MARKED (a KILL DEVIL INK standalone)

  Copyright © 2021 Sarah Darlington

  Cover Design by T.E. Black Designs

  Editing by Kamaryn Kretz

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system without written permission from the author, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, and events portrayed in this book are either a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced throughout this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  ~ 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 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 23 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 24 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 25 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 26 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 27 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 28 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 29 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 30 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 31 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 32 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 33 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 34 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 35 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 36 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 37 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 38 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 39 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 40 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 41 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 42 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 43 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 44 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 45 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 46 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 47 ~

  ~ EPILOGUE ~

  PREORDER: FAKED

  ~ CHAPTER 1 ~

  ~ CHAPTER 2 ~

  ALSO BY SARAH DARLINGTON

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  To my book friends, old and new, thank you for your support.

  ~ CHAPTER 1 ~

  FINN

  If gold started falling from the sky, I doubt I’d care. I was just that bored. That stuck.

  I’d never admit that out loud.

  I wasn’t ‘that guy.’

  The guy to complain or whine or bitch. No, I was the ‘roll-with-the-punches’ type, the ‘life-of-the-party’ type, the easy-going, best friend to everyone.

  I didn’t let myself have bad days. Or bad weeks. Or bad years.

  I’d been seeing someone new to counteract these feelings. That usually fixed this sort of thing in me. She was a yoga instructor. An unbelievably sexy, flexible, fucking smoke-show of a woman. One week ago, I’d thought she’d be a fresh start, a way out of my rut, someone with potential. But that was last week.

  “Damn, man. Is she as bendable as I’m imagining?”

  I stood at the front desk, leaning against the counter. This place was the only tattoo shop in town. Patrick sat behind the computer. He was the receptionist and our newest hire here at Kill Devil Ink. “She’s flexible,” I confirmed.

  “You’re lucky.”

  “It’s not luck.”

  “Man, it’s something. Whatever it is, I don’t have it. I’ve been dying to talk to Chipmunk Girl for months now. How do you make it look so simple?”

  Yoga instructor Mindy had brought me lunch earlier as a surprise, and Patrick still hadn’t shut up about it. “Who’s Chipmunk Girl?” I asked, being polite.

  “Remember, the bartender at The Oyster I told you about. She’s beautiful with a voice like a chipmunk. I don’t know her name.”

  “Oh right.” The Oyster was a strip club. I took my elbows off the counter and cracked my knuckles. “I could be your wingman,” I offered.

  “Really? I haven’t been laid in months.”

  “Fuck yeah, then. Let’s do it.”

  Patrick and I used to be friends in high school. But we fell out of touch when I left town after graduation. He’d barely graduated, made several more bad choices since, but now he was ‘working at being a better person.’ His words, not mine. It was probably bullshit. The Patrick I used to know was always stealing things. It used to be a running joke that he had ‘sticky fingers.’ And worst of all, I’d recommended him for this job. I’d put my neck out for this guy I barely knew anymore. If he failed—when he failed, it would reflect poorly on me.

  “Let’s go out this week,” I promised.

  Because, really, what did I have to lose?

  Jingle. Jingle.

  I glanced up as the bell on the front door chimed. A customer walked in. A guy I recognized named Nick Jasmine.

  I went still, feet frozen to the floor.

  Two months ago, Nick came into Kill Devil Ink for some new ink—a turtle on his ass, more specifically. Seemed normal enough. But that night he slept with Amanda, another artist that worked with me. I’d been close with Amanda since I moved back to town three years ago. Frankly, my friendship with Amanda was the only reason I still lived here. And this guy Nick pulled a one-night-stand on my best friend. And got her pregnant.

  “What do you want?” The words ripped through my gritted teeth.

  He didn’t know Amanda was pregnant. He hadn’t been back since that day.

  “I came to see Amanda.”

  “She’s busy.”

  “She’s here?”

  “Yes, but like I said, she’s busy.”

  My eyes fell on a woman. She must have snuck through the door behind Nick. She had on an oversized black hoodie, swimming in it, with the hood covering her hair. She was… beautiful. Pale skin and soft features. Lost in her sweatshirt.

  Nick kept talking. “I left a gray hat here. Two months back. Has it turned up?”

  He left more than a damn hat. “We aren’t your lost and found service,” I muttered. My eyes remained on the girl hiding behind him.

  “But we do have a lost and found,” Patrick chirped. “I could check.”

  I tried to stay present with the conversation. I needed to protect Amanda from this dickhead. But for a moment, I lost focus. I watched the woman in the hoodie instead. Something about her had my attention. Her eyes were on the floor, avoiding mine, avoiding everyone’s. She reminded me of a terrified little kitten, lost on the side of the road, left behind in a box in a rainstorm. Maybe the pictures of the tattoos and art on the walls frightened her. Or maybe, more likely, it was me who intimidated her. I had that effect on some women. I could be… off-putting to a good girl like her.

