by Hadley Quinn
With a sigh she held out the little box again. “Start with one. We’ll go from there.” But she bit her lip with a smile and I knew it didn’t even matter what I drew at that point.
I kept my eyes locked on hers as I reached into the box to pull out a little slip of paper.
All I read was ‘handcuffs’ and that was good enough for me.
~The End~
• Maybe This •
(The McCallans, Book Four)
By Hadley Quinn
“Hollywood is a place where they’ll pay you a thousand dollars for a kiss and fifty cents for your soul.”
~Marilyn Monroe
PROLOGUE
The tattoo parlor was entirely different inside than Kellie had imagined. She’d driven by Skin Expressions more times than she could count since it was on her way to work, but the only thing that had intrigued her was the artwork painted on the front—a naked woman with lilies covering her tits and a lotus on her lady junk. It was a beautiful mural with incredible detail, but the building itself looked pretty plain. The outside had a couple of holiday decorations, like a big red bow on the front door and the handrail was wrapped to look like a candy cane. Other than that, there wasn’t much to it.
Now inside for the first time, she was pleased with the setting. It was clean and modern, and the heavy rock that was playing was just background music instead of crashing through her ears like the last place she’d been inked. Again there were a couple of holiday trimmings—a small lit up tree in the corner and giant bows above the windows—but nothing overly done.
“Hey, what’s up?” a girl at the counter greeted.
Kellie barely saw an inch of ink-free skin on her besides her face and neck, and although being completely covered in tattoos wasn’t her preference, it looked gorgeous on this chick.
“Hey, I’m Kellie. I’m here to see Tate Sullivan?”
“Oh, yeah, okay,” she nodded. “I think he’s running a little behind today, but let me go see what he says.”
“Sure, no problem.”
She helped herself to a red couch against the wall and waited. Glancing around, she took in more of her surroundings. Everything seemed to be in jewel tones that made the ambiance feel pretty cool. It was a small lobby, but since the building looked fairly large from the outside, she assumed the hallway led to a lot more.
Kellie leaned forward and scooped a photo book off the coffee table. She was perusing through the tattoo samples when a shadow suddenly appeared overhead. Her eyes traveled from the skate shoes, past the torn jeans, over the slim black t-shirt, and paused right there on a broad, well defined chest. She could see beautiful, sexy tattooed arms and more ink peeking out from his collar. Arms were Kellie’s thing. Hell, if a guy had the right arms…instant panty melter.
“I’m Tate,” a deep voice said. “You’re Rayne’s friend?”
She finally looked at his face.
Holy fucking shit.
Still staring at him, she barely found the table to set the photo album on as she stood. “Yeah, I’m Kellie.”
This was Rayne’s brother?!? Good lord, what a hottie! Rayne never mentioned he was a panty wetter upon eye contact. But what did Kellie expect? Would someone really say that about their own brother? Yeah, she thought her own brothers were good looking, and although she had no problem saying that to someone or agreeing with it, she couldn’t imagine telling anyone her brother could mess a pair of undies at first sight.
Tate was studying her funny, which made Kellie feel self-conscious. His head was tilted to the side and his eyebrow was arched. It was sexy as hell, but he totally seemed put-off for some reason.
“Uh, I’m running behind today,” he sighed. “Client changed her mind last minute on something so it took me a little longer. I don’t know what your schedule is for the rest of the day but…?”
He paused, seeming to wait for her to give him some sort of suggestion to reschedule.
“Well, I’m heading into work right now, so I can’t really stick around,” she answered. “But I’m off at seven if you want to talk design then, instead.”
He glanced at the clock on the wall, paused for a few seconds, and then nodded. “Yeah, we can do that. Again, sorry for the inconvenience. I thought I’d have a free hour to fit you in.”
“Not a problem,” she shrugged honestly. She handed him a piece of paper from her pocket. “If you want, you can get an idea of what I want before then.”
He unfolded the paper and studied it for only a second before a frown formed at the corner of his mouth. “Yeah, okay,” he answered, shoving the design into his back pocket. “Just stop by after work. I’ll wait. It was nice to meet you.”
He barely glanced at her before he disappeared down the hallway.
Scrooge.
Well that was disappointing. The tattooed hottie was a total ass? Not surprising, but maybe (hopefully) she’d just read him wrong.
Not dwelling on it, Kellie left for work, arriving twenty minutes early. She’d expected to discuss a tattoo design with Rayne’s brother, and possibly set up some hours for it to be started, but since she now had extra time, she decided to give Melanie a call.
“Hey hon,” her cheery voice answered.
“Rayne’s brother is completely gorgeous,” Kellie announced instantly.
“Oh yeah?” Melanie giggled. “She’s mentioned he’s cute. Like how hot are we talking?”
“So hot I wish I had extra underwear with me today.”
Melanie laughed again. “Oh my, well you’ve got the mall a couple blocks away.”
“He was kind of a jerk, though,” Kellie shrugged to herself as she entered the back entrance of the elite spa she worked at. “Not sure if something was up his ass or he’s just unfriendly.”
“What’d he say?”
