Page 1 of Bad Boy in Her Bed

Chapter One

Birch Baker angledhis magnifier over his latest work one last time before turning off the light and setting it on the counter.“Okay, Minda.Why don’t we snap a few pictures before I wrap it?”

His client drew her leg up on the chair for closer inspection, a grin spreading across her face.“Damn, Baker.You really are king of the cover-up.It looks amazing.”

While she pulled out her phone to take a photo, he prepped the ointments and bandages, making a mental note to check the shop’s medical tape supply.

The tattoo was an easy one for him, a simple butterfly whose wing design incorporated, and therefore hid, the name of Minda’s ex-husband.Brightly colored and delicately outlined, it was a good start to a slow Monday when he wasn’t yet firing on all cylinders.

With her new tat protected and her aftercare instructions in hand, Minda gave him a wave and walked out the door of Serpent’s Tongue Ink, leaving him alone to slump back in his chair and mentally prepare himself to take on the bookkeeping he’d been putting off for weeks.

The business’s year-end paperwork was already overdue by a month, the stacks of handwritten invoices and receipts still haphazardly organized in a mess in the bottom drawer of his desk.

Step one.Open the drawer.

Getting to his feet, he poured himself a cup of coffee and sat, taking a resigned breath as he yanked on the metal handle until the weighted drawer creaked open.He lifted the first stack out and began the arduous task of separating the crumpled papers into piles.

Over its three years, Serpent’s Tongue had increased its business eightfold.A small hole-in-the-wall storefront at the end of a strip mall, the location was prime real estate for him and his business partner, Ryder Drayson.With low rent, plenty of parking, and functioning electricity, the space was ideal for two broke guys with limited job prospects and less than ideal reputations.

Of course, in the ink business, their questionable reps bordered on marketable.Plenty of Epson, Nebraska’s finest waltzed into Serpent’s Tongue to be tatted up, almost giddy over the thrill of walking on the wild side for a few hours while two of the town’s ex-cons decorated their biceps and calves.

Ryder relished in it.

Birch, not so much.

Ryder was built like a linebacker and covered from the neck down in ink.With dark brown eyes, a shaved head, and a penchant for leather, he didn’t fit the image of a guy who came from a decent family.His mom worked as a secretary at the local high school up until her retirement a few years back and his dad was down to working part-time at the bike plant two towns over.Little league and football games peppered Ryder’s upbringing, but didn’t do much to squash the rebellious streak ingrained deep in his psyche.

Birch never understood it, the need to rebel against comfort and security.

But Ryder did it with flair, until his underage drinking and joyriding took a sharp turn after his eighteenth birthday and the law no longer went as easy on the middle-class white boy from the nice side of the water tower.By his twenty-second birthday, Ryder was nine charges deep into a plea deal dropping his prison time down from eleven years to two.

Possession was nine-tenths of the law, and Ryder possessed a hell of a lot of stolen stereos and weed.

Fastening his piles with paper clips, Birch hauled another stack onto the desk to sort.

He and Ryder grew up together, one boy revolting against a home with heat and a full fridge and parents who attended every one of his games and court appearances, the other sitting in the Epson cop shop for two nights after stealing a stick of deodorant at thirteen while his dad was off doing whatever, or whoever, he wanted.

They sat at the back of the same classes, played on the same football team, attended the same parties.

Dated the same girls.

So it was no surprise to either of them when they found themselves in the same cellblock, Ryder doing his time with weekly visits from his disappointed but supportive parents, and Birch waiting out the clock week in and week out, with his brothers obeying his strict instructions not to visit.

The door flung open, setting off the metal chimes and yanking Birch out of his organization trance and straight into a stupefied one.

Holy hell.

From her perfectly tousled honey-blonde hair to her tailored grey suit jacket to her four-inch red stilettos, everything about the woman walking in screameddon’t mess with me.But damn, if he didn’t want to mess with her.Long legs were wrapped in tight grey pants, eyes hidden by oversized, mirrored sunglasses as she scanned the narrow reception room, her nude lips pursed.

She was a woman on a mission.

Her heels clicked across the worn linoleum floor as she approached the desk, her car keys dangling from a crooked finger.“Hi there,” she said, giving him a tight smile.“This is going to sound a little strange, but you wouldn’t happen to have a cell phone I could use, would you?”

Snapping out of his stupor, he cleared his throat and stood, glancing down at the crisp black punk tee she wore under her fitted suit.“Yeah, sure.Our landline is acting up, so you can use mine.”

She looked back toward the exit, her shoulder-length hair swinging with the movement.“The thing is, I need to use it outside.In my car.”She turned back to him with a huff, and a hint of recognition settled into his mind.“I’m pretty certain I’ve lost my phone somewhere in there, and I need to call it so I can find it before I start backtracking my whole morning.”Peering behind him to the empty chairs, she swung her keys in a little loop.“If it’s not too much trouble.”

“None at all.”He smiled, pulling his phone from his pocket as he strode around the desk and opened the door for her.“A break from paperwork is always a welcome distraction.Which car are we ransacking?”

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