Wide Awake (18 page)

"I want it as permanent as can be."

"What do you want?"
"A dragonfly." I pulled my jacket off and laid it over the chair. I turned, lifted my shirt, and pointed to the back of my hip under my jeans. "Right here."

He licked his bottom lip and looked at the skin there for a long minute before gazing back at my eyes. "Are you sure? It'll hurt there."

"It'll hurt everywhere."

"Touché." He took his jacket off, too, and the button-up shirt that covered his black wife-beater. All of his tattoos were on display then and I couldn't help but move forward and let my fingers dance across them to explore. He shivered and chuckled. "Ticklish, remember?"

"Yeah," I said softly. "I remember." I ran my finger across a black cross on his left shoulder blade. "I really like this one."

"Thanks. It's my friend's…memorial."

"It's really beautiful." I examined his shop closer and looked at the chair with interest. "You still do a lot?"

"About one or two a weekend. Usually just friends, or friends of friends." He leaned his hip against the counter edge that held all the tools. He watched my every move and it made me feel more beautiful than I ever had before. Even with Andy saying the word, Mason's honest gaze was so much more potent. It went right to my gut.

"OK, what do we need to do?"

"If you're sure," he tested again and looked at me closely, "I'll draw something up and we'll get a print on your skin. Then I'll…get to it."

"OK, but I don't want to see what you draw."

"What?" He stopped.

"I want it to be a surprise."

"Emma," he protested. "Come on. You can't ask me to do that."

"Why not?" I asked softly. I went to him slowly, loving the way his throat worked through a gulp. I let my hand grip the front of his shirt. "I trust you."

He sighed. "What the hell did I do to deserve it?"

"You brought me back to life. You made me able to live again. I'd still be in that hospice bed if you hadn't pushed me and gave me the want to get better. You know it's true. Mr. Garner was always too busy. He would never have put the time in for me that you did. You took care of me."

"Anyone would have."

I shook my head. "And you never pressured me to be anyone but myself. You didn't even know me before, but you still wanted me to be me. Plus…it's not like I'm asking you to put a Mike Tyson on my face. No one will see it on my hip but me…and you."

His eyes closed for a second and a flash went across his face before it was gone. "OK. I'll draw something up."

"Are these yours?" I asked and flipped through a huge album of pictures of tattoos on all sorts of people, on all sorts of body parts.

"Yep. That's my résumé." He chuckled as he got some weird paper and tools out.

"Can I look at it?" I said, setting it on the counter and leaning on my elbows.

"Of course, baby."

I bit my lip at that and he locked eyes with me. He smirked at being caught saying such a thing and then turned around with a smile to start his drawing. The smile stayed permanently on my face as I looked through the artwork Mason had created. And it
was
art.

The way he put all those colors together that I wouldn't have known would even look good. The way he drew something in a way I would have never thought to do. Though I was so grateful that Mason was there when I opened my eyes in the hospital, his talents were definitely here. I wondered why he worked at the hospice at all when he could do this full time.

"How come there are only guys in this book?"

He looked back for a second. "I've never tattooed a girl before."

"Really?" I said with maybe too much satisfaction. He smiled in his profile as he worked.

After about a half hour, he said he was done. He left the drawing on the table and got some things ready. Then he beckoned me to the chair, which he laid all the way down flat. I was so nervous, in a good way. I absolutely couldn't wait to see what my skin was going to have when he was done.

"All right, uh…" He eyed me strangely, his eyes jumping from my jeans to my face. "The pants have got to go, at least down to your knees."

"It's fine." I kicked my shoes off and unbuttoned my jeans. The carpet was thick and cool under my socked feet. Mason's heavy eyes watched me the entire time. I slid the pants from one leg, then the other and laid them across the counter. And I was immensely thankful that my underwear were cute today. "Lay down here?"
He nodded. "On your stomach. I'm going to rub some cold antiseptic on you first."

I got situated and waited for him. When he came back, he rolled a small stool next to the chair and sat down. "I've got to pull these down on the side just a bit, OK?" His fingers hooked in my underwear, and I nodded. He tugged the side down and tucked a small cloth under the waistband to keep anything from getting on them.

I leaned my head on my arms, but looked back over my shoulder once more before letting him have complete control. He had gloves on and a small cloth that held the stinky, brown antiseptic in his hand. He held my eyes as he bent down and kissed my hip where he was about to put his artwork. I sucked in a breath. "Ready?" he whispered.

I nodded and turned to lay my chin on my arms again. I felt the bite of cold from the antiseptic, then him wiping it away, laying the paper over my skin and peeling it off. Then the whir of the needle began. One hand rested over my skin around the area and the other held the machine. "Here we go. Last chance to back out."

He waited, but when I didn't say anything, he began. The sting was considerable, but not unbearable. I could tell that he was being as gentle as possible. Don't ask me how. And every time he hit a particularly sensitive spot, and I hissed through my teeth, he hissed through his in sympathy.

I bit my lip so long and hard that it was practically numb by the time he was done an hour later. All my muscles ached from being tense for so long, but when he said he was done, I was more than happy to get up and move around. He helped me up and said, "I'll let you look at it in the mirror, but then we've got to tape it up, OK? It'll have to be bandaged for a while."

"OK," I said eagerly. I couldn't wait to see what he'd done. I knew I was going to love it. I was just curious as to the degree of love. Would I jump him right here and force him to hand over the mind-blowing kiss he'd promised? Or was I going to burst into tears because it was so beautiful?