“Not what he said, just what he didn’t say, I guess. I thought he’d be a little more interested in collaborating on an idea. But no biggie, I’m stopping by later. Maybe I just caught him at a bad time.”
“Yeah, maybe so. Hey, Tyse is coming over for dinner. You should come, too.”
“I would, but Brandon is supposed to come in late tonight.”
“Hmm, well I’d say have him come here and we’ll do movie night, but that would be awkward.”
“Yeah,” Kellie smiled. “Both my brothers there to give him hell? I don’t think so.”
“You know they’re gonna find out sooner or later,” Melanie reminded her. “I said I wouldn’t say anything, but you know I would never lie to Jay if he ever asked me about it for some reason.”
“Yeah I know, and I don’t expect you to. I would just rather keep it quiet.”
“You know they’ll figure out you guys have been spending time together. They saw Brandon talking to you at my engagement party. It’s been a couple weeks and haven’t you gone out a few times since?”
“Just twice. It’s nothing serious, though. And nothing’s gonna come of it, we both agreed. That’s why I don’t want anyone making a big deal out of it.”
“Well I think it’s awesome,” Melanie said, and Kellie could practically hear her smiling through the phone. “I’ve known Brandon for a long time and he’s a total sweetheart. You can’t go wrong with a guy like him.”
“Are you kidding?” Kellie chuckled sarcastically. “It’s me we’re talking about here. I go wrong with everything. Doesn’t matter if it’s a good thing, it’s meant to be fucked up somehow.”
“Well when you have that attitude, of course it will!” Melanie laughed. Suddenly she gasped and said, “Oh shit, I forgot to set the oven timer! Gotta go, love you, bye!”
Kellie couldn’t help but smile at her future sister-in-law as she got into a workflow that day. The wedding was going to be in April, in four months, but it seemed like Jay and Melanie had already been married for a while. It was cool, though. Legalities didn’t make people your family. She felt pretty lucky having a few “sisters” in her life, especially because they weren’t whiny or prissy or annoying as fu
ck like some girls could be.
And her brothers were the motherfucking bomb. She couldn’t ask for anything more.
As it got closer to quitting time that day, Kellie kept glancing at the clock more often. Normally she wasn’t so obsessed with the time, but she was unusually nervous about going back to the tattoo shop. Tate’s reaction to her design had been bothering her all day and she regretted leaving it behind with him.
Who the hell was he to question what she wanted on her own body?
When she pulled into Skin Expressions at seven-fifteen, it looked vacant. The sign was even flipped on the door to read ‘closed’ and the lights were off inside.
However, the front door was unlocked so Kellie went in. It was quiet, with no music playing, and kind of eerie.
“Hello?” she called softly.
Still nothing.
Maybe no one was even in the building and somebody had just forgotten to lock the front door. If that was the case, she should just lock it and leave.
But her curiosity got the better of her and she wandered down the hall. It wasn’t completely dark since one of the back rooms seemed to have a dim light on inside it, but it was dark enough everywhere else to make her feel a little creeped out.
As tough as she was and with the brother she grew up with, people might be surprised she was scared of the fucking dark.
Kellie passed by several rooms on her way down the hall and the open doors confirmed they were for tattooing. As she came to the corner at the end, she glanced left and right across a perpendicular hallway, and instead of peeking into the two other rooms in that hall, she turned to head for the exit.
Until she heard heavy breathing.
Her flight instinct told her to run and get the fuck out of there, but she paused to listen a few seconds longer until she heard it again. Was it someone sleeping?
Pinpointing the sound, she peered into the back room she was closest to. She could tell it was an office because a lamp was on in the corner, but she could also make out a figure slouched over onto the desk, head resting on his hands.
And she could totally tell it was Tate. She would recognize those sexy, tattooed arms anywhere.
Given the choice of waking him up or pretending she’d never been there, she wanted to choose the latter. But her damn curiosity got the better of her again and she walked closer to the desk. He was still breathing steadily; not a snore but he was obviously asleep.
She reached across to tap his forearm. “Tate?” she whispered gently, just so she didn’t startle him.
That was a lost cause because the second she touched him his hand clasped around her wrist and yanked her down to the desk. Her face hit the wood and something pressed down on it, holding her there.
“What the fuck! Get off of me!” she yelled at him, pulling away as hard as she could to escape. But the fucker had her head and neck pinned down so hard she was losing consciousness almost immediately.
Just before she was about to pass out, the ton of weight lifted off of her and she slid to her knees. She felt her chin hit the edge of the desk, but really, nothing was making sense at the moment and that’s all she realized had happened.
“Fuck, I’m so sorry,” his voice spoke. A set of arms picked her up off the floor from behind and her ass was placed on something soft. “Are you okay? You can’t sneak up on me like that, I’m…I’m sorry, you just… You caught me off guard.”
When Kellie opened her eyes—or when her vision finally came to—Tate was crouched on his haunches in front of where she was sitting in a chair.
“Can you hear me okay?” he asked her.
Yes, she could fucking hear him. But her voice wouldn’t work. He’d either scared the living shit out of her or seriously silenced her vocals.
“You need something to drink?” He stood and flipped on another light.
