I wrapped my arms around King’s neck and looked over the water. The bird that was the inspiration for my sketch sat on top of a crab trap buoy in the middle of the bay. His beak was down, searching in the water for his next meal.
“So what now?” I asked, turning back to King.
“Now? Now, we need to go upstairs, and I need to get you in my bed because I’m not even fucking close to being done with you tonight.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Doe
“Get up,” King said.
He took me by the hand and lifted me off the mattress. I was still half asleep. Knocked into a sex coma after King proved that when he said he wasn’t nearly done with me, he wasn’t lying.
Heat coursed from his hand into mine and shot directly into my erratically beating heart, causing my breath to hitch in my throat.
“Where are we going?” I managed to squeak out as I pulled on a tank top and my underwear.
Looking down into my eyes, King slowly tucked an unruly strand of hair behind my ear, allowing the very tips of his fingers to brush against my skin.
“Pup,” he said, his voice almost hoarse, “it’s time for you to stop living for who you might’ve been and start living for who you are now.”
“I thought that’s what I was doing,” I said with a yawn. King’s grip tightened around my palm. He dragged me down the hall into his tattoo studio and switched on the light.
“Sit,” he commanded, releasing my hand and gesturing to the chair in the middle of the room.
“Why?” I asked becoming more aware as I slowly woke up.
My palms started to sweat. “You want me in THAT chair?” I asked.
King walked over to the iPod docking station, and with his back to me, he flipped through the songs. After a few minutes, the sounds of Florida Georgia Line’s STAY filled the room.
When King turned back around and noticed I was still standing by the door, he narrowed his gaze and again pointed to the chair. “Sit, or I will come over there, pick you up, and toss you onto it.”
His tone did not imply that I had another option. I reluctantly moved over to the chair and tentatively perched myself on the edge.
“Take off your shirt.” His voice so suddenly strained, he had to clear his throat. King sat down on his rolling stool and opened the bottom drawer of his tool box. He started sorting out materials just as if he were getting ready to tattoo a client, just like I’d seen him do many times over the past few weeks.
“What? Why? What are you doing?” I asked, unable to hide the panic in my voice.
“Because, Pup, it will be very hard to do this fucking tattoo with your shirt on. So, take the goddamn thing off, yeah?” King was demanding, but his tone hinted at a softness that wasn’t there when I’d first met him.
“I already told you. I can’t,” I said. “You just don’t get it. I may want one, but I just can’t. I’ve told you this.” Then, another thought crossed my mind.
He wouldn’t tattoo me against my will, would he?
King stood from his stool and slowly approached. A menacing look in his eyes. He pushed my knees apart and settled his large frame between my thighs. He rested his forehead against mine in a gesture that was both intimate and new.
“How many times do I need to tell you? You need to learn to do what you are told, Pup,” he growled, his cool breath floating across the skin on my cheek and neck.
In one fluid movement, he yanked my tank top over my head and tossed it onto his toolbox. “You’re mine now. In every way. And I need you to know that if you regain your memory and remember who you are, you’re still going to be mine. If you have a boyfriend out there waiting for you? You’re still mine.” He paused. “And if you ever leave me to go back to your old life, just know that no matter who you are with, every inch of this beautiful body of yours will always belong to me.”
Braless and feeling very exposed in every way, I made a move to cover my breasts with my hand. I looked down to the floor to avoid eye contact. I could feel his gaze on my body. The hair on my arms stood on end. My nipples hardened.
King’s lips curled upward in a wicked smile. He leaned back into me and placed his hands over mine, removing them from my breasts, fully exposing me to his hungry gaze. He blew out a long-held breath. His tongue darted out, licking his bottom lip before sucking it into his mouth. After what seemed like a lifetime, he shook his head and lightly chuckled.
“This isn’t about me right now,” he said. I got the feeling he was talking to himself rather than to me. “Lay on your stomach.” He snapped on a pair of black latex gloves.
