Tattoo Thief (BOOK 1) Read online

  “Beryl. Open your eyes.”

  My eyes snap open and Anthony is inches from my mouth, his gaze hot and raw. My hand trails over one of his Thighs of Steel for encouragement, but that doesn’t get me kissed. It just earns another crooked grin.

  “That’s no flinch,” he says, and his mouth covers mine—hungry, demanding, teasing and torturing at once. I bite his lip and it barely slows him down. His tongue strokes mine as one hand burrows deeper into my hair. His other hand glides up my thigh to my hip, pulling me closer, cupping my ass.

  I’m making out with a guy in public! A hot guy!

  I debate how to word my Facebook status update.

  But Anthony recaptures my attention with a sharp nip on my earlobe, his tongue tracing its outer edge, and I feel a rush of heat.

  I feel a lot less like a Bumpkin Fashion-toting New York newbie and a lot more like a sexy siren.

  ***

  Anthony owns me for the rest of the night, tight against me as the dance floor crowd swells. He gives me space to dance with Stella and anyone else who approaches, so long as they mind their manners.

  Stella’s found another bad boy—maybe Blayde 2.0, but decidedly not my type—and his eyes are glued to the outlines of her nipples whenever they’re not pressed chest to chest.

  It’s not the place to chat, so I have no idea what Anthony does for work, how old he is, or his story. But there’s plenty of nonverbal communication and I find myself melting into the hard planes of his chest, and letting my hands explore his impressive muscles.

  I take a break for the bathroom and when I’m finished, he leads me around another corner, pressing me against the wall of the club. His mouth crushes mine and I answer, feeling the electric sizzle as each part of him melds to my body.

  He nips a trail of bites down my neck and I tip my hips into his, feeling his response through the denim. It’s the alcohol and the music and his hungry kisses—everything heats me from the inside out, and I feel the frozen parts of myself begin to thaw.

  I don’t remember the last time someone kissed me this thoroughly, with this voracious need. Am I over Jeff? Oh, hell yes. Maybe there’s some truth to Stella’s theory.

  I feel a hand on my shoulder and Anthony and I look up at once. Stella’s there, her other hand entwined with a shaggy-haired, pierced guy, and she tells me she’s leaving. She asks Anthony if he’ll see that I get home safely and he promises he will.

  She’s gone and Anthony’s gaze shifts to mine, a mix of passion and intensity that steals my breath and most of my logic. His hands grip my ass and his mouth reaches me again, at first a question, and then a demand for an answer.

  I wrap my arms around him tighter and let my body say yes.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Morning slams into my brain. Even before I open my eyes, I take stock of the damage: my mouth is dry and sticky, my head pounding, and my body drained.

  All evidence of a very good night.

  My lips are still puffy and raw from the marathon make-out session with Anthony, and it took every ounce of self-control I possess to keep it from going further once we left the club. Stella’s bravery is rubbing off on me a little, but not so much that I’m ready for a one-night stand.

  I pad to the kitchen barefoot and drain a massive glass of water, then root through Gavin’s bathroom in search of ibuprofen. Success. More water, then coffee, and I’m feeling sort of human again. I open the terrace doors and enjoy the cool breeze nipping through my T-shirt.

  Jasper baroos to tell me I can’t just roll back into bed for another few hours of recovery. I scrub off my raccoon-eyed makeup, throw on workout clothes and running shoes, and take him to the park.

  We cruise a now-familiar loop around Sheep’s Meadow, people- and dog-watching. Some kind of fund-raising run is in progress at the heart of the park. At the park’s southern edge, we cross the street to get a fresh juice from a chatty street vendor and then return to the park for the rest of our walk. The green juice settles my stomach and I think last night’s debauchery didn’t do too much damage.

  Jasper whines and I let him go off-leash—he streaks around in happy chases with dogs three times his size. I hear bagpipes and crane my neck to see a man standing on top of a massive boulder playing some mournful song.

