Say it Louder by Heidi Joy Tretheway Read Free Book Online Page B

stills, waiting for an answer. I chill and wrap my free arm around my chest, shy knowing my full breasts are apparent through the thin T-shirt.
    There’s warmth in his touch, in his voice, in his gaze. And I want more. I want him closer, the way our arms kept brushing as we sat on that rail beam, neither of us admitting that every single touch was intended.
    Every one.
    “I’ll show you a few.” I walk back to my bed and sit, nodding at him to follow before I lose my nerve. “But you have to show me yours, too.”
    Dave chuckles. “I like the sound of that.”
    I glare at him. “Don’t. I’m a professional, remember?”
    I tip the cracked shade on the lamp near my bed so the bare bulb stares at us. I’m too exposed but Dave looks comfortable in his own skin, like he parades around in black boxer briefs all day.
    Maybe he does. Rock stars are known for weird shit.
    “I like this one.” Dave says as he sits on the mattress and turns toward me. One hand wraps around my wrist again, anchoring my arm in place. His other hand explores, tracing the lines of my honeybees and their flowers. He pushes my T-shirt sleeve up to the top of my shoulder, then trails his fingers down my arm.
    My flesh prickles with goosebumps and I feel my cheeks heat, the color climbing down my neck in parallel with his gaze. I’ve never been inspected like this before. Even when other people look at my tattoos, and many of them do because it’s some of Thomas’s best work, I never see this hunger behind their eyes.
    Dave swallows, his tour of my left arm complete. “Which one do you want to see?”
    “Your favorite.”
    He smiles, and it’s an easy smile, relaxed, like I’ve just asked if he likes ice cream. He stands up and turns around, draping himself across my bed so I can see the magnificent back piece that spreads across his shoulder blades.
    It’s an owl, wings spread in full flight, its legs extended forward as if it’s descending to grab its prey. It’s almost a blackwork tat—the only color in the intricate design is the owl’s yellow eyes.
    It feels so Dave, so commanding and sharp-eyed. Like if you peeled away his poor-me routine you’d get a wise creature ready to capture exactly what he wants.
    What if I were exactly what he wants? The thought of that thrills and frightens me.
    “I’ll tell you a secret,” he mumbles, his face in my pillow as I bend over his back to get a closer look at the ink. “I have a second mirror in my bathroom so I can see it. It’s my favorite, but I can’t even look at it straight. Kind of stupid, huh?”
    I trace the curves of it, my fingers skidding lightly over the owl’s feathers on his muscular back. “Not stupid at all,” I whisper. No. Not stupid in the slightest.
    He just lies there and lets me touch him. Lets my fingers wander, up his back and down it, from the crease of his spine to his muscled shoulders, from the cords of his neck down his lower back, and the elastic top of his boxer briefs.
    This is shifting fast, changing from tattoo talk to something entirely … other. I’m afraid my lack of experience is showing, and I’m grateful that he’s lying face down and can’t look at me. I don’t want him to see the embarrassment and curiosity and craving written all over my face.
    “Take your time.”
    Dave’s comment freezes me. Does he want me to stop? I play his three words back in my head and decide his tone is genuine. He’s OK with this. Maybe he even likes it?
    I trace his tattoo lines again—the primaries, the first ones a tattoo artist inks. These are my guidelines for everything going forward. All of the shading and subtlety is built off them, so if primaries go down wrong, the tattoo is virtually guaranteed to be a disaster.
    Most people have seen bad primaries and don’t know it. They just know something’s off. It usually happens when somebody gets a Yosemite Sam tattoo, or a person’s face, or some other really literal tattoo that requires precise