  “She’s with a customer,” Patrick said.

  “Yeah, she’s with a customer,” I echoed, snapping back to the conversation at hand, forcing my eyes off the woman. “Why don’t you write your name and phone number down on a piece of paper?” I said to Nick. “We’ll give you a call if the hat turns up. If Amanda remembers what happened to it. But I think it’s unlikely she’d remember you from two months ago.”

  “You remembered me,” Nick quipped.

  I glared at him.

  Amanda must have overhead us all talking because she came out from her station in the back. Without wavering, she walked up to Nick and handed him a gray knit beanie.

  “Here.”

  Nick took the beanie from her hands. He slipped it on his head, covering his short, dark hair. “Thanks for holding on to it for me,” he said to her softly. “I appreciate it.”

  I rolled my eyes. It was May and over eighty degrees outside today, who the hell cared that much about a wool hat?

  “You need anything else, turtle guy?” I asked.

  “Nick,” the woman in the hoodie whispered. She said his name like a plea to leave. She had the sweetest, purest voice. One word out of her mouth and Nick responded. Fuck, that voice, even I responded. She had my attention. She had more than my attention. She had every hair on my skin buzzing. All because of one single word. And it wasn’t even my name that had slipped off her tongue.

  “I don’t need anything else,” Nick said. “Not today. Goodbye, Amanda.” He stepped backward for the door, which he held open for the woman in the hoodie.

  Hoodie Woman followed. She slipped outside, carefully passing Nick. But just before she left, before disappearing out into the bright, sunny day, she snuck a glance in my direction. It was a glance at my body—my chest specifically. Her eyes lingered and floated over me.

  I felt like I’d been hit by an 18-wheeler straight to the stomach.

  I guess I wasn’t quite so off-putting after all.

  She disappeared out the door.

  The moment they were out of sight, Amanda buried her face in her hands.

  I moved to hug her. I wrapped my arms around her small frame. “I’m so sorry Amanda. Nick’s an asshole. He’s an asshole for bringing his girl in here like that too. In front of you. Showing her off.”

  I actually didn’t know if Nick had been s
howing her off. Something inside me told me the girl in the hoodie hadn’t been his girlfriend. Or even his sister. She was more like a stray puppy who had followed him in.

  “I’m going to go catch him before he leaves,” Amanda decided, pulling out of my grip. “Tell him everything. Tell him I’m pregnant.” She hurried for the double doors, chasing after him. “He deserves to know, right?”

  She was gone before I could respond.

  “Wow,” I whispered, alone with Patrick once more. “Did you notice the girl in the hoodie?” I asked because I wanted to make sure he’d seen her too. I wanted to make sure I wasn’t imaging things.

  “Yeah. She was pretty.”

  “Pretty? She was damn gorgeous.”

  “Gorgeous? Maybe if you’re into emo chicks.”

  “She wasn’t emo.”

  “She was something.” He made a face—a grimace. “I better get back to work. I need to call and confirm some appointments.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I hope Amanda’s okay.”

  “She’ll be fine. She can handle herself.”

  I walked away and left for my station down the hall. But I couldn’t shake off the feeling of the girl in the hoodie and her eyes on my body. I didn’t know if anyone had ever looked at me with that much curiosity before. I didn’t know what to make of it. Or how to feel about it.

  ~ CHAPTER 2 ~

  LOU

  The birds were singing.

  The sun was bright.

  I could smell salt from the ocean in the air.

  And I did it. I did it! I went into a public place. I made it out alive. Nobody captured me, hurt me, touched me, or even spoke to me.

  I breathed in deeply as I followed Nick back to the safety of his car. We’d been in North Carolina for only about an hour now, my first time ever visiting this state, and I was already in love with it. My heart sung its love at me, beating hard in my chest.

  Inside the car, Nick had his knit hat back on his head, which made even me feel better. He wore that hat like a shield. It protected him somehow. I was happy Amanda saved it for him. He was cute around her, around Amanda. I’d seen him date several girls over the years. Well, seen him date them from a distance. But he’d never dated anyone that looked like her. She had pale pink hair, a cute little nose, colorful tattoos down her arms, and she radiated a kindness I didn’t see in the other girls he’d dated before.

  I liked her already.

  “I did it,” I muttered, pulling down my sweatshirt hood, still high from the excitement and adrenaline I felt over this accomplishment. “I went inside the building with you. Did you see all the tattoos on that big guy? I’ve never seen anything like him. He looked like a man straight out of a romance novel. How crazy was that?”

