Love Is More Than Skin Deep (A Hidden Hearts Novel Book 4)

by Mary Crawford

  “I could see that. Your wife is one scary woman. I was at the library the other day, writing lyrics and I threw some paper away instead of recycling it and I thought Diamond was going to recycle me. If I hadn’t been ready to go on the road for a gig, I think she was planning to make me check out books on recycling. She takes her duties as a librarian seriously.”

  “Don’t count on being off of her radar quite yet, she’s probably got you mentally tagged for community service for your infraction,” he warns with a crooked grin. “She just loves those kids in her reading program and she’ll do anything for them.”

  Jett starts to wipe off my tattoo. “Why don’t you go check that in the mirror?”

  As I move to stand up, I remember why I absolutely hate rib tattoos. I walk over to the mirror and angle myself so that I can see the work that Jett just did. It’s pretty remarkable. You’d never guess that I had freaky tribal stuff there before. He played off of the owl tattoo that Jade gave me earlier and perfectly scattered feathers across my torso to cover my earlier work. The feathers look haphazard and random; it doesn’t look like they are covering up anything at all. They are magnificent and the level of detail and craftsmanship is spectacular. “Oh wow! This is stellar. I’ve regretted this tattoo for nearly a decade and now it’s gone — I can’t thank you enough.”

  Jade wanders over to me and examines the tattoo. “Declan, you should’ve said something, I could have added these for you — unless you weren’t happy with my work? By the way, great work, Dad. The placement of these feathers is genius. It’s a masterful cover job.”

  Faster than I can say a word, Jett is all over Jade. “I was under the mistaken belief that you had three pieces scheduled for this afternoon. I see that you couldn’t close the sale on even one of those. What’s going on? Don’t you care about the future of the shop? We count on the revenue of the shop to pay the bills and the employees. We have to have customers that book tattoos. This can’t just be a place where we gossip about makeup and hair. I taught you better than that, Girl. Where is your business sense?”

  “I’d really rather not sort out shop business here, but really, Dad? The Ink’d Deep that I know cares more about the customers than the bottom line. We take the time to do proper consults so that we don’t end up doing cover-up tattoos like you just had to do. We make sure that our clients have the right tattoos for the right reasons. Isn’t that what you always taught me? It’s the whole reason behind the name — that there’s always a deeper meaning behind a tattoo. That it’s always about more than just the ink. When did we forget that? The day that we decide that that’s not important is the day I put down my machine and walk away. I don’t care how much money I make at this; if it’s only about the money, I don’t want to do it anymore. In fact, some days I’m not sure I want to do it anyway.”

  “How can you say that? You’ve been tattooing almost as long as you’ve been able to walk. You have so much talent!” Jett argues emphatically. “Why are you suddenly doing stupid crap? Has the fame gone to your head? You don’t stop a tattoo in the middle. You sure as hell don’t pay a customer to go to our competitors. We can’t afford to do that, and we can’t afford to lose walk-in business. If you’re gonna manage the business for me, you need to know this. What the hell were you thinking?

  “Daddy, I can’t fight about this right now. I have an orchestra playing in my head. I guess you’re either going to trust my judgment on this one or not. Trust me, I had a good reason.”

  Jett walks over and grabs his daughter and pulls her in close for a bear hug. “I’m sorry you’re hurting, Baby. You know we’re going to have to talk about this someday —someday soon. The future of the business depends on it.”

  Jade visibly shrinks in her dad’s arms when she hears those words. Her words are barely more than a whisper as she responds, “Yeah, Daddy, I know. Believe me, I know. It’s not like I could forget, ever.”

  I study Jade carefully and realize that she is drinking another energy drink, but it’s a different one than she was drinking before. “Hey, I’m about to grab something to eat. I absolutely hate eating by myself. People make all sorts of dramatic assumptions about my social life if I sit by myself in the corner of the restaurant. Unfortunately, I haven’t had a chance to visit your mom this week to see if she’s got any new paperbacks for me. I would just stick out like a sore thumb. Please rescue me and go to lunch with me,” I plead.

