Pretty in Ink (Voretti Family Book 3) Read online

  CONTENTS

  Copyright

  About the Book

  Title Page

  Dedication

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  Sneak Peak - Catching Cleo

  Also by Ava Blackstone

  About the Author

  Acknowledgements

  PRETTY IN INK

  Copyright © 2016 by Ava Blackstone

  All rights reserved.

  This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher, except for the use of brief quotations in an article or review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Edited by Naomi Hughes

  Cover by Damonza

  ISBN: 978-1-944594-04-6

  Never close your eyes while you’re getting a tattoo—even if you have a pathological fear of needles.

  All Liv wanted was a small, tasteful butterfly tattoo. What she got was her (now ex-) boyfriend’s name—the worst goodbye present in the history of the universe. With the tattoo about to be revealed thanks to a strapless bridesmaid dress, Liv comes up with a desperate plan to keep her judgmental parents from pulling their loan for her clothing design business. Convince the stable, responsible, incredibly hot family friend—who happens to have the same name as her ex—to pretend to be her boyfriend.

  Even with your eyes open, sometimes it's hard to see what's right in front of you.

  The Vorettis are the closest thing to family Caleb has, and he’s not about to risk that relationship for a fling with Liv. She'd be bored with his predictable, color-inside-the-lines lifestyle inside a week. They're just not compatible, even if she is the last person he thinks about before he falls asleep.

  But when Liv comes to him for help, he can’t say no—not when he’s the reason she ended up with her jerk of an ex in the first place. But as their pretend relationship becomes all too real, Caleb must decide whether he’s going to stick to the plan, or take a chance on a woman who isn’t the person he’s looking for, but might be exactly who he needs.

  PRETTY IN INK

  A VORETTI FAMILY NOVEL

  AVA BLACKSTONE

  To my husband, for the inspiration. Life is better with you.

  CHAPTER 1

  OLIVIA VORETTI LIKED to follow her instincts. Which was all well and good when it came to ordering dinner or designing the perfect dress, but every once in a while it came back to bite her in the ass. And, as she got out of her boyfriend’s GTO near the tattoo shop he swore was the best in San Diego, she felt a distinct chomp.

  “Come on.” CJ gestured impatiently.

  She forced her legs into action, moving closer even as her brain urged her to run the opposite direction. It was the sign. The black gothic letters hovered over the door, dark and threatening as a storm cloud.

  Permanent Ink.

  Her legs shut down. She grabbed CJ’s arm to keep from splattering onto the cracked cement.

  “Careful.” He barely slowed. “You’re gonna rip my jacket.”

  She stumbled after him on jelly legs. “Sorry. I…”

  CJ sighed. It was the kind of noise guys made when they meant Can you believe I have to deal with this woman? but didn’t have the balls to say the words out loud. The kind of noise he’d never made around her.

  He’d never used to make around her.

  “What’s wrong now?” He asked the question like he didn’t really want the answer, and her heart rate kicked up a notch.

  “Nothing. Except that now might not be the best time for a tattoo. I have to work tonight. And I have…kind of a thing about needles.”

  “What kind of a thing?”

  “Sort of like…an allergy.” That sounded better than irrational phobia.

  Ten feet from the shop, CJ finally stopped. “I knew you were gonna freak out.”

  His eyes were flat. Expressionless. He wasn’t angry. He wasn’t anything, and she swallowed back something that tasted like panic. CJ might not be the perfect boyfriend, but he was the only one who understood her. When her older sister Annabelle had pushed her to interview for a data entry position at San Diego University, CJ had known she couldn’t handle a soul-sucking desk job. He’d taken her to Hannigan’s to celebrate her freedom from the man, and they’d toasted her principles, her free spirit, and the successful clothing design career she was going to have. As soon as she came up with a business plan.

  “If you don’t want to get a tattoo, all you have to do is say so.”

  “I do want to.”

  He raised one pierced brow, angling his head toward the shop. Then prove it.

  She did want a tattoo, she reassured herself, for the thirty-seventh time. She loved the intricate tribal designs that twisted across CJ’s back and down his arms, marking him as an individual. When he walked into a room, people took one look at his leather jacket, the row of metal studs through his ears, and the ink that was always visible no matter what he wore, and they saw him. They didn’t assume he wanted to be an accountant so he could take over his parents’ business, or that he liked basketball because his brother had played on the team in high school, or that his favorite ice cream flavor was strawberry because it was all his older sister had ever eaten.

  She could have that if she womaned up and walked through that glass door.

  She started forward, eyes focused on the tarnished brass knob.

  “Liv?”

  She was vaguely aware of someone calling her name, but she couldn’t take her eyes off the prize now. She was only two steps from the door. Then one step.

  And then a warm hand clasped her arm. Her brain switched back on, and her heart rate kicked up to I’m-about-to-go-under-the-needle level, even though the door to Permanent Ink was still shut. Because she knew exactly who it was even before she glanced at those tanned fingers wrapped around her bicep.

