The Darkest Link (Second Circle Tattoos) (3 page)

His ran his eyes up and down her, resting a fraction too long on her breasts before he looked away, rubbing his hand over his chin.

“You asked what’s in Orlando . . . I’m heading to a tattoo expo where I am one of the speakers tomorrow.”

“Huh,” Kenny said in response, resting his hand behind him on the log and leaning back in such a way that his biceps and triceps stretched the band of his polo shirt.

Lia wondered what it would feel like to be hugged tightly in his arms. Or whether he’d be strong enough to hold both of her hands in one of his above her head while they were in bed together. She bit her lower lip at the thought. That kind of thing totally got her off.

“Is it important to you to get there?”

To get where? Orgasm?
Did he just read her mind? It took Lia another moment to realize he was asking about the expo and she felt her cheeks heat. “It feels like I’ve been waiting forever for this opportunity to come along.”

He looked at her from the corners of his eyes. “Are we talking about whatever just turned your cheeks pink or the expo?”

“What if I said both?” she asked and bit her lip.

“What time do you need to be there by?” Kenny asked, but his eyes were on her mouth.

She released her lip and grinned. “I’m speaking at noon tomorrow. Why?”

Kenny leaned forward and took hold of her hand, massaging her palm with his thumb. It was a bold move, and she liked it. His confidence was . . . refreshing.

“Well, if I’m gonna deliver on both, I want to know how long I have to get to know you, because women as confident and pretty as you don’t drive through Fort Pierce every day.”

Lia felt her cheeks warm a little at the compliment.

Kenny coughed and smiled at her. “So why tattooing, Lia?”

She hated that question and often answered it with a generic answer about using her art to help others, but the truth was painful, stemming from long periods of being ignored by her parents while growing up. As her mother had withdrawn from the social butterfly she’d once been, her father’s frustrations had increased. He knew how much Lia loved to draw, so as punishment for some minor infraction, he would take her art supplies away. But Lia had gotten smart, and had hidden a couple of pens in the gap between her mattress and bed frame. In the absence of paper, she had taken to drawing on herself, hiding the doodles under her clothes until it was time to shower. As an adult, it was something she still found comfort in, although she was embarrassed to share that detail with anybody else.

“I’m an artist first,” she explained, trying her best to ignore the way his strong hand on hers made her stomach flip. “But of all the canvases I’ve used, skin is just the most intimate. It’s so hard to explain, the connection you get when someone gives you permission to change their skin forever. That you get to touch them while you do it, for me, means there’s this moment when . . . sorry, I’m rambling.” She rarely shared her true feelings because they sounded totally out there, so it was odd she felt compelled to tell a man she’d barely known five minutes.

Kenny lifted her chin with his finger and ran his thumb along her lower lip. “No. You’re not. Please . . . finish what you were about to say.” He dropped his hand away.

She licked her lip where he’d touched her and sighed. Unsure whether the light-headedness she suddenly felt was his touch, or her over-sharing, she continued regardless. “There’s a moment where I feel like an extension of the person I’m tattooing, because I’m creating a piece that will become an extension of them for the rest of his or her life. Sounds weird, doesn’t it?”

Kenny rubbed his hand over the tattoo on his arm. “Not at all. Getting ink that matters is . . . well . . . it can be lots of things. Reminders of love, of loss, of recklessness,” he said with a sad laugh. “I guess it can be just as intimate for the recipient is all. Not sexual necessarily, although I have a suspicion getting one by you might be.”

She studied him for a moment, her pulse racing, the connection between them undeniable. “I have a feeling you might be right.”

They sat in comfortable silence, looking out over the water, listening to the soft swoosh of the waves as they folded onto the sand. The cloudless sky was a vivid blue, and the air rich with the scent of saline.

Gravel crunched under tires on the roadside and Kenny looked in the direction of her car. “Your knight in shining blue paint has arrived.”

They walked back up the path until they reached the road. Again, Kenny steadied her as she brushed off her feet and slipped her shoes back on. Sure enough, parked ahead of her car was a brilliant blue tow truck with the words
KENNY’S AUTO SHOP
in white on the cab. Ahead of that was a beat-up minivan.

