by Kit Rocha
By the time she climbed out to dry her hair and put on her makeup, she'd almost convinced herself it didn't matter. No promises meant no promises broken. That was Noah's style.
Emma was an O'Kane. They'd all survived worse.
She stopped for coffee on the way to the studio, because Christ knew Ace would need it. Sure enough, he'd slept there again, on the beat-up couch nestled against the far wall, behind the workspace. Silly, since it wasn't long enough for someone of his height, and his legs hung over the end.
Normally, Emma would have reminded him that he had a perfectly serviceable bed somewhere, possibly even joked about whether it was filled over capacity again. Not today, not after her own amazing night--and equally shitty morning.
She shoved a mug of coffee at him instead.
Ace accepted it and swung his feet to the floor, somehow managing to roll into a seated position without spilling the steaming drink all over his bare chest. "Jesus, kid. You're up early."
"It's almost eleven," she retorted, slinging her bag over her head.
"Yeah, like I said. Early."
Emma avoided his gaze. "I have some stuff to work on."
"Uh-huh." Ace sipped the coffee before slapping a hand on the couch cushion next to him. "Or you could park your ass and tell me what's up with that stone-faced nerd you were grinding up on last night. Why so glum, junior? Did he have a tiny dick?"
"Jesus, no." She dropped beside him and pushed her hair out of her face. "That wasn't a nerd. It was Noah."
"I know it was--" Ace stopped and tilted his head. "Wait, Lennox is the Noah? The one who got you out of Five?"
The words elicited another shudder of unwanted memory. Her brother's pale, broken face. Noah's voice, begging her to calm down and tell him what she'd seen.
Running.
Emma shook herself. "Noah was my brother's best friend."
Ace set his mug on the floor and wrapped an arm around her, tugging her against the warm, solid bulk of his body. "So he came back. Took him fucking long enough."
"He didn't come back for me." The words hung in her throat, metal shards that scraped and cut. "He's planning on taking Fleming down, and he needs Dallas's help for that."
"Well, that makes him delusional on top of stupid." Ace caught her chin and tipped her head back. "Say the word, junior, and I'll have Cruz break him into as many pieces as you want. No one fucks with my apprentice."
"I don't want him broken." Though Christ knew Ace would do it anyway when she admitted the truth. "He left this morning before I woke up. I don't know if he'll be back, or if he's gone for good, or what."
Ace's chest rumbled in an irritated growl. "Forget Cruz. He'll be too efficient."
"Work," Emma said firmly. "When are you gonna let me design something for you?"
"Oh, is that how it is?" Ace's lips twitched as he released her. "Someone just wants to get her hands on my beautiful skin."
A chance to save her pride, if nothing else. She blinked up at him and smiled. "You promised."
"Uh-huh." He slapped her hip and urged her off the couch. "Grab your sketchpad. If it'll cheer you up, I'll let you violate the temple of my body."
She snagged a pad from the drawing desk closest to the couch. "Black-and-gray or color?"
Sometimes he made her design black-and-gray tattoos over and over again, just because he knew it wasn't her preference, but today he grinned at her. "Your choice. Sky's the limit, kid. I want to see the best you've got."
She arched an eyebrow as she gathered her colored pens. "No guidelines?"
"None." He rolled to his feet and turned. "Anything that'll fit along my spine."
Her momentary optimism dissolved with a groan. Ace's back was bare for a reason--he never liked a damn thing he or anyone else dreamed up to put on it. "Fool's errand. I get it."
Ace cast her an unsympathetic look over his shoulder. "Don't whine, kid. I knew the first time I saw one of your drawings that you were gonna be the one. So stop pulling your punches and make some fucking art."
Kid. She held up her middle finger, but he'd already disappeared into the back, so she dropped to the desk and uncapped a pen. She was still staring at the paper when the shower in the washroom cut on.
She sketched a heart--not a basic, flat one, but a three-dimensional, stylized shape.
Kid.
