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“Yo,” Mick raps his knuckles against the wooden frame of the door and the pencil in Rio’s grip ceases moving as he looks up at his best friend. “You got a customer,” Mick says with a nod to the floor behind him.
Mick’s right arm rests across his chest in a tight brace - a result of too much tequila and Rio’s skateboard, and the reason Rio’s been tattooing in his best friend’s shop for the better part of the summer.
Guilt has a way of changing even the best-laid plans.
Rio drops the pencil and sketchbook on the messy table in front of him and rises into a languid stretch as Mick’s attention is pulled back to the floor. Excited chattering carries into the office, the constant stream of questions broken up by Mick’s grunt of response every now and then.
She’s short, sunburnt from too much Baja sun, and no doubt here on spring break. Her mouth moves so fast that Rio can barely catch every other word.
Mick mumbles something to her, points to Rio, and quickly disappears into the back. The girl shifts, eyes falling over to Rio without breaking her stride.
“So I’m thinking live, love, laugh in cursive,” she says with a wave of her hand through the air.
Rio winces before he can school his reaction, and the girl cracks with a loud laugh.
“Kidding!” She exhales loudly and throws a look over her shoulder.
That’s when Rio spots her.
“It’s not for me,” the girl whispers before turning back to him. “It’s for my sister, she’s letting me pick,” she chuckles and it’s impossible not to pick up on the tone of mischief in her voice.
Rio’s eyes snap back to the sister as the short one continues chattering in front of him.
Her brows are furrowed as she stares at a tattoo print hanging on the wall, clueless to her sister or him.
Rio lets his eyes drop to take in the rest of her, from the black bikini peeking out of her top to the denim cut-offs and the open-toed sandals where he can see pink toes peeking out.
Her head cocks to the side as she moves to another print and the tumble of hair that rolls off of her shoulder have his fingers twitching to touch.
Her nose and chest are sunburned, too, the rosy color dipping beneath her top, and Rio wonders exactly how far her sunburn goes.
“You’d be surprised what she’d agree to drunk,” he hears the girl in front of him say and his eyes snap back to her.
His jaw clenches at the thought.
“N-Not that she’s drunk - right now -” the girl splutters quickly. “If that would say prevent her - you from tattooing her, now, here.”
Rio shakes his head, looks back up to the sister just in time to catch her as she flinches at the photo of a rather intimate piercing and he smirks.
“Nah.”
“Phew,” the younger girl responds dramatically and taps at the book of sketches on the counter between them. “Maybe a butterfly or a feather,” she hums and cracks the book open. “Something cute and - “
“Basic,” Rio snorts.
The younger girl laughs without looking up.
The sister moves closer to them and whatever she sees must be to her liking because her mouth does a thing - like a twitch, a smile breaking through against her own will.
She’s close enough now that he can see just how pink those lips are as they part and catch his attention.
“I like this one,” she speaks, eyes still on the photo. Her voice is tinged with a soft hint of wonder. “The bird - “ she adds and looks up.
She’s looking for her sister but her bright blue eyes find him instead.
Her lips part and then her eyes drop to his neck and the tattoo. They flutter for a moment and snap back up to his just as fast.
A pretty flush colors her cheeks, noticeable even with the sunburn. He’s not sure how long they gaze at one another, but it's long enough for his eyes to dip lower, long enough to pick up on the way her breath quickens and her chest heaves a little harder.
The moment is broken by the short blonde between them.
“What do you think?” She asks Rio with a serious look.
Rio shakes his head and finally looks at the photo she’s pointing to. It’s a small Chinese character tattoo with tight, dark lines.
His eyes jump back to the sister and he grins. He watches as she shifts from one foot to the other, clearly uncomfortable at the attention, and he lets his eyes flicker down to those pink toes once more.
Rio hums in response because he doesn’t really give a shit what she wants him to ink, all he can think is where.
The short girl slaps the book shut and turns on her toes to face her sister with a wicked smile.
“I think we’ve got it.”
He’s already seated on his stool and prepping his setup when he hears her shuffle behind him.
“You can get on the table,” he instructs over his shoulder.
When he turns she’s still on her feet and with him seated it brings her belly and the fingers twisting around the button on her shorts at his eye level.
