Vehn (Exotic Ink Book 1)

by LS Anders

  After Janet chatted up Tegan a little more, promising she would be getting more tattoos from him in the very near future, she was on her way out the door, but not before tossing a seductive smile over her shoulder. The poor girl had no idea she was wasting her time trying to gain Tegan’s attention, since all of it was focused on a certain blonde-headed colleague whose tattoo gun could be heard buzzing away in the background.

  After he double-checked the day’s appointments with Avie, Tegan headed back to his room, momentarily stopping short in the hall in front of Rayna’s room, his newly found look of longing firmly in place.

  Callie and Avie exchange a sympathetic look. “I feel so bad for him. He’s like a lost puppy waiting for his owner’s attention. What is wrong with Rayna that she hasn’t jumped all over that? A blind man can see he is totally and completely smitten with her.” Callie shook her head, perplexed. “I'd better get back to my room and get ready for Lilian; she should be here any minute. Oh yeah, take a look at these photos Arin sent me. Isn’t that weird how there’s like an aura around you? Like you’re an angel or something.”

  “Huh, that is strange. Must be the lighting.” Avie shrugged nonchalantly.

  “Yeah, that has to be it,” Callie agreed, walking down the hall and not giving the bizarre photos another thought.

  Glancing up at the picture of Vehn as she walked in her room, that comfortable feeling of familiarity was stripped away again, leaving her feeling like he was a complete stranger. She’d had so many fantasies about him before she’d actually met him that it was sometimes hard for her to set aside the fictional personality she had imagined for the one he had in real life. How many times had she masturbated to him fantasizing about them together in that beach scene? It all just seemed so surreal.

  Then, after she'd met Lee, she'd replaced Vehn's face with what she had imagined Lee's would look like. Thinking back to what she had done to herself in the closet that first night she'd first met Lee brought a rush of heat to her cheeks and a flood of warmth low in her belly. But then she’d been hit with the knowledge that Lee was Vehn. Lee was the guy she texted and flirted with on the phone, and Vehn was the embodiment of her fantasy. It was like they were two different people. Sometimes she had a hard time remembering that Lee and Vehn were the same man. She still caught herself calling him Lee over the phone.

  Holy shit, she was really going to be dating Vehn Mathieu!

  Taking a deep breath to push down the anxiety that was beginning to bubble up, she set out the new lavender-scented candles around her space. Lighting them, she hoped they would help calm her and that the lady at the aromatherapy shop knew what she was talking about. Last time she’d bought the ocean scented ones recommended by that same lady, all they did was make her nose itchy.

  Callie stretched trying to relieve the tension in her shoulders from the previous day's jam-packed schedule. She had already been booked solid but had taken an enthusiastic walk-in right at closing time that had admired her work on a client she’d met in a local restaurant. The girl had practically run to the studio and begged Callie to see her.

  What could she do but take the girl? She may not be famous in the traditional sense, but she was well known in her own little bubble. She was a big fish in a little pond, and the girl had totally appealed to her ego.

  After a quick consult with the girl, Callie had designed a kickass female warrior. With both of them anxious to make the creation into permanent artwork, Callie had stayed late to complete it even though it meant she would have to postpone her usual phone call time with Vehn until later. It wasn’t a very large piece, but it had taken her about three hours to complete.

  She had called Vehn immediately afterwards, excitedly chattering away about the design she and her new client had completed. Before she knew it, she had cleaned up her work station and had made the entire commute back to her condo in Brooklyn before he had spoken again. He had been so quiet on the phone, she figured he had just tuned out her yakking much like Ryder used to do. But he was nothing like Ryder.

  To her ultimate surprise, once he was able to get a word in edgewise, he had asked her specific questions about the design, so she knew he had been listening. He had even seemed genuinely interested in what she was telling him and had made her promise to send him the photos she had taken on her phone. Her heart had swelled with pride at the attention. This was definitely something she was going to have to get used to.

  Callie rocketed three feet off the ground as soon as Tegan spoke from her doorway, shocking her back to the present.

