Evanescent Ink (Copperline #4) (11 page)

“Your girlfriend went lez?” Lacey asked me with a flabbergasted expression on her face. “But you’re so hot. How could she?”

“Because he’s a moody fucker. All deep and serious all the time,” Justin offered. He turned to look at Raven. “Maybe Raven could offer some insight. What made you go lez, Raven?”

“Raven isn’t a lesbian,” Lacey laughed. “She’s bangin’ her boss.”

Raven froze. As did everyone else at the table. Denny had been on the verge of taking a drink of his beer and suddenly just held it aloft, in midair, as he looked back and forth between us.

Oh fuck.

Operation
‘keep quiet’
was dead in the water.

Lacey had no clue what she had just done. She turned to Felicity and said, “I keep telling her, you don’t dip your pen in the company ink.”

Felicity gaped at her, visibly trying to process what she’d just heard.

“Actually,” Lacey obliviously continued on, “that’s more of a man way of saying it, right?”

Felicity looked at Denny who slowly lowered his beer and stared at me.

“Wait, so you’re doin’ the bold thing with her?” he asked.

“He’s doing the what with who?” Lacey giggled over at him. “I can barely understand a word you say.”

“Yeah,” Justin snorted. “Speak English, you fucker.”

“You are!” Denny pointed at me. “You’re givin’ her the business, aren’t ya?”

While everyone else tried to decipher exactly what that meant, Felicity quickly looked back and forth across the table between Raven and I. “You two are sleeping together?” she asked.

“No, she’s not sleeping with Drew,” Lacey dismissed with a wave of her hand. “She’s fucking her boss.”

Justin leaned in towards Lacey’s ear. “He
is
her boss,” he said in an exaggerated whisper.

“What?!” Lacey exclaimed.

Raven sorta looked like she wanted to crawl under the table.

“Wait a minute,” Justin said as he straightened in his chair and studied Raven, “does this mean you’re not a lesbian anymore?”

“I never was a lesbian, Justin,” she replied shaking her head. “I just didn’t want to sleep with you.”

“Damn…" he trailed off.

Lacey stared at me before turning to shout at Raven. “So you’ve been fucking this guy?
This
is your boss? This hot ass rockstar motherfucker?”

“Shut up, Lacey,” Raven said, pressing her fingertips over her eyes.

“Don’t stop on my account,” I shrugged, “I kinda like hearing how hot I am.”

As Raven peered between her fingers, she gifted me from across the table with one hell of a death look.

“So how long have you guys been a couple,” Cody asked.

“We’re not a couple,” Raven instantly replied.

“Yeah,” I shrugged. “We’re just fucking.”

“Ok,” Cody laughed with a shake of his head. “So how long have you been fucking. It’s been, what… about a month since you got shot of Maggie.”

Raven and I just kind of looked at each other for a minute. She gave me a warning look, and began to talk.

“It’s not really any—”

“About a month,” I cut in.

Raven stood up suddenly. “I need a drink.”

“Shit, is
that
why you and Maggie broke up?” Justin asked. “Did you go and deviate outside her choice pool of pussy?”

“Holy shit, Raven,” Lacey gasped. “Why didn’t you tell me you were doing
him
?”

Raven just shot her a dirty look and headed for the bar. As if it had been synchronized, everyone immediately turned to look at me.

“Don’t start,” I said, standing up.

Denny scowled, and when he spoke, his Irish accent was thick. “Jaysus, you’ve been throwing a feckin’ moody for donkey’s years, and come to find out you’ve been out knocking knickers the whole time.”

Justin set his bottle down and stared at Denny. “What in the actual fuck does that even mean?”

“Yeah,” Cody laughed. “Speak English, you fucker.”

Felicity snuggled up against Denny’s arm, looking a little dreamy. “I think it’s wonderful, Drew.”

“Absolutely,” Sophie chimed in, then glanced up at Brannon. “Nothing like a little post breakup sex to bring you back to the land of the living.” Giving him a quick kiss, she looked back over at me. “But why didn’t you tell anyone?”

“Because he’s not a chick,” Justin offered.

I ignored him. “There are reasons we didn’t say anything.”

“Like what?” Ilsa asked with a shy grin.

I wasn’t entirely certain, but Raven’s arguments sprung to mind. “Because it isn’t anything serious. We’re just getting each other off. It isn’t a big deal.” I felt like I was lying my ass off, but I couldn’t really think of anything else at the moment. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to go cool her off.”

“Yeah, you’ll cool her off, alright. With your dick,” Justin laughed as I walked away. “Just fuck it out of her. She’ll be golden.”

I found Raven pacing the hallway near the bathrooms. If she’d been flustered before, she had gone straight to freaked the fuck out. As I came towards her, she looked up at me.

“Everyone knows,” she said quietly.

“Well, the band does.”

“Word will spread. I’m fucking my boss, which is never good. Neil’s gonna shit.”

“Why would Neil shit?”

“Because I’m fucking you. You are my boss. You are his boss. He'll see that as some kind of unfair advantage or something. Like I’m trying to sleep my way to the top.”

“Of Ink? What’s that gonna get ya’?”

She ignored me, whirled on her heel, and started pacing again. “And pretty soon everyone in Ophir will be wondering what the fuck you’re doing with me.”

“That’s crazy, Raven,” I said, shaking my head.

She threw a look my way that I didn’t quite understand, but quickly dropped her gaze.

“Hey, Rave, this isn’t really a bad thing.”

