Rivers of Ink by Julie Archer

Author:Julie Archer [Archer, Julie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2018-05-06T16:00:00+00:00

12

The sun was starting to come up, and Callan was still awake. He was stretched out on the sofa in his living room and hadn’t slept since Alicia had given him the brush off the previous evening. His behaviour towards Ned had been out of order, and he still hadn’t explained the whole situation to his new girlfriend. The truth would probably be a good start.

He’d put on The Comedy Channel for background noise, half watching the reruns of old sitcoms. He stared at the screen, not really taking anything in. His eyelids started to droop as he finally felt sleepy for the first time in hours.

What felt like minutes later, his alarm went off. Marek was doing the morning shift, as Saturday was usually a busy day for tattooing, and he was doing the afternoon. It was already midday. Callan dragged his tired body into the bathroom and turned on the shower. He stripped off his clothes and threw them into a ball in the corner. He stepped under the flow and let the jets run over him, stimulating the blood around his body.

Not more than about half an hour later, he was in Fosse Arcade. He stopped by Books ’n’ Beans for a much-needed coffee and sensed it was going to be a heavily caffeinated day. The Unbound Soul had a low-key buzz about it; Jason and Miles were with clients, and there were several guys waiting on the sofas, chatting to each other or on their phones. Callan smiled. He loved seeing people happy when they were in his shop. It made him feel the same. His eyes swept over the empty reception podium. He hadn’t expected Alicia to be there; he’d given her the day off, having anticipated spending the previous night with her. There had been a tiny part of him that hoped she might have popped in. He had to make things right with her again.

“Hey, boss, perfect timing. I’ve just taken your half twelve up.” Marek came down the stairs, leather jacket already on, ready to head home. “That’s gonna be a long job, and I can’t wait to see the results. Make sure you take pics, yeah? I’ll see you Tuesday.” He high-fived Callan and left.

Marek wasn’t wrong. It was a back piece, and even the outlining would take over an hour. He and the client had agreed that the session would last no longer than three hours. Callan wished he’d brought cake as well as coffee.

It was close to four o’clock when he finally finished. Miles had also left for the day, leaving him alone with Jason. The two of them hadn’t spoken a great deal since Jason had started, although Callan wanted to quiz him a little more about his relationship with Isobel. Neither of them had customers, so they sat on the sofas downstairs, both on their devices.

Aidy had sent Callan pictures from the previous evening. One of them was of Callan and Alicia, caught candidly while they were standing at the bar.

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