Page 6 of Ink

“No,” she moaned, holding her face in her hands. “Tell me that you’re kidding.”

“I wish that I could, for my pillow’s sake, but the proof is sitting right there on the sofa,” he said. She looked back to see the small puddle of drool that she had left behind and groaned.

“I’ll clean that up tomorrow,” she insisted. “I mean, later on this morning, when I wake up again,” she said, noting that it was after midnight.

“No, I’ll take care of it,” Ink assured.

“You will not clean up my drool,” she insisted. She turned to face him on the staircase and nearly fell off the step just above him. Ink wrapped her in his arms and damn if it didn’t feel right. Her body seemed to like it every time he hugged or touched her, and he seemed to do a lot of that today—especially when she cried. Charlie didn’t want to read too much into it, but she was starting to wonder why that was. Maybe he didn’t like it when women cried, or maybe hugging strangers was his go-to move.

“Woah,” he said, trying to steady her on the step. “You okay?” he asked.

“I’m just a little bit dizzy from just waking up I guess,” she lied. She was probably dizzy from the man who was holding her in his arms right now. He smelled good and damn if she didn’t lean into him and sniff him.

“I think you should let me help you to bed,” Ink said. Her body hummed to life, and she shivered at the idea of him taking her to bed with him.

“You mean my bed, right?” she asked. He froze and closed his eyes and for a second, she was sure that she had said something wrong. Maybe she had been too forward but for some reason, when she was in his arms, that didn’t matter to her.

“Charlie,” he whispered, “we only just met today.” Yeah, she had pushed too hard and there was no taking back the words—they were already out there.

“I know that Ink,” she said. “I’m just being silly. I get that way when I’m tired. Just ignore me.”

“What if I don’t want to ignore you?” he asked.

“I’m not sure what you’re saying,” she whispered. Her heart felt as though it might beat out of her chest and Ink didn’t seem to want to let go of her.

“What I mean is that for some reason, I feel as though I’m drawn to you, Charlie. When you ran into my shop, there was something in your eyes that made me want to help you, butgetting you back to my place, I can’t explain it, but being with you like this feels familiar. Does that make sense?” he asked.

She nodded, “It does,” she admitted. “I was just trying to figure out why my heart races every time you touch me.”

“Mine does the same thing,” he said. “But I refuse to give into whatever it is that we’re feeling. Maybe it’s just the excitement of the day or the fact that you’re here in my home. I just think that we should play things slow and if we still feel this way later, we can figure everything out then.”

“I think that’s a good idea,” she lied. She didn’t want to playthings slowly. She wanted to leap and have Ink catch her. For the first time in her life, she wanted to be reckless and let the chips fall where they may.

Ink helped her up to her room, “Night, Charlie,” he breathed. She watched as he walked across the hallway to his room and wondered if she should shut her door or not. When Ink closed his door, she did the same, leaning back against it. Charlie felt like she was in high school and had just gone on her first date. “Goodnight, Ink,” she whispered. Maybe she was silly for feeling the way that she did, but for the first time in a long time, she felt excited about waking up tomorrow.

Ink

Ink was having trouble keeping his hands to himself night after night when they went to their separate rooms to sleep. It had been almost six weeks since she moved into her spare room and took over his nightly fantasies.

Her ex-husband had been running around town, asking if anyone had seen his wife. He was showing Charlie’s picture to everyone he could stop to get to take a look at it. He knew that if Zeb kept looking, eventually he’d find her, and Ink couldn’t let that happen. He had feelings for her, like it or not, and there was no way that he’d let her asshole ex touch her ever again. The problem really was that he was the one who wanted to touch her, but he was too afraid to take charge and ask Charlie for what he wanted from her. Honestly, he never saw himself as a guy who dated a pregnant woman or even had a kid himself. So much had happened with his grandfather and the move to a new town, and he didn’t have time to think about such things. Sure, he wanted to settle down, but finding a woman that he wanted who was already pregnant with another man’s baby, felt like a bit of a rush.

He was becoming so domesticated that the guys down at the Road Reapers liked to give him a hard time. He had gone to all her prenatal appointments and seeing the baby moving around on the sonogram, and even hearing her heartbeat, had him thinking about fatherhood and all the stuff that went along with it.

Charlie had seemed a little bit stressed out about putting in a restraining order against Zeb. She struggled with the idea of going to the cops about him and Ink worried that she was still in love with her ex, but time had proven him wrong. Charlie not only filed the restraining order against Zeb, but she also filed a complaint against him for spousal abuse. The cops took pictures of her bruises and black eye along with her statement.

She had been through so much in such a short time, he wanted to do something nice for her. She told him that she wanted to be able to go out and not worry about her ex finding her, and he knew just the place that they could go—his club. He knew that the guys and their women would help make Charlie feel welcome, and she had already met Owen and Mace. It would be nice for her to meet their wives since Charlie didn’t seem to have many friends. Her sister had all but cut her off since Charlie had called to tell her that she was staying with Ink. Her sister asked her a million questions, but Charlie only told her that he was a guy she met who was letting her stay in his spare room and that she’d be in touch as soon as it was safe. Of course, her sister didn’t like not knowing what exactly was going on, and she told Charlie not to bother calling her at all. He hated seeing Charlie upset and when she cried, all Ink wanted to do was hold her—which usually led to him coming up with other ideas that he wanted to do with her, but that might be pushing things too far, too fast.

He knocked on her bedroom door and she called for him to come in. He found her sitting on the end of her bed, lookingmore worried than a woman about to go out for the evening should. “Hey, why do you look so upset?” he asked.

“I’m just nervous about tonight and meeting all your friends. I don’t have anything to wear, and I wish I could have gone out to buy something. All I have is this,” she said, standing and twirling around for him. “And I look like an Oompa Loompa.” He knew that he shouldn’t laugh, but he just couldn’t help himself.

“You do not look like an Oompa Loompa,” he insisted.

“I’m wearing leggings, and this oversized sweatshirt that I borrowed from you,” she said. He had lent it to her a few weeks back when some of her things couldn’t fit her anymore. He had to admit that seeing her in his sweatshirt turned him on. All he could imagine as he lay in bed every night was her in just his sweatshirt and nothing else.

“I look fat, and should I really be going to a bar?” she asked, holding her belly. She had a point, but no one at the bar would think it strange that she was pregnant at a bar. Mace’s wife, Brooke, had gone to the Road Reapers up until her due date. And after she gave birth, the baby started coming to the club with them. The guys even joked that the baby was the club’s mascot, not that Brooke was amused by that.

“You’re not fat, you’re pregnant,” he insisted. Mace had taught him to say that to her every time she insisted that she was fat. He said that Brooke liked to tell him that she was fat at least once a day toward the end of her pregnancy.

---