She turned to his dad. “Ready?”
Once she'd started, Mac slowly realized that a hot, beautiful chick doing ink was mind-blowingly sexy. He got worried when Trixie walked in and shifted in his seat to hide his growing boner from her.
“Music?” Trixie asked with a glance towards Vi.
“16 Horsepower,” Vi answered.
When the music started, Mac stared at Vi. It was a well-known fact that Bear was a metalhead, and he'd just assumed Vi liked something... at least similar to that.
“Country?” he asked.
“Sort of... indie, country, folk, religious... thing,” she said, and he saw the blush on her cheeks. “I like it.”
“Vi has a thing for country,” Brick said with a laugh. “Breaks Bear's metal heart that she's not into 'proper' music.”
He focused on the music for a while. It wasn't bad, but definitely not something he'd normally listen to. She was right, though. It wasn't regular country, and he just had to ask.
“Do you like regular country music, too?”
“Some of it,” she said with a shrug. “Not the honky tonk-kind, but some other stuff.”
“She's big on Whitey Morgan,” Brick said, and winked at him.
That's when Vi turned bright red. Mac'd had no idea she liked country, and at the moment it saved him from that boner, since he was laughing.
“Sure you wanna tease her while she's inking you?” he asked his dad.
“Whitey Morgan is actually called 'outlaw country,'” Vi mumbled.
“It's still country, Vi,” his dad said. “But it's okay, we still love you, honey.”
Mac sat in silence and then started to laugh again. “You're probably the only country fan on the planet with purple hair.” She glared at him, and he smiled. “Hey, I'm just kidding. And this is okay. What were they called?”
“16 Horsepower.”
He listened to the music while flipping through a tattoo magazine trying not to look at Vi. When the next song started it caught his attention. It was good. Really good.
“What's this song called?”
“Prison Shoe Romp,” she answered. Then added with a shy smile, “It's my favorite on this album.”
Seventeen, he reminded himself again and took a deep breath before looking away. Also the daughter of his extra father. You did not hit on your almost dad's not-yet-legal daughter. You just didn't. To top it off, she'd had a crush on him for years and doing anything would be so fucking wrong. It wasn't going to happen. Ever!
-o0o-
I was thrilled! Wade 'Brick' Baxter, the president of Marauder Riders MC, loved my design, and I was leaning over him, doing it at the moment. Putting it on his shoulder blade, and it would stay there forever. Something I'd designed especially for him. It was a big approval of my work!
I'd been nervous, not only that he wouldn't like it, but because it was my first personalized design. He'd said he trusted me to be able to do that, which that was pretty much the coolest part. Brick had trusted me to do a good job.
In general, since I'd decided I wanted to be a tattoo artist, things had started to look up. I was still in high school, but worked as often as possible. School didn't feel as unbearable anymore, since I knew it'd be over soon, and I didn't have to worry about what would happen once it was. I had a career that would work with... how I was, and how my head worked.
When it didn't feel as if they were going to change their mind and send me walking, I asked Sami why he'd taken me on, and he told me. It was that I could do such good portraits. Even if he wasn't going to force me into a specific style, he hoped I'd use those skills and specialize in realistic tattoos. I hadn't decided yet.
Sami, Joe, and Chris, were all sitting around me watching me work. I had actually done a small tattoo on Chris. One of my very first. It was just the letter 'W.' I had no idea what it was for; I never asked. The guys all did what they could to help me. Even if Sami was my teacher, the others taught me things as well.
Especially Chris; he often sat with the fake skin on his arm and let me tattoo it. They'd all done it once or twice, but he did it whenever he had the time. The purpose was to give me the feeling of tattooing something that moved underneath the needle.
They were all firm on the fact that even when I worked on fake skin, I had to act as if it was an actual customer. Keep up with all the health codes to make sure it turned into something I did without thinking. I even did it when I had the fake skin directly on a table.
This was the first time Brick and Mac had come to the shop. It was special with Mac; his words had started this. I really hoped he’d ask me to do the Baxter ink if he was serious about wanting it.
