Burn (Brothers of Ink and Steel #2)

by Allie Juliette Mousseau

  “It isn’t funny!” I state. “It’s a five mile hike back to my place.”

  That doesn’t stop her. Her response grows from a giggle to an all-out laughing fit.

  “He didn’t even fucking feed us!” I growl.

  But her eyes still sparkle when she laughs, and it sounds so good and beautiful I can’t help but get sucked into it.

  “You think it’s funny?” I reluctantly smile at her.

  She nods with tears in her eyes.

  I have to hand it to him, this is definitely one way to force us together.

  “Well, I’m starving, so I guess its pretzels and hot cocoa.” I feel at my back pocket. “At least I still have my wallet. Come on.” We stop at a vendor, and I order for us. “Do you still eat your pretzels with mustard?”

  She lands a solid look at me, takes a deep breath and lets it out in a heartfelt sigh. “Yeah, I still eat them with mustard.”

  “Triple the mustard,” I tell the guy.

  We sit on a bench overlooking the frozen lake and eat the pretzels silently. I don’t know what to say. I was lucky to finish Josh’s conversation, and that didn’t even go well. I can’t help but look over at her every few … seconds. It’s like my mind is trying to come to terms with the reality that she’s even here.

  I need to stop being a pussy.

  “I don’t think he’s going to come back,” she says finally.

  “I think you’re right,” I agree, scanning the area one more time. “Let’s get a couple of hot cocoas and start our long trek back.”

  If we were in the heart of downtown or uptown, we’d be able to hail a cab or hop the bus, but that ain’t gonna happen way the hell out here.

  She wraps her mittened hands around the warm cup as we take the greenway around the lake; it’s a shortcut anyway.

  “Every time I smell or drink hot chocolate, I always remember the night we snuck out on the rooftop of North House on my sixteenth birthday,” she says.

  My body jolts. Every time? I always imagine that she’s not remembering me at all.

  “I remember.” A hint of a smile captures my face. “I lifted a bottle of Bailey’s Irish Cream—your favorite—from Johnson’s liquor store.”

  “Yes! And we waited until Cade and Debra and everybody else was sound asleep—”

  “And I somehow smuggled out a bunch of stuff and balanced two mugs, a thermos of hot chocolate and the Baileys—”

  “While climbing the lattice up the roof.” She nods, and the sunlight catches in the hair that’s peeking out of her winter hat. “And don’t forget the fistful of lily of the valleys—my birth flower—you brought up too.”

  “You remember all of that?” The words spill out before I have a chance to pull them back.

  “Of course.” She sips at her drink. “I remember everything.”

  That’s a revelation I wasn’t expecting. The way she says it makes me wonder if, when she does think about it, she longs for those moments again, like I do.

  “It was a miracle we didn’t get caught that night or die!” She laughs.

  “Yeah, especially with all the noise we made—”

  “When we almost fell off the roof,” she says, finishing my sentence.

  I can still recall the feel of her soft body under mine and the sensations ripping through my body as the two of us were making out, hot and heavy. I remember my fingers traveled up through her jacket to get a handful of her breast. Oh, I remember, it was getting harder and harder not to go all the way.

  *****

  May, 2005

  Liam

  “Touch me,” she whispers with a warm breath against my ear. She smells like Bailey’s Irish Cream, strawberry shampoo and fresh May air.

  “I am touching you.” To prove it, I caress my thumb over her nipple. She moans, and it makes me press my hard-on between her legs, which are spread apart beneath me. The denim barrier of our Levi’s is becoming more and more frustrating.

  “I mean, touch me more.”

  I smile, move my hand from her chest and sink it down into the heat of her panties.

  “Oh, Liam,” she breathes while I massage her.

  This is going to require a serious solo session when we’re finished.

