Scandalous Heroes Box Set (82 page)

Just like that, Julian was no longer so fucking charming. A sinister layer lay under his cool, calm exterior. He had a trigger, and she had inadvertently pulled it. He was not kind and sweet, at all! Matter of fact, it became rather apparent that he was the wrong motherfucker to try and toy with. As her mother used to warn, ‘Don’t poke the bears!’ But Milan didn’t know Julian had fangs and worse of all, she liked that he bit…and he bit, hard. Oh how she loathed that this was happening.

You know nothing about this man, and you were falling deeper into your crush for him as he talked. He is probably a looney, a psycho… Aren’t all these tattoo guys? Talking to me about astrology, taking me to that strange shop of his, talking about losing one’s virginity is like a damn tattoo and smiling while discussing horrible deaths. He’s crazy…

She rolled her eyes, dismissing him.

“You’re tense again.” He kept working. “When something irritates you, your muscles tell me before you do.”

“If I was annoyed, then it was your fault but for the record, I’m not irritated.”

“You are. You are the type of woman who thinks logically, and wants others to agree with you.”

“Now to that, I say bullshit, at least to the latter part.” She smirked.

“Let me guess, you work in a high stress job. You were tense when you called me the first time, you were tense the first time I met you, you are tense now. You have to have everything go in a linear fashion. I tried to offer you things,
natural
things, to help you relax, and you wouldn’t even look at first. I know what you think of me, Milan, and it’s cool, really it is. I’m accustomed to it.”

“Well, since you believe you know everything, school me.” She chuckled. Now, he was doing it, too. She
was
irritated, but tried to cloak it under the guise of a laugh for she refused to let him see he was getting on her damn nerves.

“You think I’m some tree hugger, a hippy, maybe even insane. You probably think I get high, too.” He infused his tone with iciness. “You think I’m completely into astrology, using it as my personal God, and live my crazy life with no rules or regulations. You think I don’t take life seriously, right? All I do is sit around drawin’ all night and day dreamin’… Selling witchy brews. You think I don’t know about you, but I
do
. I spent the first years of my career honing my craft, talking to thousands of customers. I like talking to people. You hear all sorts of stories, you know?” He kept on working, his hands busy, his gaze averted. She couldn’t deny what the hell he was saying; he had her pegged and she was stone cold busted so she did what many would do — remain quiet, lest she incriminate herself.

“People open up to you like you’re a bartender when you do what I do. I’m not filling them with alcohol; I’m filling them with permanent ink, an intoxication far more powerful. Ink is binding. It fades, but never goes away, and a good artist will make sure it stays as beautiful as the first day it was done. So, people come back to me, and then they tell me more and more about their lives. Now, you’ve told me little of nothing, but we’ve only known each other for a short while. That doesn’t matter though. You don’t get me, but I totally get
you
. I can tell that you are smart,
very
smart. You carry yourself a certain way, to try and send a message that you’re in control, though today’s attire varied greatly from before. Today, you were trying to get attention.”

“What?” She twisted her body and her face, too, now unable to ignore his rambling.

“Stop moving or you’ll get stuck again…”

It
almost
sounded like a threat.

“Milan, I’m not trying to upset you. You said you wanted to talk, so I’m talking.”

“Well, maybe from now on you just need to be quiet.” She rolled her eyes and turned away.

He shrugged his shoulders, his grin even wider now, but kept silent.

Oh no…you don’t get off that easy!
She’d changed her mind just that fast…

“What did you mean, trying to get attention?”

“Do you want me to talk to you or not? You just said for me—”

“Forget what I said,” she snapped. “Just tell me what you meant.”

“You are dressed provocatively, as if being dressed that way would give you more courage...maybe even to flirt with me.”

“You can’t be serious!” she guffawed, but made sure she didn’t flinch. “Please don’t flatter yourself. I hope you are just kidding; you have an odd sense of humor.” She softened a bit, realizing the man may have just been putting her on once again; at least she hoped so. The fact that he was right didn’t mean anything at all. She dismissed that thought, swept it under the rug in rapid speed.

