Tattoos and Transformations (14 page)

* * * *

Dakota’s pits were wet as she hiked over to D’Ink Coda on Wednesday. The tightness in her chest wouldn’t go away. Clint had assured her that Travis had installed three hidden cameras last night.

One was pointed at the register and one at each of the two chairs in the main room.

She’d brought some of her drawings, thinking that a new influx of designs would help the store. When she entered, Harley was working on a young girl who reminded her too much of herself. She had several face piercings and jet-black, spiked hair with blue tips. The intense makeup made her look like she was getting ready to go on stage. She wondered if that was how Morgan would have described her a month ago.

“Hey, Harley.” She tried to keep her tone light.

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He glanced up. “Dakota. I scheduled a 7:00 p.m. appointment for you.”

That was nice of him. “Thanks.”

She worked from six to nine and could probably handle three quick tattoos or one more-complicated one in that time. The bell rang and three giggly girls, who didn’t look much older than eighteen, came in. They walked around the store, whispering over some of the more erotic designs.

“May I help you?”

“No. We’re just looking.”

She understood the curiosity. Before she got her first tattoo, she’d come in here several times before drawing the design herself of what she wanted. Then she spent weeks trying to get the courage to get it done.

While she waited for her customer, she cleaned up the area and familiarized herself with where he kept everything. The booklet containing possible designs was not well organized. Harley had gotten sloppy in his old age.

He finished with his client just as her seven-o’clock appointment walked in. The man wanted a tattoo of a snake on the top of his thigh.

Because he’d have to remove his pants, she led him into the back room. Unfortunately, she couldn’t hear what Harley charged his customer. She prayed the surveillance equipment was good enough to pick up sound.

It took her a little more than an hour to finish her job. She charged him the amount quoted on the sheet, but she caught Harley’s glance.

The man tipped her five dollars. Being a waitress would have gotten her a better tip.

“Should have added on your tip.”

She shrugged. “Maybe he wasn’t satisfied with the result.”

“An extra five or ten here and there never hurts.”

“I don’t like to steal from customers.” His hand clenched, but she pushed aside his concern. Morgan had said not to incite Harley, but

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she never let a wrong go unnoticed.

“It’s called getting paid for my hard work. If they don’t like what I charge, they can go elsewhere.”

“We’re the only tattoo parlor in town.”

“My point exactly.”

She busied herself with putting the inks away. “You can do what you want, but that doesn’t mean I have to.”

“I couldn’t agree more. If you don’t like it, talk to the owner.” Blood rushed to her head. “You know who the owner is?”

“No, which makes it kind of hard for you to talk to him, don’t you think?”

Smart-ass
. “Let’s hope no one comes back to complain.” Two more people wandered in. Given that they looked alike, she’d say they were sisters.

The taller one approached. “Dalia and I want matching smiley faces right here.” She pointed to a spot above her hip.

“No problem. Harley, you want to take one?”

“Sure.” He smiled at the young woman.

They both sat down, and she and Harley got to work. He made the two transfers and handed her one.

The design was only one inch in diameter and done in black and yellow. He finished before she did, but Dakota was determined to make even this tiny design perfect. “There you go.” She placed a bandage on top and handed her the aftercare instructions.

When the first sister got to the register, Harley told her it would be fifty-five dollars, which was five more than the listed price. It was doubtful either woman knew the going rate. So as not to cause more problems, she let Harley ring up her client, too.

He handed her the extra five dollars. She almost didn’t feel too bad because neither woman had tipped. They probably didn’t know that a tip was appropriate.

Harley put away his gear and put the
Closed
sign on the door. “Do you understand why I jacked up the price? I knew those two wouldn’t
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cough up an extra dime as a thank-you.”

They’d been well dressed, so there was no way he could have known. Besides, wrong was wrong. “Sure.” On her way home, her stomach wouldn’t stop churning. Yes, Harley was stealing, but it wasn’t all that much from each customer.

She wished she could warn the old man about the cameras. He needed to know that his livelihood was in jeopardy if he didn’t clean up his act. Maybe Morgan’s lawyer could stop by and give him a subtle warning. Perhaps he could say his sister had come in for a tattoo and thought she’d been ripped off. Harley might listen in that case.

She called Morgan to update him on Harley’s continued abuse of the system. Actually, she wanted to call him to hear the rich timbre of his voice. When he didn’t answer, she left a message. By the time she took her shower and crawled into bed, her body was exhausted. She did love doing the tattoos, but tomorrow she had to focus on painting.

She had five days before she returned to D’Ink Coda.

Over the next week, she accepted two commissioned pieces. One was from a woman who brought in a picture of her daughter.

“I’m afraid our Stella passed last year and I would love to have a portrait of her. Can you paint something from a photo?” The tears in the woman’s eyes tore her up. “Absolutely. In fact, most of the paintings you see are from photos. I’ll make sure she looks as lovely as this picture.” Dakota really wanted to make her image beautiful. She couldn’t imagine what it would be like to lose a daughter.

“Thank you.”

The next customer who came in asked if she could do a portrait of her dog and handed Dakota several photos. Unfortunately, they were either blurry or uninteresting. “How about if I come out and take pictures of Zeus?” The little mutt was adorable, but it was hard to see the definition in black dog’s faces unless the lighting was just right.

“That would be wonderful.”

Dakota set up a time to do the shoot. Since she’d promised to get

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this done in the next two weeks, she’d be mega busy. Clint had called and said he had to go out of town for a few days for a landscape consultation. He seemed thrilled to be invited.

