Page 46 of Forbidden Bride (Forbidden 1)
“Not even a little bit,” he says.
Getting out of the car, he comes around to open my door and offer me his hand. Hesitating, I take his hand and get out. The air is a bit humid here, with a theatrical bit of fog rolling in, and I lean against Marco as he leads me to the dark building. His three knocks on the back door are met with the creak of a lock turning from the inside. Bright light spills out as the door swings open. He steps inside first and leads me inside…to the back room of a pharmacy.
“What is this place—”
“You’ll see,” he says, kissing the top of my head.
Long metal shelves hold rows of pill bottles and boxed medicines, and I see a filing cabinet and a bunch of cleaning supplies. Scales and pill counters sit on the countertop. Framed diplomas and licenses hang on the wall.
“Is this a legit pharmacy we’re sneaking into, or—”
“We’re not here for the pills, Karina.” He laughs. “We’re going downstairs.”
A door in the back opens onto a staircase with lights shining up from below. Music thumps quietly as we descend, the lights getting brighter and more fluorescent as we reach the bottom. White and red tiles decorate the floor and mirrors line the walls, while galvanized metal and leather salon chairs create four workstations across the room. There’s a disco ball hanging from the ceiling, and one lone man in a studded black vest and no shirt holds a beer in one hand while he shimmies and twists to the music all by himself.
“Marco! You made it!”
A tall woman with jet black hair and perfectly winged eyeliner comes toward us with her hands outstretched. My eyes go wide and I catch myself before she catches me gawking. Nearly every inch of her skin is covered in tattoos. She even has a wild rose vine climbing up the side of her neck, blossoming under her jaw and behind her ear. She’s gorgeous.
“Nellie, hey,” Marco says, giving her a hug. “Thanks again for seeing us.”
Nellie looks to be about our age, or even in her late twenties maybe, but all her adornments make it hard to tell. She’s got a piercing in her nose, several in her ears, and when she smiles, I see a flash of a ball in her tongue. I wonder if she’s one of Marco’s exes.
She takes his face between her hands and then looks at me. “This is her?” She flashes me a genuine smile. “Oh, aren’t you lovely. Just beautiful. I’m so happy for you, Marco.”
Happy for him? Because of me?
I can’t help but feel warm inside. Lovely? Beautiful? Resisting the urge to look around to see if she’s speaking about someone else, I shake her hand and smile.
“Karina, this is Nellie,” Marco says. “She’s done some work for the family and graciously agreed to stay open late just for us tonight.”
“For us to…?” I ask, trailing off as my gaze bounces between the two of them.
Marco takes my hands. “I’m serious about you, Karina. And I meant it when I said that everything is going to be okay. Let me prove it to you. Tattoos are forever, after all.”
I blink in shock. “You’re…going to get a tattoo? For me?”
He nods. “For you. For always. If I have your blessing.”
“Oh my gosh.” I’m overwhelmed, so I just nod.
Throwing my arms around him, I hold him close and almost let myself believe that things will work out. Almost.
“I want one, too,” I say. “For you. For always.”
I’ve never gotten a tattoo before, but I want to mark my body in some small way and memorialize our love, now and forever. It’ll be something no one can ever take away from me.
Nellie grins. “Let’s see what we can come up with for you two, okay? This way.”
She takes us to her workstation, where we talk about design ideas and she starts sketching out our suggestions. I’m aware that the night is growing long, but with each passing moment, I care less and less. I don’t want to go home.
Soon, I’m lying on my side in the chair, the waist of my pants pulled down over my right hip while Nellie creates the first tattoo. Marco holds my hand while I close my eyes and breathe in and out slowly to deal with the pain. It’s almost like a burning sensation, like a sewing needle being dragged over my skin, and part of me goes into a deep state of relaxation as I give myself up to the stinging and vibration of the tattoo needle. I think I actually like it.
It’s all over pretty quickly, since the design is a small one and only done in black ink, and then it’s Marco’s turn to sweat it out in the chair while his left hip gets inked. When Nellie’s finished, she smears clear ointment over Marco’s ink, and then has us stand hip to hip in front of the mirror. I gasp at how perfectly the images have turned out.
My tattoo is a small open book with blank pages—symbolizing the fact that I’m going to write my own story someday—and an intricately engraved, heart-shaped locket in the center. I had Nellie draw it in the Georgian style of jewelry that was created in the early 1800s—the era that would match the wedding dress of my dreams. The lock opening is uniquely shaped, too.
And Marco—his tattoo is of a 19th century style fountain pen with a key crossed over it, so the two instruments form an X shape. The pen is so he can help me write my story, and the key is a perfect match for my locket tattoo. When we stand side by side, the book and pen, the lock and key, they’re clearly made only for each other.
“They’re so beautiful. Thank you so much.” I watch while Nellie places gauze over my artwork and tapes it in place.
Marco cups my face in his hands. “These tattoos are our secret, our sign. I’m yours. And I promise that I’ll always show up. I’ll find a way to get you out of this, I swear.”
I look up at him with love and then close my eyes as he leans in to kiss me.
I can only pray that he’s right.
