Heart Ink: A Fling To Ring Romance: A Bad Boy Tattoo Artist Romantic Comedy Read online

  Heart Ink

  By L. L. Ash

  Copyright © 2019 by L. L. Ash

  All rights reserved.

  Disclaimer

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Chapter One

  Fae

  “You have to do it, Fae,” Josie, my best friend, told me with a straight face. “Seriously, I’ve heard that nothing is better for your confidence than sexy underwear and a clit ring.”

  “Where do you come up with this stuff, Jo?” I whined, feeling already that I was losing this argument.

  “Do it. You owe it to yourself. Don’t let one stupid asshole make you feel anything other than beautiful and deserving of everything,” Cambria, my other best friend chipped in.

  I looked around the car in the darkness of the empty parking lot and met eyes with both my friends.

  “It sounds like it’ll hurt so much,” was my last and weakest argument.

  “So?” Josie huffed. “So did losing your virginity, and it was one of the best things you ever did!”

  Flawed logic, but still, it had its merits…

  I looked down at my glowing phone, still open to the last text Justin had sent me.

  Justin: Stop being such a baby and grow up.

  “Ugh!” I finally threw my hands up. “Fine! I’ll go get a...”

  I gulped. Lord...I couldn’t even say it.

  “Woo!” Cambria and Josie shouted before bending their heads over Cambria’s phone.

  “Ok, we found a place. It has the best star ratings in the area and everyone says it’s super clean and the people are really professional. Let’s do this!”

  “Does a girl work there?” I asked them.

  “Yeah, some girl named Rose or Rosie or something,” Cambria nodded.

  Josie put the car in drive and pulled out of the parking lot we’d been sitting in as they tried to convince-AKA-bully

  me into doing this.

  “You’re going to thank us,” Josie pulled to the left, turning. “Seriously. It’s so fucking hot. Have you seen a dude with one? I saw one once but never got my hands on it...”

  “You saw a dude with a clit piercing?” Cambria teased.

  “Shut up, Cam! You know what I mean!”

  We all giggled as we drove the twenty minutes to Inkubus tattoo and piercing parlor.

  Oh God…

  Pulling in, the lights were still on inside, even at the late hour.

  “On here it says they take walk-ins and they’re open ‘til midnight. We have an hour!”

  “Forty minutes,” Cambria clipped as we all poured out of the car and into the shop.

  At the front counter was the sexiest living being I’d ever seen.

  His eyes flicked up to us as the bell above the door tinkled when we entered.

  “Hey ladies,” his silk and gravel voice met us as Cambria leaned over the counter and spoke in a low voice to him.

  “She wants a piercing,” Cambria poked her thumb over her shoulder at me.

  His eyes lifted from Cambria and followed her appendage until his sky blues were looking at me.

  “Okaaaaaay,” he drawled. “What kind of piercing?”

  Josie sidled up now, leaning in as far as she could before whispering, “A clitoris one.”

  “There’s a couple of different clit ones,” he leaned in, whispering back.

  Josie popped her bottom lip out in a pout.

  “Well shit...” she sighed, turning to Cambria.

  “What kinds can she get?” Cambria asked now.

  “Well, where do you want it?”

  His beautiful face moved back over to my direction.

  I couldn’t help but stare at the short beard he had going on, the same dirty blond color as his hair, wrapped up in a man bun at the top of his head. The sides were clipped to about an inch long, but a few of the longer strands had fallen out of his top knot and were draped over his forehead.

  “Uh...the one that heals fastest,” I almost whispered too.

  “The one that feels the best,” Josie butted in again.

  “So… vertical hood piercings heal fast, and I’ve been told those feel the best,” he shrugged.

  “Ok, so get that one,” Josie nodded, as if making up my mind for me.

  “Agreed,” Cambria added her approval.

  He looked at me again.

  “Fine. Let’s do that one,” I nodded, shoving my hands in my pockets.

  I just wanted to be over and done with this.

  “Ok. It’s a hundred-forty for the piercing. Ring included,” he told me, moving around the counter.

  “That’s fine,” I nodded, then looked around the shop again. “Is there a girl...like...a female who can do it?”

  He raised an eyebrow.

  “I’m the only one in tonight. Plus Rosie’s only in on Wednesdays and Fridays. So you’ll have to wait 'til tomorrow if you want her to do it.”

  “No!” Josie yelped. “Now! You have to do it now! Before you change your mind!”

  Her wild eyes moved from me to him and back again.

  “What’s your name?” Cambria asked instead, in what I liked to call her ‘thinking’ voice.

  “Shit, sorry about that. I’m Roman.”

  He put out his hand and shook first Cambria’s hand, then Josie’s, then he reached for mine but I was too far away. I put up my hand instead, waving like an idiot.

  “Fae,” I told him when it was my turn.

  “Fae… That’s an interesting name,” Roman said, dropping his hand before crossing his arms over his broad chest.

  Muscles in his arms popped out, dark ink covering him from his middle knuckle past where his flannel shirt was rolled to his elbow. Black shapes peeked over the collar of his white undershirt, hinting at what was likely a whole lot of tattoos below.