  Caleb Ward.

  She heard Annabelle’s smooth, sensible voice inside her head. You know what your problem is, Liv? You don’t think. Slow down and take a breath. Assess the situation.

  She sucked in some air, but—damn Imaginary Annabelle to death—she inhaled that rugged, masculine scent she knew all too well.

  The summer sunlight went from a warm glow to a sultry heat. The soft breeze caressed her cheeks like a lover. Caleb hovered over her, close enough to touch though he’d let go of her arm. And all the while, she kept breathing him in—that scent that made her think of sex-rumpled sheets.

  It had to be God’s favorite joke that this man shared a name with her boyfriend. She couldn’t even write a note to CJ without remembering that terrible crush she’d had on Caleb when they were kids.

  At least the two men looked nothing alike. Caleb was taller. Broader. He wore dark slacks and button-down shirts instead of tight jeans and t-shirts with ironic sayings.

  It made him look like a tool. At least, it did when he wasn’t
clouding her judgment with his pheromones.

  “Liv?” he said again.

  She forced herself to face him head-on.

  His dark hair was gelled into place and his pristine white shirt was starched and ironed. Everything about him was too rigid. Everything except the way he said her name, husky and low, like he was thinking about her naked and under him.

  “What?” she managed.

  CJ was watching her and Caleb with only a vague interest, like they were a movie playing on one of the ten big-screen TVs at Play Hard bar. Thanks for nothing, CJ.

  “What are you doing here?” Caleb asked her.

  She must’ve imagined the husky note in his voice, because there was no sign of it now. He sounded like her dad had after catching her sneaking into her bedroom after curfew for the second night in a row.

  Her brain flipped from inappropriate-sexual-fantasy mode to damage-control. She took a firm step away from Caleb. “I’m not doing anything.”

  She couldn’t tell him she was getting a tattoo. He’d be on the phone with her parents in ten seconds flat.

  “Who the hell are you?” Suddenly remembering he was her boyfriend, CJ assumed his tough-guy pose: legs spread, hands clenched into fists.

  Caleb looked him over like he was a cockroach—dirty and unpleasant, but ultimately no real danger. “Caleb Ward,” he said finally, not offering CJ his hand to shake.

  “So you’re a friend of Liv’s, huh?”

  “I’m a family friend.”

  CJ smirked. “Is that what we’re calling it now?”

  Caleb’s expression remained impassive. “I’m not sure what you mean.”

  “Caleb is Rafe’s best friend.” Liv’s brain spun and whirred, trying to figure out how much trouble she was in. Had Caleb been at that family dinner two months ago, when she’d sworn that she’d broken up with CJ? Caleb wouldn’t even need to tell her parents about the tattoo. CJ’s name alone would be enough to freak them out.

  She took a step closer to Caleb, because the best defense was a good offense. “Why are you here?”

  “I’m working,” he said, in that maddeningly vague tone she still remembered from ten years ago. Every day she’d asked where he and Rafe were going after school. And every day he’d blown her off. Here and there. Later, Livvy.

  “Working, huh?” She made her voice extra cheerful. “Homicide at Hamburger Habit? Dead body at Delray’s Deli?”

  “I can’t discuss open cases.”

  “Of course not. I wouldn’t want you to break any rules.”

  “And I wouldn’t want you to do something you’ll regret.”

  Every muscle in her body clenched, resisting that I-know-best tone. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “You heard me.”

  ”Newsflash, Caleb. My body belongs to me. If I want a tattoo, it’s none of your business.”

  “That’s not what I—”

  “You heard her, man.” CJ wormed his way between them, throwing her off balance. “Get lost.”

  A strong hand steadied her. “Watch yourself,” Caleb told CJ.

  “Mind your own business.”

  She wasn’t aware of Caleb moving, but somehow he became even taller, towering over CJ. “Liv is my business.”

  “Since when?” CJ smirked. “If you wanna get in her pants come out and say so. Don’t hide behind some bullshit noble intentions.”

  Caleb’s eyes went dark. His muscles tensed, like it was taking all his self-control not to launch himself at CJ, and Liv’s throat closed in on itself.

  She pulled a breath in through the tiny opening. She needed to calm down. Captain Integrity wasn’t going to get into a fistfight. There was a law against that kind of thing, not to mention the mess.

  But right now he didn’t look like his black-and-white, color-in-the-lines self. He looked like a street brawler.

  She was still having trouble with that breathing thing, but she managed to force out a laugh. “Okay. Chill, you guys. This isn’t a big deal.”

  Caleb blinked, and just like that, Captain Integrity was back.

  “Don’t do anything stupid,” he told her. And then he strode away.

  Later, Livvy.

  “Damn.” CJ cracked his knuckles. “If that’s what all your relatives are like, no wonder you hate your family.”

  “Caleb isn’t a relative. He’s my brother’s friend.” No—that was the wrong thing to object to. “And I don’t hate my family. Only, sometimes, I need a little space.”

