Sweet Burn (4 page)

He shrugged. “
I won
’
t know until you tell me, but where I grew up we don
’
t jump to conclusions about people and what they may or may not have done.”

“Where did you call home?”

He had a hint of an accent that came and went, smoky with a sometimes singsong lilt at the end of words.

“Louisiana. I grew up in the bayou. I
’
ve got cousins still there.”

A bayou bad boy. Lucky her. “What made you come out here?”

“I
’
d be happy to tell you my life story later,
boo
, but right now I
’
m waiting for you to do some explaining.”

Right. Because normal people didn
’
t have the Oakland D.A. on speed dial.

“I participated in a case a few years ago.” When she hesitated, he made a
go on
gesture. “As a witness.”

The bar fire the previous summer had netted her an insurance payout. The check hadn
’
t been live-in-the-lap-of-luxury-forever money, but the dollars were more than enough to bankroll more than a few years traveling in Asia. Instead of rebuilding here, she should have picked up and gone. She wasn
’
t the kind of person who stuck around, and the universe had clearly been handing her a sign. If she
’
d gone then, she wouldn
’
t be dealing with the D.A.
’
s mess now.

“What did you see?”

“I had a street shop. I did tattoos for walk-ins in a fairly gritty part of Oakland. It was probably more a question of what I
hadn
’
t
seen by then.”

Inner city Oakland wasn
’
t pretty. It was colorful and vibrantly alive, but it was also plagued by blight and violence. Multiple gangs vied for supremacy, fighting their wars block by block while generations of immigrants, artists and first-time home owners tried to get on with their own lives and stay out of the path of the bullets. She
’
d loved it.

“You were a tattoo artist?” He reached out, running a thumb down the side of her neck, and that simple touch sent a jolt of heat through her.
Bad body.
“Explains the art.”

“I did flash tattoos. Quick ink. Whatever people walked in and asked for.” She crossed her arms over her chest and looked up at him. She wanted her boots on. She itched from all this sitting still. She also needed a hard, fast ride on her Harley, taking the mountain
’
s curves a little too fast and tight.

“What happened to your shop?”

“It closed. Businesses do that.” That topic was off-limits. “I got a lot of people coming in and out. Some were getting their first ink, others had so many tats that we had to get creative to find bare skin for me to work on. I did everything from names—boyfriends, girlfriends, kids—to memorials.”

Sooner or later she did the cover up work as well, when the relationship fell apart, but the ink remained. The memorial tattoos stuck around, except that it had gotten harder and her when she started recognizing her walk-ins, adding a new name to the growing list of the dead etched into their skin. Oakland
’
s streets weren
’
t easy and too many people made mistakes or were in the wrong place at the wrong time.

“You were good.”

His certainty gave her a little pulse of pure pleasure. “Absolutely. I loved tattooing.”

“So why did you stop?”

For so many reasons, the Oakland District Attorney being merely the visible tip of the iceberg that had crippled her ship.

“I had a guy come in. I didn
’
t know him, hadn
’
t seen him before. He said he wanted to commemorate a shooting. He had a couple of cell phone pics of the victim.”

He watched her calmly. “That was normal?”

“Pretty much. I mean, I would have passed on seeing the dead guy, but my walk-in also had pics from the funeral home and…”

Yeah. The look on Mack
’
s face said it all.

“You inked him.”

“That was my job. I liked keeping the electricity on and the landlord happy, so I inked what the guy wanted. He had space on the back of his left shoulder. I put it there, gave him the flyer about post-tattoo care. He paid cash and left.”

Mack stared at her.

She shrugged. “I
’
d had stranger requests.”

“You can tell me about those later,” he muttered. “When did you realize that there was a problem?”

“The guy came back in, two months later and he wanted me to cover it up. Usually, the guys inking girls
’
names and faces, they come back fast. The girl moves on, they move on, but the tat
’
s still there and the next honey is asking questions, so I give them a new design and everyone
’
s happy. Memorial tattoos tend to be keepers. How can a dead person piss you off?”

That particular tattoo had made an impression on her. There had been something wrong about it, but she hadn
’
t been able to put her finger on what that
something
was and she
’
d definitely had the bills to pay. If the guy in her chair wanted a tattoo of a dead guy sprawled out on the floor of a convenience store, complete with name and date, she really wasn
’
t in any position to say no. Everyone remembered fallen friends differently. When Auntie Belle had passed and left her the bar, she
’
d inked a small black and yellow bumblebee on the inside of her wrist because the insect
’
s cheerful determination and nonstop chatter reminded her of her aunt. Maybe her client had moved on, maybe he
’
d regretted looking at the grisly reminder whenever he checked out his back. It wasn
’
t her business.

“You did the cover up?”

“Yeah.”

“So where does the Oakland D.A. come into all this?”

