Sanctuary (RiffRaff Records Book 5)

by L. P. Maxa

  I, Evie James, wanted to do something a little spontaneous, a little edgy. A little rock and roll.

  I tossed my now empty cup in the trash and pushed open the large glass door, a bell dinging overhead announcing my arrival.

  “Oh, no, nope.” A young guy with a shaved head and tattoos creeping up his neck waved his hands in front of him. “I’m out, Nicky. If I have to do one more arrow or infinity sign or butterfly today, I’ll go crazy.”

  I frowned, looking over my shoulder. Was he talking about me? There was no one else in the waiting area. Who was Nicky? Was he confusing me with another girl? “Uh, I’m sorry?”

  “Look. I’m sure you’re a really nice chick, but I can’t do another small girly tat today.” He shook his head, his ice-blue eyes wide and almost pleading. He was thin and his black Henley looked well worn. Despite his somewhat rude words, his expression was apologetic. He was cute, cute in the way my younger cousin Jett was. Like I wanted to hug him and then take him out for ice cream. “I’m sorry, I am.”

  “Oh, uh, okay.” I still couldn’t really figure out what he was getting at. Were they about to close? “Do I need to make an appointment or something? I—”

  “You scaring away customers again, Bleu?” Another guy walked up from the back, grabbed the blue-eyed dude and shook him playfully. This guy, the new one? Was gorgeous. In a way that didn’t remind me of any family members. He had dark hair, longer on top and messy. His jawline was chiseled and his nose straight. He was taller than his friend by a few inches, his frame bordering on lanky. “You’re bad for business, you know that, man?” He chuckled and shoved Bleu—I assumed that was his name—out of the way. He leaned his forearms on the desk in front of him. They were covered in ink and the most attractive arms I’d ever seen. “What can I help you with?”

  His smile was kind, his green eyes playful. He was an innately happy, handsome, tattooed should-be model. And I had to pick my jaw up off the floor before answering him. “I, uh, I wanted a tattoo.” I darted my eyes to the left where Bleu was now quietly sketching on a large light table. “But if you guys are busy or whatever, I can come back.”

  “Nonsense.” He waved away my concern, standing up to his full height. “Bleu here has inked one too many sorority chicks today.” He winked, making butterflies take flight in my stomach. “No offense.”

  “None taken.” I also had a low opinion of sorority chicks after today. Plus, I understood better than probably any other SMU student how tattoo artists felt about doing the same small pieces over and over. Nearly every person in my family had tattoos, and most of them large works of art. “I have a picture of what I want.” I pulled my cell out of my purse and scrolled through my photos until I came to the one I was looking for.

  I stepped closer to the desk, handing him my phone.

  “Wow. Really?” He looked up, eyebrows raised and smile growing wider. I nodded and he let out that small chuckle again. “Bleu, buddy, you missed out.”

  “What? What does she want?” Bleu stood, reaching for my cell.

  The other guy held it up higher out of his reach. “Nope. No take-backs.” He kept my phone over his head as he headed back in the direction he’d come. “Follow me, pretty girl.” He glanced over his shoulder. “I’m Nick by the way.”

  “Evie.” I kept my head ducked, afraid that he’d see the blush on my cheeks. He’d called me pretty, and he was almost too cute to look at.

  “Nice to meet you, Evie.” He held open a frosted glass door, waiting for me to step into the small sterile-smelling room. “Is this your first tattoo?” I nodded again, afraid that if I tried to speak he’d hear the slight tremor in my voice. I wasn’t scared, but now that I was looking around, seeing all the equipment? I was a little nervous. “You picked a hell of a piece for your first time.” He started sketching the image I’d shown him on transfer paper. Every stroke sure and steady.

  I watched in fascination as he drew up my tattoo in mere minutes, adding small elements here and there to make it unique. He was a really talented artist, which didn’t surprise me. Every tattoo I’d seen come from Revival Ink back in Austin had been flawless and one of a kind.

  “There a story behind it?”

