Stepbrother Inked(11)

I bit back a sigh and leaned forward, resting my elbows on my knees to  watch him when suddenly, he paused, the tip of his pencil resting  lightly on the page. When Flor turned slowly in his seat to look at me,  jeans creaking against the leather of the chair, a shiver went down my  spine. As his thoughtful expression morphed into a wicked grin, the  shiver became a full body shake that I had to fight to quell.

"Well, what are you waiting for, Abi? Take your pants off."

The words went straight through me, piercing my heart like an arrow.  Between my legs, an insistent throbbing began that I didn't know how to  control. Wow.

"All the way off?" I asked, knowing that was a stupid question. Florian  laughed at me, hunching back over the table, pencil sliding across the  page like it was nothing, like he could do this in his sleep.

"Unless you want to do it with your pants tangled around your ankles."  The corner of his mouth twitched. "Which I'm not opposed to."

I huffed, knowing he was just teasing me and sat up, pulling off the  gray leather boots I'd put on in an attempt to look somewhat stylish.  Walking into this shop was like walking into a lion's den, one filled  with gorgeous, perfectly put-together lionesses, dressed up like wafer  thin models. I knew I'd never match up to them, no matter how hard I  tried, but I couldn't seem to keep myself from trying. A pair of boots  and some nice jeans weren't fooling anyone though; I had breasts and  hips and a stubborn layer of extra padding that nobody wanted to see. I  knew I wasn't fat (I wasn't that delusional yet), but I also knew I  wasn't winning any beauty contests.

I stood up, my bare feet hitting the floor with a slap and then started  to unbutton my jeans. I could practically feel Flor's eyes on my back,  yet when I turned around, he wasn't looking at me. I swallowed and faced  towards the wall, hooking my fingers in the denim and closing my eyes.  This shouldn't be so hard and yet  …  I felt like I was drowning again,  smothered in the ashes of an unrequited love. I breathed out and up,  sending stray strands of hair fluttering around my face, and then I  dropped my jeans. Or I tried to anyway. I'd squeezed myself into my  tightest pair of dark wash skinny jeans, so I had to really struggle to  push them down my hips and over my calves.                       
       
           



       

The bikini bottoms I'd slipped into at home felt suddenly inadequate.

"Alright," Florian said, and maybe I was imagining it but his voice felt  like it was deeper, darker, huskier. I turned around and found him  intently focused on the drafting table and his artwork. Okay, okay, so I  really was imagining it. "Come over here and just stand like you  normally would, don't do anything special."

I turned around and moved over to him, my feet cold on the bare wood  floor as I paused next to my stepbrother and watched his expression as  he looked up at me  –  or rather at my  …  crotch. He turned in his chair  and reached out, taking hold of the strings on my right hip. I felt  dizzy, this close to him, dressed in so little. It would take a split  second for him to lift me up and set me on the table, undo his pants,  and slide into me.

Holy crap.

Flor's fingers tugged roughly on the strings and the knot came undone,  the top corner of the bikini falling forward as I gasped and dropped my  hand to keep the rest of it from sliding away. I knew I was breathing  hard. Hell, I could hear my own breaths echoing in the tiny room, could  feel the sweat forming on my lower back, between my thighs. The hand  that held my bikini bottoms in place was shaking, just a little but  enough that I knew Flor could tell.

If he did, at least he had the decency to pretend not to. I looked up at  the ceiling as he leaned back and grabbed some blue tape, taping the  bikini in place so that a good majority of my hip was exposed. Feeling  his fingers press the tape into place nearly undid me completely. I had  to bite my lower lip and keep my gaze focused on the mural above his  head. If I'd looked down at him in that moment, I might've grabbed his  hair with my left hand and pulled his head back, kissed him and hoped to  God that he kissed me back.

But I wasn't that brave, unfortunately.

"Okay, now don't get your panties in a bunch over this," he said and  then chuckled, the sound worming its way into my skull and taking hold  there. "Not that it doesn't look like they're already in one." I  would've smacked him playfully, but that would've required touching him  and I wasn't capable of doing that right now. "But I have to shave you.  There are fine hairs all over the body, even one as smooth as yours." As  smooth as yours. Was that something a stepbrother should say to his  stepsister? Since Flor was the only stepbrother I knew, I had no clue.

He sat back and I finally took a chance, glancing down at him as he  snapped black latex gloves over his tattooed hands and pulled out a  disposable razor from a nearby drawer. The scrape of the blade against  my skin seemed loud and I prayed inside my head that Flor would turn on  music when he got to work. I didn't think I could sit there in silence  with him and not scream.

When he was done shaving me, Florian grabbed a small plastic tub and  opened the lid, switching out his gloves for a new pair. For all his  faults, Flor was a professional and he knew what he was doing. I waited  with a thumping heart while he dug out some of the clear cream and then  reached up to my hip, sliding his fingers along my skin as I crackled  and burned inside. Tears pricked the corners of my eyes, not because I  was sad, but because the sensations were almost too much to bear.  Florian's hands were too much, the heat of his breath against my skin  was too much, the smell of his hair, the hardness of his muscles, the  color of his eyes  …  ugh. My stepbrother was a never ending set of  stimuli for me.

When he finished, giving no indication that touching me was affecting  him quite so much as it was me, he pressed the tracing paper to my hip  and pushed it flush, running his hand over and over and over it.

Torture. Sheer torture. What was I thinking? I couldn't go through with  this. We'd just started and already, I was swollen and desperate  downstairs, panting like I'd just run a marathon and shaking like a  leaf.

"Relax, Abi," Florian told me, peeling the paper back and tossing it  into the silver trashcan near his chair. "Hell, you're even making me  nervous." Flor pushed his chair back and stood up, tilting his head to  the side and focusing on my hip. "Looks just about perfect to me. Why  don't you take a peek and tell me what you think of the placement. Don't  be afraid to adjust it. This is permanent, so make sure you're happy  with it." He took off his gloves again and stepped back, giving me room  to move to the mirror on the back of the door.

I stared at myself, pupils dilated, lips parted and moist, the mocha  color of my skin shining bronze under the lights from above. I didn't  look half bad, I guessed. And the stag? It might seem weird to put a  deer on your hip, but it was perfect. It was Flor. It was me. In a way,  it was us.

This is symbolic, Abigail, I told myself, turning side to side as I  examined the lines of my future tattoo and avoided meeting Flor's gaze  in the reflection. You and him, together, forever, but in a way that's  safe, in a way that nobody has to get hurt.                       
       
           



       

I took a deep breath and jumped in feet first.

"Let's do this."





The first prick made my eyes water, but I kept my focus on Flor's hand  as he moved the needle across my skin with an expert's touch, starting  with the darkness of the sky behind the stag. For a few minutes there, I  wondered how I was going to make it through several hours of this but  slowly, the pain started to fade away, turning into a numb buzzing  sensation, like someone was drawing on my skin with a vibrating  ballpoint pen.

I watched him work, let himself get drawn into that artistic zone that  I'd never understood but had always wanted so desperately to attain. I  was too logical, too analytical, to get there and really create. I  blamed it on my dad; sharp logic and undeniable reason were at the basis  of his DNA.

"How are you feeling, Abs?" Flor asked me after a while, silence  reigning down around us like king. I wanted to make conversation, carry  on the friendship routine we'd been practicing for the last few months,  but the closeness of the room, the nearness of his skin, the fact that  he was literally marking me, none of that made it easy.

Last time, Abigail, I told myself, vowing to make a clean break after  this. If I couldn't be around Florian without losing my mind, then maybe  I shouldn't be around him at all. It was hard to even think about that  with him sitting so close to me.