Rio blinks, tearing his eyes off of the shorts and up to her soft mouth as it parts, then closes.
“I think I want it here,” she says quietly and a hand slides to the side of her hip, right below the pocket of the jeans.
Rio nods and forces his eyes away.
She doesn’t move, her back rim rod straight, fingers still touching that button.
He can feel the way his jaw is tense, and he lets it drop before he speaks, forcing an air of indifference he doesn’t feel inside.
“You gotta take your shorts off,” he tells her and shoots her a smart-ass grin.
She doesn’t respond, just rolls her eyes and when she pops the button open Rio swears he feels it in his cock.
He takes a deep breath, rolls himself backward to get a little more space but then she’s bending forwards to push the shorts past her hips. The angle gives him a perfect view of the swell of her cleavage and the rosy freckled skin bound by the thin black material of her flimsy bikini top.
She’s too close, and he can’t seem to do anything but stare. The tattoo gun in his hand is still in pieces and forgotten because her shorts are stuck and when she tugs at them the motion causes her breasts to sway and Rio almost swallows his tongue.
Heat pools in his belly when her shorts finally hit the tile floor and his eyes find matching black bottoms. They’re bikini cut, really nothing to write home about but for some reason, they’re the sexiest pair of panties he’s ever seen.
The material presses against her soft belly, then she lifts one side up and over her hip to show him exactly where and Rio feels his balls throb. She reveals an obvious, fresh tanline and he blinks dazedly, still trying to listen to her direction.
Don’t think about her naked.
Don’t think about how pale the rest of her is.
He nods and pushes off his heels, rolling as far away and blinking down at his tattoo gun.
The paper on the bed crinkles when she finally climbs up behind him and settles.
Her sister - Annie, he’d learned, hates needles. She’d introduced herself and Elizabeth and immediately disappeared.
He tops the ink off and looks over at the floor where Annie has cornered Mick in what seems to be a riveting, one-sided conversation.
Rio grins to himself and rolls his tray when he turns back to find Elizabeth on her back, staring at the ceiling, still clutching her panties over her hip.
Jesus.
He thanks whatever Saint is watching over him that it’s a tiny little thing he’s gotta draw on her body, and he wonders if he can get it done in under fifteen. The sooner her pants can come back on the better for everyone.
“You ‘aight?”
She’s stiff and immediately squeaks out a sound with a nod.
He rolls closer and the first touch of his hand on her makes the muscles in her belly jump, grabbing his attention in more than one way.
Thank fuck he’s wearing gloves ‘cause just the idea of touching bare skin makes it hard to breathe.
He presses against the bone of her hip and her knuckles tighten against the bathing suit.
“It’s gonna hurt a little when I go over the bone right here,” he tells her with a brush of his fingers across the skin stretched out over her hip.
Fuck, he kinda wishes he could feel just how soft she looks with bare fingers.
She nods.
When the tattoo gun kicks to life the soft vibrations of the machine push through his arm, the noise and feel of the gun quickly soothing any of the nerves in his chest.
“Ready?”
She looks down from the ceiling finally, first at him and then at his gloved hand and the gun. After a beat, she nods again.
Her belly tightens at the first touch of the needle against her skin but she doesn’t make any noise. He pulls off after he completes the first line, gives her a moment to say anything and when she doesn’t he continues.
The skin isn't as taut over the bone and he knows he’s gotta touch more of her or else they’ll be here longer than he can handle.
She’s so still when his other hand descends across her lower belly to hold the skin in place.
“Alright?” He asks again and thank fuck Mick isn’t here cause he doesn’t recognize himself right now as he’s whispering to her.
She hums and he can’t help it, he looks up at her.
She’s not watching his hands or her tattoo, though, she’s staring at his neck again. He grins at the brief flash of red across her cheeks at being caught before his eyes snap back down to his work.
When he moves over the bone, and he knows it hurts, she makes no move to show it apart from the hand that’s still holding her panties out of the way. Her grip tightens and she tugs the material up involuntarily.
The move catches his attention, and he doesn’t know how he missed it all this time. There’s a sparkly little diamond on a silver band sitting happily on her ring finger and a different heat prickles under Rio’s skin.