  Jade gives me a double take as she exclaims, “You go see my mom every week for books? Even I don’t do that!”

  I grin as I shrug. “Usually, I’m your mom’s favorite customer. There was that time that the Greyhound bus took off with my backpack on board and someone took off with my stuff. I wasn’t your mom’s favorite customer that week, but usually I am. I read so much she wants me to start writing a column for the library’s website. I told her that I’m not really much of a writer. In typical Diamond fashion, she told me I was full of crap. She told me that if I could write lyrics to a song and do poetry slams, I could write book reviews.”

  “What’s stopping you?” Jade probes.

  “I don’t know,” I reply. “I guess I don’t see how I’m qualified to write book reviews. I’m just a musician. I write songs for a living and I play music to make people happy. I don’t know anything about books other than what I like to read. Why should my opinion count?”

  “My mom must have a good reason for trusting your opinion,” she points out, as I help her put her jacket on. I notice she winces as she reaches back to put her arm in the sleeve. “Exactly how many books do you read in a week?”

  “Usually three or four. If I’m going on a really long road trip, sometimes it’s more. Usually, I’ll tell your mom in advance if I’m planning a gig that’s a long ways from home. Sometimes, when that happens she’ll pull me a whole series of books. Your mom is a really great librarian. She takes great care of me. Most people take one look at my appearance and decide that I’m too dumb to read.

  Jade turns around and faces the back of the shop as she announces, “I’m not making any guarantees that I’ll be back today. I have a colossal headache and I don’t have any more appointments booked today. My arms are feeling shaky from doing a huge back piece this morning, so the world might thank me if I just stay away.”

  “Go. Go out for ice cream, go home, go out to a movie, or go do something crazy. You’ve been covering for everybody and no one’s been covering for you. That’s not the deal you made when you became a part owner. You’re supposed to be taking some perks as part of the deal. I don’t see you doing that.”

  “I went shopping with the Spooky Twins that one time,” Jade asserts defensively.

  “Ice, that was months ago,” Marcus counters, using her nickname.

  “It was not — oh I guess it was,” she admits sheepishly.

  I place my hand against the back of her shoulder as I gently lead her out of the store. “Come on, I know you have the heart of a warrior, but I am a mere mortal and I’m starving. If we hurry, we can beat Frannie’s afternoon rush.”

  “Frannie’s?” she repeats with a puzzled expression on her face. “What in the world is Frannie’s?”

  “Only the best eating establishment in all of creation,” I answer. “Do you mean to tell me that you are this close to greatness and you’ve never actually been there?”

  “Yeah, I guess that’s what I’m telling you,” she responds as she rolls her shoulders and bites back a torrent of cuss words.

  “Did you do that piece on Smoke’s back all in one session?”

  Jade shrugs as she responds, “Yeah, I know it wasn’t my brightest move. I know better and I’m going to be paying the price for the next day or two.”

  “Why did you do it then? You usually pace yourself better than that,” I ask, as I try to rub a knot out of her shoulder.

  At first she freezes at the contact. Jade and I have been casual friends for a while. Our social circles interact a lot and we have similar senses of hu
mor. She’s been pretty good at supporting my career such as it is. Whenever I post stuff on my Facebook or twitter, she always shares that with all of her friends and she’ll post flyers in Ink’d Deep for me if I’ve got a big gig coming up. I suspect if you asked Jade how I felt about her, she’d probably tell you that I’m one of her buddies — if we drank more, we’d probably be considered beer buddies. The truth of the matter is, I’d like to be more than Jade’s buddy. I’ve just never figured out how to change who I am to her. I heard her tell one of her customers that no one respects her abilities as an artist because all they see are her boobs, lips and hair. I don’t want to be “that guy”.

  It’s true, I am deeply attracted to Jade — I won’t deny it. The reason that I am deeply attracted to her is because she is an incredible artist and she is witty, smart and fiercely funny. She is a loyal friend and confidant. She is compassionate to clients and bends over backwards to make them happy. There is no getting around the fact that she is scorching hot. Her hair just begs for a man to wrap himself up in it and get lost, her lips are the soft kissable kind and those eyes — those eyes will keep a million secrets and tell you everything you need to know.

