Page 6 of Ink

“You double-booked.” His thick brows were drawn together in a line of disapproval. Of anger.

All week I’d been tripping to keep up with his commands. I’d been careful. I wassureof it. I was positive I hadn’t double-booked. But the evidence was staring us in the face in the form of two clients waiting for tattoos from him.

At the same fucking time.

“Ink, I promise–”

“Your promises mean nothing. Get your shit and leave. I told you if you fucked up, you were gone.”

I stood stunned before him for a moment. I had no idea what to do, how to react. What to even do. I was sure I’d logged the correct info in. I was positive.

“Ink, IknowI did it right.”

He sighed, leaning back on the balls of his feet. I hated that there were people around us to witness this. I hated that he didn’t seem to give a single fuck that there was an audience bearing witness to my humiliation.

His hand swept over his face, but he didn’t look at me with a single ounce of empathy. “You’re fired,” he said slowly.

Tears pricked behind my eyelids, but I refused to let them fall. “I need this job.”

Fer appeared from behind the wall, but I could barely look at her. She’d told me not to fuck up, and I did exactly what she’d advised against. I didn’t want to look at her and see the evidence of another person disappointed in me.

“Ink–”

“Not now, Fer.”

“Ink–”

“Not now!” he screamed. Then he looked back at me. “If you needed this job so badly, you wouldn’t have fucked it up. Now get out of my sight.”

He turned from me, leaving me standing there, feeling smaller than I’d ever felt before. That familiar sadness crept through me, embarrassment staining my cheeks. But most of all, there was anger. The anger that had gotten me fired from my last job. The anger that changed me completely and turned me into someone else entirely.

But…

This man was part of an MC, and it was only because of that I was able to tamp those feelings down. I had no idea what they were involved in. Whathewas involved in. What he was capable of.

And I had more pride than throwing a fit in front of so many strangers.

Fuck this place.

Fuck Ink.

With a deep breath, I squared my shoulders and turned. The clients I’d allegedly double-booked stared at me, one with sympathy, the other with a malicious grin.

Asshole.

I ignored them both and grabbed my bag from under the desk, slung it over my shoulder, and walked out of Devil’s Ink. The harsh sun was like a slap to the face. It burned the makeup onto my cheeks, marking my face red. This would be nothing compared to the verbal lashing my mamá would give me, though.

Just the thought of seeing disappointment bleed through her dark eyes made me fear going home. The first few times I’d lost jobs and was unable to help the family, she’d lashed out in the only way she knew how. But violence never scared me, and a part of me wondered if the darkness I fostered inside was a gift she’d passed to me when I was in the womb.

After she learned to temper her knee-jerk reactions, she began showing her displeasure in other ways. In ways that hurt more than a slap or a hair pull ever could.

There was just something about her sadness that cut deeper.

Seeing it twice within the span of two weeks was going to ruin me.

I wouldn’t tell her.

I decided on that course of action as I walked to the bus stop and hailed a combi in the opposite direction of my house. With my brother using the family car, I was stuck on public transport for the foreseeable future. Maybe I could walk around Tlaxcala City and see if anywhere was hiring. Maybe I’d be lucky enough to land a job before the day was out and I wouldn’t have to lie to my mamá.

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