Skin Deep (Skin Deep #1)

Emma? What do you mean what you did to him? Should I be jealous?

No! Luke, come on! Seriously? That’s why I hated texts because you never really could tell when someone was playing around unless they came out and said it.

No. You know who you belong with. I’ll just spend even more time tonight making sure you know it. In fact…

What? I replied when he didn’t say anything else.

It was about fifteen minutes later when I got the reply, and it made a shiver work its way up my spine.

Just be ready, baby.

I breathed a sigh of relief as I closed up the office for the week and headed out to my car. Luke had texted about twenty minutes ago, letting me know to head over to Skin Deep because he was still finishing up a client and had another one booked.

I got out to my car and completely melted when I saw the white rose tucked onto my windshield. I grabbed it and held it to my nose, smiling at the thought of Luke sneaking over to do something sweet like that.

I pulled up at Luke’s shop and headed inside, clutching the rose in my hand. He was standing behind the counter, finishing up the aftercare instructions with his client, and when the man walked away, I went directly to him and wrapped my arms around him, tipping my face up for his kiss.

“Thank you for the rose, Luke. You’re so sweet…” I whispered to him.

Luke drew himself out of my arms, pushing me back and holding me at arms length with his hands on my shoulders. “What rose?”

I blinked up at him in confusion. “The white rose you left on my windshield today.”

“Emma, I didn’t leave the shop all day today. I’ve been busy.”

“Oh…okay? Well someone left me a rose on my car. Oh, God! What if it was meant for someone else and they put it on the wrong car? That’s so sad…” I shook my head and then shrugged. “Well, its pretty anyway.”

Luke pulled me in and kissed my forehead before calling his client back. He shot me a look of concern over his shoulder as he walked away.

I wandered back down the hallway to Brandon’s office to see what he was doing. He was sitting at an angled drawing table, sketching out a design. I peered over his shoulder, watching as he shaded a curving line.

“Its really good, Bran,” I said by his ear.

He jumped, twisting around on his stool to stare at me in surprise. “Emma! I didn’t hear you come in. What’s shakin’, bacon?”

I shook my head and rolled my eyes at him. “Nothing, Luke just took someone back so I wandered down here to see what you were doing.”

“Eh, just working on a design for this lady. This is the fifth time I’ve drawn something because she keeps Googling tattoos on the internet and changing her mind. If she doesn’t like this one I think I’m going to scream and tell her to get fucked!” He grinned at me.

“Yeah, right. You’re too nice to do that. Well, you’re nice to other people, anyway.” I grinned back at him.

“Speaking of nice, you witch! How could you toy with my stomach’s emotions like that? You promised pancakes and left me with frozen waffles! You could have at least buttered them and put syrup on ‘em!” Brandon whined, pouting like a child with his lips stuck out.

“No,” I replied laughing. “That was just funny! You should have seen the look on your face!”

We sat in companionable silence as Brandon worked on his drawing, stopping every so often to see what I thought about something he had added. Luke popped his head in a little later and I looked at my watch, surprised to see that an hour had gone by.

“Ready, guys?” he asked.

I nodded, and with a devilish twinkle in my eye, nudged Brandon with my shoulder as I asked Luke, “So, did Brandon tell you what he complimented me on this morning?”

Brandon’s head came up with a jerk, his eyes widening as he looked at me with an I’m-gonna-kill-you-you-bitch look. I laughed as Luke turned to Brandon, asking him what I was talking about.

My grin widened as I interjected Brandon’s stammering. “He came to get me up this morning. Maybe next time you’ll make sure I have a shirt on or something before you send someone in and then I wont get complimented on my ‘nice rack’!”

I laughed as Luke swatted Brandon in the back of the head. “You ass! I told you not to go in, just to knock on the door and she’d get up! You ogled my girlfriend’s tits? Man…”

“First off, dude…ogled? What are you, eighty? And I only saw them for a second. Trust me, didn’t give me a stiffy, just maybe half a bone! She’s hot and she has a nice pair but-”

“Brandon! You’re digging a hole here, man!” I said, laughing even harder at Luke glaring at Brandon and Brandon trying to justify himself.

“Luke, its okay. He really didn’t have time to see anything and I got him back. Ask him about the pancakes this morning and I’m gonna go stop by Griff’s and get us a pizza to take home for dinner. Meet you guys there.” I stood on tiptoe to kiss him before heading out to my car.

As I walked away, I heard Luke say, “You saw my girlfriend’s girls and she made you pancakes? You are so dead!”

I waited for the pizza at Griff’s and then swung by my house to grab my mail on the way home. Leah had been staying there since I was living at Luke’s now, and Calland even crashes there sometimes if he’s close by instead of going home to his apartment. Leah has been collecting my mail for me and putting it in the decorative bowl on the sideboard table by the door. I keep reminding myself that I need to go ahead and just change my address, but I was a little afraid to take that last step.

I got to the house and Luke was walking down the stairs, fresh out of the shower when I walked in the door. Brandon was watching tv on the couch with Doug, who was cuddled up on his lap. Geesh. Over one hundred pounds and he thinks he’s a lapdog.

I sat the pizza down and Brandon pushed Doug off his lap before we all crowded around the table and ate. I had just taken a drink of my pop when Luke glanced at me and asked, “So you tortured my brother with frozen waffles this morning after he ogled (he glared at Brandon as he said it) you in my bed?”

I choked and barely managed to swallow the mouthful of pop as I started laughing. “Yeah. His face was classic!”

Luke smiled at me while Brandon glared at me and said, “You owe me pancakes, woman. And this time they better be REAL pancakes. With blueberries. And whip cream!”

I rolled my eyes at him. We finished eating dinner and Brandon pushed back from the table, winking at me and disappearing into his bedroom. He came out a few minutes later wearing tight, dark rinse jeans and a tight white t-shirt with the shop’s logo written across the chest in tribal style black lettering. He’d put on his black leather boots and had his black leather jacket in his hand, his car keys in the other.

“Going out for a while. Don’t wait up!” he said teasingly, before he grinned at us and walked out of the house.

Luke and I cleaned up dinner and I headed upstairs to take a shower while he lounged on the couch for a bit. I lingered under the hot water, and when I finally stepped out of the shower to dry, there was a large towel laying on the sink counter and my clothes that I had brought in with me were gone. Under the towel was my corset from my Halloween costume and a very small pair of black lace panties that Luke must have dug through my drawer to find.