There’s a dumb bastard out there somewhere who gets all of this for himself.
The words spill from him before he can stop it.
“Nice ring.”
She doesn’t answer immediately apart from a soft puff of air that escapes her because he’s right over the bone now and when he feels her shift beneath his palm he pulls the gun off and looks at her.
His eyes dip to her mouth and then back down to the red skin at her hip. He squeezes some water on the skin and wipes it off.
“Thank you,” she says.
“Your husband know you’re getting ink?”
He prods, like the asshole that he is.
Her hips twist slightly against the table and he realizes he’s still got his palm flat against her belly. If she realizes it she doesn’t say anything.
He’s not even tattooing her anymore, he doesn’t need to be touching her right now but she’s so warm beneath him that he doesn’t want to lose the heat of her body or miss a second of the way her belly tightens as she finally responds.
“I’m not married, and even if I was, I wouldn’t need my husband's permission to get a tattoo,” she snaps at him with a sharp breath.
He can’t help it, and it’s probably not the right move but he grins up at her.
That irritates her and when the little line between her brows deepens, so does his smile.
“Engaged?” He asks, ignoring the rest of her comment.
She doesn’t respond, but her cheeks are rosy again and he’s fairly certain he’s spot on. She blushes so pretty that he doesn’t fight the urge to see how deep he could make her flush.
“Kinda weird your fiance isn’t here for your first tattoo,” he hums and turns the tattoo gun back on. He’s about to press the needle against her again when he freezes in his tracks. His eyes snap to Annie, now arguing with Mick at the front and then back to Elizabeth. “He's not even here in Mexico, is he?”
His lips roll together, throat parched suddenly, so desperate to hear her confirm what he knows is the case.
She shakes her head and blinks up at him with those big blue eyes.
Dumb bastard indeed ‘cause there ain’t no way in hell he’d let her go to fuckin’ Mexico alone if she was his.
“It’s my bachelorette trip,” she adds quietly.
He swallows past the knot in his throat and her eyes drop to his tattoo again. After a good number of seconds, he forces his eyes away from her parted mouth and looks down to the pink skin calling for him.
“And you let your sister pick your tattoo ‘cause?”
It’s impossible not to notice the way she squirms beneath him as he pulls the ink across the most sensitive part, or the way her belly muscles feel below his palm, corded, ready to snap.
When she doesn’t answer he looks up at her to find her frowning again, lips pursed. Instantly her blue eyes find his brown ones and he recognizes the flash of discomfort across her face as pain.
“Almost done,” he adds quietly but doesn’t pull off.
He rolls closer, for a better angle, nothing else.
“So?” He hums again with a nod towards the floor where he can still hear Annie and Mick arguing. “Annie?”
He’s not sure if he’s trying to distract her from the pain or himself from her.
It works, for a moment at least because she laughs. It’s soft and airy, and the movement shakes her upper body and her chest - fuck.
“It’s a long story,” she shakes her head and takes a sharp breath, “Ow.”
“You wanna stop?” He asks her too softly and mentally sends out another thanks into the fuckin’ universe that no one else is working at the shop today.
He’s having trouble remembering how to breathe for a moment, surprised at the way his hands are moving seemingly on their own because when he looks up at her he feels trapped by the weight of her gaze.
She shakes her head and he continues.
The tattoo is almost done and it should be tacky but the ink is so dark against her pale skin and he knows when she pulls her bathing suit back into place it’ll cover it completely but fuck if he isn’t thinking about other kinda panties she could wear to show it off.
Show it off to her fiance.
He turns the gun off and cleans the area as softly as he can. Feels her eyes on him for a few more minutes before he looks up at her, palm still on her belly.
“You wanna look at it?” He asks with a nod to the floor-to-ceiling mirror in the corner of the shop.
Her hips twist again and he rolls away, finally removing his palm off of her and immediately missing the warmth. The parchment beneath her crinkles as she swings one leg over then the other. He peels his gloves off, eyes never leaving her.
When her bare feet fall against the tile floor she inhales sharply at the cold but doesn’t reach for her shoes. She pads over to the mirror on her pink toes and he follows as though there’s an invisible tether between them, one he can feel in his belly.
