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“Yeah.”

I glance from him to the concepts spread between us. “You know I’ve never designed an album cover.”

“I know.”

“My work is mostly tattoos.”

“Your paid work is mostly tattoos.” His gaze shifts to the sketchbook I moved aside when he sat down. “That’s not all you make.”

I follow his eyes to the book. He’s seen me sketch at home, and he’s been around the shop enough to catch pieces of what I’m working on, but I didn’t realize he’d paid much attention beyond his own tattoo.

“You’ve been looking through my sketchbook now?”

“No. I enjoy having all my fingers.” His smile is brief before his attention comes back to me. “But I’ve seen enough of what you leave open to know you do a lot more than tattoo flash.”

I look at him for a moment, still trying to figure out how serious he is. Then the obvious explanation occurs to me.

“So, this isn’t some weird benefit of sleeping with the lead singer?”

I mean it lightly, but Zander’s answer comes without the smile I expect. “No. I was thinking about asking you before the other night, Ruby. Sex has nothing to do with it.”

The joke disappears on its own.

“Okay.”

He shifts a little closer to the table. “I’m asking because I think you’re the person who could get this right.”

That makes me stop, not because he wants something from me, but because he sounds like he’s already put real thought into why he wants it from me.

I start to say something, but he keeps going.

“When you designed my tattoo, you could’ve taken the tour dates and made me some version of a map. It would’ve looked cool. I probably would’ve liked it.” He touches the outside of his upper arm where the tattoo disappears beneath his sleeve. “But you kept asking questions until you figured out the thing I really cared about was Amsterdam. Not the city. That moment when the crowd sang our chorus back.”

I look at his arm too.

“You turned that into the center of the whole piece without making it obvious to anyone who doesn’t know what it means.”

I don’t say anything, as Zander reaches for one of the rejected covers and taps it against the table.

“That’s what these are missing.”

“The Amsterdam waveform?”

He gives me a look. “You know what I mean.”

I do.

He sets the print back down. “I’ve seen your work on other people too. You don’t take whatever idea they walk in with and slap it where they point. You ask how they want it to move, why they picked something, whether they want people to understand it or whether it’s just for them.”

I’m really listening to him now.

“You don’t just make things look good, Ruby. You figure out what they’re supposed to say.”

That moves me in a way I’m not expecting.

People compliment my work all the time. Clients tell me something is beautiful, and other artists notice the linework, the color, the composition. I know how to take those compliments without making a big deal out of them.

But Zander isn’t talking about how the finished piece looks. He understands the part I care about most, the questions that come first and the choices that happen before I ever pick up the machine.