“You’re going to permanently and painfully mark your body because you think that will make me interested?”
She stepped closer and looked up at him with those big green eyes. “No, Mac,” she said. “You’re already interested. I think a tattoo will help make you willing to act on it.”
“Just like that? Magically?” he asked, hating that his body responded to her anyway.
“Well, the tattoo and my new wanton ways.”
He coughed, surprised. “Wanton?”
“Last night I spent some time on a website called Wet and Wanton. I took notes.” He was too frickin’ old for this. His heart almost stopped beating.
“It isn’t going to work,” he said, though the voice barely sounded like him. “Girls who are into tattoos and porn are a dime a dozen.” He knew that for a fact.
“Right. But in my case the tattoos and porn are icing on the cake, instead of being the whole cake.” That was the perfect princess statement. She was so full of herself. So sure everyone around her was just waiting for a chance to bend over backward for her. So positive there wasn’t a chance someone would be able to say no to her. So convinced they would all throw themselves in harm’s way for her.
He studied her for a moment, trying to determine if she was bluffing about the tattoo. Was she simply trying to get a reaction from him, to elicit his protective instinct, to prove he had feelings for her? Or was she honestly willing to put ink into her skin because she thought it would turn him on?
“You’ll never do it.”
32
Just My Type
“You sure?” she asked.
“You’ll see the needle and get light-headed.”
“I’m tougher than you think.”
He snorted. He’d killed tiny bugs in her bathroom with her nearly gagging in the next room. “Sure you are.”
She raised her chin. “I’ll do it, Mac. Whatever you want.” Red flags popped up all over. Another girl had told him that, repeatedly, a long time ago. And he’d never recovered. He tried to hide the feeling of a knife stabbing through his chest.
“No problem with me wanting a great big dragon drawn across your sweet ass?” he asked, frowning his meanest frown.
“If that’s what gets you goin’,” she said. “And thanks for the compliment.” He rolled his eyes and smiled, the dark thoughts dissolving like sugar in coffee. Only she would have taken a compliment out of that. “And more body art. I like this.” He drew his finger across the winding vines on her lower stomach.
She sucked in a quick breath, her stomach muscles jumping under his finger.
“Okay,” she answered breathlessly.
“You really just gonna let me do whatever I want with you, princess?” he asked huskily. Even though he said it to remind her of how stupid her easy acquiescence was, his imagination ran wild.
“Do you like your women submissive, Mac?” she asked, her own voice pretty husky. “Because I was on a site called Submissive Sweets and I could do that. I also saw a site about female domination. I can’t remember the name, but the men on there seemed to be having a good time.” He stared at her, images, ideas, fantasies tripping through his mind as he tried to reconcile the words with the beautiful face he knew so well. The Sara Jo Bradford he knew did
not
know about sexual submission and domination.
“They have free Wi-Fi here?”
“Ten bucks a day.” She grinned up at him then. “Totally worth it.”
I could do that
. She’d actually said that. He still couldn’t believe it. She could submit, to him, sexually. That’s what she’d said. He had to remember this was Sara. No matter how she was talking. He almost asked what all she’d seen on the site, but decided he would never live through hearing her tell him and he was suddenly quite sure she would tell him. Probably in detail.
Shouldn’t she at least be blushing when saying this stuff? Shouldn’t that stuff disgust her, or make her nervous, or
something
? Instead, she was talking and meeting his eyes as if she was not only willing, but fully ready to take whatever he could give her.
She had no idea the things he wanted to give her.
33
Erin Nicholas
“You are so not the submissive type.” He didn’t go for submissive though. He liked active participation. Very active.
“I’m not?”
“Did Submissive Sweets not define submission?”
“It wasn’t necessary,” she said dryly. “As they say, a picture is worth a thousand words.” Right. He almost grinned. “Then you figured out it means doing what you’re told. No questions or arguments.
Not
your strong trait.”
“When does spanking come into the equation?”
Again, he was speechless.
