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“I was actually wanting to chat with you about something if that was okay.”
Kia eyed him warily. “Sure. Do I need to sit down for this?”
“What? God, no, it’s nothing bad. I just wanted to talk to you about maybe getting some ink done.”
“Really? Sure, I’d be happy to talk to you about that.” She walked over to the fridge. “You want a drink?” she asked with her hand on the fridge door.
“Beer would be great.”
She pulled two bottles out of the fridge, cracked them both, and handed him one. “Shall we?” She tilted her head toward the living room.
As he followed her to the other room, he tried to keep his gaze from dipping to her ass but failed miserably. He was far too attracted to her for his own good. The smart play would be to go home as soon as Max was in bed each night, but he found himself finding reasons to stay each time.
Kia sat down on the end of the couch and curled her legs up beneath her. “So, you’re thinking of getting some work done?”
He shifted his weight on the other end of the sofa. “Yeah. Being around you so much and hearing you talk about your work has got me thinking a lot about getting another tattoo. A couple of my teammates and I got to talking about how it would be cool to do some kind of tattoo to celebrate.” Unsure what the right word was, he wrinkled his nose. “More like commemorate winning the World Series this past season. Is that something you’d be into doing?”
Kia’s eyes brightened. The interest on her face was clear as she turned fully toward him. “Yeah, absolutely. Did you have something in mind?”
“Not really. I’m hoping that’s where you’d come in.” He glanced at the intricate design on her right arm. “The four of us are pretty tight and we thought it would be cool to all get something together. We might not always play together in the future, but we’ll always have this and it’s not something many people can say they have.”
She nodded thoughtfully. “Were you thinking baseball theme or—” She picked up the sketch pad that always sat on the little table beside the couch. Flipping open to a new page, she tapped her pencil against her lip. “—were you thinking more along the lines of something with a hawk?”
“Honestly? I have no clue.” He chuckled. “Lame I know. You’d think we’d have some idea of what we want.”
“Not lame at all. Getting something like this is a big deal. You want to make sure it’s meaningful and appeals to all of you.”
“Yeah, exactly.”
Her hand started flying across the page. He couldn’t take his eyes off her as she worked. He’d never seen her like this. Watching her draw reminded him of how he felt when he stepped out on the diamond. The sense of calm he got knowing he was doing something he loved mixed with the excitement of what was to come. He didn’t realize her art gave her that same kind of feeling.
Several minutes later, she looked up and handed the sketch pad over. “This is super rough, just throwing a couple of ideas around.” Chewing her bottom lip, she eyed him. “Obviously, the hawk would look a whole hell of a lot better.”
He stared in awe at the page. “How the hell did you draw something that looks like this from the top of your head?”
Her cheeks turned pink, and she seemed to be looking anywhere but at him.
He stared back down at the drawing of a hawk with a baseball bat in his talons. “I knew you were talented, obviously, since I’ve seen the artwork around the house, but I didn’t have any clue you had all this in there. Damn.”
“Thanks.” She smiled shyly. “Is that sort of what you were thinking?”
“Kind of yeah, but…” He looked around the room as he tried to see if something would help him explain his thoughts.
Kia stood up and returned a minute later with several books. Some looked like photo albums, and some were sketch pads. She set them down on the coffee table. “There’s no rush to come up with a design. We’ve got lots of time and you want to make sure you’ve got the right thing.” She pushed the books his way. “This is some of my work. Maybe something in there will give you some ideas that we can work with.”
Watching her, he took a sip of his beer. “You don’t mind doing this with me? I don’t want to take up a ton of your time.”
“I’m more than happy to spend as much time as you need to get this right for you.” She smiled. Their eyes locked. The air between them shifted. His eyes drifted to her lips. When her tongue darted out to lick them, he hit back a groan. He wanted to kiss her. Clearing his throat, he tore his gaze off her mouth. Trying to get his wayward thoughts under control, he took a sip of beer. He set the bottle back down on the table and picked up one of the binders. “Alright, let’s see what you’ve got.”
This had been the week from hell. Kia glanced up at the clock on the wall. The shop had barely been open for an hour and already she wanted to call it a day. She set her sketch pad down on the counter and crossed her arms over her chest and stared at the customer sitting in the consult chair in front of her. “Yeah, no, I’m not doing that.”
“You have to. The customer’s always right.”
She let her gaze scroll over the heavily inked idiot. He had some stupid ass tattoos already but come on. This one took the cake. “Not this time he’s not. Seriously, dude. No one wants to see your dick as a pickle.”
The guy’s face scrunched up as he gawked back at her like she was the baffling one. “It’s funny.”
They definitely had different definitions of funny. “I guess it’s funny if you want to be celibate for the rest of your life.”