  “You know he hates it,” he said, motioning to her prized photo of Vehn.

  “Why? That’s a really good picture of him.”

  “Not the photo, the fame. He wasn't looking to become famous, and he hates it. He just wants to be treated like a normal guy. You know he always wanted to be a photographer? He was always pointing his camera at something when we were kids.”

  She narrowed her eyes suspiciously. “I know you’re trying to make a point, so make it already.”

  “I know he really likes you. I can’t get him to shut up about you.”

  His words turned her knees to jelly. Dragging the stool over, she slowly lowered herself down before she attempted another face plant.

  “Just know that he's just a guy, okay?”

  “I’m guessing Rayna sent you in here to have a chat with me, huh?”

  “Am I that transparent?”

  “You’re pretty damn clear at the moment, and with your stubborn streak, I would think Rayna would be the only person on the planet that could get you to do anything.” Callie grinned up at him. “But that’s ok. I feel less nervous knowing my friends are rooting for me.”

  Apparently, Callie had hit very close to home with her Rayna comment because Tegan’s cheeks tinted a lovely shade of pink. Awwwwwww... Rayna’s favorite color.

  Tegan coughed into his hand before offering, “Ask me anything you want about Vehn, and I’ll do my best to answer you, if I can.”

  “Does he sleep naked?”

  “Serious questions, Callie.”

  “Oh, I am serious, Tegan. Very much so.”

  “Pass. Next question.”

  “You’re no fun.” When he crossed his arms over his chest and remained his same stoic self, she decided to give up trying to make him blush again. “Fine. I don’t really know what to ask. Can you just tell me some stuff about him? You guys have known each other forever. Surely you can think of something.”

  Tegan ran a hand over his goatee, studying his boots. That same silky goatee she had erotic wonderings about when they had first met. However, her initial attraction to him had dissipated as soon as she had met Lee, so much so that she wondered if it had ever really existed.

  After a moment, he gave her a most serious look. Now, he definitely had her full attention, and she knew she was about to learn something monumental about Vehn that the general public would never know.

  “Raise your right hand and swear what I’m about to tell you will remain with you and not discussed with anyone except for myself and maybe Vehn.”

  Callie didn’t hesitate to raise her hand and swear to keep whatever information Tegan was about to impart completely confidential.

  “Back in seventh grade, Vehn had this group of bullies that liked to push him around because, well, the guy was kind of pretty for a boy. He’s always had those super thick, long eyelashes, you know, kind of like a girl. Back then he was skinny and awkward, not like he is now. There were three of them, bullies that is, and one day they went far beyond the normal name-calling and pushing him in the hall or knocking books out his hands.”

  Callie’s smile instantly turned into a frown and her hands curled into fists in her lap. The sting from her nails digging into her palms began to register, cueing her in to the fact that she needed to take a few breathes and try to relax. The story was only going to get worse, and she was already pissed at those boys for picking on her Vehn.

  Her Vehn, sh
e thought, pushing down her giddiness.

  “When I found them in the boys' room, two of them were holding him down, and the third was plucking his eyelashes out with a pair of tweezers. They had duct tape over his mouth, so his screams were muffled.” Callie gasped, throwing her hands up to cover her mouth. “I pulled the dickhead doing the tweezing off Vehn and tossed him out the door into the hall. The other two douche nuggets had enough sense to leave out the same door without my assistance. Vehn’s eyes had teared up so badly he couldn’t see shit, and he rushed me, slamming us back into a stall. I tried to hold him off long enough to explain that I wasn’t with them, but he was past pissed off and took a couple of swings at me. Next thing I knew, we were being pulled apart and sent to the principal’s office. I had never actually spoken to Vehn until that incident. We were in the same grade, but we didn’t associate with each other. You know, different backgrounds and all that shit, I guess.”

  Tears clouded Callie’s eyes, and she blinked hard to keep them at bay.