She suddenly looked at me with wide eyes. “We should stop.”

“You want to stop just because people know we’re together?” My gut lurched. All at once, my insecurity kicked in. Maggie’s taunts echoed in my head.

“We’re not together. We’re fucking, but people will think we’re together. And they’ll wonder what the fuck you’re doing with me. And then when you move on, everyone will be all
‘Oh, poor Raven, although what did she expect’
and I’ll look like an idiot.”

“That’s insane,” I said, and when she shot me a dirty look, I quickly tried to recover. “Look at me, and then look at you. How are we so different that anyone would think that?”

“You’re Drew Massey. You own your own business. You’re the driver behind the Bangin’ Mofos. I’m just your employee. I’m nobody.”

It suddenly hit me that she was trying to end things with me. A vile surge of rejection coursed through my veins, and my blood began to burn. “Wait, is that really how you feel, or is all this just a show? An excuse to bail? Are you done with me, too?”

“No,” she yelled, then her voice dropped to a whisper. “It isn’t… I’m not really sure why, but people knowing freaks me out. People love you, Drew. How am I going to measure up if they know what we’re doing? If they think it’s more serious, then everyone will pity me when we are done. If they don’t, they’ll know it’s because I’m not good enough.”

That rattled me right out of my chickish little pique.
Where was the confidence she usually exuded? What was going on in that pretty little head of hers?

“What the hell? Who says you’re not good enough?”

“Nobody has to say it.”

I backed her up against the wall and forced her to look up at me. “What are you afraid of… really?”

She tried to turn away, but I held firm and lowered my head closer to hers.

“Rave, fuck everyone else. The last couple weeks have been kind of spectacular, in spite of the shit storm Maggie threw down—because of
you
. I don’t want to stop this just because other people might have their own fucking opinions.”

“But your friends…” she trailed off.

“What about my friends?”

“They’re not going to think this is a good thing.”

“Why wouldn’t they?”

“Justin thinks I’m a lesbian.”

I let out a short, choked laugh. “I don’t think he thinks that anymore.”

“And Brannon and Sophie…” she hesitated, and then just shook her head.

Okay, I was totally lost now.

“What about Brannon and Sophie?” I asked.

“When I first started working for you, I was kind of going overboard trying to
not
show that I thought you were hot. I kind of… well, I kind of hit on Brannon.”

“I still don’t really see what this—”

“Right in front of Sophie. Like when they were first together and they came into Ink to get her tat. I was so obvious about it. They’re going to give you a ton of shit about me, so it’s maybe just better if we stop now and avoid all that.”

She looked up at me finally, her wide violet eyes showing me a rare hint of fear. Her own fear of rejection. Of me and my friends casting her aside.

If anyone understood that self-doubt, I did. The cuts Maggie had left were fading, but they still had their raw moments. Raven had always seemed so incredibly secure. So comfortable in her own skin. This uncertainty from her was rather mind-boggling.

“I don’t want to stop,” I said simply. “They won’t say shit, but, even if they did, I don’t care. I don’t make my decisions based on their opinions. I knew none of them liked Maggie, and I still went out with her for fucking
years
.”

What a waste that was…

“God, please don’t compare me to Maggie.”

I gave her a wry smile. “Sorry. I know it’s a little extreme, but if they’re not going to give me shit about a complete bitch like her, do you really think they’re going to hold a little thing like coming onto Brannon against you?”

“Sophie might. She should.”

“The last person in the world to judge you is going to be Sophie. She’s about the nicest person on the planet.” I lowered my head and pressed a kiss to her lips, then lifted scarcely and whispered. “The thing is, like I said earlier tonight, I really happen to like fucking you. I don’t want to lose that.”

I kissed her again, deeper and longer. I pulled her closer into my arms and ran my hands over her curves.

“Especially now that we don’t have to hide it,” I murmured between kisses. “Now we can just kinda disappear and go for it wherever…”
Kiss
. “Whenever…”
Kiss
. “Like now…”

I lifted my head and pulled her into the men’s bathroom. One guy was shaking it off at the urinals.

“Out, now,” I demanded.

He looked back and forth from Raven to me, dropped his gaze, and quickly left without even washing his hands.

“See?” I grinned down at Raven, who had the faintest smile touching her bruised lips. “I can do shit like that now. It’s very liberating.” I pulled her close and went in for another kiss.

“There’s no lock on the door,” she murmured, halting me for a second.

“I’ll just have to fuck you up against it to keep people out then.”

I swallowed any further argument as my mouth closed over hers. In no time, she was right where I was. Hot and needy. Gasping for breath. Moaning down my throat as I pressed her into the hard wood of the door. Her fingernails dug into my back as my hands trailed down her body to her bare thighs, then back up under her skirt to cup her ass. She wrapped her arms around my neck, kissing me back and writhing against me. I lifted, using her grasp and the leverage from the door to hold her still, reaching down to delve under lacy little panties and slip my fingers inside her.

So wet. So silky smooth and hot. It had barely been twenty-four hours since I’d been inside her, but I was overcome with just how fucking good she felt. I finger-fucked her hard for a moment, stroking deep and stoking the fire inside her. My thumb brushed up against her clit piercing and wrenched a ragged gasp from her lips. Every movement made me harder, more aroused, until I was throbbing almost painfully. I pulled my hand from her and jerked open the button-fly of my jeans, releasing my cock. I stroked her with the tip, wishing with every fiber of my being that I could have her bare.