  I’ve had plenty of sex with other girls. I started when I was twelve, but I haven’t had sex since that night I followed Quinn through the cemetery. Quinn and I have done a lot of heavy petting, but she’s so perfect and innocent and lovely … she’s a little scared, and so am I. I don’t want to fuck up what we have. I don’t want to break her. And I feel like the secret I’m keeping from her will shatter her and what she thinks of me. It makes me feel … I don’t fucking know … all wrong.

  But lately, she’s been asking me to do it, to go all the way with her.

  “I want to have sex with you,” she pleads.

  “We will, soon,” I promise.

  “You always say that, and we never do,” she whines.

  “Let me watch you come like this.” I work two fingertips into her opening, but I won’t go deeper.

  She grates her hips up to meet my fingers, and I rub the heel of my hand over her swelled little button.

  “I know it’s going to hurt, but it’ll be worth it.”

  She gets her hands beneath my waistband and pulls on my shaft. Her soft fingers will get me there fast.

  “I’m sixteen now,” Quinn says as she strokes.

  “Yeah, you are,” I purr.

  “Then have sex with me.” She bites at my neck.

  She’s killing me.

  “Quinn Kelley, it’ll happen soon enough. Don’t rush it. Just enjoy this. You do like this, right?”

  She’s past fighting with me about it. She doesn’t understand what stops me with her, and she’s been mad and jealous about the other girls I’ve had and has been very vocal about it.

  “Will you at least finish in my hand?” she asks a bit sheepishly.

  The idea nearly throws me over the edge. “Do you want me to?”

  She nods.

  “Alright then, birthday girl.” I balance on one elbow, open her coat and pinch her nipple between wanting fingers, while my other hand works her below.

  Soon she’s panting and close to her release. So am I, as I buck my hips against her sweet hand.

  “Come with me,” I breathe as I lick my tongue over her lips.

  She opens her mouth to accept me in, and we both climb over the edge together, each of us overwhelmed with the sensations we give each other.

  We lay together like this, satisfied, neither of us wanting to move. That’s when my boot, which has been anchoring both of us to the sloped roof, slips.

  “Fuck!” My fingers search for purchase against the roof.

  Quinn screams as we slide. The thermos, mugs and Bailey’s bottle go tumbling ahead of us. As I hear them hit the ground and shatter, I get my arm around Quinn’s waist. If we go over, at least I can position us so that I can break her fall with my body.

  At the last moment, I feel the toe of my boot catch the gutter. It halts our fall.

  When I realize we’re not going to die by going off the roof, I ask her, “Are you okay?”

  Quinn’s eyes are wild and huge with fear. I figure she’s going to start yelling at me; instead she throws her head back and laughs.

  She laughs so hard, it makes me laugh along with her.

  “Shit! I hope Cade didn’t hear me scream!”

  “If he didn’t, he must have heard the bottle break.” We always chance serious punishment by climbing up here, especially since the lattice is outside of Cade and Debra’s bedroom window.

  “Should we wait up here?” Quinn asks, laughing. “Or should we get our half-drunken asses back into our beds?”

  I take her perfect face between my hands. “I don’t know … and I don’t care.” I kiss her. “I love you, Quinn Kelley. Would you marry me? If I asked you to?”

  Her blue eyes gaze into mine thoughtfully. “Yeah, I’d marry you.”
<
br />   “I know we’re young, I’m not saying I want to run off and get married this second. But I can start saving money now, and in a year and a half, when I’m eighteen, I can get an apartment ready for us,” I say.

  “Two years … it’s not really that long to wait. You’re worth it.” She kisses me this time, and I want it to last forever.

  Chapter Nine

  2015

  Quinn

  It’s cold out here, but I don’t care; it feels so much like old times, as if I went through some amazing time portal and hurdled back to 2005. World War III could be raging around me and I wouldn’t care. Liam’s warmth is bringing me life once again, his stormy eyes are drinking me in like they used to, and his deep, resonating voice makes me remember him telling me stories, reminding me of everything good in the world, everything I miss with a heartache that never stops.

  “So, did you go to college, like you wanted to?” he asks me.

  “Yeah, I’m in my last year.”