  She hurried inside Permanent Ink before CJ noticed that her face had heated to the temperature of the sun.

  The dimly lit shop smelled like industrial-strength cleaners, but it felt like safety. Maybe because the area behind the glass-topped counter that held the cash register was deserted. She’d have at least a short reprieve before she went under the needle.

  “If you wanna let those conformists force you to color inside their lines,” CJ said, “that’s your deal.”

  “That’s not what I said.” She forced herself to meet his gaze, even though she was afraid of what she might see. “Are we okay? The two of us?”

  He didn’t speak for a second.

  She tasted the same panic as before, but then his lips turned up into that lazy grin that had caught her attention all the way across her cousin Ella’s living room. “Sorry, babe. I’m no good at dealing with posers like that, you know?”

  “Yeah, but—a”

  “The only thing you have to worry about is what kind of ink you’re gonna get.” He slid a binder across the counter toward her.

  She opened it. The plastic-covered pages held hundreds of designs. Most were sketched on paper, but a few…

  She sucked in a breath.

  A few were pictures of tattoos directly on a customer’s skin, the hint of red surrounding the ink an indication of how recently the needles had done their work.

  There was a mechanical whirr from the back room. The tattoo machine.

  She’d seen a picture of one on the internet, and now she couldn’t get it out of her head. The shiny metal. The sharp angles. Those long needles that would inject dye under her skin.

  Sweat pooled under her arms. She’d designed her peasant blouse to billow out, but she was so sweaty the cotton clung to her skin. She swallowed once, then again, but her stomach refused to settle.

  The door to the back opened, and there was a woman’s cheerful voice. “Can I help you?”

  Liv clutched the counter so tightly, the edge of the glass bit into her palm. The world swirled unevenly around her.

  Something jabbed into her side. CJ’s elbow.

  “Are you okay?” The woman sounded concerned now. “Why don’t you sit down?”

  “She’s fine. She’s just wimping out. Like I knew she would.”

  “I am not.” The words sounded faint and tinny, even to her own ears. “I was thinking about what design I want.”

  “Yeah?” CJ sounded skeptical.

  She stabbed her finger in the direction of a butterfly. Or maybe it was a flower. Everything was blurry, so it was hard to say. In any case, it was small.

  Small and tasteful—that was what she wanted. Something that would express her individuality, but that could be easily covered in case she needed to ask her parents for a loan to cover the rent next month. “That one.”

  “You sure?” CJ sounded faintly alarmed, like he hadn’t really expected her to go through with it. “Maybe you should think it over.”

  “He’s right,” the woman said. “You don’t want to rush into anything.”

  Her mother’s voice echoed inside her head. Are you sure you want to wear that? You’re showing a lot of skin.

  Her sister Annabelle. You can’t blow off the interview. Even if it’s not your dream job, it’s a foot in the door.

  Her brother Alex. You’re an adult now, Livvy. You have responsibilities.

  Caleb. Don’t do anything stupid.

  “I’m sure.” The words came out strong and clea
r.

  After that, things happened quickly. There were papers to sign and deep breaths to take, and then she found herself in one of the back rooms with CJ, waiting for the tattoo artist.

  “You gonna sit?” CJ gestured toward the chair in the center of the small room—the one that looked like it belonged in a dentists’ office or torture chamber.

  She wanted to run, but she refused to give in to her stupid phobia. Sit. That was a good idea. If she could lay back and stretch her legs, her body would be forced to relax. “Yeah. Okay.”

  But no sooner had her butt met the vinyl than her muscles twitched, already anxious to escape. The tattoo machine sat on a small counter next to her, metal glinting under the overhead lights. A sealed packet sat next to it, holding an attachment with needles.

  She averted her eyes, but she could still see the needles—why did the thing need so many needles?—like they had imprinted themselves on her retinas.

  She couldn’t do this. She had to get out of here.

  “Chill, babe.” CJ eased her back into the chair she’d been half way out of. He held her hand, weaving his fingers through hers the way he used to when they first started dating, and she told herself, for the thirty-eighth time, that everything was going to be fine. Of course it was.

  “Close your eyes,” CJ said. “I’ll take care of everything.”

  CHAPTER 2

  THE INTERROGATION ROOM door closed behind Caleb, and his muscles unclenched, glad to be back where he belonged. Inside these four white walls, he was in control. It didn’t matter that it had only been six weeks since he’d been promoted to detective. When someone was guilty, he could smell it. And guilt was wafting off the man sitting at the battered metal table, like putrescine vaporizing off a corpse.

  Polke’s vulture eyes locked onto him. Caleb kept his expression carefully blank. No reason to scare the man yet.

  After a quick glance at the wall-mounted cameras to make sure they were on, Caleb sat across from Polke. “Mr. Polke. I’m Detective Ward. I know you gave Officer Conrad your official statement two weeks ago, but I didn’t get a chance to talk to you that night. So take me through the events one more time. You got home from work, walked into the apartment, and…”