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Silence.

I wait, expecting another knock or some variation of go to hell. Instead, her voice comes through the wall.

“The Chain.”

My hand stills over the strings. That is not the answer I expected.

“You serious?”

“Yes.”

I look at the wall. For some reason, knowing she actually has a request feels different from catching her listening. She’s not tolerating the music now. She’s asking me to play something.

I shift the guitar against my thigh and start over, picking out the opening carefully. The song comes easily.

I keep the volume lower this time and play it all the way through, filling in the parts I can without the rest of the band. When I finish, I let the last note fade and wait.

Nothing hits the wall. No complaint. No threat against my amplifier. Just quiet.

I look down at the guitar and smile before I can stop myself.

Then I play it again.

Chapter eight

RUBY

Tattooing someone you’ve slept with shouldn’t feel this complicated.

I tell myself that while I wipe down my station for the second time, even though it was already clean the first time. The machine is ready, my inks are poured, the reference photo is pulled up on the tablet, and the next section of Zander’s tattoo is marked out exactly the way I want it.

There is absolutely no reason for me to be rearranging paper towels. Other than the fact that Zander is due in six minutes, and the last time I saw him without a shirt, I wasn’t wearing one either.

I shove the extra stack into the drawer and close it harder than necessary.

Nell glances over from the front desk. “You good?”

“Yeah.”

She watches me for another second, then goes back to whatever she’s doing on the computer, and I’m grateful she leaves it there.

A moment later, the bell over the front door rings.

Zander walks in wearing jeans and a dark green T-shirt, his sunglasses hooked into the collar. His gaze moves from Nell to me, and the smile that appears tells me immediately that he remembers exactly what happened between us the last time we saw each other and has no intention of making this easy.

“Morning.”

“Hi.”

I motion toward my station. “Come on. I want to see how it healed before we start.”

Zander follows me behind the divider, and I set my tablet on the counter. “Same setup as last time. Shirt off.”

His mouth curves. “You’re going to have to be more specific about which last time you mean.”

I look at him. “The one where I had a tattoo machine in my hand.”

“Right.” He reaches for the hem of his shirt. “Because the other one started with you taking yours off.”