Ms. Campbell,
I would like to solicit your services. I have seen your work and I am acquainted with your reputation. I know what your special skill is.
I will give you a challenge. My scar is ugly and frightening. I want you to turn it into a badge of honor – isn’t that how you put it?
My scar covers a good part of my right thigh and my back. It’s a reminder of my own mortality, my own foolishness. I need it to change into something it might never be. I need you to do that.
Ms. Campbell, I will give you complete freedom to come up with a design that appeals to both of us. But you will need to convince me that it will do what I need it to do. I will need you to show me that it will change how I see myself.
I am aware that your rates are often eccentric. Money is not a problem. Neither is time.
I have been told that only you can give me what I need.
If you will take me on as client, we can meet and talk about this. But until I’m sure that you will, I will be, to you, just
A.
Birdie read it twice more. She had already read it about a hundred times, or so it seemed.
She had gotten the damn email after she got home. Maybe the first thing she should’ve done was call Marley and tell him about it, but the mystery of it puzzled her. Marley wasn’t very good with mysteries. He would immediately have gotten in touch with a techie friend to try and trace the email.
Birdie felt strangely compelled to take this mysterious person as a client. She already knew a few things about him, of course. She was assuming it was a man, because it sounded very much like a man. Men, in her experience, were far more fussed about the acknowledgment of mortality than women were.
He was rich, and very concerned with privacy. If money is not a problem – and boy, didn’t everybody wish they could say that – then you’re definitely rich. If you won’t even give your name and will create a throwaway email ID just to get in touch with a tattoo artist, then you’re very concerned with privacy.
Did he have good reason to be so wary? Birdie had worked with celebrities. She had worked with musicians who’d gone platinum and trust fund babies who’d realized that misfortunes come even to the rich. Nobody had ever had a problem with how she worked. If they wanted privacy and complete confidentiality, then she gave them just that.
‘A’ had seen her work and seemed to have talked to people she’d done tattoos for. So, he should already know that.
But Birdie didn’t feel very comfortable taking on a client who was so secretive. She liked to know the people she worked with. Once she agreed to do a tattoo, it was as good as an oath. She wasn’t just promising a pretty, decorative tramp stamp. She was promising something that would change the way the clients looked at themselves.
It would also change the way the world looked at them.
You simply cannot make a promise like that and walk away. It might as well be sworn in blood.
Really, she should just reply and tell this ‘A’ that this wasn’t how she worked. She dealt with people, not emails, and she didn’t like secrets when they were kept from her.
Somehow, the email had elicited a reaction from her; an intense, visceral reaction. She wanted to do the tattoo. It would be an artistic achievement, if nothing else.
But there was something in her that warned her to stay away from that person. He was trouble, it warned her.
She should heed that warning, shouldn’t she?
But since when had Birdie ever taken the safe option?
Still, she might throw caution to the wind, but Marley wouldn’t. Birdie would never take on a client who was bound to be intensely demanding, on an emotional level, without talking to Marley about it.
She looked out of the window and saw that the skies were turning a deep pink. There were strands of heat woven through the inky darkness that was getting lighter and muddier at the same time.
Well, shit, thought Birdie. Now she was faced with the prospect of a long and demanding day with about an hour’s sleep. Wasn’t that just perfect.
Sighing, she made herself think of coffee and the punching bag to egg herself on. It was a brand new day, and Birdie believed in facing whatever life threw at her.
After all, she’d had plenty of practice with that.
*****
“I don’t really like the tone of that email.”
Marley was frowning at the tablet. They would open shop in about half an hour. She had asked Marley to meet her earlier than usual.
There was quite a bit of prepping to do before they got to work. They both had full days, as they usually did these days. Marley’s designs were whimsical and fantastic. Birdie worked almost exclusively with scars now.
Birdie shrugged. After taking a lot of her frustration out on a poor, beleaguered punching bag, Birdie was feeling silly about her reaction to the email. Rich people were eccentric. They rarely trusted people from the wrong side of the tracks, and Birdie was definitely from the wrong side, even if she had set up shop very close to the right side.
They’d want to be sure that they could trust her. She could even respect that. It took a while for Birdie to trust her clients, or anybody at all.
She also respected Marley’s approval.
“I know, it’s… I don’t know, it rubs me the wrong way, too. But there’s something about it, Marley. I haven’t worked with such a big scar before. It might be something special. I don’t want to turn it away. Plus, it sounds like a fairly big injury to cause something that big. Maybe this person really needs us. Maybe this person really needs what we can do.”
Marley looked a bit skeptical.
“If they need something, they shouldn’t put you on trial for it first.”
Birdie grinned. Marley was very protective of her, despite the evidence of her entire life that she could take care of herself very well, indeed.
“They’re not putting me on trial or anything. They’re just careful. I’d be careful about opening up about something so important, too. I think it’s a man.”
Marley shrugged. “It was definitely written by a man. I don’t know, Birdie… This could end up being trouble.”
Birdie rolled her eyes at him.
