Divine Phoenix(Divine Creek Ranch 10)(115)

Seth took a seat on a rolling stool. “Where’s the tattoo located?”

Placing her hand on the spot, Lily said, “My lower abdomen.”

“May I see?” He gestured to the padded table, which was very much like one in a doctor’s exam room only set a little lower.

Lily hopped up on the table, lay down, then unzipped her black trousers while Del drew near to her.

Lily took his hand, and he realized he must be throwing off serious territorial vibes when he looked in her eyes and she mouthed, “You okay?” Taking a deep breath as she moved her blouse and revealed the dark mark, he nodded.

Seth slipped on latex gloves then turned to her. He froze when he saw the mark and rested his elbows on the padded table for a few silent seconds, letting out a long sigh. He looked closely at the tattoo, touching her only as much as was needed to draw down the edge of her undies so he could see the entire thing.

When Seth looked up at Del, he was practically singed by the heat and anger he saw burning in Seth’s eyes. “Please tell me you’re not JT.”

“Fuck no.”

Seth nodded in satisfaction and looked at the tattoo again. “He put his name on you? Were you a slave?” His tone was neutral, but Del could see the indignation in Carter’s eyes as he glanced up at her while he looked at the design.

Lily’s cheeks were bright pink as she hesitated, shook her head negatively, then as the crease between her brows deepened, tears filled her eyes and she nodded. “I need for it to be completely gone. I’m sorry to get emotional. I promised myself I wouldn’t. Can you fix this please?”

She sniffled, and Seth lowered his eyes as he reached for a box of Kleenex on one of the work counters and handed it to her.

He examined the mark again. “This is mostly line work. No color. It would take some time but I could do it. Did you have a design in mind?”

“Not yet. We wanted to find out first if it could be covered. Do you have pictures or designs?”

“Sure. I can show you a catalog of other art I’ve done or you can bring in your own image. I’ll do a lot of line work to disguise this and using color will help camouflage as well. I can show you some designs that would work well and we can also look online. You can cover up now.” Seth turned to him and asked, “How about you, Mr. Cook?”

“Call me Del. I think I’d like something that goes with what she gets.”

Lily looked at him in surprise but then seemed thrilled by the notion as her cheeks pinkened again, and she smiled hugely.

“But no names this time, I hope,” Seth said as he pulled two photo binders from a row of such books and placed them on the table after she sat up.

Lily lifted the first into her lap and flipped through it. There were tattoos of all different kinds, animals, reptiles, replicas of black and white photos, and all sorts of fantasy-type tattoos. Dragons, mermaids, fairies, and angels.

Lily’s lips popped open, and her fingertip landed on an image. Del smiled when he realized what she was looking at. She looked up at him and beamed happily.

“Phoenix! A phoenix.” She smiled at Seth. “Would a phoenix work?”

Seth nodded in obvious approval. “Lots of color, quite a bit of outlining. It’s a good choice. If you like that, could I make a suggestion?”

“Sure.”

Seth pulled over a rolling stand that had a laptop on it and navigated to a website. He scrolled through several pages before he found what he wanted.

“There are a lot of phoenix images to choose from. You can Google it at home, too, but this is what I wanted to show you.” He turned the laptop so they could get a closer look and Del nodded. It was a photograph of a model with the phoenix positioned over her abdomen and wrapped around her left hip, with the tail undulating down about twelve inches of her thigh.

Seth pointed at the design and said, “Phoenixes have long, feathery, intricate tails, which is part of the appeal. I can place the body of the phoenix over the image you want to cover, and if you’d like we can do this with the tail. It all depends on how far you want to go.”

Lily smiled but then frowned. “Um, aren’t I a bit…fleshy in that area to accentuate it like that?”

Seth didn’t hesitate when he shook his head. “I think it would look better on a curvy figure, myself.” He scrolled down a bit and showed the image from the front and said, “Del, we could do the same image over a pectoral and wrap the tail around your shoulder and down your bicep.”

Lily smiled at him. “What do you think?”

Easily, Del replied, “I like it.”

The symbolic nature of the phoenix wasn’t lost on him either. Lily was rising from the ashes and he was, too. He’d thought about getting a lily to symbolize her but had decided he’d rather show solidarity with her in this way. Clay would probably decide to get one, once he heard about it.