“Call me if you get a chance.” She didn’t want to sound needy, but she’d come to rely on talking with at least one of them each night.

“You gonna miss me?”

She laughed. His ego was one of the things she loved the most about him. “Totally. I want you to picture me naked, with my legs spread, moaning and groaning, begging you to fuck me.”

“Darlin’, I’m not sure I can go with that image burned in my brain.”

“I was hoping you’d say that.” Having phone sex only made her hornier.

“I gotta go. Be safe, you hear?”

“I probably won’t be leaving the studio much except to get food and shoot a few pictures of a dog.”

After she disconnected, she felt a bit out of sorts. Knowing that Morgan and Clint were near gave her a sense of security. Given her time constraint, she had no time to waste. Pushing aside her erotic thoughts of Clint, she sketched the outline of the woman’s daughter.

Because the young woman had beautiful eyes, Dakota decided to play up that feature by having a sunbeam stream in and strike her face at eye level. It wouldn’t quite match reality, but it would be a nice touch.

After four hours of drawing, her back ached and her hand was tired. She needed a glass of wine and a long soak in the tub.

Tomorrow she’d have to take the photos of the dog and start on that portrait. The majority of the daughter portrait was done. She needed to do the hair and the background, but the hard part, which constituted the eyes and the light beam, was complete. Perhaps, this might be her finest piece to date.

She was soaking in the warm tub and had almost dozed off when the sound of glass shattering startled her. Adrenaline slammed into her body. She jumped out of the tub, careful not to slip. Her mind
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raced. The door between the art studio and her apartment wasn’t locked.
Shit
. After tossing a towel around her body, she tiptoed into the bedroom, locked the door, and plastered her back against it. Her mind raced on what to do next. Call 911. She searched the room for her phone.
Damn
. She’d left it downstairs on the kitchen table.
Fuck
.

Her breath was lodged in her throat. She couldn’t wait for the intruder to find her. She had to get help. Her jeans and top were on the bed. She stepped into them, struggling to put them on over her wet body. If she had to fight or run, she needed to be wearing her boots.

Once dressed, she eased open the door and listened.
Damn
. She should have an alarm system installed. Why hadn’t she listened to her dad? Maybe because she didn’t own the property.

She forced her breath to slow. Maybe some kids had run by and tossed a rock through the plate-glass window. Or was someone still downstairs? If that person meant to harm her, why wasn’t he coming upstairs to get her?

She had to do something. Nothing in the bedroom looked like a weapon, but on the second-floor living room, there were plenty of metal pieces she could use to defend herself. Tiptoeing downstairs, she kept an eye on the door that led to the first-floor studio. The knob wasn’t moving, so the intruder wasn’t trying to get to her.
Yet
.

After taking a few big inhales, she charged over to the phone. Her 911 call was answered immediately.

“What’s the nature of the emergency?”

“Someone broke into my studio.” She gave the address.

“Is the intruder inside?”

She forced the tears to stay put. “I don’t know. I don’t want to go downstairs and see.”

“That’s good. Go find a safe place to hide. I’ve got dispatch on the way there.”

“Okay.” She grabbed a steel pipe that belonged to Jade and raced upstairs and hid in the bathroom. The bastard wasn’t going to get her.

A second after she locked the bathroom door, her stomach heaved,

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and she barely made it to the toilet. Once she started, she couldn’t stop until the dry heaves claimed her.
Damn him
.

After a minute of hearing nothing from the intruder, she dialed Morgan.

“Babe, what’s up?”

A sob erupted. “Someone broke into my place.”

“You okay?” The worry in his voice tore her up.

“Yes. The police are on their way.”

“So am I.” She could hear his footstep pounding on the floor and a door opening. “You still there?”

“Yes, but I need to hang up. I want to be able to hear the cops or the criminal if he comes up here.”

“Shit. Okay, but don’t confront the bastard.” She almost dropped the phone. Her fingers had turned numb.

“Okay.” Heart banging against her rib cage, she disconnected.

Now all she could do was wait and pray. Not only was she wet from the bath, but she was sweating profusely. Her pits smelled bad.

The shakes began in earnest as her stomach sickened.

Banging sounded downstairs. She stilled. Her tummy threatened to explode. Was it the cops or the intruder?

Given she’d called for help about four minutes ago, she bet it was the cops. She stepped out of the bathroom, unlocked her bedroom door, and peeked out. Muffled voices sounded downstairs. Light footsteps came up the stairs from the studio. Someone knocked.

“Dakota? It’s the police.”

Given it was a woman’s voice, she believed her. Dakota rushed downstairs and ran toward the front door. Too bad she didn’t have one of those eyepieces in the door. She opened up.

A woman in uniform was standing there holding up her badge.

“Are you okay?”

Her breath whooshed out. She nodded, unable to get out the words.

The woman entered. “I’m going to stay with you until we process the crime scene.”

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“Crime scene?”

The woman looked down for a moment. “The front window was smashed. There was damage done to some of the paintings.” Bile rushed up her throat and tinged her mouth. “Oh, God.” The mostly finished image of the dead woman flashed before her. She’d been proud of the way she’d captured the woman’s lovely eyes. “I need to see the damage.” She tried to get past the cop, but the woman stopped her.

“You need to let us do our job. Is there anyone you can call?”

“I called my boyfriend. He’ll be here shortly.”