She’s a beautiful woman, but she’s not up for grabs. She’s a tattoo artist and she doesn’t know anything that goes on upstairs or downstairs for that matter. She’s just a normal girl who works a typical job.
Nothing makes her special and yet here I stand, eyes still boring into the way she smiles as she tattoos her client, and the way her eyes are so focused on her craft. Something about Dema’s always spoken out to me, but it doesn’t matter. I’ll never be able to have her. Just like every other day, I shove my selfish desire deep down in the pit of my stomach and head back to my office. There’s still much work to be done before Gregor gets here.
Chapter Three
Dema
Meghan ended up getting an emergency call and asked if I’d take her client for her. I immediately said yes, since I didn’t have anything better to do. I brought the chick over to my chair and asked her to take a seat.
I go over the design she wants and spruce it up a little bit, giving it more detail. I hate ordinary designs but that’s the artist in me talking. I like things to be complicated and beautiful. I start pulling out ink colors the client wants used in her butterfly tattoo and notice I’m completely out of pink and green. Ugh. This is just my luck.
Great, and Meghan’s gone so I can’t ask her to grab some for me from Kronid. In the past years since I started working here, there’s only a few rules set in place. The most important is for those who work in the front section of the tattoo parlor. We aren’t allowed in the back under any circumstances. We also can’t go into Kronid’s office. But what we can do is go to his office and ask him to get it for us, but I know he isn’t here. He said he had some stuff to do downstairs a bit ago, so I’m shit out of luck.
Sighing, I go to the front desk to see if the receptionist’s still there, but she’s not. I bet she’s probably gone out for her dinner break. How typical. She doesn’t say anything about heading out, so we’d know to keep an eye on the front doors.
I roll my eyes and pick up the phone to call Kronid’s office. Maybe he’s there and he just was busy or something. Regardless, I call to make sure. I’m trying to keep from having to go back there if possible. As much as Kronid fascinates me, I’d be lying if I said he didn’t intimidate me. Not once since I started working here has the man spoken more than one or two words in a day to me, a simple ‘hi, how are you’, ‘hey’, and that sort of thing. When I think about it, I’m lucky enough if the man even acknowledges my presence.
I’m used to this treatment and kind of prefer it this way. Other than the few people I speak with, I’m invisible to those around. That or they look down on me.
When Kronid doesn’t pick up, I put the phone back in its holder and go see if I can snag the colors from Meghan’s station, if she has any. I notice right away she does have the colors I need and make a mental note to find Kronid and ask him to open the storage closet for me so I can replenish her station before she’s back, plus stock up my station.
With colors in hand, I step back over to my station and begin working on the ordinary butterfly I’m trying to make as unique as possible. As I continue to draw the lines of the tattoo, I talk to the girl to keep her from freaking out about the pain. Telling me to hurry because it hurts. I mean what does she expect? The tattoo isn’t just going to jump out of my ass and land on her foot. There are twenty-six bones, thirty-three joints, one-hundred and seven ligaments, and nineteen muscles in the foot alone. Of course, there’s going to be pain.
Okay, so I’m somewhat of a smart ass. I can’t help it. Blame it on the fact I grew up in the States for the first part of my life and enjoyed having fun. Now that I’m in Russia, the highlight of my days consists of my inner smartass coming out.
Soon as the outline of the tattoo is done, I ask the girl if she wants me to stop and we can continue another day, or if she wants to keep going. I give the girl props when she nods and asks me to keep going. Saying how me talking her through it helps. I sometimes think the clients like hearing my American accent. To them its erotic whereas hearing, oh say, Kronid’s masculine accent doesn’t do shit for them, but I don’t understand it. I’d call it sexy as hell. I don’t think he’s from Russia because his accent sounds different, but just like living in any country for a long period of time, you begin to pick up on the dialect.
I color the butterfly in, mixing the colors and pretty much highlighting a dull tattoo into something magical.
Finally, I finish that last bit of her tattoo and put the ink gun down. I clean the excess ink off her foot and place the bandage on top of it.
“You’ll want to keep your tattoo from drying up with our tattoo goo or you can add some ointment. Try not to rub anything up against it and be careful when in the shower not to scrub it. That also goes for when it scabs over. Let it do its thing and soon you’ll be able to show off your gorgeous tattoo,” I say, giving the girl a bright smile.
“Thank you so much. Has anyone ever told you that you’re amazing?” the girl asks as I walk her to the front, where the receptionist is still missing.
Great. That means I get to check her out as well.
“So. Um. Like are you single or anything?” she asks.
What? Is this chick for real?
“Um. No, I’m spoken for,” I mutter gently. “Just started seeing someone a couple weeks ago.” Talk about one bald face lie if there were any.
“That’s too bad, I’d so ask you out if you were.” She shrugs. “Well, here’s my number if you decide to change your mind. You’re hot and those dreads and that voice of yours are sexy as hell.”
“Uh. Thanks,” I say, doing everything in my power not to roll my eyes at this chick. The same chick who whined through getting her tattoo. I have more than I can count on both hands in all honesty other than a couple of them, I fell asleep in the chair as Meghan or even Sascha were placing the ink on my body.
“No problem, I hope to see you soon,” she giggles as I check her out and hand her the receipt.
“Have a great night.” I nod with a smile.
Sighing, I turn around and head back to my area and straighten it up by disinfecting and cleaning my chair, ink gun, and the countertop where I work. Sliding my stuff back in place. I finally cave on myself and decide it’s time to suck it up and go downstairs to the storage area. I’ve never done it myself, but I don’t think I’ll have a problem. I just need to go down the stairwell to the bottom level.
Chapter Four
Kronid
“Kronid, Rytas is here,” Michail interrupts me while I’m in the room with Gregor. He’s on the floor, cowering with a bloodied face. I’ve barely had my way with him and from what I can recall Rytas isn’t supposed to be here for another hour. “He’s here early.” Michail fills in the blanks and I ball my fists at my side.
Of course, he’d arrive early. The man usually runs late and Katya gave him an earful about arriving late being an insult to their business relationship. She told him if he wanted to continue working with her, he’d be sure to arrive on time and not a minute late. Now he’s here an hour early, on the day I have someone’s brains to bash in.