  Although we’ve been close acquaintances for years, this is the first time I’ve had the opportunity to give her a backrub. I wait quietly to see how she reacts. After a couple of seconds, she takes a deep breath and relaxes into my touch and lets her cheek loll against my forearm as she lets out a shuddering sigh and appreciates, “Oh man, that feels so good. I wish I didn’t have to ask you to stop.”

  I shrug. “Jade, you don’t have to ask me to stop. I’ll do whatever you need me to do to take away your pain.”

  “Declan, you don’t know what you’re saying. My life is a bigger mess than you might imagine. There’s a lot of random pain there.”

  “Isn’t that true of us all? We’re all just a grand total of our life experience. Some of it’s been great, and some of it sucks — what we put out into the world is just a reflection of what has been given to us. It’s how we process it that makes us winners and losers.”

  Jade chuckles softly as she teases, “I didn’t realize you’re such an armchair philosopher.” As we stop in front of the restaurant and I open the door, she twists her back to loosen it. “Trust me Declan, you really don’t want me to dump on you. Some days I feel like I have the weight of the world on my shoulders. It wouldn’t be fair to you.”

  I flex my muscles a little. “I don’t know, I think I can probably handle it. I’ve got pretty broad shoulders.”

  Jade scoffs at me. “Oh, I wouldn’t argue that you don’t have nice shoulders, it’s too bad that you let some poser scribble all over them. Lucky for you, I was able to fix that mess. I hope you learned your lesson about letting a semi-drunk friend practice his tattooing skills on you.”

  “Hey, I thought it was being a good friend,” I argue. “He didn’t actually tell me he was drunk until he was halfway through the tattoo. By that point, I was already committed and there wasn’t much else I could do. Besides, it will never happen again. I swear from here on out I’ll never get any artwork done outside of Ink’d Deep.”

  Jade grins at me and her whole face lights up as she quips, “Never let it be said that I don’t like a smart man.” She’s beautiful on any day, but when she’s being mischievous it’s a whole other kind of gorgeous. She picks up the menu and studies it before asking me, “What’s good here?”

  “Everything!” I answer with a contented sigh as I rub my belly.

  Jade shakes her head abruptly as she counters, “No, I really mean it. What’s really good? Don’t take the coward’s way out, I know that every restaurant I’ve ever been to has its own specialties and the rest of the stuff they do is pretty mediocre.”

  I set my menu to the side as I answer, “Okay, I hear you now. Personally, I dream about her meatloaf sandwich when I’m on the road. It’s just that good. I also crave the open-faced roast beef and gravy sandwich and the turkey dinner. This is one of the few places you can get a turkey dinner year-round. I love being able to get turkey and stuffing with cranberry sauce in the middle of summer.”

  Jade holds her hands up in surrender as she confesses, “I give up. I’m starving and I usually just resort to inviting myself over to Rogue and Ivy’s mom’s house if I want some decent home cooking. Mama Rosa and Isaac have started calling me their ghost daughter because I’m over there so often. I love to have some roast beef and gravy. My grandpop used to have it all the time. He swore that if he ate it before baseball games, his team never lost. Even when I was nine, I knew that wasn’t exactly true, but I never pointed it out to him. I just liked that it became our ritual to have meals together before games.”

  “That’s a really sweet memory. In my family it was corned beef and cabbage. They would always make a big pot of it before church and then everybody would eat before watching the football games on Sunday. Well, that is the family members that didn’t have to work. Most of my family works at the lots on Sunday, so it’s not like we have a huge gathering or anything. There’s something that’s so great about corned beef and cabbage. It can sit around for a few hours without much damage. People could come and graze on it as they needed to.”

  “Lots? What do you mean lots?” Jade asks with a befuddled expression.

  “Ever heard of Stone Auto? ‘Our cars are as solid as a granite, but our prices are rock-bottom’. That’s my family. It’s been in the family for generations and there will likely be many more. I was one of the few to escape – much to my dad’s chagrin.”