Kellie shook her head and swallowed. She just wanted to breathe normal first. “No,” she finally spoke, taking a deep breath of air. “What the fuck was that?” she managed to get out.
“What was what?”
She motioned to the desk and her little near-death experience. “That,” she growled with emphasis.
His face darkened slightly. “It’s called ‘don’t sneak up on a marine,’” he answered evenly.
Kellie took another deep breath as she considered that piece of information. “I wasn’t ‘sneaking up’ on you. We had a meeting and the front door was unlocked. Everything was dark so I thought— Anyway, I’m not the one falling asleep at work,” she scowled at him.
He was studying her for a few seconds before he sighed. All he did was reach for another chair to pull over and spread a piece of paper on the corner of the desk in front of them. It was the tattoo design she’d given him.
“So this will take me about two hours to do,” he told her as he hastily rubbed a hand over his face. At the same time, he was massaging his left hip.
She blinked a couple of times, just to focus on the reason she was there in the first place. “Just two? Are you sure?”
“Yeah, I’m sure. Not much to it.”
She frowned at him, wondering if she should even try to decipher his tone. But she was still too rattled to even care, and added to the cold indifference he seemed to throw her way, Kellie didn’t feel like being there anymore.
“Look, you obviously don’t give a shit about me or what is important to me, so I’m just gonna go, okay?” she said as she stood and grabbed her design. “I thought maybe you could help me add to it, but thanks anyway.”
She headed straight for the door and marched down the hall. What a waste of time. Rayne was going to get her ass kicked for this one.
She heard a sound behind her when she reached the door. Tate had come down the hall but without speaking a word. Kellie cast him a curious glance but left out the front door before she could read his face.
As she got to her car she could feel he was still watching her, so when she turned around and saw him standing outside on the steps, she held out her arms and said, “What? What the hell do you want?”
He stared at her for a few seconds and then barely shook his head. “Just making sure you got to your car okay.”
Well that took her by surprise and surely made her feel like a bitch. She sighed as she unlocked the driver’s door, but he was still standing there, expressionless.
“Look, if today was a bad day for you, no big deal,” she told him sincerely.
For some reason, she felt the need to soften up a little. It really wasn’t in her nature to let anybody get to her, especially a guy, but there was something different about this one. He actually didn’t reek of bullshit and arrogance, and that was totally bizarre. Usually she could piss people off pretty well, but Tate didn’t seem offended at all. In fact, he looked fairly apologetic right now.
“I didn’t mean to be an inconvenience for you,” she added for good measure.
“You’re not an inconvenience,” he barely spoke loud enough for her to hear. He hung his head and appeared to take another deep breath as he walked toward her car. “Can we just start over? I’d really like to do your work. I’m sorry for how things have evolved. When you came in earlier…” He stopped a few feet from her but only finished his sentence with a shake of his head, like he didn’t want to get into it.
She didn’t like nosy people in her business, so she didn’t expect him to share any of his. “It’s fine,” she shrugged, trying to study him better but without appearing to do so.
Outdoors she could see his eyes better, and good lord were they green; dark, like moss, outlined in an even darker shade, and sexy like he could make her scream—in a good way without even a touch. But she also noticed how intense they were on a profound level, like he’d seen the world and never wanted anyone to know the half of it.
Feeling a rush of guilt, she was impulsive as she stepped closer to him. She took his face in her hands without thinking twice and pressed her lips firmly against his. She could tell she’d obvio
usly caught him off guard, and there was a slight fear—just a tad bit because of earlier—that he was going to perform some defensive move on her again and throw her to the ground.
But that didn’t happen. He kissed her back. And it wasn’t just to indulge her—she could tell the difference—it was almost like a reflection of what she was feeling for him. She totally felt that from him, and it scared her. Total fricken stranger and she was kissing him in public!
When their tongues began mingling together, Kellie immediately pulled away. A mix of passion and surprise pulsed through her and she had no idea what the hell had come over her.
After a few long seconds, Tate raised an eyebrow at her. “Not that I’m complaining, but what was that for?” he asked softly. No matter his mood, he always spoke softly. It was appealing, especially because his voice was deep.
That combination of soft and deep was a killer.
“Just thought maybe you needed it,” Kellie shrugged. It was the truth, but she didn’t want to expound and now he probably thought she was fucking nuts.
Oh well.
He stared at her for a moment until he ran a hand through his light brown hair—which was now a disheveled mess instead of the little fauxhawk it was in earlier—and then massaged the stubble on his chin. She thought maybe he knew that was totally turning her on, but he didn’t seem to be paying attention to her at all as he glanced to the right and left of her.
“Nice car,” he finally said, stepping around the front to look it over. “Seventy-one?”
She barely nodded her head as she realized what he’d really been checking out. “Yeah. Good guess.”
He finally looked at her again but that time he smiled. “Nah, not a guess. More of a rhetorical question.”
“Ha, well okay. You a car guy?”
He shrugged a shoulder. “Maybe a little. You a car girl?” he countered.
“Maybe a little,” she answered coyly.
He seemed amused. “Fair enough. The restoration on the grill is amazing. I’m impressed. Four-oh-two under the hood?”
