good idea.
“Please?” he asked. “My other sisters have been nagging me for the better part of the month to do this.”
“And you waited until the last minute.” Typical.
“You got it.” He took off his jacket and folded it over one arm. She noticed how the cotton shirt accented his muscles. He wasn’t a normal, flabby banker type. Not in the least.
He looked away from her. “She’s in the hospital now. She’s having surgery Friday. It’s going to be a tough day. I want to show her something. Give her some hope before she goes under the knife. Or let her laugh her ass off at me—either one would be good for her before surgery.” He took a deep breath. “She’s been dealing with cancer since she was thirteen. She had four years in remission, but now she’s older. She knows more about what the odds mean.”
Shit. That sounded rough.
“The tattoo will be red and still healing. Ugly as hell,” she warned him, but her attention was fixed on his strong fingers as they undid his shirt.
Normally she’d tell the man to piss off, but part of her—a dark part of her—wanted to see him with his shirt off.
“I don’t care.”
“You got cash on you?”
“I’ve got credit cards. And a checkbook.” He reached for his coat pocket. Who the hell carried a checkbook anymore? But not that she was arguing. She far preferred checks to credit cards.
“Check. No plastic.” Plastic just meant giving a larger cut to the banks who processed the payments. She didn’t care to let them keep any more of her own money, thank you.
“Okay,” Gael agreed. “I’ll write you the check for the whole amount.” He pulled out the checkbook from his coat pocket. Leather-bound, expensive, with gold foil on the checks.
He made swift work of the check, his handwriting precise as he wrote out a check to her for $10,000. He ripped it from the register and handed it to her. She took it and stared at all the zeroes, blinking fast. She’d never gotten a check that big. Ever in her life.
“How do I know it won’t bounce?”
Gael laughed, big and hearty, and then handed her a business card. “If it bounces, you can come find me here.” He tapped the office address, one of the sleek high-rises downtown. She’d vaguely heard of the investment firm on it. “Or hell, go to city hall. My sister’s the mayor. She’ll send out the entire Chicago police force after me.”
“Your sister is Kathleen Quinn?” The suit had political connections, too? Then again, why did that surprise her? Rich, powerful and connected. Sounded about right.
“She’s the ambitious one in the family.”
Judging by the Rolex on his wrist, not the only one, Mags thought. “The mayor of Chicago used to punch you? That sister.”
“Still does, if she can get away with it.” He let out a rueful sigh.
“Okay, we can get started today. I don’t want the mayor after me,” she said and nodded toward the small room with the reclining tattoo chair. The door was wide-open and the hook on the wall empty. “You can hang your coat and your shirt there.”
She watched as he hung his coat on the hook and whipped off his tie. After that, his hands made quick work of the buttons on his shirt. She wondered what else they could do quickly. How else they might be nimble. She bit her lower lip as the crisp white button-down came off, and there were suddenly just miles of perfect, smooth chest. Muscular, taut, unblemished skin, ridges and valleys of muscles that invited a slow touch. Damn, what a canvas. She instantly felt her body react and had to fight the urge to whistle. The man was fine. Finer than fine. Why did he do his body such an injustice by covering it with a suit? Her eyes lingered on the V of muscle leading into his wool trousers.
Well, she thought, her mind going to all kinds of carnal places, there were worst ways to spend an afternoon other than painting a freakin’ Greek god. Scratch that: Celtic god. This job might not suck after all.
He hung up his shirt over his coat and glanced back at her, arms spread in a question.
“Go on, lie down then,” she told him, feeling a trickle of sweat drip down her lower back. God, it had been too long since she’d gotten laid, she thought. She was a woman who took care of her needs—who had plenty of