“As big as your palm.”
My palm’s pretty big. Fifteen centimeters or so. That’s a hugefucking mark on Kez’s slender back. “How ‘bout as big as your palm?” Kez has long hands for a woman, but the length is mostly in her fingers. Her palm’s less than ten centimeters around.
She shakes her head. “I want to feel your hand on me. Yours can be the size of my palm if you want.”
I grunt. I want matching brands. “That means cutting two separate brands.”
“Too much work for you?” she asks.
Sarky kitten. I reach out with my free hand and smack her on the ass. “I want them to be the same.”
“Well, I’d like mine to be that big.” She reaches around me and drags her fingertip across the flimsy. I hold my hand over it, and she plays with it until the image exactly fits under my palm.
Once she’s done resizing, I tap the corners to lock the size into place, then use the stylus to thin the lines of the design. Although I don’t have anything like Kez’s scar, I know that scar tissue stretches over time. At least mine has. So unless I want a pink blob on Kez’s back and my arm in a couple of years, I’d better start with nice thin lines.
I hollow out the letters first. Turning the solid lines into outlines. Then I add curlicues to the serifs. Fill in the center of each curlicue. As I work, I see the healed scar in my mind. I want it to be flowing, not blocky. Curved, like the edges of my kukris, or the line of Kez’s soft cheek. I add more curlicues in the middle of the vertical stems, softening them. Then on the crossbars. Until there’s not a single, unbroken straight line.
Kez watches over my left shoulder, her cheek pressed against my deltoid, where the brand will be. She has one arm looped around my waist. Leaving my right side free to work. When I finally put the stylus down, she sighs. “It’s beautiful,” she says.
It is. I shift back, slide my arm around her and draw her against my side. It is beautiful and I’ll be proud to wear it. Prouder still to see it on Kez’s hide. Healed, it’ll be a soft pink against the pearl of her skin. Perfect.
I check the chrono in my eye. A few minutes before Doc Gray arrives. Just enough time for us to talk about Duncan.
“You want another cup of tea?” I ask Kez. She nods and follows me into the kitchen while I move around making us another cup. Once we’re both sipping, I put my arm around her. “Somethin’ I need to tell you.”
“Mmm, about the brand?”
“No. This is from the other night. When I took down the Bale Brothers.” I pause to appreciate my tea, and the warmth of her against my side. “They gave me another name. The name of someone who’s been feelin’ intel to Jaxon, about you.”
I let that sink in while we both drink.
Finally, Kez says, “Duncan.”
“You knew already?” I ask.
“No ... but he’s the only person who makes sense. Unless it’s Ape.”
I grunt. She trusts her brother as little as I do – because he’s a fucking infant – but I don’t think she believes he’d betray her. “It’s not Ape.”
Kez leans her head against my shoulder. “Chain will love this. He warned me. He told me Dunk was a NoBo. That I shouldn’t trust him. I thought he was just being an ass. It wasn’t long after I kicked him out.”
After she found out he’d been fucking Nev.
“Doesn’t make him any less of an ass when it came to you.”
She snorts. “According to him, I was the one who did something wrong.”
He cheated on her with her best friend and she’s the one who did something wrong? “How’d he figure?”
“He says I stopped loving him.”
“I would, too, he slept with my best friend.”
“Hmm.” She nips at my shoulder; the shock of Duncan’s betrayal is passing. “He said it was before that. I stopped loving him so he turned to Nev.”
“That’s fuckin’ bullshit.”
“I thought so, too. That’s why I didn’t forgive him.” She sighs. “But, honestly, Hale, I probably did stop loving him.”