branded (phantoms mc #2)

two: in which she needs a new poker face

"Got a tattoo, and the pain's alright" -Coldplay, Ink

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Sallow County, Florida

"Fucκ, Ghost," I cursed, letting out a loud moan. "There. Right...there."

"Stop that ѕhit," he muttered, shooting me a glare. He put the tattoo gun down, breathing out a sigh I could hear over the heavy metal he was playing on his phone. "Final warning."

I bit my bottom lip, stifling a laugh. "Noted."

He resumed finishing up the tiny black Latin cross onto my left bicep. Instead of tattooed teardrops fucκing up my face, I figured the simple cross-a vertical bar passing through a longer horizontal bar-would be more aesthetic.

Ghost finished up, cleaning the newest addition to the smattering of crosses on my arm before wrapping it. "You're gonna get yourself killed," he muttered, tracing his fingertips down my bare arm.

I got off the leather seat and stood over him. "I was wondering when you were gonna say something," I told him, going to the only wall mirror in his booth and tying my dark hair up with an elastic band. At the moment, it was a mess-split ends and ѕhit-but I didn't have the time to visit Benito, the only person I trusted with my nest.

"I always say something," Ghost pointed out, leaning back in his chair.

I caught his eye in the mirror. Fucκ, was he sexy. I couldn't get over that, even to this day. Couldn't get over the way he was the complete polar opposite to the boy who'd left to join the army.

He'd filled out-wider chest, thicker neck-and his once unblemished golden-brown skin was smattered with ink. His arms were a sleeve of tattoos, and they went up his neck as well. There were changes that weren't obvious to someone who didn't know him, too. Like how his face had gotten harder. And those eyes. Sometimes, they looked dead, like there was nothing inside. When he'd returned home after six years of service to find both our fathers dead, the first things I'd noticed were those dead eyes. His nickname made sense.

Marlon had died a long time ago, and I was fucκing his ghost.

"Yeah. You talk a whole lot," I informed him, and I caught the ghost of a smile on his face.

"And you need to stop chasing cheap thrills."

I narrowed my eyes at him. "Cheap thrills? I'm looking for my sister, Ghost. I'm not fucκing my way around South America and getting a tan." Although, when I looked at my arms, they were a nice, even brown tone beneath my sleeves of ink, darker than my usual glow.

"You need to let it go," Ghost told me, his voice grim. "Zeus did."

I stiffened. "My father didn't let it go. He pretended Camila never existed. Don't be a dicκ."

"Baby," Ghost said softly, "I just want you to understand how dangerous the ѕhit you're doing really is."

I moved to straddle him where he sat. "I do what I have to do. Just like you do. You know that."

He shook his head, and his messy black hair fell in his face. He slid his arms around my waist. "Difference between the two of us," he began in a quiet voice as he looked up at me, "is that I've looked death in the eye and I fear it. You don't."

Ghost's time in the army had changed him-for the better, for the worst... It was fifty-fifty. There were moments when I'd see glimpses of Marlon-my friend-but those moments rarely happened, at least, not with me. He was President of the Phantoms now, and everything had changed.