Fade Back (A Stepbrother Romance Novella) by Stephanie Brother Page A

hid it a little better. 
    Karen greeted her with a wave and a finger pressed to her lips. 
    "Hey, Fitz, your two o'clock is here."
    Becka waited in silence while the sound of utensils dropping and stools scrapping raw linoleum wafted through the curtain. Then shuffling footsteps, and then—Fitz. He looked drawn, too: but Becka was convinced his straggly hair and gaunt cheekbones looked infinitely more heroin chic than her own pink puffy baby face. 
    They stood there in silence, just looking at each other. A thousand words seemed to pass between them over six feet of space, the distance felling non-traversable. But somehow, when Fitz eventually sighed and, with an air of futility, waved Becka through the curtain, shaking his head sadly, Becka managed to cross that distance. She waited, shuffling from foot to foot while Fitz dug out his design, annotated with ink color codes and shading notes. He gestured, still silent, for Becka to lie down. Becka pulled off her t-shirt bashfully, a far cry from the proud peacock who shed her coat so readily a month before. She knew her flat abs weren't going to get her through this. She didn't want to push Fitz.
    "So you trust me with this thing?" Fitz said, a hint of levity and zest under the hard-baked crust of his uncertainty.
    "You're a professional. I trust you,” she replied, wrapping the towel he handed her under her bra again, just like she did last time.
    Fitz grunted in reply, and Becka lay on the table silently. The smell of the leather made her nostalgic, and she remembered the pleasure she had experienced the last time she was here. But she was too nervous for the memory of fleeting encounters to rouse her. 
    "Remember, no wriggling,” Fitz murmured, and Becka smiled in a way she hoped wasn't too pitiful. She was just glad to feel his touch on her body again, the new yet comforting feel of those rough palms spreading against her burning flesh. Even the biting sting of the tattoo pen didn't seem to hurt like it once did. Becka felt anesthetized to everything except the heaviness in her heart, and the desire—no, the need—to make this man happy.

Chapter Fifteen
    T he silence drew on as Fitz changed inks: from aquamarine, to teal, to chartreuse to carmine to aubergine to goldenrod. One by one, the panels in her tattoo filled with ink drained from that buzzing implement, and every panel took Becka closer to never seeing this beautiful man again—unless she started talking. It was almost too much to bear, and her whole body seemed to be pumping potent hormones at her to force her to run away or punch something or most painfully—to push Fitz against his desk and ravage him. She’d read that sadness could make people horny, but Becka didn't believe that the last few weeks. Now, all of a sudden, she totally got it. 
    To distract herself from her impending doom, Becka tried to small talk to Fitz while he changed the inks. At first, he was gruff. He held up his hand and paid too much attention to a process he must have done a million times before. Becka was not too perturbed by this elaborate wrangling of machinery, so she continued trying. As the rows of ink packs were spent one by one, Becka took each one as a challenge. She felt some of her old pluck return as she tried to bait him.
    "Knock knock... C'mon, knock knock!" 
    Nothing, Fitz would just shrug, and bite his lip to hide a smile (or stop a tear). Becka could feel his hands shaking a little, and she thought about kissing those quivering fingers. For the first time in weeks, Becka felt like she could maybe make things right. She kept her voice soft and just tried to enjoy her proximity to the object of her desire. Her sex drive was stymied with woe all those weeks, and the sadness in her had only lightened a little. But now, with the pool of warm light cast by the bulb dangling above her, and the smell of the leather heated by her skin, and the stunning man stroking her tenderly under her breasts with damp towels