Page 72 of Bad for You

The little bell above the door jingled.

No one was behind the main desk and music played through the speakers around the room—not as loud as usual—but all I could hear were my mother’s hateful words.

Jesse walked out of the room where he created his beautiful tattoos and smiled when he saw me. “Perfect timing. Just cleaned up after my last client.” He swaggered toward me, like he always did. It was sexy and confident and made me want to kiss him. I always wanted to kiss him.

He pulled me into his arms and gave me what I wanted, what I needed. He kissed me like only Jesse could, like some medieval warrior back from war.

I clutched him to me, kissing him back almost desperately. He hauled me up into his arms and set me on the counter, filling the space between my spread thighs, and gave it back to me just as urgently.

He kissed me until I was dizzy, then he lifted his head and grinned. “Hey, beautiful.” Then his chin jerked back, eyes widening. “What happened? Why the fuck are you crying?” He growled like a feral animal. “Did that fucker Jarod hurt you? I’m going to kill him.” His gaze sliced to the door, like he was about to take off, like he was already committing murder in his head.

I cupped his jaw and made him look at me. “No, it wasn’t Jarod, not entirely.”

“Lila…”

“My mother,” I whispered, the pain choking me. “She was there when I left Cassy’s. Waiting for me. Jarod told her about you and me, that he saw us kissing. She called me a slut and a whore. Told me I’d disgraced the family, and I…I didn’t hold back. I told her about Jarod, all of it, what he tried to do. She blamed me, of course, and she cut me out of her life, like I’m a bit of rot. Like she did Kate.” I broke down then, tears running free.

Jesse held me tightly.

“I know it hurts, Lila, but you’re better off without her poison in your life. I know that better than you think.” He pulled back so I could see his face. “You still have me. You have your friends. You have Kate. And we’re not going anywhere, ever,” he said with so much feeling behind his words, he shook.

“Thank you.”

He wiped the tears from my eyes. “Don’t need to thank me. Having you in my life is the best thing that’s ever happened to me. If she can’t see how amazing you are, that’s her loss.”

“You really mean that?” I said, gripping him tighter, fighting more tears.

“Yeah, I fucking mean it.”

We stared at each other for several long moments, and I gave him a shaky smile. The look in his eyes was intense, so intense my heart raced and I was close to blurting out how much I loved him.

“I’ve always wanted a tattoo; did you know that?” I said to break the tension.

His mouth kicked up on one side. “Yeah? What would you get?”

“Kate and I have always talked about each getting a bird…well, a black-throated blue warbler in flight to be precise. We rescued one once, but it stayed for a long time after we released it, let us feed it. After it finally left, when things started getting tough at home, we started a secret group, just me and Kate…the Blue Warblers.”

Jesse chuckled.

I laughed as well. “Hey, we were little.”

“I think it’s cute,” he said, eyes warm and sexy.

“We used to pretend we were birds, that we could fly away, too.”

His gaze grew intense again.

“Anyway, we thought it would be a cool sister tattoo, something that has meaning to just us—togetherness, freedom. Is that silly?”

“Nope.” He tucked my hair behind my ear. “Let’s do it.”

“What?”

“Let’s ink you up, Bambi. We can do Kate’s next week if she’s still game.”

“You’re serious?”

“Why not? What’s stopping you?” he said, that sexy grin front and center, daring me to do it.