Page 121 of Dirty Like Zane
For fucking once in ourlives.
And he still wasn’t trying to get in my pants. He never tried to touch me for anything more intimate than ahug.
But all the while… he looked at me like a man who lovedme.
He spoke to me like a man who lovedme.
By my side, he felt like a man who lovedme.
Theman.
He never once put pressure on me to discuss our relationship or to further our relationship. I never asked him to further our relationship, because I’d realized it was pretty damn sweet as it was, and maybe it should just stay this way for a while; respectful, peaceful, mutuallycomfortable.
Platonic; at least on thesurface.
When I walked back into the tattoo parlor this afternoon, though, that allchanged.
* * *
“What do you think?”Zane asked me. He’d gotten up out of the chair and stood before me, his T-shirt sleeve rolled up over his newly-tattooed right shoulder, which was turned tome.
The tattoo wasn’t massive or crazy-elaborate, but it covered most of his shoulder. The skin looked tender, which still made me cringe, but the tattoo was gorgeous. Both the boat and the serpent were pretty detailed, outlined beautifully in crispblack.
He’d already told me the tattoo artist had a friend in New York that he was going to see in a few weeks, to have the colors inkedin.
“It’s beautiful, Zane,” I told him honestly. “Are you happy withit?”
“Yeah,” he said. “It’s exactly what I wanted. But… I think this one is myfavorite.”
Then he showed me his left hand. I had to blink at it several times before it really sankin.
Those ring tattoos some people got around their ring finger when they got married? Like in lieu of or in addition to an actual weddingring…
Zane now hadone.
In very delicate, tiny, gorgeous script, the nameMaggiewas now inked on his ring finger, right where a wedding ring wouldgo.
Permanentlyinked.
My jawdropped.
When he turned his hand over to show me the other side, it saidMay.
“Oh my God… Zane.” I looked up at him. My vision was blurring. “You didn’t.” I blinked furiously, looking at his hand again… but there it was. I grabbed his hand and pulled it towardme.
“Easy,” he said, eying me. “It’s tender,babe.”
“Sorry.” I gentled my touch, lifting his ring finger and turning his hand, back and forth, reading the little script-ring.
MaggieMay
“You hateit.”
I looked up into his blue eyes, startled. The look he gave me back was guarded, his eyelidslowered.
“No. No, I don’t hate it, Zane. I’m just a little… stunned. I mean… it’s so…” I swallowed. “Permanent.”
“Yeah?” Now there was a spark of challenge in his eyes that I knew all too well. “Well, so were my vows to you. Even if you divorce me, right the fuck now, what I said at that altar stands. The fact that I married you stands. Even if we aren’t together, all that shit is real and it’s forever. At least, it is forme.”
