“Hello, are you there?” This time, it was probably the sweet woman who had to pull her phone away to see if there was somebody still on the line.
Lux was many things, but a runner or a chickenshit wasn’t one of them. “This is Lux. What’s up?”
“Your bedside manner truly needs work, girl.”
Lux lifted her right hand, giving Ember her fellow tattoo artist the bird as he spoke up from behind her. His tattoo gun stopped the constant buzzing at some point to listen to her. Damn nosey fucker.
“I’ve offered, but you keep turning me down,” Ember said.
She flipped her long hair over her shoulder, glaring at him with her finger still in the air while still holding the phone with one hand. “First of all, me flipping you the bird is not me propositioning you for sex. Second, you have never offered to have sex with me, and if you did, I most certainly would’ve turned you down on the basis that A. you’re like my brother from another mother, and B. you are a walking, talking, manwhore.”
Ember staggered backward, grabbing his chest as he gasped for breath. “You—you have wounded me. All the times I’ve offered you my body, and you’re saying you never noticed?”
Lux turned back to face the front of the shop, ignoring Ember who happened to be one of her best friends. “You didn’t deny the manwhore.”
“I cannot tell a lie.” Ember’s laugh was wicked and filled with promises she had no plan to take him up on. She also knew he had no real interest in her in that way either.
A loud grunt had her turning to see the object of her lustful thoughts had returned, his dark gaze was trained on Ember with an intensity she couldn’t decipher.
“Hey, man, I forgot to schedule my final session.” T-Rex didn’t so much as walk but stalked back toward Ember’s station.
“Lux, are you there?”
“Shit. Yeah, sorry.” She pulled her thoughts away from the two men and back to the caller.
“I was wanting to see if I could come in for a—tattoo,” she stuttered.
She didn’t have time to sit around with some high society chick who wanted to get a flower or butterfly tramp stamp or whatever was in at the moment. “Listen, hun, I’m not sure what your reasoning is or why you want to get inked, but you should probably sleep on it before you decide to do something that’s permanent.”
The bell over the door rang, making Lux look up. She had to squint since the setting sun was shining in through the windows, temporarily blocking her view.
“I’ve slept on it for a long time, hun.” Her caller disconnected the call, but Lux heard the echo come from the woman in front of her.
“Dayumm,” Ember whispered.
Lux set the phone back on the charging base but didn’t get off the stool. If this woman was wanting a consultation, then she’d give her one. Hell, she didn’t have another client until tomorrow morning, which she’d just finished drawing the design for only moments before the phone rang.
“Well, I’m at a disadvantage since I didn’t get your name. I’m Lux, and you’re?” Lux lifted one brow and waited.
The blonde with her Chanel bag and designer everything looked around their shop before coming to stand in front of Lux, letting out a sigh. “You don’t recognize me?”
At twenty-seven, she’d seen a lot of people and been a lot of places, including foreign countries thanks to her father being in the military. So, no, she didn’t recognize the woman. Hell, this was California. Blondes were basically a dime a dozen. She didn’t say that though. Instead she lifted one shoulder. “Um, I’m really bad with names.”
Ember snorted from behind. He knew her better than most and was aware that wasn’t true. Fucker. Smart man he was, he kept his trap shut.
“Nora Clark from high school. We graduated together. We were both Valedictorians for our class.”
“What the fuck, Lux? I didn’t know you were smart?”
Again, she lifted her middle finger, panic making her heart race. Nora’s face swam in front of her, memories threatening to topple her out of the chair. Fuck that, she wasn’t doing that, not here, never again. She’d squashed those demons from her past. Hell, she’d run, but whatever.
“Damn, my bad, Nora. You’ve not changed a bit.” Well, aside from the obvious boob job, probably had Botox scheduled like clockwork every six months, and her teeth appeared to be sporting pearly white veneers. Lux was pretty sure Nora didn’t have such a perfect smile when they’d been in school. Every high society woman in LA was getting veneers nowadays. She had other things she’d do with fifty grand, but she wasn’t judging. Nope, not her.
“You’ve gotten really good at lying, Lux. I didn’t even see you blink, twitch, or do any tell-tale signs that would indicate you weren’t saying the truth. And trust me, I know a liar.” Nora let out a deep gust of air while looking down at her feet.
“It’s been a long time since I saw you last. So, you want a tattoo, huh?” She wasn’t going to touch the lying bit. In her opinion, if a person wanted to alter their appearance in any way, that was their business. Her own body had been altered, albeit with ink instead of surgically. Yet if she decided she wanted to enhance her girls, she’d totally do it. For now, she was solidly in the C-cup family. Her girls were high and firm, which she thanked the lord for that one saving grace. Well, she and the man upstairs weren’t actually on speaking terms, but again, whatever.
Nora licked her lips, but she nodded, pulling out a folded piece of paper from her expensive leather bag. Lux eyed her shaking hand, admiring the fact the other woman didn’t drop it, given the fact she was literally shaking like a leaf on a tree in a damn tornado. Lux gave a little mercy, reaching across the short counter space to take it from her. Nora’s hands smoothed down her legs, probably wiping away sweat.
Lux was expecting some cliché tattoo image from the other woman. In her experience, she got a lot of women and some men or rather boys, who came in wanting shit tattooed on their bodies, but Nora shocked her again. The image that had been drawn was of a human heart, not a pretty one you see on valentine’s day cards, but the organ inside a human body. The rough drawing was done in pencil with the heart showing a jagged split down the middle. Lux liked how Nora tried to show the edges being sewn back together. It was obvious that Nora wasn’t an artist, but she’d put a lot of thought, and as cliché as it was, she’d put her heart into the design, keeping it black and white until she added the ribbon, or stitching where she’d obviously grabbed a crayon in a deep red. At the very bottom of the image where the coloring began, it looked as though the stitches made a large X with each weave, sewing the broken heart back together. She fingered the top of the paper where the ribbon went off on either side, imagining what she could put on it if Nora allowed her. “This is...this is really good, Nora. Can I play with it a little?”
While Nora had done a good job of sketching the art down, Lux wanted to make it a little more crisp and clean. That way when she transferred it to Nora’s skin, it would look even better. Something she could be proud of.
“You don’t think it’s too morbid?” Nora asked. She looked down toward the paper on the counter.