Wild For You (Always a Bridesmaid 3) Read Free

place?” Melody asked, feigning surprise to see him.
    “Yeah. Mine, and a buddy of mine. We just opened up last week,” Nick said, lifting a hand to the man in the Harley shirt as he left. “See you next week, Frank. We’ll get the color finished up in one or two more sessions.”
    “Catch you then,” Frank said.
    The door tinkled as the man stepped out onto the sidewalk and Nick turned back to Melody, leaning over the counter, close enough that she caught a whiff of his signature smell, that campfire and sage with a faint overtone of motor oil scent that always clung to him, hinting at manly activities of various sorts. The one that made her want to strip off his shirt, press her nose to his bare skin and breathe deep.
    “Congratulations,” Melody said, heart beating faster as she prayed her thoughts weren’t showing on her face. “That’s great that you’ve opened your own business.”
    “Thanks. We’ll see if we can stay open long enough to get into the black.” Nick smiled a shy smile she’d never seen before, a smile that made Melody’s heart do a swan dive into her stomach and her fingertips ache to touch the dimples popping on his cheeks.
    “So what’s up?” he asked, raising an eyebrow in Melody’s direction. “You’re not thinking about getting a tattoo, are you?”
    “I am, actually,” Kitty interrupted. “I’m Kitty.” She held out her hand.
    “Sorry, I should have introduced you,” Melody said, blushing with embarrassment as she turned to do the introductions. “Nick, this is Kitty, my best friend since third grade. Kitty, Nick, a friend of mine from work.”
    Nick took Kitty’s hand and shook it, his grin morphing into its usual wicked twist of his lips. “Nice to meet you, Kitty,” he said. “For a second there I thought I was going to have to call Melody’s big sister.”
    “Why’s that?” Kitty asked, smiling up at Nick with a look of obvious appreciation, a look Melody wasn’t so sure she enjoyed seeing on her best friend’s face.
    “She’s Melody.” Nick shrugged, as if that said it all.
    Melody felt her blood begin to heat in a way that had nothing to do with attraction.
    “If she’d come in here looking for a tattoo,” Nick continued, “I would have assumed she was either drunk or experiencing some kind of psychotic break.”
    He laughed and Kitty, the traitor, had the nerve to join in.
    “Either way, I’d have to call Lark,” Nick said. “John and I are barely breaking even with the shop. I’m going to need my catering job for a while, and Lark would fire me in a hot second if I inked her baby sister.”
    “Lark would not fire you for giving me a tattoo,” Melody protested.
    “You don’t think?” Nick asked in a patronizing tone.
    “No, I don’t think,” Melody repeated, though she actually wasn’t sure what her big sister would do if Melody came home with a tattoo.
    Lark would be surprised, that’s for sure. Aria, the eldest March sister, had always been the wild child of the family, and even she was tattoo-free. Melody was the sweet, positive, peacemaker of the family. The girl most likely to wear pink chiffon and kitten heels, not red retro pin-up dresses and five inch stilettos like the heavily tattooed girl in the poster tacked onto the wall next to Nick’s tattoo station.
    A tattoo would be a significant departure from the norm for Melody, a bold step in a different direction. The thought made her nerve-endings sizzle.
    A second later, her decision was made.
    “Lark isn’t my mother,” she said, lifting her nose into the air. “Even if she were, I’m twenty-two, and old enough to make my own decisions, and I’ve decided I want to get my first tattoo. Tonight.”
    Nick’s eyebrows shot up and Kitty made a surprised noise, but Melody didn’t turn to look at her friend, worried she might lose her courage if she met the eyes of someone who had known her her entire, wholesome, straight-laced life.
    “You do?” Nick asked, disbelief