Page 7 of Sinful Lies

The apartment stairs creaked under my weight as I made my way down to the street. The air was icy cold, cutting through my foggy mind.

I started walking, my destination clear—the tattoo shop.

The streets were busy now, people rushing home from their nine-to-five jobs, returning to their loved ones.

Family.

The word lodged itself in my chest like a shard of glass. I stopped halfway down an alley, leaning against the brick wall to catch my breath. My hands shook as I closed my eyes, trying to push the word away, but it stuck there, stubborn and cruel.

Family.

The ones I loved, but constantly hurt.

The ones I’d lost—not just my sister, whose death had shattered something vital inside me, but the rest of them too. Not because they’d left, but because I’d pushed them away.

Grief consumed me, guilt weighed me down, and shutting them out seemed safer than letting them see the wreckage inside.

Family binds us by blood, weaving an invisible vow to stay together. But whenshehad died, it felt like that cord had snapped, and I’d been cutting the frayed edges ever since.

I swallowed hard and forced my legs to move, ignoring the tightness in my chest.

The tattoo shop wasn’t far. Just fifteen more minutes.

Fifteen minutes, and I could forget it all again.

“You’re late,” Jasmine said flatly, not even glancing up as she poured herself a cup of coffee.

Jasmine Miller.

We’d been inseparable in high school—cheerleading together, devouring greasy burgers and strawberry milkshakes every Wednesday after practice, gossiping about boys and dreaming up the futures we’d both believed we deserved.

But life had kicked us hard.

She’d married her high school boyfriend fresh out of graduation, and he’d turned out to be a monster. The abuse had ended when he was arrested for domestic violence, but not before he left her with a baby to raise on her own—a little girl she named Star.

Now she was the only tattoo artist in Bay Village, turning pain into art for anyone who walked through her door.

I followed her as she gestured toward the back room, her shop smelling faintly of ink and antiseptic. She closed the door behind us while I slipped off my jacket, draping it over a rickety coat rack.

I settled onto the tattoo chair, the leather cold against my skin.

“Yeah, sorry, I got caught up with work,” I lied smoothly.

She let out a heavy sigh, turning her honey-brown eyes on me. Her gaze flicked over my face, zeroing in on my pupils. They must’ve been blown wide, judging by the way her lips tightened before she spun around to her computer.

Clicking through a few screens, she finally pulled up the design we’d discussed.

The dragon glared at me from the screen—fierce and alive, its bold black lines coiled into vivid swirls of color that would crawl across my back, its tail curling just above the dimples at my spine.

A dragon to mark my transformation.

Not just a rebirth—a reckoning.

The new me, built from fire and pain.

“Still sure you wanna do this, Jade?” Jasmine asked, turning her head just enough to catch my gaze.

“Yes.”

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