  “Of course I’ve heard of them. Everybody in Florida has heard of them; it’s like a gargantuan company, they have ads everywhere. Do they still give a pet rock out to every kid who gets dragged along when their parents buy a car? I always thought that was kinda cool. I’m confused though — your last name isn’t Stone.”

  “It is and it isn’t,” I start. “My family is an interesting mix of very prideful people. When my grandfather emigrated here from Greece, he decided that Ailín didn’t sound American enough so he changed it to Stone to fit in. The names mean the same thing.”

  “Wow, isn’t that funny? Our last names mean the same thing, but Declan isn’t Greek, is it? It sounds Irish to me,” Jade comments.

  “That would be my mom’s side of the family who wanted very much to keep naming traditions alive in the family, as apparently I am named after a great uncle.”

  “You have met most of my eccentric family, Jett, Diamond... I’m sorry you didn’t get a chance to meet my brother, Onyx, but are you sensing a pattern here?”

  “I like your name I think it suits you well. It’s beautiful just like you,” I compliment like the gentleman my mom taught to me to be.

  Jade groans. “When did you turn into such a cheese ball? I think I liked you better as the armchair philosopher.”

  “Hey,” I protest, “I might actually resemble that remark. I write lyrics for a living. I thought women liked this sappy stuff.”

  “I don’t know, maybe some women do. You should know by now that I’m not like most women. Maybe I just march to a different drummer or something, but it just sounded like a really lame line to me. It sounded like something you’d say to any old woman in a bar or at a club to pick her up. It just seemed skeevy to me.”

  “Wow! Talk about your fundamental misunderstanding. I was just trying to be nice. I do happen to think that you’re very pretty and that your name reflects your personality and your beauty very well. I wasn’t trying to be creepy at all,” I explain in an attempt to clarify my remarks. “If that’s the way I’m coming off, perhaps I need to work on my interpersonal skills.”

  Jade takes a long drink of her iced tea and then sets it down on the table. She runs her fingers through her hair and then takes a rubber band off her wrist and puts her hair in a ponytail. I try not to cringe because I like her hair down and wild. Having long hair myself, I know why she puts it back. It can be a pain to have it fall in your face al
l the time. When she finishes fiddling with her hair, she sighs and says, “Look, I’m sorry; I might be just a little oversensitive. It’s been a bitch of a week.”

  “Is there anything I can do to help?” I offer.

  “Sadly, I don’t think so. Unless you can change a lifetime of expectations. It’s really complicated and I don’t think there are any great answers. If there are, I haven’t come up with any and I’ve been trying to work it out for months, if not years.”

  “I know that feeling. Sometimes you have to do what’s right for you even if it hurts the people you love.”

  “Really? Because you know all the people I love. Do you think I’m big on hurting them?”

  “I know you’re not. It’s all a really hard balancing act Sometimes you have to watch out for you, too. What’s your dilemma?”

  “Declan, I don’t know if I should even tell you. First of all, you’re going to think I’m crazy and secondly, you’re technically my dad’s client,” she argues after the waitress puts our food down in front of us.

  I silently ponder her arguments as we eat our lunch. After a few bites, “I usually try my best to see both sides of an issue before I make up my mind,” I counter. “I’m as much your client as I am your dad’s. Besides, where is it written that you have to have some sort of sacred relationship with me like a priest or a doctor? We’re just friends.”

  Jade takes a deep breath and blows it out as she acquiesces, “Okay, it’s not like I have anybody else to tell this to. Marcus is too busy making googly eyes with his wife. Ivy’s friend Jessica is cool, but she’s got Mitch now. I can’t tell my own family because they’re part of the issue.”

  “If there’s anything I can relate to, it’s family being the issue,” I commiserate.

  “So, what you’re telling me is if I completely unload on you, you’re not going to go running to my parents to tell them what I said?”

  “I told you I had broad shoulders and I meant it. If you need to talk, I’m here for you.”