  “Yeah,” I agreed, still not sure, after all these years, what to say when people hear my name and give me a weird look.

  “I like it. Pretty original.” He shrugged.

  Smiling, I remained silent.

  “Ok, well, we’ll wait here for you,” Cambria told me, plopping herself into one of the overstuffed velvet armchairs in the lobby.

  Josie sat too, leaving me standing with sexy Roman.

  “You want to do it now or do you want to wait to see Rosie?” he asked as we faced off.

  “Um...I don’t know if I...”

  I couldn’t get the words out around this beautiful man. Where were my girlfriends when I needed them?!

  “I’ve done a ton of them.” He shrugged again, nonchalance oozing out of him.

  Well, I wasn’t sure if that made me feel better or not, but looking back at Josie and Cambria, they were absorbed in their phones.

  The clock above the front counter was inching toward eleven fifty.

  I had to decide.

  Thinking about what Justin had done, I steeled myself and nodded.

  “Let’s do it,” I agreed.

  He loosened his arms and waved for me to follow him.

  Walking past four stations with black, padded chairs, he moved toward a back room with a door.

  “Go ahead and take your pants and underwear off. I’ll be back in a sec.”

  He left, and I just stood there, catatonic for a full minute.

  Slipping first one shoe off, then another, I slowly managed the button on my skinny jeans. It was just like going to s
ee my Gyno… just like that.

  Pulling off my jeans, I put them on a little table beside the chair and stood there in my underwear.

  How was I supposed to get half naked for a stranger?

  Two sharp knocks later he entered the room, not even asking if I was ready.

  “I know it’s awkward, but I can’t do it through the panties,” he told me, putting a few items on another table beside a rolling stool. “If you want to do this, you gotta take them off.”

  “Is there something else I can wear? Or a sheet or something?”

  He grinned.

  “It’s just you and me in here. A sheet would only get in the way, not cover anything up. I mean, if you really want it, I’m sure I can find something...”

  I closed my eyes and sighed before bending and pulling my practical pink cotton panties off.

  He was fussing with some stuff on the table, probably feeling just as awkward as me while I undressed.

  Stacking my panties on top of my pants, I quickly sat in the chair that had plastic wrap coating the seat and back before covering myself with my hands.

  “So, before we start, this is your choice, right?” he asked, looking me in the eyes.

  Wow, his eyes were so blue...almost unreal.

  “Yeah, it is.”

  “Ok, well if it weren’t, you know we could always pretend you did it. Not like your girlfriends would find out. Unless one is your girlfriend.”

  He lifted one brown in question.

  “Oh!” I chuckled nervously. “They think it’ll make me more confident...Plus, I just wanted to do something special… There’s this guy that...”

  “Ah!” He nodded. “Say no more. You wouldn’t believe the number of chicks that are walking in here, doing this for their boyfriends.”

  “He’s not my boyfriend,” I said firmly. “We just broke up, actually. I’m doing this for me.”

  “Good for you.” He nodded, meeting my eyes again with a perfect little smile.

  He sat in the stool and scooted closer, moving his table with him.

  “So, you can have a ring, a circular bar or a straight bar. Your choice. For your first one though, you’re getting surgical stainless. No option there.”

  I looked down at the three he held in his gloved hands. The others were so big...I chose the straight bar.

  “Ok, gotta let me in,” he chuckled, setting the other rings on the table again.

  Right. Back to the awkwardness.

  Moving my hands, he patted the arms of the chair.

  “Just hook your knees around these.”

  Doing as he said, I sat there, spread eagle for a stranger.

  Oddly enough, he didn’t ogle or make me uncomfortable. Instead, he kept up a steady dialogue as he picked up something from his table and moved closer.

  “So, I’ve gotta test to see if you can do the vertical one. If this fits between the hood and the clit, you’re golden. Some people just don’t have the right anatomy for it,” he rumbled, his head getting closer as his fingers touched me.

  I jumped at the first contact, then sat frozen as he quickly did the test, something involving a Q-tip.

  “Sweet, you’re good,” he nodded, retreating immediately and turning back to his table.

  He got some kind of tweezers or clamp or something and...oh God...the needle.

  “So this will hurt, probably pretty bad, but it’s just for the poke, then it’s gone,” he told me.

  I nodded, watching his hands this time as he and his head dipped back toward my crotch.

  He swiped something across me down there, the sharp smell of antiseptics hitting my nose as he moved the wipe around.

  Tossing it in the trash, he clipped the clamp on me, a hole right in the middle of the metal where I assumed the needle would go through.

  “So...this will feel like a bit of pressure...”

  “Can we not talk about the needle?” I asked him, making him pause.

  He looked back up at me, those strands of wild hair still over his forehead in this boyish way.

  “Ok, so what would you rather talk about?” he asked me, still paused and looking me in the eye.

  “Well...do you have any piercings?” I asked him.

  He nodded, going back to my privates.

  “Quite a few, actually,” he nodded. “You can see two of them on my head.”