He doesn’t mind it though, he realizes quickly. It gives him a perfect view of her ass, one cheek covered by the suit and the other bare enough from the way she’s pulling the material up that makes his hand itch.
It wouldn’t take much, just one finger to slip the rest of the fabric between the cleft of her cheeks and free more skin.
She stops in front of the mirror and he rips his gaze from her ass to find her eyes on him, not the tattoo. She arches a brow at him, but she doesn’t look mad.
He laughs, and he thinks he likes being caught, likes the way it makes her blush. He can hear Annie and Mick still talking around the corner when he steps up behind her.
She hasn’t looked at her tattoo yet and he’s got a smart-ass comment queued up, just hanging off his tongue but he knows the moment he says it he’ll lose those blue eyes. She’s still holding her panties up, and when he takes another step his jean-clad thigh brushes against the skin of her bottom.
He holds her gaze, lets it slip to her mouth for no more than a second when her lips part with a breath. They stay open long enough for him to catch a glimpse of tongue and he thinks he’s going to die if he doesn’t get to feel it against his own.
She smells like sunscreen and something else, something sweet that clings to her hair. He’s close enough that if he’d turn into her it would push his nose right against the blonde locks tucked behind her ear.
But that isn’t a good idea, so Rio clenches his jaw and touches her instead - idiot.
Her skin still carries the sun’s warmth, and it feels just as soft as it looks. She takes a sharp breath and her chest jars softly but he forces his gaze to stay on her eyes, no matter how badly he wants to count the freckles across her chest.
His palm slides against her thigh, fingers coming dangerously close to the sensitive skin. He gives her a nudge with his palm, tilts her hip closer to the mirror.
“You like it?”
He watches her face for a reaction, watches as her eyes drop to where his hand is and her brows arch in surprise.
She blinks in awe and just stares for a moment before her hips turn in even closer to the mirror.
Something tightens in his chest as he waits for her to speak, waits for her judgment to fall as though everything depended on it.
He doesn’t even like tattooing but fuck if his entire world didn’t feel hinged on the next words that come out of her mouth.
Regrettably, she doesn't answer him, not with words at least. She grins, slowly at first until it grows into a full-fledged smile.
The tightness in his chest bursts and its pride rushing through his veins . The tattoo is without a doubt the single most horrendous thing he’s ever inked on a person, but he thinks he’d do it again every single day if he had to if it meant seeing her smile like that at him just once more.
Her eyes climb up in the mirror to find his own.
Then she looks down at his neck again and it’s his turn to grin.
“I could give you a matching one,” he says quietly, watching her in the mirror. “Since you seem like you got a thing for birds.”
She’s pink again but she doesn’t look away from his tattoo until he says that and she rolls her eyes at him.
“I don’t have a thing for birds,” she says.
“No?” He hums and dips closer, touching more bare skin. “Just me, then?”
His palm slips around her thigh when he says it, fingers sliding into the dip where her thigh meets her cheek and he squeezes lightly.
She rocks back into him, against his hand and chest but doesn’t let her eyes slip from his.
He doesn’t push it but doesn’t retreat either, just lets it linger in the air, giving her time to stop whatever this is. When she doesn't, he slides two fingers beneath the material of her bathing suit and dips into her folds from behind.
She gasps quietly as his fingers curl into the wet warmth.
He grunts at what he finds, and when two thick fingers ease inside of her she parts her thighs to give him more space.
His fingers slip deeper, stretching more of her, and then he’s pulling out only to press in again faster and deeper than before. She arches up to her toes on the fourth, or fifth stroke, and when she takes a step forwards with another gasp he follows quickly.
His palm comes to rest against the mirror and they’re too close to it for him to see her face because her forehead drops against the mirror and her hair fans around her.
She gasps loudly when he grinds his fingers particularly deep and he touches something so soft inside of her that he reaches for it again and again. Her head snaps up and he mouths against her ear.
“You gotta’ be quiet Elizabeth,” he says softly but pumps his fingers harder again.
He touches it again and she keens, this time muffled against his bicep of the arm pressed against the mirror.
Her mouth is hot against the material of his shirt as she whines into him. She’s still on her toes but when he curls his fingers around that spot again she presses back against him, chasing his hand.
