Read Online Steel Lust by Jayne Kingston - Free Book Online Page B

of the seven Rodriguez children. She was
also the only one who had their mother Brenda’s coloring. While all six of her
siblings had their father’s wavy black hair and dark-olive skin, Eva’s long,
straight hair was the color of honey in sunlight, her complexion fair. The
running joke in the family was that she was the milkman’s kid, but her wide,
deep-green eyes had clearly come from her father.
    She was ten years younger than Leo, but they had always been
close, even when she was a little girl and he was just one of the guys always
hanging around the full-to-capacity Rodriguez house. The older she got, the
closer they became, to the point that Leo considered her just as close of a
friend as Jamie had always been to him.
    No one was surprised when she announced she wanted to work
with what were essentially her three older brothers when Leo, Jamie and Oz
opened the shop. Not that Oz had shown her any brotherly love when he’d been
making her apprenticeship a living hell. But she’d done one better than survive
it, she’d thrived. She was only twenty-three, but she was already making a name
for herself as an amazing tattoo artist.
    She snorted. “Same old copout you always use, Jones. And you
forget all the summers you spent swimming in our pool. I’ve seen the legs.” She
tilted her head to one side and pointed. “For that matter, I’ve seen the ass.
Remember when Steve pantsed you at his graduation party?” she asked, talking
about the fourth Rodriguez sibling.
    “He was always trying to get a look at my ass. Frankly, I’m
surprised he married a woman,” he muttered, then smiled when she snickered.
“What are you doing here on a Sunday night?” he asked, moving to stand behind
his desk chair.
    “Same thing you are, trying to work without interruptions.”
She turned and made a couple of mouse clicks, taking him to what appeared to be
the shop’s new website home page. “I’ve been working on redesigning the
website.”
    “You just did that a few months ago.” He leaned in, one arm
over the back of the chair, his other hand braced on the edge of the desk.
    “It’s been almost a year.” She turned her head and sniffed
his hair. “You smell fucking incredible. What is that?”
    He straightened. “I’m trying a new shampoo,” he muttered.
    He’d used Joy’s shampoo. He scrubbed a hand over his nose
and mouth, surreptitiously making sure he didn’t still smell like Joy as well.
He’s spent most of the afternoon making sure he was thorough about saying
goodbye. To all of her.
    “You’re grinning like an idiot,” Eva observed. “I heard
she’s hot.”
    “Oh yeah? Who’d you hear that from?”
    “The Pop-Tart.” She made a few quick clicks and closed out
of what she was doing.
    “Her name is Agnes.” He still had no idea why Eva called her
the Pop-Tart. Frankly, he was afraid to ask. “And I thought you didn’t talk to
her.”
    “She’s growing on me.” She stood and stretched with a noisy
groan. “But only because she’s not as stupid as the other two.”
    “Sharonda is a dean’s list honor student.”
    “Who works part-time as a counter girl in a tattoo shop.”
    He paused a beat. “ You used to work as a counter girl
in a tattoo shop.”
    “Only until Jamie talked Oz into mentoring me. And besides,
the brainiac’s got that haughty way of talking like she’s better than the rest
of us. I don’t like her. And don’t even try to defend Miss Marvelous,” she
snarled, meaning Pete’s girlfriend Marvella.
    He held up his hands in a gesture of surrender and said
nothing.
    Marvella was a vapid, shallow girl who only worked one or
two nights a week, and then only for a few hours at a time. When she didn’t
call off, that was. He and Jamie and Oz had talked about letting her go from
time to time, but she drew in clients like crazy when she did work, and she
could sell the hell out of shop t-shirts and body jewelry.
    “I think the Pop-Tart was a little jealous.” She