  He stares at me, waiting for more. “Well??” He jumps ahead of me and walks backwards while he examines my expression. “What did you end up majoring in?”

  He knows it was my biggest dream to go to school. “Interdisciplinary studies,” I confess. “I couldn’t make up my mind once I got there, so I’ve studied a little of everything.”

  “Hmm …” he cocks his eyebrow at me.

  I slap his shoulder. “Don’t judge me!”

  He laughs and pretends to be wounded, grabbing at his arm.

  “What about you, Mr. MMA fighter and tattoo-creating badass? Couldn’t choose just one thing to be amazing at?” I tease.

  “Don’t forget, I still work for Cade,” he says as he falls back in next to me.

  “I didn’t forget.”

  Liam’s a man with incredible talents. I’m fortunate he’s been in the spotlight. His celebrity has let me watch him secretly, from a distance.

  “Which is your favorite thing to do?” I ask.

  “That question’s been thrown at me a lot lately.”

  I shrug. “It seems like you can’t make up your mind, like I can’t.”

  “Who says I can’t do all of it?”

  “No one,” I answer him. The next thought pops out of my mouth before I can stop it, like some part of me wants him to know what another part of me wants to keep a secret. “I catch your fights, you know, every once in a while.”

  “You watch my fights?” He doesn’t believe me.

  “Yeah …” Hell with it, I’ve already leaped. “I went to the convention center in College Park when you fought Palomino last year … and Fuentes the year before that. He dealt you a cheap shot.”

  “What?! Wait a minute!” He leaps ahead of me and grasps my shoulders. “You … YOU went to my matches? Live?”

  I lift my chin to keep myself strong after letting my defenses down. “Yes, why wouldn’t I?”

  He opens his mouth to answer me, but no sound comes out.

  “I’m proud of you. You’ve really made an incredible name for yourself. You deserve all your successes. Plus, I got to show you off to my friend Shellie and brag that I knew you.” All of a sudden I feel like I’m digging myself into a hole. A deep, wide hole I may not be able to get out of.

  “Why didn’t you come backstage to see me?” he croaks.

  I didn’t think of him asking me that. “I don’t know, I didn’t want to mess up your mojo.” God, that sounded stupid.

  He looks off to the side, visibly shocked.

  “I’ve also watched each time you were on Ink Master,” I say, and he makes a noise beside me. “I’m really happy you continued with your art. You’ve always had an amazing gift, and I’ve loved watching you showing it to the world.”

  “I had no idea you even knew,” he says in a low tone.

  “You’re a celebrity, Liam,” I say, trying to lighten the conversation up.

  “You hate fighting,” he accuses.

  “Yeah, so?” I laugh. “At least the MMA is sanctioned with rules and not fighting to the death.”

  He doesn’t say anything and we walk a little in silence. I desperately wish that I knew what he was thinking. Then I wonder if maybe he’s thinking I’m a crazy stalker.

  “I think my favorite subject in my interdisciplinary studies program is art history—and the humanities. Definitely. I’ve contemplated becoming a museum curator after I graduate,” I say out of nowhere, trying to turn the silence around.

  “What period are you most into?”

  I’m relieved he picks up the conversation.

  “I don’t really have one favorite time period. Actually, I’m more intrigued by the people who created the art and what was happening to them, the world and their society at the time. For example, the Chinese art made by women from the Hunan province, they were so oppressed by the men in their society that they formed a secret language to communicate with each other called Nushu. They embroidered the words into ornate fans, cloth books and other things that could be passed to each other as gifts without being detected. Egyptian art is so cool too. You know, they never recorded their failures or defeats, only their victories. The Bauhaus Movement, DaVinci and Galileo …”

  “How were they intriguing?”

  “Because the church was the almighty power, and their philosophies, art, science and religion didn’t usually mesh.”

  He smiles at me like he already knew that.

  “Are you teasing me?” I ask.

  “No. No, not at all. I’m just remembering your passion and your fire. And the sound of your voice. I could listen to it all night,” he says. “So please, keep talking.”