“I haven’t looked at any spanking sites. I’ve seen some listed, though.” Now spanking was something that would do Sara some good. “No spanking.” He tried very hard to remember the Christmas he’d given her the kitten. The thing she’d wanted most. Innocent, cute, simple—
those were good things. Things he associated with Sara. Kinky sex talk—not as much.
“Okay, no spanking,” she said. “Yes to dragon tattoos.”
“Right.” He finished off his beer.
“Let’s go.” She turned, picked up her flip-flop sandals from the sand, slipped her hand in his and started toward the beach condos.
“Where are you going?” he asked, pulling her up short.
“To the tattoo place.”
He pulled his hand free of hers. “No. No tattoos. Nothing permanent.” Like ruined friendships, for instance.
“I’ll sneak out later.” She slid close. “Unless you’re going to sleep with me. To keep an eye on me.
Then I probably couldn’t get out without you knowing.”
He stared down at her. It was just a big game of chicken, he realized. She didn’t think he’d let her do it, so she felt confident talking big, driving him crazy, making him nuts.
There was no way she’d go through with it.
“You’re right. Let’s go now. This way I know they’ll get the dragon right.” He started for the front gate of the resort, Sara in tow.
The cab ride to the shop called, creatively, Body Art, was short.
When they stepped through the doors, Mac finally breathed deep. This was perfect. It was dark, smelled of incense and was wallpapered in various designs for use by the artists. Totally not the kind of place Sara would be comfortable.
Then he frowned at the top of her head as she passed through the door in front of him. She had been here before. She sure didn’t seem uncomfortable.
“What do you like?” he asked, gesturing at the designs on the wall.
34
Just My Type
“You rethinking the dragon on my ass?”
He stifled a chuckle. “Not necessarily. It is smokin’.” He dropped his gaze to the object of conversation.
She wiggled it for him as she muttered, “Thanks.”
He grinned. He was feeling good again. In control, with a plan that would work.
Sara might have grown up. She might be a woman now. But that didn’t mean she was a
woman
. She wasn’t ready to play with the big boys. And Mac was a big boy.
“Maybe we should talk about where first,” he said. “There’s not that much of you, so where we put it might narrow down our choices of what we put there.”
She frowned, as if unsure if she would be complimented or offended.
“Here?” She hooked her thumbs in the waistband of her sarong and tugged it low enough to show the dimples just above her buttocks.
Mac stayed resolutely where he stood. Somehow. “No.”
“Not lower back?” she asked, looking at him over her shoulder.
“Sam might see it sometime.”
“So?” She turned to fully face him, not having pulled the skirt back up. The silvery paint on her lower abdomen glinted in the light.
“Sam isn’t going to see your tattoo.” That she wasn’t going to get. Probably.
Sara propped her hands on her hips. “I’m open to suggestions.” The tattoo would involve a needle, so there was no way she was getting one.
“Somewhere…else.” Somewhere no one else would ever see it. Ever.
She came toward him, her hips swaying gently, her flat, smooth stomach drawing his attention again.
“Maybe here?” She pointed to her right shoulder blade.
“Sam would definitely see that.” So would anyone else who ever looked at her in a tank top. That was not going to work.
“Here?” She bent, pointing at her ankle, but the position drew his eyes to the valley between her breasts shown off by the bikini top.
“Higher.” He wanted it someplace where only he would know about. Very stupid. Totally stupid. But there it was. If Sara was getting a tattoo, it would in be in a place that would only be visible when she was in a thong…or naked.
Of course, she wasn’t getting a tattoo. Then again, if she did…
Somehow he found himself nearly on top of her now, her neck bent back to look up at him. She licked her lips.
“Where do you want it, Mac?” Her voice was husky.
35
Erin Nicholas
The question wasn’t innocent at all. He knew it. He knew she knew it. He also knew she meant it to be un-innocent.
“Let me surprise you.”
“Okay.”
Something about that made him groan. It was the blatant, unquestioning trust. It was the easy acquiescence to his doing whatever he wanted with her body.
This was so bad.
He
was bad. Bad for her.
“It’s gonna be a big needle,” he threw in as one final, albeit weak, attempt to
not
do this.
