Total pages in book: 28
Estimated words: 25932 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 130(@200wpm)___ 104(@250wpm)___ 86(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 25932 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 130(@200wpm)___ 104(@250wpm)___ 86(@300wpm)
Since breakfast was long over, I didn’t expect to find Kiara still in the kitchen but decided to check there first. As I’d suspected, they were no longer there, but none of the current occupants had any idea where they’d gone. They weren’t in the lounge or the activity room, or the kids play area. Figuring she might have lain down for a nap—she hadn’t had a lot of sleep the night before—I took the stairs two at a time to the room we were staying in. When she wasn’t there either, my mood plummeted. Where the fuck was she? I knew Erin and Bridget wouldn’t let her wander alone even though she was wearing my vest, so they had to be together. But no one seemed to know where that was. Until I checked the garage and found Rylee, Nova’s old lady and a talented mechanic, rolling out from underneath a car.
“Have you seen Bridget or Erin?” I asked impatiently.
Rylee grinned as she wiped her hands on a cloth. “Are you asking about those two or the knockout blonde with them?”
I mentally snapped at her for not just answering my damn question and trying my patience, but if Nova lurked anywhere near, he’d break my jaw if I did it out loud.
“Any of the three,” I grunted.
She laughed and pointed at a door that led from the garage bays to the back office of Silver Ink. “Nova mentioned that your lady is quite the talented artist. Apparently, Patriot has taken an interest in her.”
I hadn’t been aware that Kiara was an artist, and I felt a wave of fury that someone else was appreciating her talents before me. I was even angrier with myself for not knowing every single thing there was to know about my woman. This wasn’t rational, considering the time we’d been together, but nothing about Kiara and me was rational.
I was also aware that Rylee was purposely egging me on, but fuck me if I could keep from letting it get under my skin.
Nova ran Silver Ink, and he and Patriot were the best tattoo artists in the business. If they thought Kiara was talented, that was huge, but I’d have to learn to be happy for her about that another time. Right at that moment, I was too busy trying to fight the urge to kill one or both of my brothers. Each one was as gone over their old ladies as I was over Kiara, but that logic wasn’t having much luck penetrating my jealousy.
“Thanks,” I grunted as I stomped over to the door. It slammed against the wall when I yanked it open and marched through the back and out onto the main floor, where several stalls had the equipment needed to ink someone’s skin. The last stall was bigger and held a large design table and walls with corkboards for ideas and partial or finished sketches.
Kiara sat at the table, bent over a pad with her hand moving a pencil quickly over the page. Bridget and Erin sat across from her, looking like proud mama hens. Patriot was seated around the corner of the table, close enough to be able to watch carefully but far enough away to be respectful of her space and her old man. I had to admit, albeit begrudgingly, that I had no reason to pick a fight with him.
Irritated, I walked up behind Kiara, interrupting her flow when my shadow fell over her sketch pad. She glanced up with a frown, but when she saw me, her entire face lit up, and her irritation dissolved into a beautiful smile.
“Hi!” she chirped as she swiveled her stool around and rose just enough to kiss my cheek.
“That is not how you greet your man, baby,” I muttered right before I took her mouth in a deep kiss that left her breathless and in a daze of passion.
Smirking, I turned her around and tucked her into my side before leaning forward to examine her drawing. “Wow.”
My exclamation seemed to shake off the fog, and excitement infused her expression. “Do you like it?”
“It’s beautiful, baby. I had no idea you were an artist.”
“Well”—she shrugged—“we haven’t known each other long. I’m sure we’ll learn everything there is to know about each other soon enough.”
“We can check what you sound like when you come, what your sweet pussy tastes like, and how fucking gorgeous you look spread beneath me with my cock buried inside you off the list,” I whispered in her ear, making her blush hard.
“She helped me with a design I’ve been stuck on for weeks,” Patriot informed me, clearly impressed. “When I asked her about the design for another client coming in next week, she drew this.”
The drawing depicted an intricate gemstone tattoo that looked sort of like a shoulder epaulet. It started with a large jewel on the top of the shoulder, then layers of beaded strings swagged over the shoulder and down the arm, all dripping with jewels. About halfway down was another large stone in a setting that made it look like an antique brooch, then a few more swags of beads and jewels until the design ended at the elbow. Even in a black-and-white sketch, the jewels looked as if they were sparkling on the skin. I could only imagine what it would look like in color.