  He spun around on his little black stool, his hands on his ripped-jean-clad thighs. He had black ink on each and every knuckle, but I couldn’t really make out what they said. “I, uh, I saw the image in a book once. I like that at first glance it appears to be one thing, but the longer you look the more you see.” It was a picture of flowers, almost like a line of wildflowers. But then the longer you studied it, the flowers morphed into the image of a skull. The eyes, the nose, and mouth. I’d been in love with it instantly, and I’d always kept it saved.

  “Where do you want it?”

  I tried not to blush as Nick’s eyes traveled up and down my body. “My thigh.” His eyebrows rose to his hairline again and I rushed to explain myself. “It’ll be the easiest place to keep covered.” I rarely wore short skirts or dresses, and the only time I was ever in a swimsuit I was around family. Although I was sure my parents wouldn’t be thrilled about a tattoo, they wouldn’t be mad either. That would be the rock and roll pot calling the kettle black.

  “Okay.” He pursed his lips, staring at my cropped ankle pants. “You’ll need to take your pants off.” He stood and pulled a blanket out of the cabinet above his head. “You can cover up with this, and then I’ll move it around as I go.” He placed it on the bed and then turned his back to me. “Tell me when you’re ready.”

  He was kind. There was really no other way to describe the tattooed god. He wanted me to feel comfortable, he wanted me to trust him. I made the right decision coming in here tonight, and all my nerves were vanishing into thin air. I no longer felt homesick either. I felt connected to my family. I felt grounded, like I was exactly where I needed to be.

  After I removed and carefully folded my pants, I sat down on the cool leather table and let my bare legs swing under the safety of the blanket. “How do you, uh, how do you want me?”

  Nick spun around on his stool once again. His gaze raked from the top of my head down to my pink painted toes. Then he cleared his throat, like he was having trouble finding words. And I was once again blushing. Did he like what he saw? I doubted that was the case. I was a plain, virginal disappointment; ask anyone in Dallas.

  “Lay down on your side.” He looked away, busying himself with a rubber band around his tattoo gun while I adjusted myself and the cottony grey blanket that smelled like fabric softener.

  “Like this?” I had the covers off my thigh up to my hip, otherwise I was fully covered and bundled up. Still, I didn’t feel nervous or uncomfortable. I liked Nick. He was gorgeous, but more than that, he was nice. And I was for sure running low on niceness today.

  “Perfect.” He fired up his gun and I started to bite my lower lip. He noticed, and I know that because his eyes fixed on my mouth and stayed there for several seconds. I felt my cheeks flush red at the attention and then, almost instantly, his gaze softened. “This is a pretty big piece for your first time, we can do the outline this evening and then—”

  “I want the whole thing,” I interrupted him, and then felt bad about it. “I’m sorry. I just, I really want it all at one time. If that’s okay with you.” I bit my lips together. “I mean, if you have other appointments or whatever, I can come back.” I didn’t want him to think I was rude. I wasn’t trying to be. I couldn’t really explain it, but I had to have the whole tattoo, right now. It was important, and I was almost craving it or something.

  “You’re my last client for tonight. We can do the whole thing if you’re up for it.” He put his hand on my bare thigh, his black glove softer than I thought it would be. “I need you to let me know if you need a break though, okay? I don’t want you passing out on my table.” He winked.

  “Okay.” I nodded, taking a deep breath.

  Nick’s hands on my skin felt better than they should. He was about to ink me, permanen
tly. We weren’t on a date, he wasn’t flirting with me...at least not in an overt sort of way. I needed to get my mind off how attractive he was. This wasn’t me; I didn’t usually notice hot guys, and I never longed for them to keep touching me. The dates I’d been on in high school had all been PG. All of them. But there was something about Nick, something about his winks and his little chuckles. I wanted more. For the first time in my life, I wanted more.

  The needles pierced my thigh and I narrowed my eyes, clenching my teeth.

  “You good?”

  “Yeah.” And I was. It was uncomfortable, but almost in a good way. I liked it. Was that weird? Was I some kind of deviant? It was like an adrenaline rush or like a high. I’d rarely drank, certainly never got drunk. And I never smoked with my cousins. My system, my whole damn body, was pretty much as pure as it came. But this, I could get addicted to this. And him, if I was being honest.

  Nick stopped and I glanced over at him, meeting his smiling gaze. “You like it, don’t you?”

