Evanescent Ink (Copperline #4) (3 page)

I felt the sting of the needles in my flesh, welcoming the bite. I wished it hurt more, really. She was surprisingly good, though. I’d gotten ink by pros who’d been in the business for years that had felt like they were digging through my flesh with nails, but with her the pain was slight, almost more of a push or a pull than anything. She worked with a steady hand, glancing up from time to time to get a read on me. There was no question in her eyes. A little worry maybe, but no question.

She didn’t try to get me to talk, to open up and share my feelings. It was really very un-girl-like of her, but it made the whole situation feel more comfortable. It took my mind off the shit of the last couple hours and gave me an odd sense of peace as I watched her work furtively to complete my request.

The needles hit a sensitive spot and my arm tensed almost imperceptibly. Her gaze flicked up to me, and the deep violet of her eyes instantly distracted me from the pain. She was a blast of gothic color, deep jewel tones and black. Perfectly put together every time I saw her. Never a hair out of place or a smudge in her makeup. Almost untouchably perfect. I itched to run my fingers over her to see if she was real.

“When I first met you,” I murmured, “I could have sworn your eyes were green.”

Without hesitation, she looked back down to the canvas that was my arm.

“Hazel,” she said after a moment. “They’re actually hazel. I wear contacts.”

“Why?” I was a bit entranced, sitting there in my drunken stupor trying to recall what she looked like with hazel eyes. Wondering what she looked like without the smoky eyeliner and the dark lipstick. She was stunning with it. Steampunk and a little gothic looking, even. She still wore the corset she’d had on earlier in the day, paired with a short purple plaid skirt and black patent leather pin-up pumps.  She’d also worn a long duster-type sweater, but took it off not long into the tat because the ruffled sleeves were getting in the way. The black leather corset set off the ink on her arm and did an incredible job of making her breasts look amazing.

This was Raven. Sweet. Sexy. Unique. She stood out from the rest, especially in a small town like Ophir. Most girls would look ridiculous or like they were trying too hard.

But somehow with Raven… it
worked
. It really, truly fit.

She dipped the needles and continued with my ink.

“It’s part of my mask,” she murmured quietly. “The eyes, the makeup, the hair, the clothes…”

“Why do you need a mask?”

“It’s just easier.”

I frowned. “What’s easier?”

“Life… everything.”

“I’d love to see you without it,” I breathed. Even to my own ears, I sounded like an idiot creeper, but it just slipped from my lips. “Without your mask. Sometime.”

She took a shaky breath and flashed me a quick warning look before touching the needles to my skin.

“Quit moving,” she demanded.

“I’m not.”

She lowered the gun to my skin, but jerked it back again quickly.

“Hold still.”

“I am,” I murmured.

“Dammit, Drew.” Her voice had lowered to a whisper, husky with something. I wasn’t sure what underlying emotion simmered, but something did.

I sat as still as my drunken body let me and watched her. The concentration and the way she tilted her head, exposing the sensitive skin at the base of her neck. The tip of her tongue grazed her rich, burgundy lips, gifting me with the faintest glimpse of a tongue piercing that left me slightly breathless. Warmth surged through me, blood rushing to my dick, stiffening it with that innocent little movement.

I tried to distract my thoughts by studying her ink, which was amazing. Graceful and beautiful. All her own artwork and design that she had tattooed onto the smooth ivory of her skin. I suddenly envied the hands that had touched her. That had brought her visions to life.

Like the dusting of stars encircling her wrist. Delicate with a wisp trailing down her arm and another extending almost up to her delicate fingers.

Or the fine scrolling design that would occasionally peek out at her midriff.

And, holy fucking hell, the smooth, straight lines up the back of her legs. Like seams in stockings. My fingers tingled just thinking about trailing up the ink to what was at the top.
Did the lines just stop, or was there something else?
Raven often wore short skirts, just not quite short enough to tell.

Finishing up, she stood and leaned over to grab the green soap solution, offering the faintest glimpse of scrolled lines circling her thighs at her hemline. A simple lacy outline that was the stuff dirty dreams are made of.

Between the tequila and that sexy-as-fuck image, the last vestiges of Maggie’s cruel dismissal quickly dissipated.

My dick began to throb.

My palms began to sweat.

I felt flushed and hot.

Raven was entirely oblivious to the wicked thoughts swirling through my head. She grabbed the clear plastic from the cabinet and ripped a piece off the roll. Her focus was on my arm, on the tat. She was so quiet, a little apprehensive almost, as she taped the protective layer over the fresh ink.

And then, with one last stroke of her fingertip over the tape, she stood and began to disassemble the gun, turning her back towards me as I sat in the chair. The ink on her thighs peeked out again as she leaned over to the sharps container to dispose of the needles, and I was done.

Sleeping with an employee, even one who’d become a good friend like Raven, was such a shit thing to do. Sexual harassment alarms shrilly rang in my head.

Stop.

Don’t.

Baaaaad idea.

But I was really,
really
done. I’d hit my limit. I had to touch her.

Beginning just below her knees, I traced my finger up the line on one leg. She froze with a sharp gasp, but didn’t move away. I trailed the faint touch up the back of her knee, slow and light. Barely a touch. A shaky breath sounded. A shiver ran through her muscles. Goosebumps rose over her skin.

I was being such a fucker. This was a bad idea. Those thoughts screamed inside my head, even as I brought my other hand to her other leg. Tracing the lines in synchronicity, going higher to slowly push up the fabric of her skirt just enough to reveal the intricate designs that encircled her thighs.

Raven’s fingertips curled into the counter, her knuckles turning white with the force of her grasp.

“Drew…” she gasped as I brushed my thumbs across the simple lacy pattern that simulated the tops of ornate thigh-high stockings. She didn’t pull away, though. She didn’t try to stop me. She even leaned into my touch, like she wanted this as badly as I did.

