Chapter 2: Tattoos and Temptation
The neon buzz was the only sound for a long moment after Marla left. Gunnar finished the cold coffee, the bitterness a grounding anchor in the quiet. He studied his hands again—the nicks, the faded green ink of a battalion number, the permanent stain of pigment ground into the creases. Tools. They were just tools. For building now, not breaking.
Thursday arrived under a blanket of thick, grey clouds. The shop smelled of fresh bleach and the sweet, gluey scent of stencil paper. Gunnar was lining up ink caps when the bell jingled, and Jenny Maeve blew in like a perfumed storm.
“Hope you’ve been thinkin’, artiste,” she announced, shutting the door firmly behind her. She was dressed not in her diner uniform, but in tight, dark jeans and a red top that clung to every curve. Her hair was down, a cascade of blonde that caught the neon’s glow. She carried a small paper bag.
“I have,” Gunnar said, wiping his hands on a black rag. “You bring a design, or you trustin’ me?”
“A little of both.” She set the bag on the counter and hoisted herself onto the high stool beside it with a practiced ease. “I want an anklet. A chain of flowers. But not… out in the open.” Her eyes held his, a challenge and an invitation. “Somewhere only you and I will know about, sugar.”
He didn’t blink. “Hidden means sensitive skin. It’ll hurt more.”
A slow smile spread across her red lips. “I can take it.”
He nodded, took the sketch she pulled from the bag. It was good—delicate lilies of the valley, interconnected with a fine, vine-like chain. “Inner thigh? Above the knee?”
“Higher,” she said, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. “A lot higher.”
He met her gaze. The air between them crackled, dense with fifteen years of unspoken want and small-town history. “Alright. You know the drill. Wash up. The room’s back there.”
She slid off the stool, her heels clicking on the floor as she walked towards the back, the sway of her hips a language all its own.
When she emerged from the bathroom, she had removed her jeans. She wore only her red top and a pair of simple black panties. She walked to the tattoo chair with a defiant confidence that couldn’t completely hide the flush on her chest. She settled into the reclined position, one leg bent, the other extended slightly off the side of the chair, exposing the soft, creamy skin of her inner thigh all the way up to the junction of her hip.
Gunnar focused on his work. He shaved the area, the rasp of the razor unnaturally loud. He applied the stencil, his fingers firm and impersonal against her warm skin. She flinched only once, a tiny jump at the first cold touch of the transfer gel.
“Ready?” he asked, pulling on fresh gloves, loading a round liner needle with black ink.
“Do your worst, Gunny.”
The machine buzzed to life, a high, angry whine. He positioned her leg, his own body leaning close, his broad shoulder brushing her other thigh for stability. The first touch of the needle was a sharp, insect-like sting.
Jenny hissed through her teeth, her fingers digging into the leather of the chair.
He worked in silence for a few minutes, the buzz and pause, buzz and pause, a rhythm that filled the room. He was careful, precise, each tiny dot forming the first delicate stem.
“So,” she said, breath hitching slightly as the needle traced a curve. “Grady Hicks.”
“What about him?”
“He’s tellin’ folks you’re a thief. Says that’s how you funded this place. Stolen valor, stolen cash.” Her words were clipped between the bursts of pain.
Gunnar didn’t look up. “He’s a dumb fuck.”
“He is. But he’s a dumb fuck with three brothers who are just as dumb and twice as mean.” The needle moved higher, tracing a petal near the crease of her leg. Her breath caught, held, then released in a long, shaky sigh. “He’s also sweet on Marla Krawczyk. Or was. Till she divorced his cousin. Thinks she’s too good for the likes of them now. Sees her lookin’ at you… it pisses him off.”
“Not my problem,” Gunnar muttered, wiping away a smear of blood and ink.
“It is if he makes it yours.” She shifted slightly, opening her leg a fraction more. The scent of her perfume mixed with the sterile smell of the alcohol. “Marla came to see you.”
“She did.”
“What’d she want?”
“A tattoo.”
Jenny snorted. “Bullshit. That woman’s got ‘midlife crisis’ written all over her. She wants a story. Something wild to tell herself in the mirror.” The needle buzzed again, closer to the delicate skin where her thigh met her body. Jenny’s teasing tone evaporated into a sharp gasp. Her hand flew down and gripped his wrist, not to stop him, but to hold on. “Jesus, right there… fuck.”
He paused. “Too much?”
“No. Don’t you dare stop.” Her grip tightened, her nails pressing into his arm. Her eyes were glassy, fixed on the ceiling. The pain and the intimacy were blurring, the sharp sting melding into a raw, thrilling ache. He continued, the needle tracing the final, highest lily, its blossom perilously close to the hem of her panties.
Her whispers became ragged, losing all pretense of gossip. “God… your hands are so fucking big… I used to watch you mow your dad’s lawn… all skinny arms and…”
She trailed off as he wiped the area again, his thumb brushing a spot high on her inner thigh. A full-body shiver wracked her. Her panties were damp, he could see it now, a dark patch of arousal soaking through the thin black fabric.