  Of course, what he confesses takes my breath away, and I can’t form a word.

  When the pause gets too long for Liam, he says, “I assume you attend the University of Georgia?”

  “I was offered a scholarship at Georgia State.”

  “What do you do for fun?”

  I laugh. “Fun? Well in my free time, I help build houses with Habitat for Humanity. Oh, and I volunteer at the city’s homeless shelters. Especially the halfway house for teenagers.”

  “Of course you do.”

  “Don’t make fun.”

  “I promise, I’m not. It all just sounds very much like you.”

  “I have a few good friends that I keep close to, but really, school and my volunteer activities take up a lot of my time.” I gather my thoughts. “What about you? Did you … go to college?”

  “Minneapolis College of Art and Design.”

  “Liam, really? They’re so prestigious!”

  “Cade and Debra put me through. I kept living at the home while I studied and worked for Cade at the gym—training with the kids that came through. After I graduated, I never stopped. That’s my most rewarding job.

  “Cade recently paired me up with a thirteen-year-old boy—his name is Jonah. He’s bright, but he’s autistic, so he’s quiet, and it’s obvious that he’s frightened and lonely. My entire purpose since he came into my life a few weeks ago is to break through the shell he’s built around himself. He doesn’t talk, but he can. I know his mother tried drowning him when he was around five years old and he’s been in foster care ever since, but I think something else has happened, something in more recent history that’s sealed him off even more from the world.”

  I look up at him as he formulates his next thought. Good God, he’s so amazing and so gorgeous. He hasn’t changed at all.

  “My art gives me a way to express the deepest part of who I am. Tattooing also allows me to draw out someone else’s essence. When you create a tattoo on someone’s body, it’s art for life. You help them express themselves, and a piece of you becomes immortal.”

  I pull on a string unraveling from my mitten, and I find it ironic. Liam is unraveling me.

  “Thank God,” he says as we round Lake Nokomis. “My house is right around the corner.”

  “You have a place near the lake?”

  “I bought it a couple years a
go. I’ve got a big dog that needed some extra space.”

  He said “I” both times. Maybe he doesn’t live with his girlfriend. Maybe it’s horrible of me to think that way.

  I assume that he and Adrienne are together, considering the fact that he felt the need to kiss her goodbye when he left the shop. At least he only kissed her on the cheek—probably in an attempt to make me feel less uncomfortable. Uncomfortable doesn’t really describe the feelings I had in that moment—I’ve always been intensely jealous of other girls around Liam, more than I’d like to admit. All of these years, keeping tabs on his life the way I have, I’ve relished every article that called him a playboy; it let me imagine that maybe a part of his heart still belonged to me. I know I don’t deserve the claim—I just wish …

  He kissed me at The Core, but he hasn’t mentioned it since. With Adrienne in the picture, he could have chocked the kiss—the ravaging, soul-reaching kiss—up to a mistake.

  “And there it is.”

  “That’s your house?”

  “Don’t you believe me?”

  “I believe you, it’s just huge,” I observe. Too huge for a single man.

  Could he actually be married? I think I’d have seen something about it if he was, but the press has pretty much stayed away from his private life for some reason. Josh has been in the tabloids a lot, but Liam really hasn’t. I wonder how he’s managed that. Could Cade’s influence have anything to do with it?

  I notice him staring at me.

  “It’s stunning,” I say finally.

  The house is constructed mainly of glass. Massive windows are set in rough-hewn wood and slate.

  He hasn’t mentioned children, but a ball of ill energy forms in the pit of my stomach. “Do you … have a boat?” Do you have kids?

  “Yeah, a rowboat. It helps me keep in shape.” He smiles and pats his abs.

  I’d like to see his abs.

  He opens the front door and holds it open for me. I hold my breath against what I’m going to discover—all the things he hasn’t talked about—when a mammoth bear-dog comes running up to me.

  “Oh my God!” the biggest black Newfoundland I’ve ever seen greets me before he greets Liam.