“Shaun, Jason, this is Lia. Lia, these guys are mechanics at the garage.”

“Hi,” she said. “Thanks so much for helping me out.”

“Need a hand getting this on board, Kenny?” Jason asked.

“Nah, I got this.”

Lia watched them do some weird fist-bump thing, then leave.

“Want to help?” Kenny asked, coming to stand right in front of her. His polo shirt clung to his pecs, stretching across the chest. It shouldn’t have been delicious. Polo shirts were dorky, conventional, staid. But after seeing how Kenny rocked his, she felt like buying stock in Fruit of the Loom.

“Do I look dressed for manual labor?” Lia looked down at her shoes and shrugged.

“Not one bit.” He laughed. “You look dressed for sunshine, sushi, and saki.”

“Any other
S
words?” she asked playfully, placing her hand on his side which was,
Lord God,
so freaking solid.

He leaned forward and slowly ran a finger down the length of one of her curls, watching the way it bounced back into place. It was a simple move, and shouldn’t have aroused her like it did. Kenny placed his lips next to her ear. “Slipping, sliding, seducing, sucking, screwing, and sexual.” He stepped back. “Will those do you, Red?” he asked gruffly.

She swallowed deeply and nodded.

“Good. Now hop in the truck, the AC is running.”

It was impossible to hide her pleasure at his words, and she grinned. Cool air would have to do for now . . . until she could make it to a cold shower.

* * *

Reid took a whiff of his polo shirt and cringed. His bike and Lia’s car were now secured on the tow truck, which was a good thing. But he smelled like his old hockey bag used to, which was most definitely a bad thing. For a moment, he considered removing it, but his body didn’t smell much better. Neither of which were conducive to persuading Lia to stick around a while longer. He’d seen her periodically watching him through the rearview mirror, and he liked having her eyes on him. Those gray eyes were like quicksilver, and such a contrast to all that sexy-as-hell hair. But man, he needed to cool the fuck down, because he’d had a freaking hard-on since those fucking wide eyes of hers had flared when he whispered in her ear. And it had taken every ounce of self-control not to kiss her.

He opened the door to the cab, and propped his arms on the seat. “I’m going to give you two choices, neither of which is great.”

“Okay, hit me up.” The heat-induced pinkness had gone from her cheeks, her skin as close to perfection as he’d ever seen.

“I stink, the shirt stinks. I’m thinking me without it might be marginally bearable, but we get to keep the AC. Or, we wind down the windows and roll with it. Less stink, more breeze.”

Lia lifted her hand up to her hair. “There’s no easy way to answer that,” she said with a raised eyebrow.

“No?” He waited patiently for her to answer.

“Does it make me shallow and vain if I say ditch the shirt so my hair doesn’t get mussed up?”

Reid walked back to the bed of the truck and hopped up. He took his shirt off and threw it into the tool kit before returning to the cab to climb inside. “Better?” he asked.

Lia looked him up and down, and if he had to guess by the way her pupils flared again, and the way she bit down on her bottom lip, the answer was yes.

“Bearable,” she said primly and turned toward the window, but not before he saw the corner of her mouth turn up in a grin. “You look like a goddamn soda commercial.”

He tried not to stare at the way her blue dress had ridden up her thigh because,
fuck,
those were fine-looking legs, and started the truck.

“So, how long have you lived in Fort Pierce?” Lia asked once they were underway. “That accent doesn’t sound native.”

“I’ve been here for five years. Illinois originally.”

Lia shivered dramatically. “Anywhere north of Atlanta freaks me out. My boss’s fiancée, Harper, is from Chicago, and I always tease her about why anybody would live where it’s freezing half the year.”

Kenny laughed. “While I was looking at your car, I wondered why people choose to live in a place without seasons. You don’t know what you’re missing. Plus, saunas, snow, and sex go together perfectly.” Why had he never realized just how handy the letter
S
was?

Without thinking, he grabbed her hand and placed it flat on his thigh, his hand on top of hers.

“If you miss the seasons so much, why don’t you live somewhere that has them?”

“That, Lia, requires a long and complicated answer, but it’s good for business to build custom bikes in a state where it’s possible to ride them year-round.” Deflecting was a shitty thing to do, and his gut dropped a little at the thought, but today was for
S
words and flirting, not for reminiscing about the things that haunted him.

