by Ranae Rose
It was hard to imagine James being a pain in the ass. He was the kindest and most hard-working person Arianna had ever met – the way he took care of Emily proved it, and his tattoos had the beauty and quality she’d normally expect to see in the work of an artist who’d been tattooing for years longer than he had.
Then again, people matured over time. Maybe he’d been different seven years ago.
She’d certainly made her share of mistakes when she’d been young.
“So,” she said, changing the subject for her own sake as a familiar uneasiness threatened to set in, “what was the first thing you ever actually tattooed on someone?”
James smiled. “Well, Jed said he wouldn’t unleash me on Hot Ink’s clients until I was good enough that he’d be willing to let me tattoo him. So that’s what he did. The design was—”
A phone went off, cutting James short. Arianna reached for her purse automatically before realizing that the ringtone wasn’t hers.
James pulled his phone from a pocket. “Hello?”
For several seconds, he didn’t say anything further. His expression darkened by degrees, until eventually he looked like a storm cloud was hanging over his head. Arianna almost wondered whether the caller had hung up on him, but he didn’t put the phone down.
“Where the hell are you?” he asked, a sharpness to his voice Arianna had never heard before.
More silence, and then he swore.
Arianna’s gut tied itself in knots that dulled her hunger. The easiness of their conversation had evaporated, and the amber lighting that filled the restaurant wasn’t warm enough to erase the chill in his voice. Who could’ve upset him so severely with just a few words?
“Do you have any idea what kind of a risk you took by having some jackass just leave her on my doorstep? Anybody could’ve come along and taken her, hurt her. She was all alone when I found her. She was hungry, and she needed a diaper change. What the hell is wrong with you?”
Arianna felt the color drain out of her face. James’ sister? A million questions raced through her mind, mostly ones that were similar to the ones he’d already asked.
“Yeah, well he didn’t stay by her side,” James said in response to something Arianna couldn’t quite hear. “He left her on the doorstep and watched her from his car on the other side of the parking lot like a fucking coward.”
A couple at the nearest table turned to stare.
James didn’t seem to notice. Beneath his blond hair, his face was growing redder by the second. “Yeah, I read the note, and I’ve been taking care of her. She’s doing fine, no thanks to you.”
“What do you mean that was all you wanted to know – what about all the shit I want to know?”
A few more tense words were exchanged, during which James sat rigidly in his seat, his free hand curled in a white-knuckled fist. “90 days – I wonder if she’ll even remember you by then. She was so small when you abandoned her.”
He ended the call. Had he cut his sister off – had she tried to make excuses, or had his harsh words stunned her into silence?
They’d stunned Arianna into silence, and she’d only been an observer.
“That was my sister, Crystal.” He finally met her eyes.
What she saw reflected there made her ache. Anger, yeah, but sadness too, and something she couldn’t quite put her finger on. Regret, possibly. Or shame.
Or maybe she was just projecting the feelings lurking in the back of her mind onto him.
“I figured,” she finally said.
“She’s in some drug rehab program. Said she had to wait until the detox period was over to call.”
“Some place nearby?” Arianna didn’t know anything about drug rehab. She’d grown up in a conservative household, and drugs were part of a world she’d never waded into. She was the black sheep in the family, and she’d never touched anything so taboo.
“Near Philly. Guess that’s where she’s living now.”
“And she called to ask about Emily?”
James nodded. “It would’ve served her right if I hadn’t told her a damned thing. Acting like she cares after the way she just abandoned her…”
The tension in his jaw was visible, and a vein throbbed at his temple. “What kind of person would just leave their own kid? She wants to put on this concerned mother act, but if she’d ever given a shit about anyone but herself, she never would’ve abandoned Emily. Every kid deserves to be taken care of by their own parents, not pawned off on whoever will do the job.”
James’ words went straight through Arianna, causing sharp pain to flare in the vicinity of her heart while a creeping numbness radiated out into the rest of her. Her lips tingled, and though her hands rested on the table, she felt nothing – not the texture of the well-worn tabletop, or the coolness of the wood.
What kind of person would leave their own child to be raised by someone else?
Her. She would – she had.
James didn’t know that, but it was easy to imagine that if he had, the same anger that rolled off him in waves now would be directed at her. Arianna didn’t consider herself to be on the same base level as his sister – she certainly hadn’t dumped her baby on a doorstep – but his words made it clear that he wouldn’t see things the same way. And it was no wonder, considering the way he’d grown up: unwanted.
Regardless of how she’d done it, she’d surrendered her child to others to raise. And James obviously found that repellant.
Suddenly, she didn’t feel like the girl in his tattoo chair anymore – the one he’d failed to disguise his lust for, the one he’d taken on a date. The one who’d seen and touched every last one of his tattoos, not to mention the hidden piercing that’d just about driven her out of her mind with pleasure. Instead, she felt like the girl she’d sacrificed so much trying not to be – a bad person. A bad mother.
Someone a selfless guy like James could never be attracted to.
Sitting there across from him as his date, she was living a lie. As soon as he found out about her past, he’d be out of her life quicker than she could blink.
