by Jo Raven
Weird because I thought he liked me—that we were friends, at the very least. And that he’s a good person. Look how he’s helping Jason out.
Tears burn behind my eyes, but I refuse to let them fall. I won’t let Ocean break me. Never realized how easily he could do it.
Maybe that’s why I hate him. He made me realize how vulnerable I really am, when I thought I was hard as nails.
“He’s not been himself lately,” Amber is saying. “Remember, we talked about it. Something’s off, JJ told me the same. Maybe it wasn’t you he was angry at. Maybe it was something else.”
“Yeah, well, that’s not good enough. I’m not his punching bag.”
Still, I think back at our exchange. Did I miss some clue? Could it be the phone call he made upset him?
“Let’s have a look at the new page.” I point at her website. “See if the prices are now presented correctly. I want to forget about Ocean.”
For the next thirty seconds, at least. It’s something.
“Right.” She’s still eyeing me warily, as if I might bite. “Here’s the section for long dresses. What about wedding dresses?”
“What about them?”
“Will you be making Ev’s, like she asked?”
I shrug, still turning the mystery of Ocean’s strange behavior over in my mind. “Haven’t given it much thought. It’s not like it’s urgent, is it?”
“It might be.” Amber winks, and I stare at her, momentarily blindsided.
“What?”
“You may, in fact, start thinking of several designs, as I’m sure you’ll get more requests pretty soon.”
“Why? What’s going on?”
She winks and returns her attention to the screen. “Well, for one, Micah proposed.”
“Yay. Awesome! Ev totally knew he would.”
How did she know? How could she read Micah so well, and I misread Ocean all the time?
“And I am certain more guys we know are about to propose to their girls.”
“Yeah? And what makes you so certain?” I stick my tongue out to her. “Did you spread my Tarot cards when I wasn’t looking?”
“No need to look at your cards to know,” she says, clicking through to my blouses category. “When your girl tells you she’s about to have your baby, you’ll hurry to put a ring on her finger. And I know that because I know these boys, and they’re good men.” She hesitates, then says it. “Ocean, too, Kay. He’s a good guy.”
“Maybe to other people.” I stab the needle into the fabric and bite the inside of my cheek, because anger is starting to give way to numbness, and I’m not ready to give up on the anger yet. “Now gimme more gossip. Who’s having babies?”
“I’ll tell you if you promise to calm down and not murder Ocean in his sleep.”
I shrug, because I can’t make any promises.
“Oh, before I forget!” Amber’s eyes brighten. “Rafe and Zane are organizing a tattoo convention at Damage Control. A small one. More like a sleepover.”
“Sleepover?”
“Yeah. Well, sort of. They invited the tattoo artists from a hot new tattoo stop in Chicago, Soul Stain, and it will be a walk-in weekend. There will be lines, and people entering and going, and we totally need to set up a stand with my jewelry and your clothes. Have you got any of those nifty fingerless gloves you make? And the headbands? They’ll sell like hot cakes.”
“Look at you, all businesswoman-like.” It’d be nice to make some extra money. This could be fun. “It sounds good.”
“It does.” Amber winks at me.
I frown. “Why are you winking at me? Something wrong with your eye?”
“Nothing’s wrong with my eye. The tattoo artists? They’re hot. Kade is to die for. They have a picture from a party on their website.”
“I see,” I say absently.
“Mancandy, girl. Maybe they’ll let you touch. Wouldn’t you like that?”
Not sure, to be honest. I know I said many times that I’d love to touch this or that guy’s ripped chest, and I wasn’t kidding. What’s wrong with some fun, right? Especially if you’re not interested in a relationship.
But now I don’t know if I want to touch anyone but Ocean. Scratch that: I know I don’t want to touch anyone but Ocean.
Sick. I’m sick. Definitely coming down with something. Especially since I’m still pissed as hell at him.
But I remember his kiss, and it’s a bitter-sweet sting to my mind, a wave of heat unfurling in my body, in my heart.
