“What about you?”
It took Nova a moment to realize he was talking to her. She lifted her head and was blasted by his shrewd green gaze. Those eyes bore into her, as piercing as any needle.
She watched him take in her two-toned hair and the dozens of piercings that studded the rims and lobes of her ears. She didn’t blink as his gaze moved down, over her tattooed shoulders and full-color sleeves that continued down onto her gloved hands, her extensive body art accentuated by the black leather vest she wore to work that night. It zipped up the center, showcasing even more tattoos that rode the faint swells of her breasts.
She couldn’t care less what he thought of her or all of her ink and metal. She wasn’t intimidated by his stare or his certain disapproval.
“What about me?” she tossed back at him irascibly, as his prolonged visual appraisal continued.
Finally, his eyes returned to hers. “I’m looking for an artist who did some specific work on someone recently. Maybe you know something about it that could help me.”
He held his expression neutral, carefully so, but the dark power in his stare was unmistakable. This man, this Breed warrior, didn’t have to resort to bellowing or brute force to get what he wanted.
No, he was all the more dangerous for the way his calm demeanor coaxed her interest, her trust.
And just because he was attractive and cool-headed didn’t mean there wasn’t a monster lurking behind his knight-in-shining-armor good looks.
She’d gone up against worse than him and emerged unscathed.
Well, mostly unscathed.
“Nova’s busy with a client, as you can see,” Ozzy interjected. “She don’t have time for your questions either.”
Intrigue sparked in the Breed male’s eyes. He was intelligent, to be sure, but at the moment, Nova read a note of suspicion in his keen gaze. “If the Order were to shut this shop down tonight, you’ll both have nothing but time on your hands.”
Ozzy snarled under his breath, but let the warrior continue. Without waiting for permission, the vampire took his comm unit out of the pocket of his black fatigues and flashed a photo on the device’s display. “This look familiar to anyone?”
It was a close-up of a tattoo, an incomplete piece. The Celtic cross portion of it was older, a finished work, but the star behind the cross was only an outline with partial coloring applied.
“Not sure? Here’s a different shot.”
The warrior clicked to another photo, this one taken slightly farther away. A wide enough angle to show the full length of a man’s bare arm from below the short sleeve of a sodden, dark T-shirt to the tips of his thick fingers. Against the colorful ink and black lines of his many tattoos, the man’s skin was unnaturally ashen and waxy.
Cadaver-white.
Nova’s pulse kicked up a notch.
“This body was fished out of the Thames about an hour ago,” the warrior confirmed. “No ID on him. JUSTIS is checking for criminal records to see if they can identify him that way, but it’s doubtful they’re going to find anything. All we know for certain right now is that whoever put that star on him was likely to be one of the last people to see this guy alive. If not the last.”
Nova set down her tattoo machine and blotted the ink on her client’s pec. “Let’s break for a bit,” she murmured to him. “Go on in back. I’ll come get you in a few minutes.”
“Nova.” Ozzy’s voice vibrated with warning.
“It’s okay,” she assured her overprotective boss and mentor. “I can handle this.”
The Breed male was determined to have some answers, and as well-meaning as Ozzy was, his lack of cooperation was liable to get them all arrested. Or worse.
After her client had shuffled to the break room and it was only Oz and her left to contend with their unwanted visitor out front, Nova walked over to the counter where the warrior stood. “The star is my work.”
He didn’t seem the least surprised to hear it, didn’t even blink at the admission.
Up close, his face was even more captivating than she thought. Sharp cheekbones, strong, proud jaw line. Green eyes the color of palest sage. “Tell me what you know about the dead man, Nova.”
Her name on his lips sent a shiver of awareness through her that she had to fight hard to ignore. She shrugged. “I can’t tell you much, other than he was a real asshole. Came in here late last night, drunk, belligerent.” An errant lock of her chin-length hair slipped from behind her ear and into her face, but she ignored it, her hands down at her sides, encased in ink-stained gloves. “As we told you, we don’t take walk-ins. That goes double for intoxicated walk-ins. But this guy was insistent. No matter what we said, he wouldn’t leave.”
“Seems to be a pattern lately,” Ozzy muttered, still glaring at the warrior.
“Like I said,” Nova went on, “the guy came in late, just about the time we were closing for the night. He refused to leave without getting some fresh ink--something about commemorating friends who’d recently passed.”