Bittersweet Promises by Carrie Ann Ryan

Author:Carrie Ann Ryan [Ryan, Carrie Ann]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Carrie Ann Ryan

Chapter 11

Leif

* * *

Today was all about skulls and roses. I grinned as I worked on the final shading on the current skull with the rose crown.

“How is it looking?” Christy asked, and I kept silent, my focus on my work, not answering.

“You know he’s not going to answer you. Not when you’re nearing the end. You’re just going to have to wait and be surprised,” Nick said from his station.

Christy let out a breath but kept perfectly still, like she had been the entire session.

She was a trooper, didn’t complain about pain, didn’t bleed, and as this was her fourth tattoo with me, she knew the ins and outs of aftercare and actually listened to my instructions.

By the time I was finished and had washed off excess ink and plasma, I knew Christy was champing at the bit to get a look.

“Okay, are you ready?” I asked.

She smiled up at me. “I’ve been ready since you took away the mirror and didn’t let me watch the progress anymore. You’re a mean one, Leif Montgomery.”

“I really am. The meanest. Now, take a look and tell me what you think.”

My stomach twisted at that thought, waiting to see her reaction. We had gone over the sketch and incorporated the designs from her childhood. Each flower, whether blooming or wilted, was significant to her in the memories she had chosen to ink on her skin. This one piece was a small part of the growing art on her thigh. We wanted it to look like a forest that the viewer would travel through and find parts of her.

Her heart, her memories, her past, and her future.

This was the art that I loved to do most. Yes, I painted, molded clay, sketched with charcoal, among other things, and I sold what I could, and I enjoyed it.

Working with somebody else to create something that was a permanent fixture on their bodies meant something special to me. Something that couldn’t be replicated on paper because the person wearing it added their own layer of…magic.

“Leif…” She let out a breath. “It looks so real. Like it’s 3D and coming out of my skin. I cannot believe this is what we worked on. It’s even better than I could’ve imagined. And I know your work, so I was already imagining perfection.”

Christy, the woman who didn’t cry, didn’t show any emotion when it came to the pain of getting a tattoo, choked up as she spoke, and I swallowed hard.

“Glad to see it meets your approval,” I said with a wink, trying to cut the tension. Christy wouldn’t like anyone else knowing she cried like a human being. She liked to be stoic, sarcastic, a little bitter. She showed the world what she wanted them to see. So I was going to do my best to make sure the world saw that.

Even if it made me grin and fill with pride at the thought that she had broken just a little bit of that shell of hers because of my work.

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