“Whatever it takes.” She turned and headed for the counter where she rang the bell.
A woman emerged through a curtain behind the counter. She was short, had tight gray curls on her head, wore jeans with a garishly flowered sweatshirt and was chomping on a wad of gum. “What do you need?”
“A tattoo.”
Sara said it with confidence, which made Mac roll his eyes. Sara always did whatever she wanted.
Usually what she wanted wasn’t decided without input from the people in her life—including him.
Ultimately, she always got her way because the rest of them made sure any complications were a moot point.
“’Kay.” The woman didn’t seem concerned. Or any other emotion about it, for that matter. She slid a piece of paper toward Sara. “Sign this.”
She did. Without reading it.
“A consent form?” Mac asked, looking at the top of the sheet. “You sure you want to do something that requires a consent form?”
“I get a yearly physical, which requires a consent form, and that’s good for me.” Right. Like he was going to win this argument. He wasn’t sure why he was even wasting his breath.
“What are you gonna do?” The woman pushed a huge book toward Sara and flipped the cover open. It was a three-ring binder with page after page of designs.
“I know exactly what she needs.” Mac pulled the book toward him.
Sara didn’t say a word, just leaned her elbow on the countertop and watched.
He flipped several pages but finally got to the smaller, more subtle designs. Still, they didn’t have exactly what he was looking for.
“We can do something custom,” the woman said around her gum.
“Great.”
“Can you draw?”
“Kind of.”
36
Just My Type
She pushed a piece of paper and a pencil toward him.
“You can draw a dragon?” Sara asked.
“Close your eyes,” he told her.
Of course he couldn’t draw a dragon. But he didn’t need to.
He sketched what he wanted quickly and good enough. “There.” He shoved it back to the woman.
She looked at it, shrugged and turned. “Meet me behind the curtain.” Sara started for the hot pink and gold striped curtain toward the back of the store. She seemed to know where she was going.
Over her shoulder she asked, “You’re coming too, right?” He wasn’t going to miss this. “Of course. If you chicken out, how will I ever know?”
“Where exactly are we putting this thing?”
“Somewhere only I’ll ever know.” He couldn’t help the low growl that intruded into his voice.
She gave him one of those I’m-driving-you-crazy-and-I-know-it female smiles. “Oh.” Of course, the only time he would ever see it would be tonight as it was applied.
“Where?” the tattoo artist, the same woman from the front, asked as Sara climbed up onto the tattoo table and lay back.
“Hike it up,” Mac said, looking at Sara’s skirt. She wouldn’t do this in front of a stranger.
She started to inch the sarong up along her smooth, tan legs.
When it hit mid-thigh—and Mac’s gut clenched with the realization she
would
apparently do this in front of a stranger—he stopped her. “Better go from the top.” He sounded much gruffer than he meant to.
Sara gave him a knowing smile, which was ridiculous considering she couldn’t possibly know all the places his imagination was going.
Her fingers went to the tie at her hip and she pulled before he realized she meant to lose the garment all together. He’d meant she could inch it down. Which he would have explained but he couldn’t find his voice once the sarong was spread open, showing off the fact that the bikini bottoms were as skimpy as the top.
He breathed, barely. He blinked not at all.
“Where?” the woman asked, obviously annoyed with how long this whole thing was taking so far.
“There.” Mac pointed.
“Here?” The woman pointed next to Sara’s belly button.
“No. Lower.”
“Where?”
“Lower. Below the paint.”
The woman was obviously losing patience. “You wanna show me?”
37
Erin Nicholas
“Lower.” There was no way in hell he was touching Sara. Especially on the inside of her hip bone, just above where the top edge of her bikini bottoms rode.
The woman rolled her eyes and moved her finger down to the top of the bikini. “Here?”
“To the right.”
“Here?”
Mac shook his head. “To the right.” His gaze flickered up to Sara’s.
She smiled and stretched her arms over her head. “Whatever you want, Mac.” Lord. The position, the words, the breathlessness, the way she was looking at him… He was never going to survive this.