“You can’t. I can’t,” I argued.
He sat down on his stool and rolled it toward me with his feet. “You said you wanted a tattoo, right?”
“Yes, I did, and I do. But I can’t. I can’t because what if—”
“No. Let me guess, you can’t because it may be what you want, but it may not be what SHE wants?” He didn’t wait for me to answer. Probably because he knew that was exactly what I was going to say. “But what you aren’t understanding is that you are her!” King roared, standing up so abruptly his stool slid back and hit wall behind him. “Don’t you see? You can’t second guess everything you want because you are afraid of remembering another life!”
He paced the room and wrung out his hands, cracking his knuckles.
“Fuck who you were!” King screamed, the veins in his neck pulsing with each of his ragged breaths. “Be you, this fantastic, amazing, fucking beautiful…” His tone softened, and he stopped pacing, lifting his eyes to meet mine. “We’re not just going to have a life, remember? We’re going to live.”
He slowly approached me. Again, he moved my hands away from my breasts. He pressed his chest into mine. His hands circled around my lower back, his hardness to my softness.
“I fucking love who you are, Pup, and it’s about damn time you learned to love her, too,” he said, placing a soft kiss on the edge of my mouth, igniting a sensation deep within that caused my entire body to shake.
LOVE?
I started to protest again, but the fog of desire wouldn’t lift, and instead, I just sat there with my mouth open, waiting for King to make the next move.
Much to my disappointment, he sat back onto his stool and opened another drawer of his toolbox. He took out a sheet of paper that was almost see-through with colorful lines already drawn onto the page.
“Here.” He passed me the paper, averting his gaze to the floor. “I made this for you.”
I reached for the paper. It took me a minute to figure out what it was. The lines were all colorful, deep purples, pinks, and blues. The design was ornate, and at first, it just looked like beautiful vine work, but when you looked closely, hidden in the design was…me.
Concealed in the design was a book opened to the middle with wings protruding out the sides as it perched upon a pink pair of brass knuckles. Further down and off to the side was a quote woven into vines, ‘I don’t want to repeat my innocence. I want the pleasure of losing it all over again.’
My breath hitched in my throat, and I couldn’t form the words. It was completely me.
I had to have it.
Suddenly, nothing mattered anymore because this man knew exactly who I was. Not who I used to be, not some girl I was waiting for to return while putting my current life on hold in the process.
I was tired of standing still. I wanted to move forward. All that mattered was what I wanted now, and what I wanted was right in front of me.
“Where?” I asked, unable to tear my eyes away from it.
“Do you trust me?” King asked.
“Yes,” I said without hesitation. Because it was true.
“Good. Then, lay down.” King took the paper from me, and with one hand on my shoulder, he pressed me down onto the table, placing his knee on the outside of my thigh. His face hovered just inches above mine. “Now, be a good girl,” he whispered on my neck, “and roll the fuck over.” A crooked smile on his lips.
“Yes, sir,” I said, no longer able to contain my own smile, my belly doing flips as I thought back to where those beautiful lips had been not long before.
“Good girl. Now, you’re learning,” King praised me, sealing his compliment with a smack on my ass as I did what I was told and rolled over.
He shuffled around, preparing his tools. The tattoo needle started to hum, and shortly after he applied the template, I felt the first sharp sting on my skin, followed by a scratching sensation.
It didn’t hurt as bad as I thought it would. In an odd way, I welcomed the pain. I closed my eyes and lost myself in the sensation of the needle across my skin.
The sensation of taking over my life and making it my own.
The needle stung and scraped its way across my back and shoulders. At the same time, I said a silent goodbye to the girl I’d been protecting for months.
I wasn’t going to miss her.
As King branded my skin, I embraced the girl whose life was just beginning. I embraced life.
My life.
King filled me so completely. Not just my body. My heart. My soul. My life. I didn’t give a shit if I ever got my memory back.
Because with King, I knew exactly who I was.