The thought was heart-wrenching. She’d grown so attached to him, in such a short period of time. Emily, too. Maybe it’d be best to confess and leave – get it over with as quickly as possible, like tearing off a Band-Aid.
Maybe, but she couldn’t bring herself to do it. Not while he was already seething, and not in public. It’d be devastating enough without an audience to see him look at her with the same disgust he obviously felt for his sister.
The waiter approached the table, oblivious to the tension that was so thick Arianna could’ve cut it with the knife that tumbled out of her napkin when she unwrapped her silverware.
The food that smelled so delicious tasted like ash in her mouth as she ate, mechanically carving bites from her plate as James did the same, chewing like he had a personal vendetta against his food.
“Sorry,” he said, laying down his knife and fork with a clatter after he’d taken several bites. “I didn’t mean to ruin our date.”
She shook her head. “Don’t worry about it.” Things were ruined between them anyway; he just didn’t know it yet.
“No, I mean it. This was supposed to be about you. I should be thinking about everything you’ve done, not everything Crystal failed to do.”
“Really.” She carved a bite of pork into too-small pieces. “I can’t blame you for being upset. It’s not like you knew she was going to call.”
“I didn’t even know she had my number. Figured she lost it ages ago.”
Arianna nodded, toying with her fork. “So … is she coming back? For Emily, I mean.”
His frown deepened. “That’s what she claims. The rehab thing she’s doing is a 90 day program, and she says she’s coming for Emily afterward.”
That was two and a half months away. James didn’t look pleased about it, though whether it was because he wanted Crystal to come sooner or not at all, it was hard to tell.
“She’
d better be clean when she shows up,” he said, glaring at nothing in particular, “because if she’s going to touch drugs, she’s not going to lay a finger on Emily.”
It was obvious that he meant it. He looked so fiercely protective that Arianna’s heart would’ve melted, if it hadn’t been busy breaking.
“Forget about Crystal though,” he said, shaking his head. “I can stop bitching about her if I really put my mind to it.” He smoothed his expression with obvious effort, erasing lines from his brow. “We’re on a date.”
Arianna tried to smile. If her attempt was weak, he didn’t complain.
“How was your day?” he asked.
His innocent question conjured up memories of Maya, driving Arianna’s uneasiness even deeper. Not for the first time, she wondered how much Maya would resemble her own daughter when she was older – the cousin she’d never meet. The little girl Arianna had given birth to was 10 now – 10 years, 3 months and 16 days old, to be exact.
Sometimes Arianna wasn’t sure what seemed more surreal: the fact that a decade had passed since she’d given birth, or the fact that it had happened at all. The experience had marked her more deeply than any other event ever had, yet at the same time, there were moments when she could hardly believe that she was really the same girl who’d brought a new life into the world and then left the hospital with empty arms.
“Okay,” she said. “Tiring. I hate to tell you this, but babies are even more exhausting to take care of once they become mobile.”
“I can’t even imagine what it’d be like if Emily could run around on her own.”
“Yeah, the running can be scary, especially if you’re outside and have to worry about things like traffic and strange dogs. I took Maya to the park and she tried to tackle someone’s yellow lab. The worst thing though is the climbing. She tried to scale the bookshelf in my bedroom and I about had a heart attack.”
James’ anger seemed to ebb as they made conversation, and by the time they finished their meals, his jaw had loosened and there was hardly a sign of the vein that’d been throbbing visibly earlier. When the waiter asked if they wanted dessert, he said yes.
They shared something dripping with chocolate and swimming in ice cream. The sweetness seemed foreign on Arianna’s tongue, the vanilla strangely bitter. No matter how hard she tried, she just couldn’t relax and enjoy it. Every two seconds or so, her imagination presented her with an image of James turning away in disgust when he learned she’d been a teen mother – a teen mother who’d chosen not to raise the child she’d given birth to.
Apparently, her distress didn’t show. After paying the bill, James walked with her out of the restaurant, a hand against the small of her back. The light but sensual contact sent a shiver down her spine, allowing her to shrug off her sense of dread for just a second.
After that perfect moment ended, she savored the heat of his touch, fully aware that it might be the last time she ever felt it.
Except it wasn’t. When they reached her apartment, he walked her to the door, then slipped inside, wrapping his arm around her waist so that the contact seemed natural, like anything else would’ve just been strange.
Even she had to admit to herself that it felt right, standing alone with him in her living room, the door locked behind them.
* * * * *
Arianna trembled lightly in James’ arms. Feeling that – having tangible proof that she wanted this again, and just as badly as he did – had him painfully hard as he held her, breathing in the floral scent of her shampoo and faint cherry tang of her lip gloss. When he lowered his mouth over hers, the sweet flavor was crushed against his lips.
He’d hardly thought of anything else since they’d fucked the other evening – and night, and the following morning. The heat of her skin and texture of her bedsheets had been burnt into his memory, where he relived every heart-pounding, cock-stiffening moment of what they’d done. Several times hadn’t been enough, even then, and the handful of days he’d gone without touching her since had left an ache deep in his balls.