Maybe Noah was hung up on the same thing, as if the four years that had passed didn't exist, and she was the same poor girl from Sector Five, the one with a dead brother and bleak prospects. The one who'd probably wind up in Fleming's stable of whores--if she was lucky.
Maybe he regretted their night together, and that was why he'd crept out without waking her.
Her pen accidentally scratched across the paper, and she worked the mark into her design, turning it into a thread of barbed wire. It wrapped around the heart, points almost but not quite piercing to draw blood--
And suddenly she knew exactly what she was going to design for Ace. Stop pulling her punches, he'd said. Make some fucking art.
She reached for the other pens and fleshed out the design, then began to color it in, and she was just finishing up one last swoop of gold when Ace braced a hand on the table beside her and leaned over her shoulder.
He stared for long enough to kindle fluttering nerves in her stomach, and she prepared herself for the one word she'd gotten every previous time, always delivered in the same easy, friendly tone of dismissal. Nope.
Ace straightened. "Better."
Her heart skipped a beat, and she capped her pen. "But not great."
"Technically, it's solid." He traced a finger along the edge of the paper. "A little on the nose. Make them ask the question, don't give them the answer."
A warning lurked just under his admonition--people wanted truth, but only so much of it. "Understood. But I'm gunning for your job, Santana. I won't be designing flash forever."
"No shit, you won't." Ace squeezed her shoulder. "You remember that if your nerd comes crawling back. Give me another couple years, and you'll be able to barter your skills for any goddamn thing you want. Ink talks in Sector Four, and you're gonna be one of the best."
Emma had to swallow past the lump in her throat, and she covered his hand with hers. "Thanks, Ace."
"Aww, don't go getting mushy on me." He leaned past her and ripped the page out of her sketchbook, leaving her with a fresh one. "Give me a nice bloody heart and dagger this time. One of the fighters is coming in this afternoon, and if he likes what you come up with, you can do his tattoo."
"Yeah?"
Ace grinned as he folded her drawing and tucked it into his pocket. "You're already better than all the stencil-tracing posers in the marketplace combined. If you weren't, you wouldn't be my apprentice."
A challenge, and the perfect thing to distract her from thoughts of Noah. Either he'd show up again or he wouldn't, but either way, one thing could never change.
She was an O'Kane, and her family would always have her back.
Chapter Four
Before he'd taken two steps into the tattoo studio, Noah knew Emma had found her home.
The abstract knowledge had been there, but his gut must have still believed there was some future where they ran off to the mountains and lived out the imaginary life he'd bought for her all those years ago. It was the only explanation for the loss that hit him, like a truck careening out of control.
The woman on the stage, flashing knives as she stripped--that was a stranger. So was the woman who'd climbed into his lap and goaded him into the hottest sex he'd ever had, the one who'd listened to his filthy words and sworn to protect him. A beautiful, hauntingly familiar stranger, but the Emma he'd known hadn't fit in any of those situations.
She fit here. The studio was surprisingly large, with plenty of space around the tattoo chair situated in the center. It was book-ended by a table and a few rolling trays covered with a familiar array of instruments, but that wasn't what struck him. It was the artwork lining all four wa
lls, a joyous jumble of pre-Flare masterpieces in gilded frames and hasty sketches taped over one another.
And in between the artwork--shelf upon shelf of supplies. Markers. Pens. Paints. Charcoal and pencils and stacks of sketchpads and thick, creamy paper, the kind they manufactured in Sector Eight and mostly sold to Eden. You could buy a kidney cheaper than you could the contents of just one of these shelves, and there had to be two dozen.
Emma was sketching at one of the tables set against the wall, her hair twisted up from her neck and her arms bare, a sight so familiar his heart lurched. She always changed into a tank top before settling in to draw, claiming she didn't like working in sleeves.
Even Cib had never dreamed of being able to give her this. And as selfish as Noah was for coming back at all, he wasn't enough of a bastard to try to take her away from it.