“No, I’m
not
kidding this time around, and you know that I’m telling you the truth. That’s okay, though. I’m
not
ashamed to tell you that I’m attracted to
you
.” His eyes narrowed as the buzzing seemed to increase. He leaned over and studied some detail on her shoulder with great intensity. “I can tell you that, and be okay with it. Doesn’t mean we are going out after this, or anything. It just means I appreciate beauty when I see it and my pride is not harmed by making the admission.”

“Okay.” She huffed and glared at their reflection in the mirror. “You say you know me, that you get me, fine. I get you, too.”

He smiled and sank his teeth into his bottom lip, driving her mad.

“Tell me about myself…” he dared as he kept on working.

“I think you’ve had a hard luck life. I think you have all those damn tattoos to try and hide and protect yourself. You are witty, a bit quirky, and never fit in anywhere. You’re smart...too smart for your own good. It makes you think you are better than other people sometimes, too.” Her raised eyebrow was met with a smirk.

That’s right. I said it…

“I think you love women, and sex, and all that entails, but your intellectualism prevents you from becoming a full-fledged jerk. I think you believe in astrology because it matches how you interpret the world. Your head is in the clouds, but your foot stands firmly on reality. I get you just fine!”

She turned away and closed her eyes, pleased with herself, knowing deep within his ass had been read, toasted and thoroughly roasted.

She heard him chuckle lightly, then louder.

“Jeee-suuuus, Christ…yeah, that’s me. You
do
get me. Holy shit, I think you just made me fall in love with you!” He burst out laughing so hard, she had to look at him. A vein protruded in the middle of his forehead; she longed to touch it.

What in the hell?! I just handed him his own ass and he laughs, agrees and carries on like not a damn thing happened? Julian…Lord help you…

She kept quiet as she let his words marinate, a strange feeling of contentment sweeping over her. This conversation felt like a damn roller coaster and the more time passed, the more drawn to him she became. He was an enigma, but yes…she
really
did understand him…

“I’m an accountant.” She offered a peace pipe, fragrant and sweet like a succulent Georgia peach.

He nodded. “Yes, I can see that you’d be drawn to that sort of profession.”

“What, based on astrology?” she teased. “You don’t even know my birthday though.”

“I do.”

She searched her mind for when and where he could’ve found that out. He didn’t go up front to see the paperwork…

“I don’t know the exact time you were born, however, so I don’t have the full picture. Angela, my assistant and receptionist, always emails me in advance the birth date of each customer I work on,” he confessed, taking her out of her confusion-driven misery. “She knows I want it. It helps me find out things that can aid in their relaxation. When you made the appointment, she asked for your birthday, amongst other bits of information. That gave me twenty-four hours to prepare. That’s why you have the white tea, why I changed the music and also why there is a yellow rose behind your ear. It is
also
why I anticipated you becoming annoyed with me.

“I knew, the more I opened up and talked, what the potential of this conversation would be. We are very different people, but we have a natural curiosity about one another. On one hand, you are very serious — rigid almost. On the other hand, you want to know more about everything and everyone. You do believe that our existence is bigger than what we see. If you didn’t, you wouldn’t even be lying here getting your mother on your arm. You have questions…and for the record, just so you know…” He laughed. “I don’t get high, Milan.” He didn’t give her the chance to respond, to defend herself.

“I don’t smoke anything, though I’m not against those that smoke for healing. I do chew on the end of lit incense from time to time… I am into taking care of my body. I don’t eat meat; I’m a vegetarian. I exercise. I meditate. I box for fun, too. I like being physically active, especially since I’m required to sit so much for my job. It’s a way to get my negative energy out, to get balanced. I also enjoy reading.”

Milan buried her chin into the headrest and sighed.

“What do you like to read?” she asked. The man intrigued the fuck out of her. Resistance was futile.