Maybe even more.

My mouth watered. I wanted to trace the tip of my tongue along the edges, around the outside of her leg until I’d come around to the front. I wanted to go higher, to find out what luscious treasure lay at the juncture of her thighs.

Almost of their own volition, my hands pushed the plaid fabric up a little more to reveal the smooth curve of her heart-shaped ass. She wore tiny thong panties, the black satiny fabric making her fair skin almost glow in smooth perfection. On her right ass cheek was some ink. Black and purple lips with
“kiss this”
written in script beneath them.

My last shred of reservation fled. I did exactly what it told me to.

I dipped my head and pressed my lips to the tattoo. Raven made a small, desperate sound, a moan mixed with a gasp.

“Oh, fuck,” she whispered. It was faint, barely audible. “This is a bad idea.”

“I know,” I said in a low voice against her smooth skin, and she shivered beneath my hands. “I don’t care. Turn around, Rave.”

She slowly turned, looking at me with dark, passionate eyes. Her lips were open, breathing in shaky puffs of air. My hands gripped her hips beneath her skirt, my thumbs pressing into her hip bones, venturing closer to her center as they brushed against the smooth plane low on her abdomen. Every breath she took felt labored. Her fingers curled into my forearms, pulling just a little in a silent plea for me to continue, then trailed up my arms to my shoulders, and grazed along the hairline at the back of my neck.

The little flick of her tongue, the slightest glimpse as it darted out to wet her lips, finally did me in. I lifted one hand to cup her jaw, and I pulled her in for a kiss. Jerking her against my body with my other hand on her ass, I lifted and fell back to settle her on my lap as she straddled me on the chair.

Insanity.

For a split second, that nagging thought flashed through my head once again, attempting to push me back. Raven was my employee. My friend. I should
not
be doing this.

But,
God
, she kissed me back like she was starving. Deep and long, and the bead of her tongue piercing drove me wild. I couldn’t seem to stop myself. The need to touch her was uncontrollable.

I
had
to keep going.

“Drew, I don’t know that we should be doing this,” she whispered against my lips even as she melted into me, like she was trying to convince herself. Her hair fell in a loose, silky curtain around us, making me feel like the world around us had disappeared. “You’re really drunk.”

“Please,” I replied, my voice sounding hoarse and thick. “It’s helping me forget.”

Her beautiful eyes whirled through a myriad of emotions. Longing. Lust. Empathy. A few others I couldn’t quite get a read on.

Then she placed her hands at my shoulders and came forward to kiss me again.

This kiss quickly abandoned any remaining reservation. It became hot, full, and open. She pressed her body tightly against mine and wrapped her arms around me. My mind was buzzing with the fiery need that tore through my veins. I suddenly wanted her like nothing I’d ever known before.

She drew back a bit to study me, and I used the break in our kiss to glide my fingertips from her jaw down her throat to the softness of her breast, pushed up by the tightly cinched corset. She swallowed hard and took a deep, shaky breath.

And then she reached around behind her to tug at the tight strings of her top, loosening the leather until she could unhook the front and slip it off.

Fuck
, she had the most beautiful breasts. A handful of soft skin, lined slightly from where the stiff corset had pressed against her. Her nipples were fair, pink and hardened with a delicate gold ring piercing each one, calling for me to taste them.

She came back down to kiss me again, hard and wild, as she gathered the fabric of my sleeveless tee. Scraping her nails along my chest, grazing my own pierced nipples as she lifted it, breaking the kiss only long enough to pull the shirt off over my head.

Already amped from the kiss and the sight of her exquisite tits, I damn near came in my jeans when she molded her naked torso to mine. The contact of our skin was electric, shocking and maddening. My grasp tightened on her ass, clutching with a bruising grip as I pulled her closer. Somehow, I’m not certain how I did it without us both ending up on the floor, I flipped us over. My hips settled between her legs as she arched her pelvis up to grind against my dick.

“Drew—” she gasped.

I cut off whatever she was going to say with a deep kiss while my hand slipped from her hip to her center, dipping down beneath her sexy-as-fuck underwear to feel her smooth, bare pussy. I grazed the outer lips, swallowing her moan, then quickly slid into her wet heat.

Smooth and silky, hot and tight. She cried out and threw her head back. She was beautiful and pagan in her dark makeup, arching on the black leather chair.

Everything seemed to vanish around me. The world only existed for this one moment, for her soft moans as I caressed her silky wetness. I watched her climb, watched as a pale flush spread across her fair inked skin. Her eyes fluttered open as her fingertips grazed up my arm, over my shoulder to rest against my neck. Her hips began to lightly rock in time with my fingers, urging me on until she suddenly leaned up and kissed me again, slowly drawing me back down on top of her.

My hand left her pussy to grip tightly on her bare thigh as I nestled into the tenderness she provided. Her slender limbs wrapped around me, one hand still cradling my jaw. The other feathered across my abs towards my back and down to grip my ass as she lifted her hips. The promise surged through me. My dick throbbed with the pressure of her body grinding into mine. Her faint, breathy moans echoed in my ears.

Then her fingers trailed down my back to the waistband of my jeans, slipping down towards the front. She shifted her hips away ever so slightly as she worked the buttons, quickly as though she couldn’t hold back. Her touch was so incredibly feverish, her warm, trembling hand sliding into my boxers and closing around my cock. I felt the delicate swipe of her thumb over the underside of my length, following up the thick ridge until she came to the lower ball of my apadravya. With a gasp, she traced the heavy silver in a way that reverberated through my spine. It jolted through me, sending a burn through my fingertips and toes. Lighting a buzzing sensation in my head.