  I love this. Love it! Even with the sounds of traffic and people and chaos and hawkers, New York is also full of music. Also, I suppose the bagpiper’s neighbors wouldn’t let him practice in his apartment.

  When we get back to Gavin’s apartment, Raúl, one of the weekend doormen, greets us and waves me over to his desk.

  “These came for you,” he says, pushing a massive bouquet of pink-tipped white roses at me.

  My jaw hits the floor but I recover, thanking him and taking them up to Gavin’s apartment. The instant I’ve deposited them on the granite kitchen island I’m tearing into the tiny envelope from the plastic spear at the heart of the bouquet.

  “I want to see you again.” That’s all it says, with a phone number at the bottom of the card.

  Caveman.

  But I’m impressed. I never gave Anthony my phone number—he never asked for it, which I confess disappointed me a bit. The only things he knows about me are my first name and the address where the cab we shared dropped me off.

  I didn’t invite him in. If he was annoyed, he disguised it well, giving me a hard, thorough kiss as I exited the cab.

  I grab my phone and debate whether to send a text or call. I wimp out: a text. I simply say, “Thank you. They’re beautiful.”

  In minutes, my phone buzzes back. His note is equally brief.

  “Tuesday at 8? Balthazar.”

  I reply, “Yes.”

  And just like that, I’ve got my first real New York date with a wall of muscle. My insides clinch just thinking about it, and I wonder what other tricks Lulu has in her closet.

  Mental note to look up Balthazar and figure out what I should wear.

  My stomach rumbles now that I’ve burned off the green juice and most of my hangover, so I pour a bowl of cereal and decide what to do next. Even though Gavin’s gone dark online and his admission has me totally freaked out, fixing his place is my job.

  I decide to start on the living room, considering the white leather-and-chrome couch still lists like a sinking ship.

  What would Gavin want? He said he needs different, so I page through the decorating magazines, ripping out pictures as they suit me—warm earth tones instead of the stark white and gray that’s here now. Casual, comfortable shapes. I want a couch that’s begging to be sat on, snuggled in, and for a moment my mind flashes to cuddling up on that couch, watching a movie next to Gavin.

  Stop it, Beryl.

  Gavin’s thousands of miles away, and that’s just the start. He’s a rock star, filthy rich, and reckless. And if he caused Lulu’s death, he could be dangerous.

  The person I need to think about cuddling up to is Anthony/ Thighs of Steel—strong, down-to-earth, and sexy as hell.

  But who am I kidding? On stage, Gavin oozes sensuality, holding a microphone as if he’s holding a woman. I reign in this train of thought with another—he’s damaged. And I’m not the one to fix him.

  I will fix his apartment. I feel a responsibility to make his home somewhere he wants to come back to. Somewhere good and comfortable, that will help him make all of the wrong in his life feel right again.

  To do that, I need to understand him better. Which is why I quit tearing ideas out of magazines and start snooping, searching for evidence to answer my questions about who he is and what he needs.

  I check my computer and he’s still offline. I haven’t heard from him in two days and I regret the accusations I threw at him. Lulu’s death might be his fault, even preventable, but he isn’t the only one to blame.

  It took courage to admit what he did. He gave me his trust by telling me, and I stomped on it.

  Not hearing from Gavin worries me. Not that it should. I’m not his girlfriend. Not
his keeper. I’m only in charge of his place and his dog.

  I push open the glass French doors to the office and wonder at the destruction here. Nearly every book has been pulled off the shelves that run floor-to-ceiling along the far wall. His filing cabinets are open, with papers strewn from corner to corner across his floor and desk.

  I see the corner of a laptop peeking from beneath the papers on his desk and flip it open, hesitating a moment when a password prompt appears in the middle of the screen.

  I type “Gavin.” No good.

  I type “Tattoo Thief.” I type “Jasper” and “Feast” and “Beast.”

  And then it hits me—I type “Lulu.”

  I’m in.

  The computer’s desktop screen is littered with icons and I don’t even know where to begin or what I’m looking for. But I know that this is wrong. So I close the lid.

