LITMIR.BIZ

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shit! You’re Shaw? You’re freaking real? Unbelievable! Guys, Rule’s girl is here and she’s like an actual girl with an actual brain. Un-freaking-believable. The terrible trio has been talking about you for weeks and I just didn’t believe it, but here you really are.”

      Like something out of a movie all eyes in the shop suddenly swiveled up to where I was standing. I had spent plenty of time with Nash and Rowdy over the last few weeks, so they both just offered up brief “heys” and went back to what they were working on. Rule’s look turned my insides out and he gave me a wink before saying something to the kid he was working on and sitting back to wipe the excess ink off. The other three artists stared at me openly, which would have made me uncomfortable, but the blonde had sprinted around the counter and was now standing right in front of me. She was almost the same height as me but weighed a good thirty pounds less, though somehow her wild hair made her look taller and it was hard to believe that loud voice came out of such a tiny package. She was like a punk-rock pixie.

      “Do you have any idea how long I’ve waited for one of those guys to land a serious girlfriend? Forever! Sending away the ink bunnies has never been as satisfying as it is now and I never ever would have pegged Rule as the one to go down first.”

      She waved a hand over her shoulder toward the opposite side of the shop, where the three artists I didn’t know were working and pointed to each one. “Bixie, she’s married to a firefighter so she’s never caused too much fuss with weirdo client stalkers. Mase has an on again-off again girlfriend so he can behave, but when they’re off he can give Rule a run for his money in the manwhore department. Jasper, well, we call him Jaz, keeps his liaisons quiet because he’s got ties with the Kings of Sorrow, the local biker club, and apparently that’s supposed to be hush-hush so the bunnies don’t hover around for him too much. But the terrible trio, man oh man, I show those bitches outta here all day every day, and even with Rule being hooked up with you it still seems like it’s my full-time job.”

      She talked so loud and so fast I had a hard time tracking everything she was telling me. Plus, Rule had snapped off his gloves and was prowling toward me in the way that made my legs go all gooey. He moved with a limber ease that was just sexy and confident; also his hair was starting to grow back in and I liked the near black fuzz covering his scalp.

      “Are you telling my girl stories, Cora? I told you Shaw’s been around for a long time—you aren’t going to be able to scare her.” He came around the corner and before I could get myself all worried about whether it was appropriate to touch him at work he had me all wound up with his hands in my hair and his mouth slanted across mine. He tasted like coffee and peppermint, and he didn’t seem to mind that all eyes remained on us while he thoroughly devoured me, like we hadn’t seen each other in weeks rather than just a few hours. He gave his tongue one last flick, clicking his tongue ring against the back of my teeth. When he pulled away I’m sure my eyes were glassy and I was breathing hard. I cleared my throat and put a shaky hand on his chest until I regained my composure. “I’ve got, like, a half an hour left. Are you cool to hang out that long? You can come chill in the back and do your school shit or whatever.” I nodded and took a step back from him. He was potent and went to my head fast.

      “No, let her stay up here and hang out with me. I’m dying to know all about this mystical creature that got you to act human for once.”

      He shot an annoyed glance over his shoulder at the pixie. “Shaw, this is Cora Lewis. She’s the shop manager and our resident body modification expert.”

      She wiggled her eyebrows up and down and gave me a leer. She twirled a finger in Rule’s direction. “Since you’re with this guy I’m sure you’re familiar with my work.”

      I choked back a laugh and put a hand to my mouth as a hot flush worked up Rule’s neck. “Seriously, Cora?”

      She shrugged a tiny shoulder. “What? It’s true, isn’t it?”

      His arctic eyes landed back on me and the chagrin in them made me laugh out loud. “She’s from Brooklyn. None of us know where Uncle Phil found her and they refuse to tell us but she keeps the shop running like a well-oiled machine. Most of us wouldn’t know if we were coming or going without her.”

      “I can stay up here and wait for you. I’m hungry, though, so you need to feed me when you’re done.”

      He bent down and put his lips right next to my ear. “Oh, I’ll feed you when I’m done all right.”

      A hot shiver shot through me so I gave him a heavy-lidded look. “Goody.” He kissed my cheek and made his way back to his waiting client. I shifted my gaze to Cora and blushed when I noticed she was grinning like a demented Cheshire Cat.

      “So it’s like that, is it?”

      I blinked and shifted from foot to foot. She grabbed my hand and pulled me around the counter, actually shoving me into another leather chair that was stashed back there.

      “Like what?”

      She swiveled her chair so we were facing each other and gave me a level look. “It’s like all hot and bothered but sweet and fuzzy, too. I didn’t know the asshat had any of that in him. You make him human.”

      That was the second time she had mentioned something like that but I had to wait until she fielded a couple phone calls to question her about it. “What do you mean about that, exactly?”

      “I’ve worked with Rule for the last five years. I was here when he and Nash started their internships right outta high school. Phil and I go way back so I’ve known the boys for a while. I adore Rule. I think it’s genetically impossible not to be kind of in love with him when you come equipped with a vagina. It’s just something about all that angsty, moody swagger he has that makes you want to cuddle him up and make him feel better.”

      I knew exactly what she was talking about so I just nodded in agreement. “But he’s also arrogant and explosive, he treats women like crap because too many of them let him get away with it, and for a long time after his brother died I watched him just go through the motions of living his life. He came to work, he hung out with his boys, he gave me shit on a daily basis, and he screwed his way through the entire Front Range. But he was doing it all locked inside this bubble that none of us who loved him could get through. He was cold and unreachable but then all of a sudden there were cracks, and some of the old Rule was showing through. The robot version of himself he had been operating from for so long started to fade and the good ole human Rule was back, and I think it has to do with you.”

      “That’s a really nice thing to say.”

      “It’s not nice if it’s the truth. So tell me how a vanilla girl like you, all virgin skin and no piercings, gets into a guy like Rule. From first appearances I would never peg him as your type; you look more Brooks Brothers than Dickies if you know what I mean.”

      I twirled a piece of hair around my finger and watched as she typed a bunch of stuff in the computer. She was freakishly efficient and fast and I wasn’t sure I wanted to talk about how sexy I found Rule with someone who already had intimate knowledge of my boyfriend’s junk.

      “When he was sixteen he came home one day with an awful tattoo of a horseshoe and a shamrock on his forearm. Phil had given Nash a tattoo machine and some ink for his sixteenth birthday and instead of trying to learn on pigs or melons they decided that they would try to learn on each other. Both of them were always really gifted artistically. Nash was more into street art and graffiti-type stuff where Rule just fiddled around with it and happened to learn he had some real talent.

      “Anyway, I was over at his house and I don’t know if you ever got a chance to meet Remy, but identical doesn’t even come close to how those two looked: the same eyes, the same dark hair, and the same innate sense that they were out-of-this-world good-looking. So Rule came home with that terrible tattoo and suddenly he was a new guy. He claimed his skin as his own, made the mark to define who he was and how he was different from Remy, and it was just beautiful how much he loved what changing his outer appearance did for his inner sense of self. He’s always been a babe, but when he started to customize

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