Uncaged (An MMA Stepbrother Romance) (2 page)

He’s talking about his dick.
Again
.

What can I say? I’m not even a little bit surprised.

“What is it?” I ask, tattoo machine in my hand. I’m going over the shadowing of a fluffy white rabbit tattoo on my client’s arm, but already he’s screwing up my concentration.

“I want a Prince Albert.”

I lift the compact needle off her skin, watch as her reddened flesh depresses slowly. I don’t bother looking up at him. I know the expression he’s got on his face without needing to see it. A cocky smirk, as though he thinks he’s so funny, so clever.

He’s already got me completely annoyed.

A Prince Albert?
Is he serious? He can’t just come to my place of work and mess with me like this. But it’s not the first time he’s done it, and I’m certain it won’t be the last.

I push my lips together. My temper frays. “Please don’t disturb me while I’m working.”

But he doesn’t move. He just stands by the leather-bound reclined chair my client is sat in. He shouldn’t even be in the back room where we administer the tattoos. But things like regulations, closed doorways, heck, even mere manners don’t stop him.

At the bottom of my vision I can see his lower legs up to his knees. He’s wearing jeans, but I see straight through the dark denim.

Tribal-inspired lines coil around his shins and calves. On his left knee he’s got a ram’s head with huge, gnarled horns, and on his right knee he’s got an owl with ram’s horns. The two look scary, unreal in a monster-in-the-dark kind of way. The first time I saw them, I was extremely impressed by the artistry. The eyes on each beast look straight into you, no matter which angle you look at them from.

Of course, I should know about all his tattoos. I’m his new favorite tattoo artist, apparently.

“Sorry,” I mouth to the girl in the chair, scrunching up my face with an apologetic look. This is unprofessional, and she, the client, shouldn’t have to deal with Pierce’s uncontrollable and childish impulses.

She says
no problem
with her eyes, and then offers me a quick but confused smile. I’m not sure if she knows what a Prince Albert is.

“Can you do it?” Pierce asks me. In his baritone voice I can hear just a hint of playfulness. He’s definitely trying to rile me up, trying to get under my skin. And if there’s one thing he’s good at, it’s being a splinter.

With deliberate slowness I pull my eyes up his body. I don’t see his clothing or his skin, but instead see his tattoos. I know them all because I’ve worked on them all.

I filled in the trawling tentacles of the jellyfish on his leg, redid the outline of the coiled serpent-slash-dragon on his chest and stomach. I darkened some of the fading ink on the snarling, salivating white wolf he has on his right shoulder. I added a line to the tally he keeps on his wrist – his fighting wins – and I did the fifth numeral on his fifth knuckle. I have no idea what the numerals mean.

“No,” I say, finally meeting his eyes with as stony a stare as I can muster. He doesn’t blink, doesn’t shift his focus, doesn’t grow uncomfortable in the slightest. He looks right at me with a sparkle of amusement. I hate that he always seems at ease, confident, unburdened by awkwardness, embarrassment, or shame. I hate that he still messes with me.

Truth be told, we’ve been through too much together. I thought he had grown up.

“I can’t, and I won’t. Please leave,” I tell him curtly. The last thing I want to do is make a scene in front of this client. His eyes seem to flash, grow hot not with anger but with... competitiveness. It’s the only way to describe it. He thinks everything is a competition. He thinks every situation has winners and losers, and God forbid he ever lose.

Pierce’s eyes are this shade of light grey that always surprise me. Looking into his eyes is like looking into a shaken-up snow globe. They almost seem to glow. Sometimes, his eyes remind me of a wolf’s in the night. They have a shine to them, something intense.

“You sure?” he asks. His thumb slides beneath the waist of his jeans, and he adjusts it, showing a flash of trimmed pubic buzz.

I roll my eyes. “One-hundred percent.”

“You
don’t
want to…
pierce
my dick?” He’s in full-on smug mode now, and he has an eyebrow raised as though he just made the witticism of the century.

“I’m not trained,” I tell him in a matter-of-fact manner. I do my best to sound bored. “I’m sure you can appreciate the…
dangers
involved if I were to attempt to give you a Prince Albert.”

His lips curl to the side, a little off-center within his granite jaw. “Amen to
that!
Don’t want to damage my junk, do you?” He pauses for a moment. “Go get training, then.”

I wear my annoyance freely on my face. “Go get
training?
”

“Yeah.”

“Just go away, Pierce. I don’t want to see your dick.”

His full, endlessly kissable lips pull farther to the side in what I can only describe as the most smug and conceited smirk ever. He’s so full of himself. Why have I gotten myself into this mess? He’s a walking whirlwind of trouble… it seems to seek him out.

“You know,” he says, voice dripping with sarcasm. “That’s not what you said last ni—”

“No!” I bark, glancing quickly toward my client. I pinch the bridge of my nose, and lower my voice, steady it. My client is stewing in the awkwardness. “We don’t do piercings here.”

“You could do
this
Pierce.”

He grins, I glare.

“I only trust you to do it,” he says. “Besides, you and I both know you wouldn’t mind getting your fingers wrapped ’round my junk again.”

I groan and look away. Why does he insist on calling it his
junk?
It’s disgusting.

“No, okay? I can refer you to someone who is qualified, though.”

“I don’t want anybody else touching my cock, Penny. Just you. You know it’s all yours.”

The girl on the chair clears her throat. “Maybe I’d better go into the waiting room.”

I nod at her. “Sorry, Maya. This will only take a minute.”

“Take your time, honey,” she says, and she gets up. She looks Pierce up and down. He licks his lips and flashes his eyes at her, and I’m certain I see her knees wobble.

I feel it in my chest: The white-hot burn of unwanted jealousy.