  I can’t do this to him. He trusts me. As much as I’m dying to understand what happened with Lulu, what I really need to know is what makes him tick, what he likes and doesn’t like, so I can fix his place. Whatever information I get to satisfy my own curiosity needs to be secondary to this.

  By the time I’ve re-shelved and sorted all of the books, I’m sweating, confident I’ve done more squats than a Pilates instructor. Gavin’s tastes are eclectic, from unauthorized biographies of some famously troubled artists to business books, travel guides and fiction.

  Much of the bookshelf holds saddle-stitched Moleskine notebooks covered in soft brown paper. I crack these briefly and see pages of ideas, song lyrics, set lists and musical notes.

  The notebooks are dated and I shelve them in order. I open a recent book and immediately recognize a title: “Peace of Madness.”

  I know this song, but reading the lyrics brings it into sharper focus.

  Crashing, clawing world

  Breakneck broken girl

  I find you undone, drowned in a bottle

  Tonight

  Can I give you peace?

  Not a chemical release

  It’s madness, sadness, spinning out with you

  Tonight

  I can’t keep you

  Can’t tame you

  Can’t fix you

  Can’t blame you

  Suffering

  I can’t help you

  Can’t rescue

  Can’t bring you

  Back to me

  Reality

  It hits me so hard, so come down

  I’ll catch you, wherever you’re falling from

  I’ll give you peace

  But it’s not enough

  It never was

  You want your next fix

  A peace of madness.

  The breath leaves my chest in a whoosh as I finally understand this song. This is his anthem to Lulu, his desperate cry to save her from the addiction that pulled her under.

  And people bob their heads when it comes on the radio like it’s just another song.

  I finally understand what he meant when he said he felt responsible for her death. The song’s lyrics make me ache, feeling the rift between what she needed and what he could give her.

  Could Gavin have rescued Lulu? I don’t know. Maybe Lulu set herself on a collision course as she got deeper into drugs, and Gavin only sped her toward the inevitable end?

  I’ve cursed Gavin a million times in the last two days, but now I curse Lulu. Damn her for breaking him, for falling into that pit of darkness and pulling him in with her.

  It’s no wonder he ran. If I were stuck staring at these walls, wallowing in guilt, I might go crazy too.

  I close the notebook and shelve it, feeling like I’ve pushed into Gavin’s life too far. As I pick up his office papers, I train my eyes on Jasper so I won’t see what the reams I gather say.

  I don’t want to know any more about Lulu. This is already too much.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  I can see the office floor again. Neat stacks of paper cover the table behind Gavin’s desk, waiting to be sorted and filed. I close his office door and leave, still feeling a yucky unease.

  The flowers on the kitchen island from Anthony also seem out of place, but I shake my head, clearing that mixed-up feeling. They’re fine. I’m just living my new life in New York.

  Since Gavin’s absent from chat, I open my laptop and start an email, attaching pictures of the living room furniture I’m thinking about buying for him. It’s insanely expensive, but I’ve got his credit card and instructions to spend whatever it takes to transform the space.

  Gavin,

  Please don’t go dark. I don’t want to make you feel worse than you already do. I’m working on your apartment like you asked. Do you like the pictures? I want to help, to make this place new. I want you to come home. I believe you can get through this, find forgiveness for Lulu, even forgive yourself. I believe in you.

  B.

  I Google furniture stores and plan my trip, a sheaf of magazine photos and a running list of what to buy and where tucked in my file folder. In addition to two couches and a leather club chair, I’ve chosen a Stickley quarter-sawn oak coffee table with wide map drawers, matching end tables, and a softly speckled nubby rug.

  I want to get some large-scale houseplants to make the place feel more natural than most New York interiors. Or maybe that’s just the Oregonian in me missing her trees.

  Just as I’m about to close the lid, Gavin pops up in chat.

  Gavin: Beryl. Are you there?

  Me: I’m here. Gavin, I’m so sorry. You trusted me when you told me about Lulu and I just threw it back in your face.

