Total pages in book: 135
Estimated words: 123672 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 618(@200wpm)___ 495(@250wpm)___ 412(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 123672 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 618(@200wpm)___ 495(@250wpm)___ 412(@300wpm)
I peer up at him as he holds the door open for me. “I’ll have to see just how much of it has healed, but are you sure?” I ask. “You nearly shit yourself when I held my tattoo gun to your skin.”
“I’ll be fine,” he says.
I hold back a grin as we walk into the shop, flipping on lights as we go, and judging by the chemical smell in the air, I’d say Big Jim only took off a little while before we got here. I turn on the music, not being able to work without it, and by the time I step into my station, Alex is already pulling his shirt over his head.
As always, I get distracted by the sharp ridges of his toned body, and as he lowers his big frame into my chair, I force myself to get in the zone. Grabbing my gloves, I stride over to him and drop down onto my rolling stool before glancing over his tattoo.
It’s only had a little over a week to heal, and while it’ll still be raw and scabbed, there are other sections I will be able to work on.
I start preparing everything I’ll need and a few minutes later, I have my gun in hand. My gaze shifts to his face, holding back a grin as I find him white as a ghost, and without hesitation, I grab his hand and place it on my thigh, just as I’d done the first time. “How can a man who spends his days fantasizing about ending someone’s life be so terrified of needles? I mean, fuck. You cut yourself with a blade like you were chopping up a roast chicken, and you had no issue jamming a syringe into the side of my neck, but this has you breaking out in a sweat. It makes no sense.”
“Fucking tell me about it,” he grits through a clenched jaw, his gaze locked on the ceiling, refusing to watch what I’m doing.
I laugh to myself, pressing the gun against his skin and watching how he flinches away from it. My terrifying serial killer stalker boyfriend is scared of needles. Wait. Is he my boyfriend?
“What?” Alex questions, his gaze coming to mine.
“Huh?”
“You made a face,” he comments, blowing his cheeks out as he clearly tries to use whatever this is as a distraction. “Something’s on your mind.”
“Oh, I umm . . . it’s nothing, really,” I tell him, my gaze shifting back to his broad chest. “I was just laughing to myself about my serial killer boyfriend being a little scaredy-cat, but then it occurred to me that I didn’t actually know if you were my boyfriend. I mean, is that . . . is that what you want, or is that not how things work in the serial killer world? This whole screwing your stalker thing is new to me, so I don’t really know how it works.”
Alex grins, his eyes softening, and for just a moment, he doesn’t look as though he’s about to throw up. “You wanna be my girlfriend, Mace?”
“I mean, it sounds so trivial when you say it like that.”
“How else am I supposed to say it?”
I let out a frustrated groan, rolling my eyes as I try to focus on what I’m doing. “You’re impossible, you know that, right?” I tell him, before gently biting down on my lower lip, feeling shy all of a sudden. “But for what it’s worth. Yes. I’d like it very much if, from this point on, you referred to me as your girlfriend. Or your highness. Either works.”
Alex winks, and every part of me swoons. “I think I’ll stick with Mace.”
A stupid grin settles across my face. “I think I can deal with that.”
His hand on my thigh squeezes. “Alright, let’s stop dancing around,” he tells me. “I know you have questions, and it’s been killing you not to ask for the past few days.”
Rolling my tongue over my lips, nerves begin pulsing through my body, and as I meet his eyes again, I let out a shaky breath. “Your mom?” I ask him. “I was curious about you, and the other night when I was at Nat’s place, I found an article that suggested you killed your mom and were discharged from the Marines with a warrant out for your arrest.”
His face scrunches, and he sucks in a breath, probably trying to buy himself some time to work out how he’s going to explain this. “Starting with the hard stuff, huh?”
“Sorry,” I murmur just as my phone blasts through the silence, cutting me off. I glance over to the screen, getting ready to silence it when I find a FaceTime call from Nat. “Shit,” I say, picking it up and showing him the screen. “If I don’t answer, she’s going to get worried.”