“Alright then,” D’Andre said. “If you’re so sure then loser covers the tab for a dinner at Mel’s and a night in South Beach.”
He flinched, imagining his bank account after that kind of night. “I’m on a cop’s salary now not the league minimum.”
D’Andre arched an eyebrow and smirked. The bastard wasn’t about to give up on busting his chops. Of course, if the situation had been swapped he would have been busting his best friend’s balls just as hard. It’s what they’d always done since they’d both unpacked their suitcases in the dorms years ago.
“A date?” he asked, the idea taking hold of him.
His heart sped up but doubt shoved its way through his ego and set up shop in his head. Penny wasn’t like the women he usually dated—she wasn’t a club girl or a badge bunny—plus, she lived next door. Love ‘em and leave ‘em wasn’t an option unless he packed up his condo and moved.
D’Andre held out his fist. “You playing or what?”
Time to either man up or surrender his balls. Trying to ignore the way his mouth had gone dry and his toes had started to sweat, he raised his knuckles. “Fine.”
They bumped fists.
“Look sharp, man.” D’Andre laughed, nodding at something over Sawyer’s left shoulder. “Your girl is on her way over.”
He whipped his head around. Penny wasn’t just strolling over for a flirty chat. She was marching over with her full lips in a tight pucker. In a heartbeat he scrolled through the last ten minutes wondering what in the hell he could have done to piss her off so completely, but he came up empty.
Penny stopped in front of D’Andre’s chair, her hands on her hips. “Where did you get that tattoo?”
Obviously unprepared for the total lack of awe over who he was, D’Andre blinked as he looked down at his chest, which was littered with tats of varying shapes, sizes and quality. “Which one?”
“The Phoenix on your shoulder.” Penny pointed to his left side.
D’Andre screwed up his face. “A year ago. Miami. Shit, I don’t remember exactly where, but it was definitely here.” He pivoted in his seat and grabbed the suntan lotion off of Sawyer’s chair and held it out to her. “You want to put some of this on it while you take a closer look?”
Her cheeks turned pink, highlighting the freckles dusting the bridge of her nose, and she exhaled a disgusted sigh. “How do you not remember who did your work?”
D’Andre shrugged. “I was drunk.”
She’d been pink before, but now her coloring went straight to Ferrari red. Her big brown eyes rounded and the vein in her temple throbbed to a techno beat. This situation was about to go south quick.
Putting on his most soothing, I’m-a-cop-and-I’m-here-to-help look, Sawyer asked, “What’s going on?”
“Some asshole is stealing my tattoo designs.”
Weird. Who knew that that was a thing?
“How are they getting them?” D’Andre asked, always so completely not helpful in tense situations.
Penny went ramrod straight again. “That’s what I’m trying to find out,” she said with enough bitterness to turn the Miami summer downright chilly.
“I could help.” The offer was out of Sawyer’s mouth before he had a chance to double-think it.
She rolled her eyes. “Yeah right.”
“No really. I’m a cop, remember you examined my badge last night? I work vice.” And solving her problem would be the perfect way to work his way into her good graces and go out on that date. Penny will be happy because her thief will be caught. He will be happy because his bank account won’t be plundered. It was a win-win situation. What could go wrong? “I’ve got a few days off. Why don’t I help you look around?”
She eyeballed him, suspicion forming a little line between her eyes. “Vacation or suspension?”
More like well-deserved break after a case he’d worked on fell apart right as they were ready to put the cuffs on the perps because the frat boy drug dealer leading the operation had parents with enough money and connections to make the whole case disappear. “Something like that.”
She stared at him, her body language as stiff as ever, but she was wavering. He could see it in the way she nibbled her bottom lip and how she kept fidgeting with the black sketchpad she had pressed against her tits like a shield. All he needed to do was give her a gentle nudge to push her over the edge into yes.
“I can track this thief down.” And he could. No one was better at working a case than he was. “Do you want my help or not?”