She didn't look up until she finished one curving line, her wrist twisting in a delicate arc. Her eyes locked with his, dark and guarded, and she laid down her pen. "Hi."
"Hey." And just like that the familiarity was gone, because the Emma who'd complained about long-sleeved shirts getting in her way had never looked at him with eyes this wary. "Noelle said I'd find you here."
"It's usually a safe bet." Emma rose, and her stool skittered a few feet across the floor. "I thought you'd left."
There was no apology or excuse that justified sneaking out of her room without so much as a note, not when he hadn't been sure if he was coming back. "I didn't."
Her lips twisted in a half-smile. "I guess."
Not enough. He shoved his hands into his jacket pockets to hide the fact he'd curled them into fists. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have cut out like that."
"No, you shouldn't have." Emma propped her hands on her hips and faced him squarely. "I deserved better than that. Especially after--" The words cut off abruptly.
He could blame the nightmare, but he'd have to open a box he wanted safely shut for as long as possible. So he took the hit square on the chin and made himself feel the pain. He deserved it. "It wasn't about you," he lied. "I left some shit in Three that I didn't want unguarded for long. Just in case."
"Okay." She rocked back on her heels and nodded toward the couch along the back wall. "You want to sit?"
It was a reprieve, if not forgiveness, but he snatched at it. "Can I see what you're working on?"
Instead of showing him, she picked up the sketchbook and held it close to her chest. "It's nothing. I was just fucking around with a design from earlier. Ace says it still needs work."
Ace. Plenty of the O'Kanes had files, but none as lurid as Alexander Santana's. In Eden, he was best known for a series of paintings he'd done almost a decade ago, paintings rumored to have been gifts to the rich women he'd slept with in exchange for their patronage.
Ownership of a Santana had led to divorce and scandal more than once, which only added to their legend and increased their value among a certain set.
Noah had seen enough pictures of the paintings in question to know the man had skill. It was one more thing he and Cib had never been able to supply--a teacher.
Squashing jealousy, Noah tried for a smile. It stretched his mouth in unfamiliar ways, but maybe it was the kind of habit that muscle memory could restore. "C'mon, Em. Just a peek?"
She looked like she was going to say no, but then she flipped the sketchbook around and held it out for him to see.
She'd drawn a heart with a keyhole at its center, effortlessly shaded to make it three dimensional. Barbed wire and chains crisscrossed each other around it, so intricately sketched that he could make out the individual twists of wire and the sharp, pointed tips of the barbs. "It's a tattoo?"
"It is." She wiggled the pad of paper. "You want this one? It suits you."
More than she'd ever know. "It's not meant for someone else?"
The notebook hit the desk with a soft thump, and Emma turned away. "I was kidding."
"No, you're right." He shrugged out of his jacket and stripped his shirt over his head. "If I'm going to hang around the O'Kane compound, I should have at least one tattoo, right?"
She sucked in a breath. For a moment, her gaze lingered on his chest, soft with memory. Then her eyes shuttered, and she folded her arms across her body, one hip cocked out in a pose that screamed challenge. "I'm not that easy. You want ink? You have to pay."
Good for you. "All right. Cash, credits, or information?"
"Information," she said immediately. "Answers."
Of course. The one thing only he could give her, and the quickest path back out of her life. But he liked her like this--tough, challenging. Unafraid to demand what she wanted. "Just as long as you know I'm not easy, either. Anything that could put you in danger's gonna cost more than a tattoo."
"Fair enough." She gestured to the antique tattoo chair. "Have a seat."
Noah tossed his shirt over the table and sank into the chair. "How do other people pay for tattoos?"
"Depends." Tiny plastic cups rattled on one of the trays as she laid them out, side by side. "O'Kanes get certain ones for free, obviously. More if Ace is feeling generous. Someone off the street better bring cash, clean credits, or damn good favors. He barters sometimes, too."
"Did he do yours?"
Emma grinned as she dropped to another rolling stool and pulled the tray to rest beside the tattoo chair. "Ace would have a hissy if I let anyone else do my ink. He gave me my first one a few years back--I'd heard he was the best, so I saved up and brought him one of my designs. Been in and out of this shop ever since."