  True. Two small black gauges stood out against his fair skin, one in each ear.

  “Any I can’t see?”

  He nodded.

  “Got my nipples pierced when I was nineteen,” he rambled.

  I felt that pressure he’d warned me about and looked down to see that clamp on my lady bits.

  It’s a damn good thing I just got a wax a couple days before...

  “And how was that?” I squeaked as I saw him with that needle in his hands.

  “It was fine. Hurt like a bitch, but I like ‘em.”

  “Who’s it better for?” I asked, then shrieked.

  “Ok, breathe. The worst is over,” he told me.

  “You could have friggin’ warned me!” I said breathlessly, feeling the throbbing ease to a tolerable level.

  “That’s what doctors do. I’m not a doctor.” He grinned, fussing with something down there.

  Seconds later the needle was out of my skin, the clamp removed and he was backing away again, back to his little table.

  I started closing my legs but he put a finger out.

  “Wait, wait. Let me get the solution on first,” he told me, moving back at me with a squirt bottle and some paper towels.

  He pressed the towels to me and squirted the bottle on the piercing.

  “Saline,” he said eventually, just to fill the quiet.

  “You didn’t answer,” I told him as he gently patted my bits with the paper towels.

  “Answer what?” he asked, looking up at me again, moving back and turning to the table. “You can get dressed.”

  I quickly grabbed my underwear and slid it on.

  “I asked who nipple piercings are better for.”

  “The answer to that is simple. Yes. It’s good for anyone who has nipples.”

  I looked up at him, my hand hovering over my jeans folded on the table beside me.

  He was grinning, looking down at his own table.

  “Do you have any of these?” I asked finally, so incredibly curious of those piercings he said he had in abundance, but wasn’t visible.

  “Any of what?” he asked, tossing a few things in the trash can and folding up the towel everything had been placed on.

  “Any...down there?” I smiled.

  Josie would be proud of my ridiculously obnoxious and inappropriate question.

  His head raised slowly, eyes meeting mine.

  His mouth didn’t move, but the look on his face was something between ‘that’s none of your business’ and ‘that’s a stupid question. Of course I do’.

  How a simple look could say so much, I wasn’t sure, but I knew there was something down there.

  “C’mon, you just saw like...everything,” I told him with a blush and a laugh.

  He rolled his eyes and stood.

  “I’ve got a lot of piercings,” he said eventually as he opened the door and headed out again.

  He was out the door, so I took the opportunity to stand and put on my pants.

  Gingerly, I managed them before sitting down again, feeling that achy throbbing in my crotch.

  “So, let’s go over care,” he told me as he came back into the room, sitting back on his stool again, big hands without gloves on this time. “Don’t do anything special when it comes to washing. No abrasive soap. Just do a saline solution spray or a salt bath. Healing takes about four to eight weeks, depending on the person. No pools or hot tubs ‘til you hit that two month mark. Be gentle when you wipe down there, and for fucks sake, don’t use those netty wash things that chicks use in the shower. It’ll get caught and you’ll be right back here or at your doctor’s office trying
to get the net off.”

  He rolled his eyes as if thinking of a particular case where that’d happened.

  “No sex for at least four weeks. Eight is better, but yeah, I know it’s a long time. If you have to have sex, then use a condom. The body fluids can cause an infection and those aren’t pretty. Speaking of, if it gets overly sensitive or painful, if it swells or anything unusual, go to a doctor. Be gentle with it, keep it clean and don’t get it snagged, and you’ll be fine. The stainless steel I used is hypoallergenic so you’re golden. Any questions?”

  So many questions.

  Why was he so beautiful? What would his hands feel like down there giving me pleasure instead of pain? What did his other piercings look like?

  “Uh, nope!” I chirped nervously, “All good!”

  He nodded and stood, motioning me out of the room again.

  Getting onto my wobbly feet, I followed him to the lobby.

  “Hey! We heard you yelp,” Cambria looked at me with compassion. “You ok?”

  “Other than it being embarrassing as hell, I’m fine,” I told her, grabbing my purse from her hands.

  She smiled her gentle, lovable smile, knowing I couldn’t stay mad at her for making me go to a tattoo parlor and get a piercing by a super hot dude.

  Dammit…

  “You handled it like a champ,” Roman told me, that charming smile coming out full force, peeking one little dimple at me.

  Oh dear Lord...not a dimple too…

  It was official. The sexiest man I’d ever met had just had his hands on my clit and did nothing but put a ring in it. He’d seen me spread eagle on that chair and kept professional. All the while I was having sexy images of him and what kind of rings he had in his bits.

  Pulling out my credit card, I pressed it into his hand.

  “Credit ok?” he asked as he ran it through his machine.

  I nodded, suddenly feeling nervous again now that my clothes were on.

  How weird was that, right?

  “If you ever get the itch to get another piercing or a tat, come back,” he told me, then looked over at my friends narrowing his eyes. “And if you ladies ever get the courage to do what Fae did, I’ll hook you up.”

  Josie’s eyes went wide as if he’d just propositioned her, but Cambria flicked her wrist.