Chapter Three
Penny stared at her bedroom wall—her silent bedroom wall—and tried to understand what she’d just done.
You said yes, dumb ass.
Why in the hell had she done that? She never asked for help. It was the one thing she and her twin brother, Copper, had in common. Well, that and the red hair and stubborn streak. Still, she’d said yes to Sawyer. It made no sense.
The doorbell buzzed.
It was too late to go back now. Her temper had landed her smack dab in the middle of trouble again. At least this time it wasn’t the mystery man who happened to be her surprise father on the other side of her door. This time she knew the devil in the hallway.
Hurrying through her condo, she pinched her cheeks and smoothed her stick straight hair back behind her ears. By the time she turned the doorknob, she was ready for battle.
Sawyer stood in the hallway in olive shorts and a white T-shirt that fit snug across his broad, muscular shoulders.
He held out an unopened package of Oreos in one hand and two unopened bottles of beer in the other. “Peace offering.”
Her mouth watered at the sight of the chocolate and creme cookies. “How did you know?”
“Your wrist.”
She glanced down at the Oreo cookie tattoo on the inside of her wrist. It wasn’t her best tattoo, the details weren’t as crisp as they should be, but it had been her first. Her brother had the glass of milk inked into his full sleeve tattoo. Her cookie, though, was small and easily noticed. The fact that he had made her brain all fuzzy.
“Wow.” She brushed her thumb across the quarter-sized tattoo as if she could rub away the discombobulated feeling Sawyer always incited. “Usually most guys just notice my boobs.”
“Those are pretty phenomenal too.” He winked, but his gaze never dropped from her face.
Someone was on his best behavior, which only put her more on guard. “Come on in. I’ll go grab a bottle opener.”
*****
It had taken every iota of self-control, but he managed to keep from staring at her amazing tits, which were shown off to perfection in a tight black v-neck T-shirt with a picture of a tattooed Marilyn Monroe on it. He needed a beer after seeing that.
Her apartment had the same layout as his, with the open concept living room/dining room leading to the kitchen on one side, a small balcony straight ahead that let in the day’s last rays of sun and a bedroom on the other side. From the black suede couch to the red leather chairs, everything was pin neat, perfectly organized and followed the same black, red and white color scheme—until he looked toward the bedroom. The door was open, revealing a sliver of an emerald green comforter and electric blue sheets still twisted from last night. The T-shirt he’d seen her in last night lay crumpled on the floor.
She sauntered back in, drawing his attention from her bedroom to her long, lean legs that seemed to go on forever. His dick twitched. God, this woman was going to wear out his zippers.
He took the beer she offered with a nodded thank you and sat down on the couch, resting his arm across the back. She hesitated for a moment before taking up residence in one of the two red leather chairs, tucking her legs up under her.
“Okay,” he said. “Bring me up to speed with what’s going on.”
Penny chewed her bottom lip and sighed. “When you got your tattoo, did you bring in a picture of what you wanted or did you just pick something from the flash?”
Obviously, this was not going to be a just the facts retelling. He settled back against the couch, knowing better than to try to push a story out of someone before they were ready to tell. It was interrogation 101.
“What’s the flash?” he asked.
“The pieces of paper showing a bunch of different designs. Most studios have them tacked to a wall or collected in books.”
He thought back to the small tattoo studio in Vegas where he’d gotten the thunderbolt tattoo after getting the call from the Miami Thunder coach that they wanted him to come on down for training camp. The bolt on his shoulder was one of six options shown on a white piece of paper hanging on the wall. “The flash.”
“You’re like most impulse tattooers. Those clients can be bread and butter for some studios, but they’re not the work that really lets an artist show their creativity and skill. For that, you want a custom client, someone who is looking for something that is unique and feeds into their vision.” She took a sip from her bottle. “With customized designs I’ll usually meet with the client at least twice before we even begin to ink. During the first visits, the client and I come up with a design and refine it before we’re ready to go. Those designs are never repeated on another client.”