Maybe touching a hot inker at this tattoo convention/sleepover can cure me. One can only hope.
***
Babies, huh? Amber wasn’t kidding. Three babies, to be precise. Not bad at all. Looks like the Inked Brotherhood kept busy. Looks like everyone kept busy while I pined for Ocean.
Hold up, not pined. Considered him. Checked him out. Entertained vague hopes of dancing, kissing, getting hot and sweaty with him.
And almost did. No, I definitely did. I mean, we kissed. And got sort of hot and sweaty together. Good God, that boy knows how to use his mouth and hand, and…
I shouldn’t be remembering that. At all.
Screw him.
But anyway, we kissed, and that’s off my list now, right? A list I don’t have, but maybe it’s about time I made one, too.
Ocean Storm, check.
Next.
Besides, why not? Was I going to wait for Ocean to date me and woo me and marry me or something? That’s exactly what my family would want, and that’s bull crap. Except they wouldn’t want Ocean as my husband to be. He’s too… colorful. Has too much of a bad vibe going. Blue hair, tattoos. No college education. A blue-collar job.
Is being an artist a blue-collar job?
Probably.
And why am I thinking of Ocean and marriage again? Am I crazy? Has to be all the talk about babies and weddings. Amber could be right.
I should make a wedding gowns category.
Also, what’s with the timing, huh? Three Inked girls pregnant at the same time? What’s up with that?
I get that Tyler’s son would want a little brother or sister to play with, and Zane and Dakota got married, which meant they were seriously thinking about it—probably—but I didn’t think Rafe and Megan were in any real hurry to have kids. If anything, I thought Megan was kind of scared of the idea.
Personally, I’d have bet on Dylan and Tessa getting preggers first, but come to think of it, they have Dylan’s little brothers. They’re already set, I guess. They can wait a while longer to have their own.
I love babies. They are the cutest things. And I’d love to make wedding dresses for the Inked Brotherhood girls. If they’d like me to. I’m not as close to them as I am to the Damage girls, but I do love them all. One thing you can say about these pretty, wounded boys is that they have good taste in girls.
All except one, that is. Otherwise he’d have called me, right?
I’m sitting on my bed, a drawing pad propped on my knees, retouching a design of a pair of long, slinky pants, but my mind isn’t on it. I glance at my sewing table, at the glittering, beautiful fabrics waiting for me to shape them into funky clothes, and sigh.
It has been like this since Tuesday. Since I walked out of Ocean’s apartment.
I tried not to ask about him, not to be interested, but information has filtered in anyway. Happens when you hang out with his friends. Looks like Jason’s sicker than he himself thought. It’s the flu, it seems, and there was an emergency trip to the doctor’s when the fever wouldn’t go down. Jesse was there, too, and Amber.
They didn’t tell me, as I was so upset with Ocean.
Crap.
Ι stab my pen into the paper, then start shading in one side of the pants. I add a flare at the hem. Then a pattern of flowers.
Yes, I was angry when I left his apartment. Confused. Thrown off my game. The fact he’s been taking care of Jason doesn’t change that.
My mind keeps going back to that night in his apartme
nt. Could it be I overreacted? That my attraction to him blinded me to what was really going on? Was he sad over something else, and I pushed him too hard to talk to me?
“Not now,” he’d said when I’d walked into his room. Had I waited a little, would he have told me what was on his mind?
But why should I let him snark at me when I was only trying to help him? That’s dangerous territory. He should explain. He should apologize.
In my mind I see his eyes, blue like a slivers of summer sky, and that sharp edge of sadness in them, and my heart hurts.
Yeah, dangerous.
Before this went down, I’d started on a present for him. Two, actually. A long-sleeved T-shirt, and fingerless gloves. I’ve left them unfinished.
Everything between us feels unfinished. Only starting.
Or already ending?
I put down my drawing pad and grab my pack of cards. It’s not the first time today I’m spreading them, hoping for some insight, some clue. About him. About his reaction.
And mine.