“All sorts of things, especially non-fiction, like books on metaphysics, natural cures, sensuality, art, design, astrology, health. I’ll read almost anything though. I believe that we can learn from just about anything we see. It’s just a matter of having a good filter, and finding the gold even in something that appears to be worthless.”

Sensuality…

“Tell me a little more about yourself, Milan.” He moved his chair away, extended his arm. The needle became tight as he went into detail along his artistry.

“Well, I do work a stressful job, but it wasn’t
always
that way. It seems that when one thing goes wrong, everything follows.” She didn’t give a shit anymore. The man gave her a platform to purge. They’d already had their first argument like an old married couple; the ice had been broken. She lay half-naked, he was jabbing her, and they’d discussed everything from God to getting high. So she tossed her pride aside and cut loose. “I used to love my job, and then they promoted this bastard who can’t handle having a little power. He used to be just a co-worker, but now, he is the guy I have to report directly to. I can’t even bring myself to call him my manager and what really burns me up is, he is not qualified! Now, the guy above him, Garrett, is a really good person and I’ve been debating reporting his butt to him, but that could start all sorts of trouble.”

Milan shook her head and realized at that moment that Julian had been right. People
did
treat him like a bartender. Just like that she’d rolled out her woes, pushed the bastard face first down a hill, and lest she admit it, it felt good, almost healing.

“Go on,” he encouraged as he kept his hand steady, the needle moving about her stretched skin just so.

“Well, they are friends and though I know you may not agree with this, I’ve seen it too many times — white men will protect
other
white men, even if they like the person from the minority group that is complaining on an issue. No matter how much Garrett enjoys me as a person and thinks my work is good, he could take Martin’s side and then things could potentially get even worse for me.”

“You don’t have an argument from me there. I will say this however: it’s not only the white race that does that. Race is a made-up paradigm anyway, but there isn’t any need to get into all of that. Anyway, yeah, people with physical similarities tend to cling to one another. We evolve when we understand that we are not races at all in the first damn place. We are just people, with different cultures.”

This man truly surprised her.

“We tend to gravitate towards people we perceive as similar to us, and we will protect those people, based on that likeness. The key is to realize that just because someone
appears
similar to you, it doesn’t mean they have your best interest at heart.” And with that, he swiped at her flesh with another moistened cotton ball, and continued along his way.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, your manager and the big boss are both white men, right? They like each other, they have their sex, gender and racial identification in common. They may like similar teams regarding sports and have similar political and religious views. Find out what your boss likes, the manager, find something in common, and see if you can talk about that with him. People don’t naturally gravitate towards differences, oddities or strange situations unless they have that sort of personality. I am one of those peculiar people that
do
.” He grinned really wide now, showcasing that gorgeous, sexy grin of his.

“But I know, most people aren’t like me.” He shrugged. “So, what you have to do is get on this guy’s level, to see if he’d ease off you then. The more we have in common with someone, the more we see ourselves in them, and since we don’t want to hurt ourselves, we tend to make things easier for people we think are like us. He sees no commonalities between the two of you right now. Once he does, he may be swayed to change.”

This man actually makes sense!

“We do things for them, help them out. That’s what you want to try to do. It is hard for a woman to do this with a man though, because in a professional environment it can be misconstrued as flirting, so be careful. Now, if that doesn’t work, you’ll want to tell the head guy what the hell has been going on. You already have a good rapport with him.”

“Why not just go to him
now
?”

“Because you’ll be filing a complaint, a report. You first want to fix your current situation.” The buzzing seemed to get softer as he spoke, as if the entire place knew he was speaking important stuff. “You want to stop the troubled waters, if you will, the hemorrhaging.” He ran his forearm over his nose, then continued. “This accomplishes something really important. It shows that you tried to get along with your manager
before
you made a complaint. It would demonstrate that you attempted to work with him directly, to fix the issue before running to a higher-up.”