  I bit my lower lip harder, trying to keep myself from grinning. “I, uh…”

  His eyes moved to my mouth, widening slightly before moving away. “It’s okay.” He chuckled and got back to work. “Totally normal, tons of people like getting tattooed. It’s a rush.”

  He was right. Everything about this experience was a rush. We were both silent for a little while. I watched him ink me, and he kept his attention on my skin. After a few minutes he cleared his throat again. “How did you hear about us?”

  “My dad and all my uncles get their work done at the Revival Ink in Austin. I recognized the sign when I was exploring the area this evening.” When I was walking around, homesick and forlorn. Hating stupid mean girls as well as my boring self.

  “Oh yeah? Waylon, the owner, is my uncle. I did my apprenticeship there in Austin before I came to Dallas and opened this place for him.” He paused and readjusted his hand. “Who is your dad? Maybe I’ve met him.”

  And this was the part I always hesitated. How would he react when I told him who my family was? Would he be starstruck? Would he ask to meet them? Ask for an autograph? Would he immediately call the tabloids to tell the world he’d tattooed Evie James? “Um, Smith James.” Let’s see what you’re made of, Nick the handsome tattoo artist.

  “Oh okay, yeah, I’ve met those guys a couple times.” He let out that sexy little laugh again. OMG. Did I call his chuckle sexy? “They’re a good time.”

  I snorted. “That’s an understatement.” My family was all a good time. My aunts and uncles and cousins, they all had a wild side. In my opinion, my parents were the most strict and unexciting of the whole bunch. But I’d heard stories about my dad’s past that made me cringe. My sister Emmie and I were the calm ones, the boring ones, and that was way the way our parents liked it.

  “Well randomly coming in for a large piece like this makes sense then, very rock and roll of you.”

  “Oh yeah?” I sighed. “Would you mind telling my new suitemate that?”

  “She giving you a hard time?” He paused again, looking up to meet my eyes briefly before going back to my tattoo.

  I didn’t normally open up to strangers. In fact, I didn’t normally have conversations with strangers. But we were going to be sitting side by side for the next couple of hours. What else were we supposed to discuss if not my apparent faults? “I overheard her tell someone on the phone that I was a shy, prudish, badly dressed disappointment.” I didn’t need to give him specific details. Words like “virgin” and “elementary school teacher” were unnecessary. “And apparently that assessment is spreading like wildfire.”

  He didn’t stop working as he talked. “Well, if you ask me, your ass looked killer in those pants you were wearing. And you aren’t shy. Shy people don’t stroll into a tattoo parlor on a whim. You’re quiet, and I’ll take quiet over obnoxiously loud any day. Not to mention the fact that I’ve been working on you for thirty minutes and you haven’t even flinched. You’re a badass in my book, Evie James.”

  “You’re kind.” He was. He had been from the first words out of his mouth. Maybe the universe was trying to even out my life with this small ray of sunshine in an otherwise overwhelmingly shitty day.

  “I’m not that kind, ask anyone.” He paused long enough to shoot me another flirty wink. “I just tell it like I see it, dove. It’s a fault.”

  Dove. I hid my smile behind the blanket. “I don’t think honesty should ever be considered a fault.” The room got quiet again, the only sound, the gun. It was almost lulling me to sleep. Maybe I really was a deviant? I wasn’t sure how long I lay there with my eyes closed, but they flew open when I heard Nick clear his throat.

  “You know what the best thing about moving away is?” He had stopped, the gun on the table and his smiling green eyes on mine.

  “What?”

  “You get to start over. You can be whoever you want to be.” He sprayed my tattoo down with a cold liquid. “But if you ask me, I wouldn’t change one damn thing about you. You’re gorgeous and tough, and easy to talk to.” He wiped a paper towel over my skin and then held his hand out, helping me into a sitting positon. “And you’re all done.”

  I stood, making sure to keep the blanket covering as much of myself as I could. “Really?” Who the hell sleeps through a tattoo? Maybe I needed to see a doctor? I walked over to the floor-length mirror, a huge grin taking over my flushed face. “Wow.”

  “You like it?” Nick was behind me, still on his stool.