Her cries are muffled enough against his arm that the only noise around them is the sound his fingers make as he pumps in and out of her wet center.
“Fuck,” he rasps against her hair. “Do you hear that? How fucking wet you are?”
Her hips stutter as a tremor rips through her and he feels heat against his arm as she cries. He curls his fingers, stroking at her inner walls to feel her tremble inside. She lifts her face out of his arm and takes a stuttering breath.
Her lashes are wet, cheeks red, and fuck if she’s not the most beautiful thing he’s seen.
He’s still stroking her, still inside of her when she rocks against him lazily, once then again. She looks like she could come again and he really needs to stop touching her because fingers aren't enough and if she keeps looking at him like that he’s gonna make her scream his name.
Plus he’s pretty sure they just broke half a dozen health and safety laws and if Mick knew what he’d done he’d kick his ass. He fixes her bathing suit bottoms but not before he lets himself get a final look of perfect ass and pink, wet folds.
He busies himself taking the gun apart, cleaning up, and absolutely not paying attention to Elizabeth as she shows her sister the final product not two feet away from where she’d just come.
When he finally looks their way at Annie’s insistence that he join them to revere Beth's first and last tattoo - Annie’s words, his eyes snap up to the mirror and the two obvious handprints staining the otherwise clean surface. One large one and a smaller right beneath.
Elizabeth notices his gaze and when her cheeks pink he feels his cock stir again, both at the way her lips part and the mirror.
“Nice job, bro,” Annie says when he’s close enough, not looking up from Elizabeth’s hip. “I thought it was gonna be way more basic, but this is kinda sexy, Beth,” Annie frowns, as though the thought disappoints her.
Elizabeth rolls her eyes and pulls her hip away from her sister. She turns to face the mirror again, looks at her hip again, and then frowns.
“What does it mean?” She shoots Annie a quick look.
Annie shrugs and casually answers her, “I dunno.”
Elizabeth’s mouth drops as she stares at her sister in disbelief.
“Ask him,” Annie says with a nod at Rio and turns her attention back to the tattoo.
Elizabeth blinks, and her eyes find him in the mirror.
Fuck.
Annie had granted him full artistic freedom, he’s pretty sure those were her exact words. She’d said she could never think to impede on his creative process, he’s pretty sure he heard her cackle when she left them alone.
Rio wipes his hands with the paper towel in his hand before he answers, biting the smirk threatening to burst through.
“River,” he answers, eyes on Elizabeth.
Elizabeth inhales sharply, and her cheeks flush.
Annie snorts and looks up at him, “That’s - ” she pauses when she finds him staring at her sister. Annie’s eyes bounce between the two of them before returning her attention back to Rio. “Oddly specific and weird.”
She makes a face and when no one responds to her she lets out a loud sigh.
“Oookay, I’ll go pay, I guess.”
It’s quiet when Annie leaves, Elizabeth’s staring at her tattoo again when he steps closer.
Don’t touch her.
“I gotta clean it and wrap it before you go.”
She nods but doesn’t look at him again.
They’re back where they started, he realizes.
Him seated on his stool and her standing in front of him again, only this time she’s holding her shirt up for him and staring at him as he gives her instructions on how to care for her tattoo.
His tattoo.
Fuck.
Maybe he takes his time cleaning the area, and measuring out the saniderm while he makes her repeat the instructions back to him which she does, verbatim and with an eye roll.
When she’s taped up he picks her shorts up off the floor and holds them out for her to step one foot in then the other. Then he tugs them up her legs, and over her ass, careful to not press against the freshly marred skin at her hip.
He doesn’t reach to button them and neither does she.
Then she slips her pink toes into her shoes and he gets a final look of those blue eyes before she turns for the front with a small smile.
He hangs out in the back for a bit, cleans, and sanitizes until he hears the front doorbell ding, and the door closes.
When he’s sure she’s gone, he heads to the front and joins Mick.
After a few moments of quiet, Mick finally turns to him and speaks.
“You know I installed cameras in the back last week, right?”
Rio groans and his head drops against the counter, “Fuck.”
Mick laughs until his arm begins to hurt.