  Gavin: Stop it. You’re right. It hurts to hear it, but I’m way ahead of you in the Shame, Blame and Guilt department. Short of pulling out my own fingernails, I couldn’t torture myself more over it.

  Me: I get why you ran.

  Gavin: I had to get away. Everything—Jasper, my penthouse, places we’d go, even my band—everything was a conviction. I can’t handle any more of that right now.

  Me: I won’t say I understand it all. But I’ll stand by you, OK? You can tell me. But you can’t just log off when you get mad. No more of this disappearing offline shit. I can’t take it.

  Gavin: Miss me? Of course you did. I’m irresistible.

  Me: Aaaaand we’re back. Don’t be a brat.

  Gavin: Who, me? I’m being charming. Like this: How are you Beryl? What are you up to today?

  Me: I’m good. Just about to go shop for your new living room stuff, if you like what I sent over.

  Gavin: I like. But where’s the hot pink???

  Me: That’s for your bedroom.

  Gavin: 8-) I like the sound of that. The bedroom, not the pink.

  Me: Guys and their one-track minds. So you like the living room ideas?

  Gavin: I like you

  What? Before I can even respond, the rest of his message pops.

  Gavin: r style. It reminds me of a mountain lodge.

  I breathe a sigh of relief and disappointment.

  Me: OK, then, I’m going to get stuff today.

  Gavin: I can’t come home to the way things were. I can’t come home and be assaulted by her memory every moment.

  Me: Why don’t you just hire a decorator? I mean, I love taking care of Jasper and I’m starting to get the rest of your place sorted out, but shouldn’t someone else be in charge of picking things out? An interior designer?

  Gavin: No. I trust you.

  Me: Why?

  Gavin: You just feel right. It seems like you get me. But not like you’re trying to get something from me. Pretty much everyone in my life has a hand out wanting something.

  Me: Well, you’re giving me a place to live for a while. I appreciate that.

  Gavin: I’m glad you’re there. I’m glad we’re … friends?

  Me: Jasper says we can be friends. Even though you owe him big time for ditching him at Barks in the Park.

  Gavin: I’ll make it up to him, I promise. And to you.

  Me: A massage at
a spa is a good start.

  Gavin: Noted.

  Me: I was kidding! Gavin, it’s fine. You’re paying me to fix your place. I can handle it.

  Gavin: I’m not paying you to chat with me. But I’m glad you’re here.

  Me: That’s what friends are for.

  Gavin: This is weird. Why is it so much easier to talk to someone I don’t even know? I get emails from my band mates and it kills me. I don’t respond.

  Me: Face-to-face relationships are hard. It’s easy to disappoint.

  Gavin: I’m afraid I’ll disappoint you.

  Me: Rigggght. A hot rock star? Some disappointment.

  Gavin: Is that all you think of me?

  Me: Sorry. That’s now how I meant it. It’s just, you’ve accomplished a lot. But now you’re running away from it all.

  Gavin: I told you, it’s complicated. Stop pushing me!

  Me: I’m sorry. See? I’m already disappointing you.

  Gavin: You just don’t know what it’s like.

  Me: Dude. Don’t play the Pity card. That’s beneath you.

  Gavin: Play a card? This is real life, Beryl. You don’t understand the kind of pressure I’m under. How much I needed Lulu to help me and how things got so fucked up when she died.

  Me: Maybe you need a friend to give it to you straight, even if you don’t want to hear it. Cut the crap, Gavin. Own what happened. Everything you did or didn’t do. Don’t explain it away like, “you don’t understand,” or, “I was under so much pressure.” Own that shit!

  Gavin: I’ve heard enough.

  He goes dark again and my stomach plummets. I smack my laptop shut, angry with him for abandoning our chat and angry with myself for dishing out exactly what he said he couldn’t take—more conviction.

  All the reversals leave me drained and aching, feeling the whiplash as he lets me in and then shuts me out. My responsible side craves stability and Gavin offers none of that. With every conversation, the sand shifts beneath me and I’m not sure what he wants from me. Or if he wants me at all.