There was a full-length mirror on the door and he stood me in front of it. I probably should have been embarrassed to be in my underwear, but I wasn't. This was
Mason
. He was in a box on the shelf all by himself. He was the one person I could be myself, utterly and completely, with.

"Let's take a look at it, shall we?" he taunted and smiled as he turned me around.

My eyes glued themselves to the beautiful white and ethereal green dragonfly. It looked like it was…glowing on my skin. Just like the ones on my ceiling did. I found myself crying on the spot. So between jumping him and bursting into tears, I was apparently going for option two.

"Oh, no. Emma…" He turned me to look at him and I fought him to turn back. I couldn’t stop looking at it, but he took that as anger. "Dang, I'm so sorry. I should have known not to do it when you've been upset."

"I love it," I said through my tears and laughed. "I love it so much."

"Really?"

"Yes, really," I promised and turned a bit more. "It's like you read my mind."

"See, this is why I don't tattoo girls. I've never had a dude break out in tears before." I punched his gut lightly, making him laugh. He sobered as he said, "But they didn't look as beautiful as you do right now either."

He was looking at the tattoo, but when our eyes met, I waited for the fire alarm to sound. But it didn't. Mason did, however, give me my answer. He was going to kiss me, and it was going to be
the
kiss. His hands went around my hips, careful of the tattoo, and he pulled me to him. I stared up at him. He so wasn't who I thought he was. He turned out to be so much more.

"I made my decision," I told him in a whisper.

"I can see that." His voice was huskier than I'd ever heard it.

"My family can accept me, or they can't."

He nodded and rubbed his nose against mine, holding the closeness. "I've made a decision, too."

"And?" I waited, my bare feet on my tiptoes and my pounding heart in my throat.

"I'm done waiting."

He pressed his lips to mine and I held so still. When I felt the pressure there, his lips pushing against mine, I felt my legs threaten to buckle. The softness of his lips felt like taking a first breath, like opening your eyes and seeing the sun for the first time. I realized then that I had experienced all of those things with Mason, so it was fitting that he continued to give me my firsts in this new life. Soon the pressure increased even more and I knew he was asking me to open for him. That was it for me. I did as he asked, and when his tongue eased past my teeth and came to dance with mine, it was already better than anything Andy had ever dreamt about, let alone done to me. And my next thought was, Andy who?

He was such a gentleman. I was sure a guy like him that hadn't dated in such a long time, who had a willing, half-naked girl in his arms, had plenty of things that we could do on the brain. But this kiss, though mind-blowing in every sense of the word, was still setting a pace that said,
One thing at a time.

His hand moved from my hip slightly, placing it snugly into the small of my back and pressing me to him. The other came up to hold my face like I was precious, like I was the only thing that mattered in this world for the time being. His lips pulled and drew little noises from my throat that surprised me. I pushed both arms around his back. He was hard all over, always hidden by the shirts he had to wear for work, but now, with barely anything but scraps between us, I felt it all.

His muscles moved under my palms and I found my fingers digging into his back to anchor me. The surprised groan that rattled through him and into my mouth had me sighing and sagging against him. He held me up to him easily and continued to ravage me. I loved how his tongue tasted. And I loved how that scratchy chin of his rasped against my cheek. It really
was
like I'd never been kissed before. He was so, so right about that. Nothing else before this mattered. And a hundred comas? I'd
never
forget this.

Then he changed pace, and instead of using his tongue, he sucked on my lips, one by one, like each was equally important. So I sucked back. While he firmly had my top lip, I gripped his bottom. He groaned louder at that, and I loved it so much that I didn’t want him to ever stop making that noise. So I pushed my tongue past his lips like he'd done to me and pressed myself as close as I could get to him.

The hand on my cheek moved to the back of my head, tunneling through my hair and tugging just a little to give him control. And just like that, I was back to being the one unable to control the noise coming from me, and hanging on for my life.

He pulled back slightly. His ragged breaths loud. "Are you OK?"

"Yes, why?" I said too quickly. "Why are you stopping?"

He laughed a little. "You're shaking like a leaf, Em."

It was then that I realized how cold I was. And my muscles were giving out, too. My legs were trembling with the effort to stay on my tiptoes after all that walking. I looked at them like the traitors they were.

"Here." He reached for his coat and threw it around my shoulders. "I'm sorry. I should have thought about you getting cold without…your clothes on." He set me on the couch gently, mindful of the tattoo, wrapped in his jacket that smelled like him, and then sat beside me, pulling my legs into his lap. He massaged my calves. I wanted to moan at that, too, but held myself in check. "The muscles take a while to get used to strain and use."

He dug his thumb into the inside leg muscle and I did moan, unable to keep it in. He smiled smugly and kept doing it. "Sorry about this, too. I could have made sure we were sitting first before…that."

"I wouldn't change a second of…that." I smiled at him when his own smug smile turned shy. So honest. You could always see what was right on his face as the truth. "Thank you."

"For what?" he asked softly.

"For keeping your word."

He leaned forward and let his fingers rake through my hair, his thumb tracing my earlobe. "You're more than welcome, Emma."

"And thanks for the tattoo, also." I smirked at his silent chuckle.

"You're more than welcome," he repeated. "Anytime. Though," his thumb rubbed across my ankle bone, "inking this pretty white skin makes me feel like a villain."

I giggled slightly. "Are you going to start tattooing girls all the time now? Did I start a trend?"

"No," he said softly. "You will always be my one and only girl." We stared at each other. "You want to come back over tomorrow? I'll check your ink and we can eat some dinner if you want. You can tell me everything that's been going on with you."

"Yeah. I'd like that."