  I met his scrutiny in the glass. “Are you kidding me? I love it.” I turned to the side, viewing it from another angel. “It’s perfect.” It was more than perfect. “Thank you, so much.” I stood in that spot, staring at my new tattoo, absorbing my new appearance.

  Nick was right. Moving to Dallas, going to SMU…no one knew me here, not really. I could be whoever I wanted to be. I could reinvent myself. They wanted rock and roll princess? I could give it to them. I could be the fun one. I could be the wild one. I could have friends and fun, and I could flirt. I could do it all. Heck, I could even join that stupid sorority and make Hannah pay for the things she said.

  I spun around, suddenly feeling brave and a little bit bold. “Would you let me buy you dinner tonight? As a thank you for the tattoo?”

  “No.”

  I bit the inside of my cheek, his immediate rejection stinging more than I thought possible. There went my newfound confidence.

  “But I’d love to buy you dinner.” He grabbed the back of my thigh, moving me closer to him and making chill bumps break out of my skin. “Because the tattoo was my pleasure.” He winked and then started rubbing some kind of ointment on me.

  I swallowed around the sudden lump in my throat. “Okay.” I’d never asked anyone out before. I’d never wanted to. But suddenly I felt like I could do anything. And I felt…turned on.

  I couldn’t remember ever feeling this way. I wanted Nick to keep touching me. I wanted his hands to travel up higher.

  I wanted him to touch me everywhere.

  I wanted to kiss him.

  I wanted…him.

  Chapter Three

  Nick

  Evie James was the most understated sexy girl I’d ever met in my entire fucking life. She was quiet, but when she spoke chills shot down my spine. Her voice was a little soft and she had the slightest hint of a drawl; it was almost like every syllable was meant to be whispered again my ear. And don’t even get me started on her appearance. She was so fucking pretty. Her dark hair was long and straight, and I wanted to wrap it around my fist and pull her head back, exposing her slender throat. She was thin and tall, like a dancer. Her dark eyes seemed to see everything at once. And that fucking perfect thigh I’d been touching for the last two hours? Kill me now. I wanted to sink my teeth into her flesh more than I wanted my next breath.

  But the absolute best part about Evie? She had no fucking clue what she was doing to me.

  “You like it?”

  “It’s so good.” She
put her hand over her lips, like she was embarrassed that she’d talked with her mouth full.

  “Snuffers has the best burgers around.” I smiled then took another large bite out of mine. “You feeling okay? Not in too much pain or anything?” I glanced down, looking at my art covering her flawless skin. It made my dick twitch in my pants.

  I’d given Evie a pair of shorts to put on before we left the shop for dinner. They looked good on her, real fucking good. I was positive that they were shorter than anything she’d normally wear. They belonged to one of the girls who worked the counter for us from time to time. I was pretty sure she was fucking Bleu when I wasn’t looking, which was why her clothes ended up left behind.

  She shook her head. “It aches a little, but it’s nothing I can’t handle.”

  I believed that. That gorgeous, innocent girl slept through most of her large thigh piece. She was tough, way tougher than she gave herself credit for. “Tomorrow will probably be worse. You can take some ibuprofen tonight when you get home.”

  She wrinkled her nose, which was fucking adorable. “I don’t want to go home. Home is where I’m hated.”

  “I seriously doubt she hates you.” I sat my food down, wiping my hands on a napkin. “If anything, she’s jealous.”

  She scoffed. “You sound like my dad.”

  Evie James could, for sure, call me daddy if she wanted to. But I hated that school hadn’t even started and she was already dreading her new life here. “Look, girls are catty. We all know it.” I took a long sip from my beer. “You can’t show weakness. You can’t let her walk all over you.” I grew up an only child, but I had three girl cousins—I knew the way the world worked. “You’re hot as hell, your legs go on for days, and you’re obviously smart if you got into SMU. Believe me, she’s jealous.”

  “You’re a good guy, Nicky.”

  I sent her a small shrug. “I’m really not.” I was young, somewhat well off thanks to hard work, and covered in tattoos and muscles. I got around. And I wasn’t always that nice when I was kicking chicks out of my bed before the sun came up.