  “He may seem like he’s untouchable, but he’s had his share of shit. Trust me, Callie. He doesn’t want to be up on a pedestal. He’s just a regular guy who happened to get lucky enough to have someone promote him to the world and make him into something more than what he wanted to be. Now he wants off that ride and to go back to being as normal as he possibly can. So treat him like you would anybody else. He doesn’t want to have to try and meet the high expectations everyone has set for him. He’s not perfect, and he doesn’t want anyone else to think he is, either.”

  Callie sat in stunned silence still trying to process that horrific story, trying to imagine Vehn being held down and having his eyelashes plucked out. She couldn’t even begin to imagine what that must have felt like. Once she found her voice, all she could manage was a weak, “Ok.”

  Tegan gave her a hard stare. “Don’t forget, you swore not to talk to anyone about this except me and Vehn.”

  “I promise, I won’t say a word to anyone.”

  Tegan seemed satisfied with her answer, nodded once and headed back down the hall to his work space when Avie appeared at Callie’s door.

  “Lilian’s here.”

  “Thanks. Don’t send her back yet. I need a minute.” Callie shook herself, trying to get her head back in the game.

  “Ok, sure. You need anything?”

  “No, I’m good.” Callie smiled tightly, wishing she had a baseball bat so she could give those three dickheads a beating they wouldn’t forget.

  She looked up at the photo of Vehn and wondered what kind of lives those prick bullies were living today. She’d bet it wasn’t anything like Vehn’s life. She really hoped those assholes had seen all the magazine covers he had been on, especially the People magazine’s, where he'd been voted sexiest man three years in a row. She hoped they were choking on their jealousy.

  All right, enough with the hating. She needed to pull herself together.

  Even though she hated being booked so tightly, she was glad to be working instead of being at home, knowing the time would go by faster if her mind stayed occupied. She was sure to be a basket case if she had to sit around her condo waiting and pondering.

  It was going to be another busy day, and she was already running behind due to her client’s unfortunate run-in with typical NYC traffic. But she was glad for the extra time it had allowed her to talk to her friends, since she was feeling uncertain and a little too exposed about her date that night.

  But, sheesh, that story Tegan had just laid on her? She had been on a roller coaster of emotions since she had started her day and it wasn’t even ten a.m. yet! She would be sure to hug Vehn extra tight when he picked her up that night, even if he didn’t know the reason for it.

  Steeling herself for the day ahead, she made her way down the hall to greet her first client with a smile. “Hey, Lillian, come on back.”

  Huge tears of frustration were rolling down both Callie’s cheeks as she wadded up the dress and threw it across the room. It landed in a mangled heap in the corner of her bedroom. The dress she had picked out was for her date with Lee, not Vehn! She couldn’t go on a date with a mega star wearing off-the-rack clothes. Who was she kidding?

  She was trying really hard to keep that horrific incident Tegan had told her in the forefront of her mind, so she could put Vehn in a more realistic perspective. But, shit! That was hard to do when the man was a household name.

  She had already decided she would never be able to date a superstar and put herself under the microscope of the paparazzi, but that was before she thought it was even conceivable, and that was before she had real feelings for him. Real feelings that were already teetering on the thin-edged precipice of love, and she didn’t want to ignore them by setting them aside. She just couldn’t do it, because she wanted him!

  Whirling around to look at the clock, her anxiety shot through the roof. Now what the fuck was she gonna do? There was no way in hell she could find a new dress and be ready by the time Vehn picked her up in one measly hour.

  Maybe she should just text him and say she was sick or something. No! She couldn’t do that to him. He was so excited about their date that he’d already texted her several times wanting to come early, but she had managed to hold him off so far.

  “Fuuuuckkk!”

  Sheesh! There was no telling how many paparazzi would be clicking their pictures and posting photos on the cover of God only knew what magazines that would be seen by thousands of people… everywhere!

  Her panicked mind was dredging up uncertainties she wasn’t sure what to do with. She didn’t know what she was going to do if they continued to date or how she could afford to buy new expensive shit all the time to wear out. She didn’t know how she would handle tabloid photos of them together or how she was going to deal with other people's opinions about her. She was already the most self-conscious person she knew!

