Surviving Ice (Burying Water, #4)(18)

Thankfully, I can walk the talk. I am that good.

“Who’d you hear that from?” I ask.

“A friend named Mike.”

I’ve traveled all over the world and inked hundreds of people. I’ve worked on at least five Mikes, Michaels, or Micks. Names mean little. “What’d I do for him?”

“A skull,” he answers without missing a beat.

Great. Just as useless. I’ve done at least a dozen skulls. So common.

His upper lip twitches ever so slightly. “Do you normally interrogate potential customers like this?”

“No,” I admit. I’m not exactly sure why I’m doing it now. Looking for reasons not to trust this guy, a valid excuse to turn him away, perhaps.

“Then do my reasons for being willing to pay more really matter?” Again, that arrogant little smirk.

In another time, that may have held sway. I’ve always had a weakness for strong but quiet masculinity. “No, they don’t. Because Black Rabbit is closed and I have a ton of cleaning up to do to get the place ready for selling.” I can’t help my voice from cracking with emotion now. I’ve managed to keep down so far. If I can just get through this, maybe it’ll fade without ever truly surfacing.

He nods toward the chair. “What are you doing with that?”

“Throwing it in the Dumpster, if I can ever get this bolt off.”

“Why?”

I’m tired of being questioned about this stupid chair. “Because someone was murdered in it.”

Most normal people would flinch at an answer like that, or press with more specific questions. Not this guy. He simply leans over to reach into the toolbox on the floor for another wrench.

“Don’t bother. I need a torch,” I mutter as he crouches down, the cuffs of his jeans hiking up to show more of his boots.

He ignores me, latching the end onto the bolt. The muscles in his arms and shoulders cord as he works on it, his body rocking back and forth several times until the bolt gives way and begins to rise from the ground, flecks of orange rust dusting the floor.

“That worked?” I exclaim in shock, relief filling my chest. Bobby was wrong. Or he just tricked me into agreeing to finish his ink for him. Either way, I’m going to call the beefy biker on it—who must have at least fifty pounds and three inches on this guy—when he shows up here tomorrow.

“Use a six-point wrench next time. Better grip,” the guy says, standing up smoothly. All of his movements seem fluid. “Do you want help bringing it outside?”

“No. I’ll do it myself.” He’s being too nice to me, and I don’t have the energy to be nice back.

A flash of surprise skitters across his face—a momentary lapse of his carefully guarded expression perhaps. “How?” His eyes drift over my limbs, toned but slender.

I know I’m small. I’ve always been small. When I was young, I was tiny. Thank God for that growth spurt at fourteen or I might have snapped one day and turned homicidal, after a lifetime of people telling me what I can’t do because of my size. My teachers, my friends, their parents. Even my own parents worried about me more than they did my brothers. They still do. It’s a double-edged sword with them, though. Not only am I small, I’m also a girl. Aka fragile.

Weak.

I’ve spent my entire life proving to them—and everyone—that I’m not a weak little girl. That’s probably why I’ve become so independent. If I don’t ask for help, then in my head I’m proving them all wrong. I can’t have people seeing me in that light, especially in this profession.

Granted, as I stand next to this tattoo chair that probably weighs as much as I do and I probably am physically too weak to drag down the hall, I know that I should accept his help. Too bad I’m also stubborn.

“It’s not your problem.” I level his unreadable gaze with one of my own, that I know without seeing a reflection isn’t pleasant. My friend Amber tells me often enough to wipe it off.

It doesn’t seem to faze him. He folds his thick arms over his chest. Waiting for me to ask for help, which I’m not going to do, because then I’d owe him and I hate owing people.

The guy isn’t wavering, and this showdown is becoming more and more uncomfortable as each second passes. Finally I break free of his gaze. “If you don’t mind, now. I’m going to be here all night as it is.”

He tears a sheet of paper towel from the roll and wipes the wrench before setting it back in the box. He wipes his hands next. Again, so graceful. Turning on his heels, he begins walking toward the door, offering a low “You’re welcome.”

“Wait . . .” I heave a sigh, rolling my eyes.

He stops, turns. Settles that stone-cold gaze like he’s expecting something.

Fuck, I already do owe him. I really hate owing people! And somehow I’ve gone from no customers to two in a matter of thirty minutes. Though, as I study his face—a nose that should be too long and narrow but on his angular face not so; a too-perfect dark trim beard, as if he shaped it with a straight razor or something—I decide there could be worse things than owing a man who looks like him. “Come by on Thursday and we’ll talk. Maybe I can do your ink then.”

“I’ll think about it.” He turns and strolls out the front door, leaving me staring at his back in wonder. What was that supposed to be? A hissy fit?