“Look who is being all dramatic! A meeting wouldn’t mean that we have to take him on. I mean, he might decide that I can’t do the job when we meet.”
Marley sniffed in disbelief.
“Yeah, right.”
Birdie chuckled. When Marley’s tone changed like that, she knew that they were almost home free.
“That is true, who in their right mind would turn down the genius I, and only I, can offer,” teased Birdie.
Marley chuckled, turning serious again.
“How about if I get somebody to try and trace the email?”
Birdie sighed. She had known that he would say that, and of course he had.
“Marley, you know how I feel about respecting our clients’ wishes.”
“Whoever ‘A’ is, he isn’t our client,” reminded Marley.
Birdie shrugged.
“It doesn’t matter. That we even considered that – that’s reason enough to justify his desire for secrecy. Well, I think the person is a ‘he.’”
Marley sighed grudgingly.
“All right, you win, Birdie. Reply to the email. Ask the person to come in for a consultation. We’ll see how they deal with it. But…”
Birdie shook her head.
“Yes, I know. If you’re not comfortable with the idea, we won’t take the job. We won’t take the client. I promise you that. This is our life, Marley. I wouldn’t do something that truly made you uncomfortable.”
“Wouldn’t you?” quipped Marley, making Birdie grin again.
“Well, I really would try not to, you know.”
They stayed there, a unit, for a minute. Birdie had known that it would be a difficult conversation, of course, but they had dealt with it, just as she had known that they would.
“Just promise me you won’t do
anything hasty.”
Birdie nodded. Marley was protective. It had been something of a novel experience for Birdie, who had grown so accustomed to taking care of herself that the idea of somebody else protecting her had been ludicrous.
She had done Marley’s first tattoo – a silly cup of coffee on his café au lait skin. She had been appalled at his choice, but it suited him. Marley was taken to whims and fancies, and he never regretted any of them.
But, Birdie had slowly come to realize, there was a simple reason for that. All his whims and fancies were, in fact, carefully reasoned. He loved coffee with steaming milk. It was what got him out of bed every morning. He wanted multiple tattoos. So, he had done that one first.
Birdie had given him more than he had expected, of course. A dragon rose in the steam of the coffee – a tiny, silly looking dragon.
To Birdie, that characterized their relationship. Marley seemed to be the easygoing one who would always do things intuitively, but she was the one who went with the flow when it mattered.
Pursing her lips, she composed the email as Marley got to work getting things ready to open shop.
Dear A,
If you have seen my work and heard about me, you will know that giving my clients what they want matters to me more than anything else. If you need to meet me to be sure that I can give you what you need, then that is what we will do.
But in agreeing to meet with you, I’m not agreeing to work on your body or with you. I’m giving us both the chance to see if it’s a viable possibility.
Regards,
Birdie Campbell.
There, thought Birdie, satisfied. That should do it.
Chapter 2
Adam woke up sweating, biting back a scream.
He lay in bed, pulling himself up from the dredges of that familiar nightmare, as he waited for his heart to stop beating as if it wanted to pump right out of his chest.
It should be routine now, thought Adam, as his heart finally leveled out a bit. It should be, but it felt as if it would never be anything as mundane as routine.
Every night, he was back in that nightmare that couldn’t just be pushed aside as a dream. Because he had lived through it, and he couldn’t seem to leave it behind.
Even with the best of medical treatment, he knew his body would remind him of that evening for the rest of his life. Even with all the money in the world, you can’t buy peace of mind or a completely sound body once it had been broken.
He waited for the pain to die. It always did. He no longer knew which part of it was real and which was from memory.
No, that was wrong – it was all real, anyway. His memory of that night was all too clear to even consider dismissing it as just a nightmare. Even the phantoms from that night that persisted with him were real.
He knew that he wouldn’t get any sleep now. It was only about five in the morning, and he knew that there was absolutely no use trying to grab another couple of hours of sleep, no matter how much he felt like he needed it.
Might as well get some work done, decided Adam, as he often did. At least, since the accident, he’d been getting an incredible amount of work done.
As he pulled the tablet to him, he saw that it had been a year. It had been exactly a year.
He paused. Should he give himself time to process and deal with that? Maybe he should, but after that nightmare, he didn’t feel like indulging himself.
Instead, he checked his email – the one he had created on impulse to send a mysterious email to the undoubtedly talented Birdie Campbell.
He knew of Birdie from Celeste. He knew Celeste because he had hired the woman, who was a brilliant coder. But she would never have been able to realize that potential if it hadn’t been for Birdie Campbell.
He had been mulling over the idea of getting in touch with her for a few weeks, but despite the glowing accounts he had heard from Celeste, he had found himself unwilling to trust a stranger.
So, he had done what he would’ve recommended to anybody. He had created an email account, routed it through multiple proxies and servers, and sent it to Birdie Campbell. After all, there was no way he could be identified. He was just putting an enquiry across, that was all.
Deciding to go through with it would be another matter entirely. To go through with it, he would need to trust this woman with more than he had shared with anybody else.