He quirked an eyebrow. "Are you adding my questions to my bill?"
Her grin gentled into a smile. "Maybe." She pressed the design notebook face down against a thinner sheet of paper, then ran them both quickly under a light fixed to the bottom of the rolling tray. The image appeared on the thin sheet, and she held up the paper. "Where do you want it?"
"Wherever you think is best." This was fascinating, too. Watching her so sure and confident, totally in her element. She looked the way he felt surrounded by terminal screens--in control.
She considered him for a moment, then cleaned a spot on the left side of his chest. "Here, I think." When she pressed the light-processed paper to his wet skin and lifted it once more, it left a blue image of the design behind. "Perfect."
Right over his own frozen heart. "Yeah."
He watched in silence as she slipped on a pair of gloves and reached for a tube of gel. He couldn't read the label, but Fleming's pharmaceutical logo was plastered across the side, something that Noah might have brooded over if Emma wasn't about to put her hands all over him.
The gel was cold, but it warmed against his skin as she smoothed it over the transferred design. "First question," she whispered.
He didn't let himself tense. "Okay."
"What did you go get this morning from Sector Three?" Her gaze flicked up to lock with his. "I'm assuming you only went to Three."
"Yeah." Not a tough question, and one he could answer honestly. "I needed some clothes and some tech. And I wanted to set a couple traps in case I'm gone for a while. I can't afford to have anyone get into my place."
"Will you show it to me sometime?"
He hesitated. Most people thought he lived in some dank cave or retrofitted basement, some gloomy underground lair, scraping by and making do. The truth was far more dangerous, a family secret that could lead to Eden bombing more than one sector off the map.
And yet.
Emma, in his domain. A place he fit as cleanly as she did here, a place where he was in control. If he'd known for sure four years ago that the bunker was more than family legend, he would have disappeared into the tunnels beneath Three with her to start with. But it had taken him seven months to find it, and by then...
By then, she'd almost been gone.
"Is that a no?" She changed her gloves, plucked up a bottle of black ink, and poured a little into one of the tiny cups she'd set out.
"No, it's..." They were alo
ne in the studio, but he still lowered his voice. "It's a dangerous secret to know, for reasons I can't even explain without showing you. So make sure you really want to know first."
"Mmm." Emma tilted her head and filled the rest of the ink cups, then began to put together her machine. "Second question. How'd you like the party last night?"
"What, the orgy?" His lips tugged up, and he struggled to school his expression. "I was a little too distracted to appreciate it properly. This girl I used to know was touching herself right in front of me."
"Oh, is that all I am to you?" she teased, and the machine cut on with a menacing buzz. "A girl you used to know?"
Christ, the warmth in the words heated his blood. He welcomed the sting of the needles at this point, though he doubted something as mundane as pain would get his dick under control. "Is that your next question?"
"Nope." She slid closer and laid her free hand on his shoulder. "I know better."
Her face was close to his, her gaze intent on his chest. He could look his fill, memorize the shape of her brow and the set of her lips when she was concentrating. He could answer her question anyway, see what expression flashed through those eyes. "You were never just a girl I knew."
Her throat worked as she swallowed, but she didn't look at him. "What was I?"
"Exactly what I told you last night. The bright spot in my world."
She released a long, slow breath. "Right." But she shook it off by the time the needle touched his skin, jabbing into him with a hollow ache, and her smile was back in place. "Favorite color?"
She was retreating. Scrambling away from dangerous territory, and it should have been a relief. But he liked the challenge better, the thrill of walking the tightrope.
Or maybe he was just another asshole guy drunk on the chase, because he dropped his voice to the lowest, most suggestive fucking whisper he could manage. "Pink."
Emma didn't blush, and she didn't stammer out an embarrassed deflection. She met his gaze with a soft laugh and an arched eyebrow. "Yeah? I'm kind of fond of it myself."