The buzz of the machine stopped. The sudden silence was deafening, throbbing with her quick, shallow breaths.
“Outline’s done,” he said, his voice a gravelly rumble. “Color’s next session.”
She didn’t move. Her chest rose and fell rapidly. Her grip was still vise-like on his wrist. Slowly, she turned her head to look at him. Her eyes were dark, hungry, stripped of all pretense. “You think I give a single, solitary fuck about the color right now, Gunnar?”
She let go of his wrist and instead grabbed the back of his neck, pulling his face down to hers. The kiss was violent, a collision of teeth and tongue and fifteen years of pent-up, frustrated want. She tasted like lipstick and coffee and something fiercely, uniquely Jenny.
He responded with a growl, his gloved hand coming up to cradle her jaw, his other arm bracing against the chair beside her head. The kiss deepened, turned filthy and wet. She moaned into his mouth, her free hand scrabbling at the waist of his jeans, fumbling with the button.
He broke the kiss, breathing hard. “Jenny…”
“Shut up,” she panted, popping the button open. “This is what the coffee was for. This is what the information is for. This.” Her hand slid inside, wrapping around the thick, hardening length of him. She squeezed, a rough, knowing stroke. “Fuck. I knew it. I fucking knew.”
He grabbed her wrist, stilled her. “The door’s not locked.”
“So lock it.” Her voice was a command.
He stood in one fluid motion, strode to the front door, flipped the lock. The ‘OPEN’ sign went dark from the inside. When he turned, she was already shimmying out of her panties, kicking them across the floor. She lay back in the chair, legs spread, the fresh, black lines of the tattoo gleaming against her flushed skin. Her gaze was defiant, triumphant.
“You gonna stare or you gonna fuck me, soldier?”
He was on her in three long strides. He didn’t bother removing his jeans, just pushed them down enough to free himself, his cock springing out, fully erect and ruddy with need. He positioned himself between her thighs, the broad head of his cock nudging against her soaked opening. He could feel the heat radiating from her.
“No pretending,” she breathed, her eyes locked on his. “No sweet talk. Just give it to me.”
He thrust forward, burying himself inside her in one smooth, relentless motion.
She cried out, a sharp, guttural sound that echoed off the tiled walls. She was tight, impossibly so, and slick with wanting him. He paused, feeling her inner muscles flutter and clamp around him, a searing, velvet fist.
“Oh god… yes…” she whimpered, her head thrashing back against the headrest. “Just like that… fuck, Gunnar…”
He began to move, setting a brutal, pounding rhythm. The tattoo chair rocked with the force of it, the hydraulic base groaning in protest. Each thrust was a punctuation mark to their history—a denial from the senior prom, a whispered rumor he’d heard about her, the thousand times she’d poured him coffee with a look he’d been too young or too dumb to understand.
Her legs hooked around his waist, her heels digging into the small of his back, pulling him deeper. Her cries became a ragged, sobbing chant. “Yes… right there… don’t stop… you fucking beast… ruin me…”
He fucked her with the single-minded focus of a man completing a mission. One hand gripped her hip, surely leaving bruises, while the other tangled in her hair, holding her still so he could devour her mouth again. The taste of her, the feel of her clenching around him, the sharp scent of sex and ink and her perfume—it was a sensory overload. The world narrowed to the slick, wet sound of their joining, the slap of skin, her desperate pleas.
“I’m gonna…” she choked out, her body arching, tightening like a bowstring.
He felt her climax unravel, a series of violent, milking spasms that ripped a roar from his own throat. He drove into her one last, deep time, emptying himself with a shudder that seemed to come from his bones. He collapsed forward, catching his weight on his arms, his forehead resting against her shoulder, both of them slick with sweat and struggling for air.
For a long minute, there was only the sound of their ragged breathing and the faint, persistent hum of the fridge.
Slowly, the world leaked back in. The hard line of the chair under his knees. The chill of the air on his exposed back. The raw, throbbing sensation on his inner thigh where her nails had broken the skin.
Jenny’s hand came up, stroking his sweat-damp hair with a surprising tenderness. “Well,” she breathed, her voice hoarse. “That was a hell of a down payment.”
A weak laugh escaped him, puffing against her neck.
The sharp, unmistakable click of the front door lock turning made them both freeze.
Someone was trying to get in.
Gunnar was moving before the handle finished jiggling, pulling himself out of her with a wet sound, yanking his jeans up. He moved with a lethal, silent grace towards the front, putting his bulk between the door and the still-exposed Jenny.
Through the frosted glass, he saw a slender, feminine silhouette. Then he heard a soft, tentative knock.
“Gunnar? It’s Marla. I… I brought you a book. On art history.”
Jenny, from behind him, let out a low, dirty chuckle. She was already pulling her panties back on, moving with a languid, satisfied ease. “Better let her in, sugar,” she whispered, her voice rich with amusement. “Your next appointment’s here.”
Gunnar stared at the door, at the shadow waiting patiently on the other side, then back at the woman slowly dressing in his tattoo chair. The neon glow from the street painted everything in garish, pulsating light. He took a deep breath, ran a hand over his beard, and walked to unlock the door.