Once the lining was done, Brick wanted a break for a smoke and coffee. When he left the room, I looked up at Mac who was still flipping through a magazine while at the same time fiddling with his phone.
“Hey, Mac,”
“Yeah?” he said when he looked up from the phone.
“Thanks again.”
“For what?”
I shrugged and held out my hand to indicate the room surrounding me. “For this. It’s been... I love this. I just, you know, feel at home here. Like I belong. So thank you.”
It didn't fully explain how fucking big this was to me, how much I loved being here, but I couldn't think of any other way to say it. What it meant to me to be a part of an environment where I truly belonged and was accepted for who I was.
“You're here because you're a fucking talent. These guys all know it, and we all know it,” he smiled. “So I didn’t do shit, babe.”
“I think you did,” I mumbled while I took off my gloves and threw them in the trash before reaching for a bottle of water.
“Ever gonna ask me?” he said, and my eyes flew up to meet his.
I cursed to myself and wondered if he, like,
knew
I was crushing on him. That I had been when I was a kid and again since he came back from Kansas. It would be so super embarrassing if he'd figured it out! I'd really tried to hide it. Sort of avoiding him to not make it too obvious. Finally, I decided it was best to just ask him what he meant.
“Ask what?”
“If you can ink me?”
I exhaled in relief. That wasn't so bad. “You don’t ask that. The person wanting the ink chooses, both ink and inker. There should never be any pressure to have it done.”
Sami had taught me that. You could offer if you knew the person really well, and knew they’d choose you to do the ink. But that was it. You didn't ask otherwise. I knew Dad had asked others to let me ink them, but that was hardly something I could stop him from doing. Besides, I'd seen them get ink from piss-drunk guys. No matter how inexperienced, I was at least sober.
“Okay,
Katze
,” Mac said with a big smile. God! 'Katze' didn’t sound anything like that when Dad said it. Not at all. “Would you do the Baxter Marauder-ink on me?”
“Yes.” I really hoped I didn’t sound as nervous––or eager––as I felt. “I’d like that.” I took a few sips from my water bottle, and then asked without looking at him. “Where?”
“Thought I’d do it on my side. Here.”
“Over the ribs?”
“I know that hurts like a motherfucker. Would you do it?”
I took another big mouthful of water and nodded. There was no doubt in my mind that once I started tattooing it wouldn’t bother me anymore, but there might be some red cheeks before that. Trixie had a point; I should probably just get laid to not keep blushing in front of hot guys. I wasn’t doing it that often anymore, but this was Mac. Which made it different. Since I was, sort of, crushing on him—a little.
“Not sure the design works on the ribs, but I'll see what I can do.”
When Brick came back, I tuned out the things around me and got back to work.
-o0o-
Bear hadn't missed it. Vi still had a thing for Mac. Or she had a thing
again.
He wasn't sure which, but he knew she'd had it in her early teens, and she definitely had a thing for him now. She was too shy to do anything about it, and Mac was too good of a guy to take advantage of it. If it'd been Mitch she was fawning over, he'd be more worried. Not that Mitch wasn't a good guy; he just tended to think with his hanging brain a little too often.
The day after Brick'd had his ink done, Vi came walking into the lot and smiled at Bear when she saw him.
“Hey, Katze,” he said and gave her a hug. “All good?”
“Yeah.” She sat down on a bench, and he got down next to her. “I have today off. Thought I'd go and see Edie.”
Vi still hung out at Dawg and Edie's place at times, but not as often as before. She simply didn't have the time. Not even mentioning that baby Travis kept Edie quite busy these days. But Vi still visited them as often as she could.
“Want me to give you a lift?”
“No. That's okay.” She shook her head. Then she gave him a strange look before clearing her throat. “I can get home by myself, in case you want to... stay here, or something.”
It took him a while, but when he caught on to what she was really saying, he laughed.
“Honey, you really don't have to worry about me getting laid.” When she blushed, he laughed again. “Seriously, where did that come from?”
