think he would never see her again rattled
his cage as badly as thinking about marrying her. Where did that
leave him? A hammer on one side, an axe on the other?
A year ago, he’d been self-assured. Maybe not
exactly happy, but definitely content. Definitely with a sense of
direction. Now he felt like he didn’t have
any
direction. As
if he were a stalled car. No forward movement. No movement at
all.
“So, what’s your story, mate? If you don’t
mind my askin’.”
Mark came out of his reverie and cleared his
throat. “Maybe I don’t have a story.”
Razor lifted his head and met Mark’s gaze
with a dubious smirk. “Everyone has a story, especially when they
don’t wear their tattoo where people can see it.” He returned his
attention to his needlework. “And especially when they tattoo the
word
karma
directly over their heart, even if the word is
written in Asian glyphs.” His deep, tobacco-hardened voice sounded
suspicious, almost accusatory.