“I accidentally walked into the store.” She
’
d never gone into the place before, but she
’
d wanted a soda and chips and so she
’
d pushed open the door and been hit with the strongest sense of déj
à
vu. She hadn
’
t even had to ask. The store
’
s clerk had volunteered details about the shooting that had gone down two months before. The problem was, her walk-in had parked his ass in her chair
before
the cops had discovered the scene.

“I did some asking,” she said, “and a few things became real clear, real fast. My client had come to me with his pictures before the cops had let anyone into the store, so he had to have been on the scene himself. These weren
’
t snapped over the shoulder of the cop. He had close ups and distance shots, a picture of a gun and then he had a picture of the store clerk before everything went down. I had assumed he
’
d known the guy, had taken the
before
shot well before the shooting
.
When I found myself in the store, I had to start questioning some of my assumptions and if I
’
d made them because it was easier than admitting the truth.”

“So you went to the D.A.”

“I did.” She
’
d kicked herself the whole way there and back, too. She
’
d gone armed with her quick hand drawings for the guy
’
s tattoo and a video. What her walk-in hadn
’
t known was that she had video surveillance in her shop. Given her shop
’
s location, she
’
d had issues with break-ins and petty theft, so she
’
d kept a camera trained on the chair as well as the front. That camera meant she had dated before and after images. She
’
d made a phone call after finishing the cover up, because some things weren
’
t acceptable and her
don
’
t get involved
rule had to be suspended. Temporarily.

“They convicted the guy and took him off the street in a big gang sting.” She shrugged. “He
’
d pretty much inked the proof that he
’
d been at the crime scene on his shoulder.”

Mack cursed, a sentiment she shared, although probably for different reasons.

“He got a life sentence.” She hadn
’
t been in the courtroom on the day the judge had handed down the sentence. She
’
d already been on the road to Strong and the bar that she
’
d inherited.

Every time she imagined being forced to stay in one place for the rest of her life—and she wasn
’
t even the convicted guy, stuck in the eight feet by six feet of a jail cell—she got itchy feet. She
’
d never liked staying put. No. Scratch that. She
’
d always had a case of the wanders. She
’
d been the toddler who wandered off from the family picnic and who was happily exploring
terra incognita
when the frantic nanny found her, the teenager who took her car on joy rides that spanned a state and a half. When she
’
d had a working credit card, she
’
d gone to the airport once and bought a ticket on the next flight out to somewhere warm and tropical.

The
where
hadn
’
t mattered, as long as it was
not here
and
all aboard now
.

“He earned it.” Rough surety filled Mack
’
s voice. His world was a lot more black and white than hers. In fact, his world was
all
black and white. She was fairly certain he wouldn
’
t approve of many of the things she
’
d done. Where he saw two choices (right or wrong), she saw fifty shades of gray.

She reached for her bag and her keys. She needed to go for a ride now, needed the Harley
’
s power beneath her, eating up the road. The problem was, she
’
d painted herself into a corner, hadn
’
t she? She could take the bike out, but she was like a hamster on a wheel, spinning endlessly in place despite all the forward motion.

Mack
’
s big hand came down on hers, covering her fingers. That was a gentle stop sign right there if she
’
d ever seen one. Mack redefined inexorable.

“I
’
m going for a ride.” She made the words a statement of intent, because she didn
’
t ask
anyone
for permission. Not anymore.

“Got it.” He didn
’
t move his hand though. “You go to the D.A. by yourself?”

“
I
’
m going for a ride
is English for
let go of my hand
.”

He shook his head. “Anyone ever tell you you
’
re stubborn?”

Mack somehow always managed to make her smile. “I think you
’
ve said that one way or another every day I
’
ve known you.”

She tilted her head back to look up at him. He
’
d snuck up behind her while they were talking—maybe that kind of Ninja stealthiness was a skill the military taught—so her head banged into his chest, which was as hard and unyielding as the rest of him. Of course, she
’
d also enjoyed the hell out of certain
hard and unyielding
parts. So maybe
hard
went into the plus column after all.

“I
’
m a grown woman. It wasn
’
t difficult,” she said, answering his previous question.

He was silent and she wished she could get inside his head, figure out what he was thinking. Mack was stubborn as hell in his own way—he just dressed it up as being Mr. Strong, Dark and Silent.

“I didn
’
t need a police escort to do the right thing,” she added when the silence stretched on too long.
No
. She was filling up the silence, something she
’
d vowed she
’
d stop doing. She didn
’
t have to explain herself.

“That wasn
’
t what I meant.” His fingers curled around hers, lifting her hand from the counter, cupping it. His other hand scooped her keys up and dropped them into her palm. “Family can be a good thing,” he said quietly. “
Friends. You don
’
t always have to go in alone, Mimi.”