As far as he knew, and he was actually pretty sure about it, his baby girl was very much a virgin. He highly doubted she'd even kissed anyone. Besides the people in the club, she didn't have many friends. She'd never been on a date and had definitely not taken home a guy to introduce him. In fact, she'd never even taken home any friends to introduce them. So, her suggesting he might want to get laid, even if it was subtle as fuck, was a surprise.
“Nowhere. Just, you haven't been away for the night in a while and... I don't know.” She looked at her shoes. “Can we just forget I said that?”
“Yeah. Let's,” he immediately agreed. He got up from the bench and held out his hand for her. “For the record, nighttime is only optional when having sex.”
She was flaming red and glared at him when he laughed again. He gave her a hug.
“That's not cool, Dad,” she muttered.
“Then don't bring it up.”
“Trust me, it'll never happen again.”
They walked towards the clubhouse, and when the door swung open in front of them they were standing face to face with Mac.
“Hey,” he said and looked at Vi. “Uh, you okay?”
“Yeah, she's just mortally embarrassed at the moment,” Bear said and pulled Vi closer.
“Okay,” Mac said with a laugh. “I sent Mitch out for booze, give him a call if you need anything else.”
Mitch was currently prospecting and was doing surprisingly well. His year was up in a few months. He'd get in, no question about it, and it had nothing to do with whose son he was. Bear enjoyed messing with the kid, though. He'd wait half an hour, until about the time Mitch should be on his way back to the clubhouse, and only then send him a text with what he wanted.
He took Vi inside. He saw her sitting next to Wolf for a while, probably discussing country music, and about an hour later she came to tell him she was on her way to Edie's. When he hinted that he might stay at the clubhouse, she blushed again, and with a laugh he gave the top of her head a kiss.
Once she was gone, Brick turned and looked at him.
“What the fuck was that about?”
“She hinted earlier that I might wanna stay the night to get laid.”
“Vi?! What the fuck?”
“Yeah. Think she regretted that comment immediately.”
“You do realize it's probably pretty bad if your
daughter
thinks you need to get laid?”
“She's not really aware it doesn't have to be night for that shit to happen,” he said to Brick with a smile. “You know, girls like her think it all goes down in darkness and in bed.”
“Ahh!” Brick started laughing. “But really, where the fuck did that come from? Find it hard to believe that our little
Vi
would bring it up.”
“I don't know.”
“Maybe she just wanted you out of the house so she could get laid.”
He slowly turned his head and glared at Brick. Brick just kept smiling and downed a shot of scotch.
“She's not getting laid. She's seventeen.”
“
Very
close to eighteen. Remember what you did when you were seventeen? Or what you've done to girls who were seventeen at the time.”
“You should drop this.”
“I know. Just couldn't help myself.” Brick turned around and leaned his back against the bar. “I'm sure she's going to stay at home, do her homework, and some drawings.”
That was probably exactly what she'd do, and part of Bear was sad about it. She was seventeen, she should be out doing stupid stuff. Maybe not having sex—definitely not sex—but at least sneaking out to be with friends.
Even if Lisa had been easy to handle when she was teenager, but he'd still chased her around town a couple of times when she was Vi's age. He'd picked her up at an abandoned house once, and it was lucky Brick'd been with him, since he stopped him from killing the guy she was there with.
Vi never did stuff like that, but he didn't want to nag about it either. At least she seemed happier these days, and that was something.
CHAPTER TWO:
He's Not Alone
-o0o-
IN A VERY DRUNKEN
state, Bucket was trying to tell me the benefits of drinking Tequila rather than whiskey. Since I was more than three years away from being legally allowed to drink, and since I liked Bucket and didn't want Dad to kill him, I left him on the couch. It didn't seem likely he'd notice me being gone.
It was Mac's birthday, and it had been just over two weeks since I did the Baxter-Marauder ink on Brick. It was healing up nicely, and I was pleased to see I'd done it dark enough. Sometimes I didn't do the shading properly, which could make it look faded once the tattoo healed. That was still easier to fix than if I made the opposite mistake.