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“Tell you what, baby?”
“Don’t you baby me,” I grumped even though it was about fucking time he rolled out one of those endearments. “Why are you at BadAss Tattoos? Is Max there? Is he giving you a new tattoo?”
“So much for surprising you.”
Oh. “It was a surprise?” I ask, feeling a little guilty for being a brat.
“Mm.” He agreed.
Through the line, the whirring of the tattoo gun hummed. “Are you getting it right now?”
“Yep. Say hi to Max.”
“Hey, Max,” I said a little louder than before.
Max grunted over the whirring.
“Does it hurt?” I asked, more focused on his pain than the unpleasant sound of the gun.
“Nah.”
I hesitated. “Can I come watch?”
“If you want to.”
“Really?”
He scoffed softly. “Have I ever said no to you?”
“No slick, no dick,” I parroted, trying to sound like him.
He laughed. “That doesn’t count.”
“Hold still,” Max ordered.
“Sorry, bro,” he replied. Then to me, “Besides that.”
I really loved him. Like really. A lot.
Since the cops had come and hauled McClaren out in handcuffs—okay, technically, he went in the ambulance first to get stitches, and then the cops hauled him off in handcuffs—Arsen stayed firmly planted at my side.
I was mostly lost in my own head for a few days after everything before I could even start processing it all, but he never once complained or acted like I was a disappointment. He gave me everything I needed plus some, proving his words that I was, in fact, enough.
“I’m coming,” I said, anticipation accompanied by the underscore of nerves. The last time I went to the shop, the sound had been unbearable.
“Bring your AirPods.” Arsen reminded me. Like I’d forget. They were practically a part of my anatomy.
“I will.”
I ended up grabbing a ride with Wes. When I told him I was going to see Arsen at Max’s tattoo shop he wanted to come too. Technically, it wasn’t Max’s shop, but we all thought of it that way.
When we walked in, Arsen looked up and smiled over Max who was bent over his chest. I already had the Pods in, music blocking the sound, but I barreled in without hesitation to go to Arsen’s side.
“You’re getting your chest tattooed?” I asked, trying to peer around Max’s frame to see whatever he was doing on the right side of Arsen’s chest.
“Among other places,” he said, gesturing to his left shoulder.
The second I saw the design, I gasped and leaned in to touch it.