  She wasn’t sure how long her flimsy armor would last before it was breeched and Vehn saw the damaged fat girl hiding beneath. How did she think she could pull this off? She wanted there to be another date, and another, but once he discovered the truth—that he was so far out of her league that they weren’t even in the same dimension—he wouldn't want to date her anymore. And that would crush her!

  “There was nothing at all good about this idea of dating a celebrity!” Callie screamed.

  Just great! Now she was starting to hyperventilate. Left with no other options, she sent out an urgent text to the only person she knew who would remain calm under pressure: Evana.

  Callie: HELP! i can’t find anything to wear on my date tonight

  Instead of receiving a text back, her cell rang immediately, displaying a photo of Evana. Answering right away, Callie started yammering, “Oh God, E! I’m so fucked right now! The dress I was going to wear just isn’t going to cut it. What am I gonna do now?”

  “First of all,” Evana began calmly, “you are going to calm down and breathe, Callie. What happened to the dress you were going to wear?”

  Trying to take a few deep breaths, Callie started to cry, dropping to the wood floor with a thud. “It’s not good enough, E.”

  As Callie’s sobs turned hysterical, Evana remained calm. “I’m on my way to your place now. I will call you when I get to the door. You will answer the phone and buzz me up. OK?”

  “Ok,” Callie agreed between hiccups.

  After taking a few fortifying breaths, she pulled herself up from the floor and shuffled to the bathroom mirror to see the aftermath caused by her tears. Absolutely unsalvageable. Her make-up had melted right off her damn face. What a fucking mess!

  Snatching a washcloth and soap from the shower, she scrubbed the melted mess off a little too hard, pissed at herself for being such a damn freakshow. She had attempted to pull her hair up in a loose chignon, but all she'd accomplished was a big fluffy disaster. Snatching up her brush, she ripped the bristles through her pitiful excuse for a bun, starting from scalp to tip, pulling out the pins as she went.<
br />
  Disgusted with herself, she plodded her sorry ass to the kitchen, having decided a glass of wine might help change her shitty attitude. She guzzled half of it before flopping down on the couch to wait for her salvation to arrive.

  Callie jumped when her phone rang, praying it wasn't Vehn arriving early and not expecting Evana to have arrived in record time. Someone call Guinness! How that girl had arrived at her condo in Brooklyn from the SoHo district in Manhattan so quickly was anyone’s guess. But Callie was damn glad she was there and wasted no time scrambling to the intercom to buzz her up.

  The moment Callie opened the door, she drew Evana into a tight hug trying to draw strength from the tight embrace.

  Evana pulled out of the hug, holding her at arm’s length. “I’ve already sent Avie a text, and she is shopping for a new dress right now, as we speak. Now,” Evana led Callie to the bathroom with one arm draped over her shoulder, “let me fix your hair and makeup, and by the time we’re done, Avie will be here and we can get you dressed.”

  “Thanks, E. I don’t know what I would do without you.”

  * * *

  Evana was right! By the time she had finished primping Callie, her buzzer sounded and Avie was walking through the door with a garment bag dangling from her fingers in one hand and a shopping bag clutched tightly in the other.

  “I think you’re going to love what I found, Callie! Oh, your hair and makeup look flawless.”

  “Thanks, Avie. Evana gets all the credit. I had absolutely nothing to do with any of this, that's why it actually looks good.”

  “Great job, E. Maybe you would be interested in doing mine for my wedding?” Avie gave Evana a hopeful look.

  “Sure, I’d be happy to.”

  “Not to break up this female bonding moment, but I’m dying to see what’s in the bags,” Callie said, bouncing on her toes.

  “You’re going to shit when you see what I found.” Avie dropped the shopping bag at her feet, flashed Callie an impish grin, and unzipped the garment bag revealing the most perfect little black dress from the Ralph Lauren Collection.