Reckless Road (Torpedo Ink 5)

“Our heart, if we have one,” Alena supplied.

“Everyone’s in agreement, Lana,” Ink said. He was leaning against the wall, quiet, the way he often was. Ink could be moody. “Player’s onto something. You’ve got a gift. Help these kids out.”

Her gaze jumped to his. “You really think I should?”

“Yeah, babe, I really think you should,” Ink said. “Every damn time Darby, Kenny or that crazy kid Benito talks about those lost teens, I want Blythe and Czar to take them in. Just sittin’ on your furniture will make them feel better, let alone wearin’ something you make.”

“You know if you make a few outfits and sell them to adults first, you’ll be a huge hit and everyone will want your stuff,” Alena said. “Just do it.”

The others nodded in agreement.

Player indicated them all with a sweep of his hand. “This is why, Destroyer. Those colors you wear mean something. You were in that school with us. You lost just the way we lost. Let Ink put that shit right into your skin, the way we wear it in ours. You’ll feel it.”

“There’s nowhere it can go,” Destroyer said softly, his voice a husk of a sound, filled with something close to regret. “I’ve got ink all over me.”

“Show me,” Ink challenged.

The group went silent, all eyes moving from Lana to Destroyer. He stood for a long moment. Savage held out his hand, a casual gesture. Destroyer shrugged out of his vest and let Savage take it from him. The big man caught the hem of his T-shirt and pulled it over his head. His body was every bit as strong as he appeared to be, skin stretched tight over muscle.

Dark whorls and white slashes marred what should have been smooth skin, most wounds they all recognized—they had them as well. The shocking ones were the most recognizable, scars only Torpedo Ink members should have. No one from any other school had ever been subjected, as far as they knew, to the diabolical torture of the loom. That had been reserved for their school only. It had been hideous, and all of them still had nightmares.

How had Destroyer gotten those scars? They weren’t just a few scars either. He had far more than any of them. They were all over his chest, but the stitches were torn as if his skin had literally been ripped off. He turned his back to allow Ink to see what he would have to work over. His back was very broad, and the scars there were much worse, long raised ridges making his skin look much like a road map. The worst had been made by the loom, long, hideous stitches weaving patterns in every direction. Again, those had been torn, ripped away as if he had been skinned alive.

Someone had crudely tried to tattoo various pictures around the scars, most depicting rank in the prison. It was clear Destroyer had risen fast in prison, but the artwork had to have hurt as it had been tatted along or over the ridges. The tattoos were done with whatever the prisoners could find to use.

No one said anything, but they all looked. Stared. More than ever, Player felt Destroyer belonged with Torpedo Ink. Czar had molded them into a family, one fiercely loyal to one another, and somehow Destroyer fit with them. The loom scars proved that. He was another strong thread in their tightly knit family.

Czar had told them Destroyer had completely damaged the loom and killed the weaver when his sister had been tortured, raped and murdered, but they hadn’t seen the terrible evidence of the toll on his body. His skin had to have been pulled off both his chest and his back when he’d ripped his way out of the weave to get at his sister’s killers.

Ink studied Destroyer’s back, not looking at the black ink there but more at the ridges and whorls that were spread from his shoulders all the way to his buttocks. “Yeah, you want me to, I can work with this. I can make the tree kick-ass. The ravens are personal for each of us. They represent whoever you knew that didn’t make it out. I can make them however you want, standing on a branch, wings out, in, flying, as many or as few as you prefer. Your tree can have eighteen branches. You’ve got the room, and it will help with covering this bad ink here.” He ran his finger up along a particularly bad ridge.

Savage nodded, standing close to Ink, his eyes on the scarring the loom had made. “Yeah. It will look good. The skulls in the roots represent the ones we took out for those tortured, raped or killed. They could be an instructor inside the school or someone Sorbacov brought in and let enjoy us for his own fucking pleasure. You know what I’m talking about.”