The Magician card keeps coming up, and this time is no exception. I study his youthful face, his determined expression as he lifts a scepter in a lush garden, the symbol of eternity hovering over his head. He looks a bit like Ocean, I think. If his hair was blue, perhaps.
His belt is a snake biting its own tail, another symbol for the eternal, and he has all the symbols of the deck laid out in front of him: the sword, the cup, the rod and the pentagram.
Beginnings. Initiation. Call to adventure.
Is this him? Or me?
What was my question again? Damn.
I close my eyes, picture Ocean as he stood in front of me in his tiny kitchenette, bright eyes flashing, soft lips parted. How he looked when he asked if I find Jason pretty. When he told me he’d show me what he likes.
What he tasted like. What his scent was.
Who is he, deep inside? What made him so sad and angry? What don’t I know or can’t begin to guess?
I shuffle the cards again, cut the deck three times, spread three more cards.
Show me.
I flip the first card and stare at the Five of Cups. My hand shakes a little as I put it back down and stare at the young man standing in an empty landscape, facing away, surrounded by the discarded cups. His shoulders are hunched, his head bowed. He looks so heartbreakingly lonely.
I know what this card means. Regret. Unhappiness. Despair. Something that is lost.
Is this what you want to tell me? He’s alone and unhappy?
What about me? What should I do? Worrying at my lower lip with my teeth, I flip the second card. The Eight of Swords.
A girl, blindfolded and bound, surrounded by a forest of swords.
Denial. Imprisonment. Isolation.
So what are you saying, cards? I’m being blind?
Come to think of it, isn’t this the question I’ve been asking myself already? If I missed something? Is this my answer?
A heaviness is settling on my chest. I flip the last card and place it in the middle of the other two.
The Magician.
I start to laugh. I push away the three cards, scattering them, and lean back, still laughing, a little hysterically.
New beginnings. Adventure.
Okay, okay. Fine. I’ll call him. Just to see what he has to say.
PART II
Chapter Eight
Ocean
“You should’ve told me,” Jesse Lee mutters, pacing up and down, wearing a rut into my thin carpet. He gestures at Jason who’s dozing on my sofa, the blanket wrapped around him tightly, only the top of his head showing. “I had no idea he was so sick. Why didn’t he want you to tell me?”
“Said he didn’t want to worry you.” I’m rubbing my hands over my face for the millionth time in the vague hope I can rub away the tiredness. Fucking hell, I was up all night, trying to bring the guy’s fever down. I keep finding myself dreaming where I’m sitting, jolting awake with the sensation of falling. “He’ll be fine.”
“Yeah.” Jesse finally stops the goddamn pacing and perches on the coffee table beside me. He looks like hell—a mirror image of myself, I’d wager.
He spent most of the night here, too, from the moment I called him in barely suppressed panic until we brought Jason back. We then hovered over him until we were sure he wouldn’t need another trip to the doctor’s.
Nothing like seeing a guy in the throes of a seizure to break down your cool. Kids get seizures with high fever. The elderly. Not young men like Jason. But Jason was already weak from a variety of other problems and malnutrition, apparently.
I shudder.
Amber was here as well, only left a couple of hours ago. Jesse drove her to her apartment and came back to keep vigil with me.
“Fuck, I’m sorry about this mess.” Jesse grips the back of his neck. I bet it’s stiff, like mine. “Amber said to move him to her place. She’ll ask Kayla, but it’ll be okay. God I wish we’d moved into our studio already.”
“It’s okay, man,” I tell him. “Let him stay here, get well. I’ll be out of town over the weekend anyway. If you can check on him, then the couch is his.”
Jesse gives me a long look, as if trying to read my face.
Good luck with that, buddy. I can’t even read myself.
“You’re a good guy, Ocean,” he finally says.
“No, I’m not,” I say truthfully. If only he knew… “But he seems to be. And he needs to rest and get better. He deserves that chance. Where would we be if Zane and Rafe hadn’t taken us in?”
Jesse grunts in agreement. “He does deserve it. He took care of me so many times. He looks young, but he’s my age. He’s been on the streets for a long time.”