He raised her hand and kissed her knuckle. Her skin was perfectly soft against his lips. “I want you to stick around for a little bit longer. Can you do that?” Reid turned to look at her.

She paused for a moment, then smiled. “
Sí.
”

“I fucking love
S
words.”

The drive back to his garage took all of twenty minutes, and within another ten, he had the car up on the hydraulic lift.

Reid ran a number of checks on the car, and made some notes. He stood up and raised his hands in the air to stretch his spine out. Shaun had left for the evening and Jarod was just about to lock up for the day.

“You need a hand, boss?” he asked.

“Nah, I’ve got this,” Reid said. “I’m going to take a proper look at this in the morning. Gotta love these old classics, but life got a whole lot easier when they introduced engine management systems.”

“She’s a beauty,” Jarod said, looking from the car to over where Lia was standing in front of his tin poster of Betty Page on the cover of
Modern Vixen.

“Yeah,” he answered, because it applied to both.

Jarod whipped his rag across Reid’s chest, and he was thankful he’d taken the time to pull on a clean polo shirt.

“Ow, motherfucker. What the hell was that for?”

“Lucky S.O.B.,” Jarod said, walking away, laughing.

Reid rubbed his chest.
Asshole.
Jarod was going to end up on call the following weekend in retaliation. Lia had waited, but it was hard to say she’d done it patiently. She’d picked things up, turned them over in her hand, and put them down before moving on to the next. He’d suggested sitting in the waiting room next door, even though he liked looking at her. Instead, she’d simply carried a stool out into the garage but never sat on it.

“I’m done for now,” he said, grabbing a towel and wiping his hands. “It’s none of the obvious things, so I’m going to have to dig deeper in the morning, see what needs doing. My gut tells me that it’s going to require new parts and we’ll need to special order them, given the age of the engine. Or see if we can find them online.”

“You can do that?” she asked, looking around the garage.

“Yeah.”
’Cause I’m a fucking auto wizard.
“There’s no end to my talents.” He couldn’t resist touching the end of her curls.

“That’s . . . impressive,” she said with a raised eyebrow.

“I like to think so. Where do you need to be, and by when?” Reid asked.

Lia looked at the huge clock that hung on the far wall.

It was already six in the evening. Technically, he should be on his way to Shakey’s to join the guys for an after-work beer, but right now he was quite happy with his current view.

“I’m speaking at noon, but the expo opens at nine. I have a room booked for tonight, but I’d planned to head home straight after it was over. I guess I should start to make arrangements to get there.”

It was strange the way the deep feeling of dissatisfaction crept over him. It wasn’t immediate, but in the same way paint changed color as it dried, her words bothered him more as they settled. He wasn’t ready to let her go. He would eventually, of course. But this woman had potential, and he wanted to explore that for a little while longer before they said good-bye. To pretend for a moment that he wasn’t such a screwup, and that he actually stood a chance with the hot-as-hell woman standing before him.

He shook his head. Now wasn’t the time to think about the past.

“I have a plan. It’s a ninety-minute drive to Orlando, plus or minus, depending on where you are staying. For both of our sakes, let me go shower. I live upstairs,” he said, motioning upward with his eyes and chin. “Then, I’ll drive you to wherever you need to go, buy you dinner”—he gripped her chin—“and perhaps kiss those pretty red lips of yours.” She smiled at that, which warmed him inside. “And after that I’ll deposit you safely at your hotel.”

“And what about my car?”

“I’ll figure out what needs fixing,” he said, reluctantly letting go of her. “I’ll work up a quote, e-mail it to you. You like it, I do the work. You don’t, then I’ll tow it wherever you want the car to go. If you’ve got a mechanic at home you really like, it’s no skin off my nose.” Except it was. He wanted to work on the car desperately. The chance to work on a classic Plymouth was too good an opportunity to miss. Missing out on working on Lia’s car would suck donkey balls, not least because he wanted to see her again once it was fixed.

“Okay.”

“Okay? Simple as that?” he asked.

“As long as you shower, because that’s a deal breaker.”