He knew she was skilled, of course. Celeste had shown off her tattoo, and the scar. It wasn’t just the work, though he had noticed that it was technically perfect. Birdie was obviously gifted.
It was that the tattoo had done its job, and from everything Celeste said, it had as much to do with the tattoo artist as the tattoo itself. It had healed Celeste in ways that nothing else could have. She had stopped being a victim and became a survivor, and with that, she had found strength that she hadn’t known she had.
That was a lot for a tattoo artist to achieve. That was a lot to expect from a tattoo artist, too.
Of course, Celeste wasn’t the only person who had told him about Birdie Campbell. Having a Birdie was like buying a piece of art, but the art was on you. A lot of the people in the rarefied social circles he was now a part of had Birdies.
A couple of them were even people he truly respected. But he hadn’t asked them about the experience, or anything to do with it. Everybody knew what Birdie Campbell’s specialty was. Everybody knew what scars he bore.
He didn’t want everybody to know that he needed what had become a new way to cope. That would be the same as admitting that he hadn’t recovered completely, and that was something Adam refused to admit.
Maybe he had trouble admitting weakness. But he was done feeling weak. Months of physical therapy, weeks of bed rest, multiple surgeries – no, he was done with feeling weak, he was done with feeling helpless. Now, he was in control. He intended to stay in control for the rest of his life, no matter what it took.
Birdie Campbell might be a genius and an artist beyond compare on the unusual canvas that was the human skin, but she wasn’t very good at replying to emails, noticed Adam with some irritation. He wasn’t used to waiting for replies.
Adam caught himself in time before he fired off a sharp demand for a reply. He was far too used to being the boss and having everybody hop every time he told them to, he realized with a rueful grin. His mother would’ve clipped his ears.
He had only sent the email at nine the night before. Maybe she didn’t check her mail obsessively like almost everybody he knew.
He hadn’t told anybody that he was considering getting a tattoo. Not to cover his scar, but to make it… something else. He just wanted it to stop being a reminder of his mortality. After all, he had survived. He had survived when doctors had feared he might not make it through the night. He had walked again when his mother had wept, telling him that all she wanted was for him to live. His father’s face had been a harsh mask of grief. He would never forget it.
But Adam had wanted to do more than just live. He had wanted to thrive.
He had proven everybody wrong.
Well, that wasn’t quite true. He had proven everybody except his brother, Richard, wrong. Richard had never doubted that he’d make it.
“You stubborn bastard, I’ll kill you if you stop fighting. I’ll kill you. Fight, you fucking asshole.”
Adam had heard the words, said in a fierce low tone that brooked no argument or disagreement. It had been an order.
Adam had fought, and by all accounts, he had won.
But he didn’t feel as if he had won. Every night, plagued by nightmares, he felt as if he was sliding down a slippery slope, and nothing could stop that slide.
Adam had found himself seeking oblivion in whiskey, and had known that he might be in trouble.
He knew he could turn to Richard for any help he needed. He knew it.
But, well, he was a stubborn bastard who insisted on finding his own way.
Richard would understand. He would be supportive. He might even get a
tattoo in solidarity. It would be just like Richard.
But Adam needed to do this alone.
Well, not quite alone, he corrected himself. He needed to do this with Birdie Campbell.
And that brought him right back to square one. How was he supposed to know whether he could trust Birdie Campbell with this? Unlike coding mistakes, this couldn’t be fixed. If she screwed this up, he would have yet another reminder of how fucked up everything had gotten.
Two years ago, he had been flying high and living it up. Why not? At twenty-nine, he had been one of the youngest billionaires in Silicon Valley, having turned his aptitude for making niche apps into a lucrative business that hired hundreds of people.
A year ago, he had owned property, invested in everything he felt like investing in, was an angel to many start-ups, and his business was thriving.
Everything had come to a crashing halt, quite literally, when his passion for motorbikes had gone horribly wrong.
He had loved sports bikes and dirt bikes from the time he was fifteen. He had learned how to do stunts in his teens. When he wanted to blow off steam, he’d hit the dirt track and do so in a cloud of dust.
The adrenaline rush… Even now, when it had been a year since he’d gotten on a bike, he could feel it. He could even miss it.
But it had all come tumbling down. He had known the moment it had started to go wrong. He had felt the control slipping out of his hand for that split second, but that split second was all it had taken. He had crashed.
He could still feel the pain – the blinding pain that had made him scream for oblivion. The searing heat of it all that had made him feel as if he was boiling from the inside. The sickening crack as his leg had broken in a compound fracture that had needed multiple surgeries. He had felt the bike crushing him, pressing down on him as if it had turned into a monster intent on killing him.
Then, mercifully, he had blacked out. From then on, everything had been a blur of pain and pain meds.
He remembered more from those days than most people knew. If they knew he remembered, they would worry. He had a lot of people in his life who seemed to make worrying about him a full-time job.
Be My Everything (Brothers From Money Book 11) Page 16