Hard to imagine. The few months I spent homeless was a fucking nightmare. “Sorry to hear it.”
“He’s too proud to let me help. But that’s gonna change, I swear it. Now I can give something back, and I just fucking wish I’d done it sooner. This...”
His voice cracks, and Jesus Christ, what he said echoes my thoughts about my brother.
“Hey.” I bump his shoulder with my fist. “You couldn’t know he’d get worse. And it’s not like you didn’t try to help. You brought him here. And you’re only just getting your feet under you, with your job at Damage Control and your girl. Let him stay over the weekend. Then he can make up his mind. Like you said, he’s an adult. He can make his own decisions.”
And now I sound like a hypocrite. Because if this was true, then Raine also has that ability and that right, and I should stop calling him, like he asked.
Am I so selfish? Is this only about me? Why do I have this wild fear that if something happens to Mom, something fucking irrevocable, and Raine doesn’t see her first, he’ll blame me for it, too?
Like it will make any difference. He refuses to see me anyway. And it’s not like I know what’s wrong with her. I just know she’s getting worse, and that’s something, considering she’s never had it all together. It’s not just her mind that’s going. It’s how frail she seems, how weak—
“I’ll let you catch a few Zs,” Jesse says, clapping me on the back, and I’m so tired I barely feel the sting where the bruises darken my skin. “He seems quiet now. Call me if it changes, if you need anything.”
What I need isn’t something he can give me. What I need is a sure foothold in a life that seems to be slipping away—my parents, my brother, my sanity.
I’m just tired. That’s it. That’s why I can’t see an end to this twisting path.
So I nod. “Will do. Go back to your girl. Grab some sleep. I’ll cancel my appointments at Damage and stay here with him.”
“The hell you will. I’ll cancel mine.”
“It’s okay.” I wave a dismissive hand at him. “I only have two today, and they’re regulars. They won’t mind putting it off.”
“Thanks, man. I owe you big time.” He gets up but hesitates, and I resist the urge to push him out the door. I’m having some trouble ke
eping up my end of the conversation at this point.
Dream images again flash in front of my eyes—the filthy interior of the trailer and Raine, so young he can’t reach the door handle, dark curls tousled, cars in all the colors of the rainbow lined up for a race, my mom staring off into space, her gaze blank.
A bang jerks me out of my trance. It takes me a moment to realize it’s the sound of the door of the apartment slamming shut. Jesse is gone.
Shit. Scrubbing a hand over my face and gritty eyes, I check on Jason, who seems to be in deep sleep.
Good. At least one of us is getting some rest, I think, and instantly feel like a prick for begrudging him that after seeing him so sick.
Dammit, Ocean. Get your shit together.
I settle in the only chair of the room and fold my arms over my chest. I’m afraid that if I lie down in my bed and allow my eyes to close, I won’t hear anything short of a bomb going off in the next room.
My sleep is normally very light, because keeping vigil is second nature to me. I’ve watched over Raine, over my mom, over the trailer since I can remember as my old man disappeared for days on end to feed his addiction and spend every penny we had.
But there’s only so much a body can take, and mine is reeling after days with almost no sleep, and the worry about my mom is taking its toll.
She won’t answer the phone. Why won’t she answer the phone? It’s been days since my visit, and I need to go see her. See them. Tomorrow. Make sure they’re still breathing, that there’s food in the fridge and that nothing too bad has happened—an overdose, a stabbing over a gambling fight, a robbery that ended in bloodshed.
I’ve seen lots of dark things in the trailer park as a kid, things I tried to protect Raine from. I didn’t always manage.
Raine, Livvy, the accident. My old man always ignoring me. And after the accident, finally noticing me.
And deciding he’d had enough of me.
I keep letting people down, people who matter to me. Good for nothing, that’s me. Unreliable. Worthless. Raine wants me to leave him in peace, and Kayla… I snapped at her, made her feel like crap when she came to help me, sweet and kind and pretty and everything I want. My rainbow princess. I let her down, too…
