Ink Lust by Jayne Kingston Page A

and one red—she and Jo had decided to get both in honor of their mother and their bond as sisters. Their mother had raised them on her own without help from their father, his family or hers from the time they were infants, and the three of them had always been extremely close and fiercely protective of each other as a result.
    The orange lily was for their mother. The field behind the house she’d raised her girls in was full of them. Her father—Leni and Jo’s grandfather—used to cut them out of the ditch in front of her childhood home and burn them every year, calling them weeds. It broke their mother’s heart, so when she had a place of her own, she filled her yard with them and let them run wild.
    When she had her girls, she planted huge numbers of pink and red lilies to the field—pink for Leni, her quiet, happy girl and red for Jo, her little spitfire.
    “It takes forever to get back on your books if I cancel.”
    Not that he didn’t already know that. Jamie was one of the best tattoo artists in the area, and in high demand. His books were filled months in advance year round.
    “She insisted I come without her,” she added. She put her purse on the small chair in the corner of the room and tucked her hands into the back pockets of her jeans.
    “I’d have cleared my schedule for you,” he told her, his gaze steady on hers.
    She pressed a hand to her stomach as it dipped dangerously at the look in his eyes.
    “Any day, anytime.” His eyes never left hers, even as he stepped on a pedal under the chair. A motor hummed to life and the back and leg rests started to lie flat, making it look more like a flat table than a dentist’s chair. “Any way, anyhow,” he added, so serious he left no question about whether he was messing with her or not.
    The heat rising in her stomach burst and spread in a molten wave through her.
    “Good to know,” she breathed, crossing her arms to hide that her nipples had come quite fully to attention. “Are you ready for me?”
    His answering smile was positively wicked.
    “Ready, Freddy,” he said, gesturing to the small rolling table at his right.
    He’d already set everything up before she’d arrived. All of his supplies stood ready like neatly organized soldiers. Colored inks in little bottles that made her think of grade school art class stood in a line at the back of the sterile covered table. The spray bottle of skin cleanser and the tattoo gun were both already wrapped with plastic to protect both her and the machine. The stencil he’d apply to her side and use as a guide had already been prepped and was taped to the edge of the table.
    All she had to do now was take off her shirt.
    “All right.” He held his hands palm up and made come-on motions with his fingers. “Let’s see ’em.”
    Her eyebrows went up and her mouth went dry.
    “Kidding.” He smirked, rotating on the stool to face the opposite wall.
    “Does that ever work for you?” she asked, turning her back to him even though she was sure he wasn’t looking.
    Cripes, she didn’t know why she was being so modest. How many times had she thought about showing him her tits, and the newish nipple rings she now wore with pride? Between the heavy gauge earrings he had in both ears and the rumored Prince Albert, she knew he’d like them, maybe admire and—please, please, please, oh please— want to touch them. Not like Aaron the Asshole Hypocrite, who was both pierced and fairly heavily tattooed, but hadn’t “allowed” Leni to do either for herself.
    The nipple piercings had been a gift from Jo to celebrate her finally leaving Aaron three months earlier. She wanted to show them to someone, damn it.
    No, she thought as she pulled her shirt off, she wanted to show them to Jamie.
    “Now that you mention it, it rarely works on the women I want it to,” he answered.
    She gave him a look over her shoulder but he missed it. His back was still to her.
    “I’m sure you don’t have the slightest