  The man whom I meant, the one with so many tattoos, was named Finn Parker. I’d read it off one of the framed license certificates by the front door. The shop employed a John, a Sydney, an Amanda, a Finn, and a Patrick. The big, muscular man behind the receptionist counter, the one who looked at Nick like he wanted to snap him in half, had to be Finn Parker. That name fit him.

  My inner book worm screamed over this man. He embodied every fantasy I’d ever formed in my mind while reading romance. I’d lived in the top of a library most of my life. I could count on one hand the number of times I’d been into a business establishment that wasn’t my library since the day I left my library. So I quite literally had never seen a man like Finn before, at least not in real life.

  He scared me to death and excited me all at once.

  “Two minutes, Lou,” Nick breathed. He unbuckled his seatbelt. “Give me…me two minutes.” His voice was strained and raw. He opened his door and left the car in a flash. He slammed it shut, disappearing outside.

  Oh no. Oh no. Oh no.

  I buried my face in my hands. My good moment was crushed. Nick was having a panic attack. He had panic disorder. Since the day I met him, on my thirteenth birthday, he’d been having these panic attacks. They were severe and completely debilitating. I occasionally had panic attacks myself—but not like Nick’s.

  Nick’s panic attacks struck without warning and crippled him. I didn’t follow him because I knew he wouldn’t have wanted me to. He liked privacy as he suffered.

  I pulled my knees up to my chest.

  The car suddenly felt twice as small. Nick’s clothes and bags and belongings in the backseat, all the stuff he’d brought with him to move into our new rental house in North Carolina, they felt like they were growing larger, about to swallow me up.

  My heart broke for him.

  Had I done this? Had I amplified his anxiety? Had Amanda? Had seeing her magnified it? I looked over my shoulder and caught my breath.

  Outside the car, Nick stood talking with Amanda. He wasn’t having a panic attack. He was smiling and talking, and… normal. And then—he kissed her. Holy crap, I bit on my fingernails, and I watched. I shouldn’t have watched, but I watched. Their kiss—it was hot. Like the hottest thing I’d ever seen. It calmed me. Calmed my claustrophobia.

  I thought I’d convinced him to come back to North Carolina. I thought he’d made the move and done it for me. Or, at the very least, for his marine biologist job. But no—I saw now it was for her. He’d moved back for her.

  It made me happy. I was happy for my friend.

  I only wished I could be as normal as Nick.

  ~ CHAPTER 3 ~

  FINN

  I had my eyes on Amanda. When I first started working as a tattoo artist here, I’d asked her out. We went to dinner as something more than friends. Afterwards, we’d returned to the shop. We’d kissed. It had been an average kiss. No better or worse than the kisses I shared with most women. I might have even pursued it further, slept with her that night; but after, she’d smiled at me like something was funny. She’d giggled. Then she’d said, and I specifically remember her exact words because they’d etched themselves into my brain, “I guess this means we’re only supposed to be friends.”

  What? How had she known that?

  From one kiss, how had she known we weren’t meant for more? The thing about it was—she’d been right. We’d been friends three years now—great friends. And we worked as friends. We never would have made it as a couple. But how could she tell from just one kiss? One moment? Better question—why couldn’t I tell that sort of thing from a kiss? If I could weed people out like Amanda could, I wouldn’t have to waste my time kissing and sleeping with every girl who looked my way. I wouldn’t have so many failed relationships under my belt.

  It had been only a couple hours since Nick had come in after his hat. Amanda had chased him out to the parking lot, and she hadn’t stopped smiling since. She smiled now as she cleaned up her station, the day almost over.

  I decided that they must have kissed—or more—out in the parking lot earlier when she’d chased after him, and he still had her smiling. It made me jealous. Not because I wanted to be the one kissing Amanda and making her smile like that. But because I myself wanted to smile like her, like an idiot, all giddy and ridiculous from one kiss.

  Lately, not even sex was making me smile.

  “You tell him you’re pregnant?” I asked, point blank.

  Amanda’s smile faded. “No, Finn.”

  I took a breath. “Sorry.”

  “It wasn’t a good moment to tell him.”

  “Don’t wait forever.” I tapped the partition wall, embarrassed I’d said anything at all, and stepped away. I walked out front to the empty receptionist counter. Patrick had left about an hour ago. I sat down in his seat, fidgeting.

  I felt so out of control.

  I wanted to help Amanda but had no idea how. I didn’t know if Nick being back was a good thing. If he’d step up and be there for her and the baby, or if I would need to step in and fill that position? Ditch the yoga instructor and take Amanda out on a legitimate date. Try with her one more time. I had to help her somehow.

  Ring. Ring ring. Ring. Ring ring.

  The sound was the phone at the counter.

  People could book appointments online, but we still got a lot of calls, a lot of questions, a lot of people who apparently didn’t know how to use the internet. I grabbed the phone, bringing the receiver up to my face. “What?” I asked, pissed-off for no good reason at all.