Now he would drown it in work. He needed to put the mindfuck Candace had run on him out of his head. Of all frigging ways for it to end. If only he’d cut out as soon as he’d been dressed and ready, like he usually did in those situations, he might still be willing to stick it out and see what the future held. It was probably for the best it had happened the way it had, before he let himself get too involved.

“I’ll be with you guys in a minute,” he told the waiting group as he strode through toward the back. He thought he sensed a collective sigh of relief from his artists. It only took him a few seconds to grab his cap and his gum—damn, but he needed a smoke—and head back out to the chaos.

His first client of the evening wanted her navel pierced. She thought. She was petite and really pretty, and looked young enough that he made her flash her ID. Nothing irked him more than sixteen-year-olds coming in here trying to pass themselves off as eighteen—well, nothing except thirteen- or fourteen-year-olds who actually had permission from their parents—but his girl checked out.

She’d only ever had her ears pierced, and had about five bazillion questions. As he began to settle into the routine, explaining aftercare, helping her pick out the jewelry she wanted, he started to feel a bit better.

But his girl was so hung up on whether or not it was going to be unbearably painful that he was finally forced to give his usual spiel about the pain factor, only it came out all wrong. And ended with, “So, hey, it’s all gonna hurt, there’s no way around it. If you’re deciding on where to get pierced based on where it’s going to hurt the least, then it’s not for you.”

She looked at him in surprise. Great. He was supposed to put them at ease, not chase them away. But just then he realized where his statement had come from…it rang true with relationships too. They weren’t for him. Too much pain involved.

Physical pain he could take. It came, did its damage, and was gone. He didn’t know what to do about the ache that gnawed at his gut after everything crashed down around him. There’d only been a handful of times he’d experienced it, and today was definitely one of them.

After one night with the girl? No way.

It couldn’t be just about her. The way she’d treated him was shitty, that was all, and he’d be pissed at any girl who screwed him over. God knew he didn’t mind using someone, and he didn’t mind being used. But that shit was supposed to be understood from the start. There were ethics involved. Two people getting each other off was one thing. But she couldn’t ask him to be her first, she couldn’t look at him as if she wanted to crawl inside him, she couldn’t cry on his shoulder for ten minutes in the shower only to turn around and treat him like dog crap afterward.

But she wouldn’t know a damn thing about how any of this works, dumbass. Remember?

That was the exact reason he was better off without the hassle.

His girl finally stopped fretting and went ahead with the piercing. The clamps seemed to freak her out more than the needle. She did better than he expected, but then, he knew he was good. Most of his clients said they felt a pinch and that was it, but he had the occasional one get light-headed. It always made him feel like an ass, and he ended up buying them a drink from the machine and talking them through it until he was sure they were okay to leave.

That was actually how he’d met Michelle at his old workplace, the one and only client he’d ever let himself get involved with. As soon as she jumped off the table after getting her navel pierced, she’d gone dead white and swayed. He’d taken her arm and steered her to a chair before she could hit the floor. It had been such a slow weeknight, he’d ended up sitting with her and talking until closing time. Her friend had finally grown exasperated and taken off.

They’d continued the conversation over beers and tequila shots at a bar up the street, and then at her place, where they’d had marathon sex until well after the sun came up. It wasn’t his normal MO at all, but that night, he’d figured what the hell. She was hot and funny and she’d been all over him as soon as they’d reached his truck at the bar. Fond memories.

Too bad those from last night and this morning were tainted from Candace’s subsequent freak out. He could’ve still been drifting on the euphoria of it all. Even now, he could still smell the scent of her skin, still taste her on the back of his tongue. Still feel her wrapped tight and wet around his fingers. He’d been walking around all day at half- mast from that memory alone, and it was beginning to wear him down.

When he went back up front, someone had turned up the tunes, but the sounds of Static-X were doing nothing to soothe his savage beast. He got the next person in line—who wanted a tat, thankfully, because it was his favorite thing to do to mellow him out—and got her prepped and under the needle in no time. She wanted a fairy on her shoulder blade, and it would probably take a good hour or so. Plenty of time to clear his head.

Until Starla stuck the phone under his face, totally destroying his already feeble concentration. “Here. It’s your brother.”

He frowned and leaned away from the offending instrument. “He can get me on my cell later.”

Starla rolled her eyes and brought the phone back to her ear. “Evan, he’s tied up, can you call him later?” She listened for a second and then held it back to him, laughing. “He says you need to learn how to multitask.” Even the girl he was working on giggled.

“Dammit.” He grabbed the phone, crammed it between his ear and shoulder, and picked up the line he’d left off on her skin. “We’re swamped, brother. I don’t call for you and tell them to drag your ass out of court, do I?”

Evan cut right to the chase. He and their mom were alike in that regard, at least when it came to Brian. “Why is Sylvia Andrews calling me out of court asking me to help her keep you away from her daughter?”

“The hell. Are you shitting me?”

“What have you done now?”

“Man, I ain’t done nothing. I can’t even begin to tell you how much nothing I did.” Well, okay, he’d done a little, but that was no one’s business but his and Candace’s.

“Ordinarily I wouldn’t believe that for a second, but because it’s Candace we’re talking about, you might be telling the truth.”

Did everyone know this girl was a virgin except for him? Did other guys have some kind of built-in hymen alert mechanism he was lacking? He never would have taken Candace for someone who took frequent trips around the block, but hell, at least once or twice. She was in college and she was hot, for f**k’s sake. How had she managed to keep that smokin’ body under wraps all this time? Were the guys over there blind?

I’d still want to wait for you.

Shit.

“Why do you say that?”

“Her parents guard her like she’s Fort Knox. If they had snipers stationed around her place to take out anyone who dared approach her door, I wouldn’t be surprised.”

Then they must have f**king surveillance cameras mounted somewhere across the street. Or spies. “I kinda get that now,” he muttered. “I’d already heard, but Jesus, I thought Michelle was always exaggerating at least a little whenever she talked about it.” Damn, it must have been hard for Candace growing up. Guys probably ran screaming from her at the very thought of facing down her parents.