Page 18 of Arris, Jayme & Dyani
“You good?”
“Yeah.” I nodded as if he could see me.
“You sure?”
“Yep.”
“So, you’re just talking about me with your friends now?”
“I uhm…” I paused while I tried to think of something to say. “Illiana is thinking about getting a tattoo!” I blurted. “I was just recommending you.”
“You’ve never seen me tattoo.”
“But I trust you.”
“Yeah, alright.” Arris snickered. “What is she thinking about getting?”
“What are you thinking about getting again, Illiana?” I turned toward her.
She shrugged. I gave her a look. A moment passed, then another. A smile slowly crossed her face.
“A butterfly,” she said. “I was thinking a butterfly on the back of my shoulder. Ask him if he has any openings tonight?”
My mouth opened but I didn’t get a chance to say anything to her or him.
“I can hear her and I can take her if y’all want to do a quick walk-in,” Arris said. “It shouldn’t take too long and I don’t have anything scheduled.”
“Okay. We’ll drop by,” I said simply.
“Alright. I’ll send you the info of the shop I’m at tonight.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
I hung up quickly. Illiana broke into a fit of giggles. I cut my eyes at her.
“Bitch.” I elbowed her and a second later we both started laughing.
“Let’s get this check and head to the tattoo shop then.” Illiana clapped her hands then lifted one to try and get the attention of our waiter.
It didn’t take her long to get them. We paid then called an iDrive to pick us up and take us to the address Arris sent.
When we got there, I felt even better than I had before and Illiana and I stumbled out of the back of the car a giggling mess. The shop was in a nice part of town which for some reason shocked me.
Illiana walked in first and I damn near jumped out of my skin when it was Arris who held the door open for us.
“What’s up?” His eyes trailed over me, from my feet on up and settled on my eyes.
“Hey!” I responded a little too loudly. Arris’s eyebrows knitted together. “This is my friend, Illiana. Illiana, this is my brother’s friend, Arris.”
“Nice to meet you.” He offered her a hand and I noted the way she raked her eyes over him, up and down twice, before grinning and shaking his hand.
This time it was my eyebrows fiddling together.
I mean, I’d said Arris was fine and I meant that.
He was average height, but he was also dark skinned with deep brown eyes and some of the best lashes I’d ever seen. He had a sleeve of tattoos going up his right arm, a brand on the left arm that I knew was a signal to the outside world that he was an official member of DP, and a bird on the left side of his throat with a small, cursive J inside one of the wings. I did my best not to stare but that wasn’t hard to do when he smiled and gave me a full view of his pearly white teeth and partial gold grill at the top. It was covering four of his teeth, two on each side.
He slipped a hand into the pocket of his sweatpants.