All that was about to change. Pulse jumping in anticipation, he pulled her tight against him, letting the hard rod of his dick press against her belly.
She breathed sharply, a little moan leaving her lips only to be muffled by his.
The kiss went on, deepening until both of them were breathing harder than they had been at the start. When she shifted against him, leaning in and increasing the exquisite pressure her body put on his shaft, he broke the seal of their kiss.
“Fuck, I want you.” The words tumbled out of his mouth, the truest thing he’d ever said.
Her eyes widened, and she shifted again, giving him a jolt that had his balls drawing closer to his already overheated body. She’d looked so beautiful during dinner; even when he’d been pissed over Crystal’s phone call, he hadn’t been able to stop admiring Arianna.
“I want you too,” she said, staring up at him. At first it seemed like she was going to say more, but instead she shut her mouth, denting her lower lip as she bit it from the inside. One of her hands drifted over his hip and she loosened her embrace a little.
Her fingertips were only an inch or two away from the hardness straining the front of his jeans. Slipping his hand over hers, he guided her touch there, unable to resist.
Her hand felt like heaven against his dick, even through his jeans. As she rubbed the underside of his shaft, his mind filled with visions of her beneath him, breasts rising and falling as he drove himself into her.
Or on top of him. He’d take her any way he could get her, and love it.
“Should we go to the bed, or see just how much that table will hold up to after all?” He ran a hand over the contours of her side, letting it dip into the hourglass notch below her ribs and come to rest on her hip.
Another one of those shivers went through her – he was so close he felt it easily, and it made his skin prickle with desire. Had she been thinking about last time as often and as hard as he had?
Hopefully. Probably, judging by the way she shook against him.
“Bed,” she finally said, her grip tightening around his erection.
He groaned, so ready to feel her pussy wrenching tight and hot around his shaft that he could hardly stand it.
He didn’t waste any time heading exactly where she’d said, taking her by the hand as they hurried toward her room.
She was like hot silk in his hands – warm and pliant, a pleasure to feel under his fingertips no matter how or where he touched her. He undressed her as quickly as he could while still taking the time to admire her body, his hands tracing and cupping her curves.
When he’d uncovered and touched every inch of her – hands lingering on the places that made her draw sharp breaths – he stopped exploring her body long enough to strip his own bare.
Or at least, he managed to pull off his shirt. That was as far as he got before he felt her hands at his waist, fingertips slipping beneath the waistband of his jeans as she worked the button through its hole.
His hard-on fell right into her hand when she unzipped his fly. Before he knew it she’d pulled down his underwear too, letting her fingers curl around his shaft as she formed a fist.
A tight fist that had his blood roaring in his ears as she slid it up and down, the edge of her palm kissing the head of his dick at the end of each stroke. It felt good. Not as good as being buried balls-deep in her pussy, but still – good enough that he forgot about everything else, his world narrowing to include nothing but her and him and the effects of her touch.
That world shattered when she lowered her head into his lap, redefining what pleasure was with the simple act of touching the tip of her tongue to the underside of his cock. She traced the length of his shaft that way, her breath ghosting over his skin, heating it even more than the blood rushing beneath the surface already had.
He looked down, watching her upper lip brush his hard flesh as her tongue peeked pink and wet from beneath. It wasn’t a surprise
to see a drop of come shining pearl-white at the slit bisecting the head of his dick.
It was a surprise when she licked it away, tongue tracing that tiny notch before her lips closed around him. The shock of heat and pressure tore deep into him, freeing a moan that started out wordless and ended in her name.
She took him deeper, lips sliding down his shaft as her tongue caressed it from beneath, creating smooth friction that made his balls ache.
She didn’t take him all the way in, though she came close, her lip coming within a bare inch of the captive bead at the base of his cock. When she slid a hand up his thigh and over his fallen jeans, cupping his balls, it was all he could do not to come in her mouth.
He slid a hand over the curve of her skull, letting his fingers get tangled in her locks as he resisted the urge to pull them, guiding her to go farther and harder. “I’m going to come,” he said, “if you don’t stop now.”
She slid back, running her tongue down the underside of his shaft ‘till the last moment, when he popped free of her mouth altogether. Her eyes flickered up to his. “You don’t want me to stop then, do you?”
He was painfully hard, his skin stretched taut and wet from being inside her mouth. She still held his balls in her hand, too. It was easy to imagine her parting her lips and sliding back down on him, sucking him off to completion. “Guess that’s up to you.”
It wasn’t like that’d be the end of things. Her pussy was a temptation he wouldn’t be able to resist in any case; coming this way wouldn’t be enough to make his dick go soft. He had her all to himself, for once – they had time to take their time, within reason.
She rose higher, still kneeling, and pressed her lips to his.
They were hot, wet and the tiniest bit salty. He thrust his tongue between them, kissing her hard as he palmed one of her breasts, feeling her nipple go stiff against his fingers.
He didn’t stop her when she rocked back. Seconds later she had him in her mouth again, driving him crazy with her tongue and lips, her fingertips brushing the sensitive skin behind his balls. Her hair spilled across his thighs, lying dark against his jeans and the exposed skin above.
