Page 8 of Mimic

“No, you don’t know what fucking happened, and it’s none of your fucking business.” Mimic turned away from me and pulled out his phone. “Keys, get your ass to Shadow Ink, in a fucking truck not your bike, and sit outside the door until my sister is done. Don’t step one foot inside the shop or I will carve your fucking eyes out of your head, got me?”

He hung up without waiting for a response. Turning to me, he growled, “Go inside, lock the fucking door, and finish her tattoo. Don’t ask her a fucking thing.”

He yanked the door open and pushed me inside. He stared at me through the door until I turned the lock, and then he finally walked away. I crept back around the divider and found Kytten wiping away tears.

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry. I’m sorry he’s being an asshole.”

Kytten chuckled. “He’s not, I promise.” She waved her hands over her legs. “This is hard for him. We lost each other for a lot of years, and I went through some shit. He’s blaming himself.”

“He’s still an asshole,” I mumbled.

I sat on the stool and got back to work. Trying not to think about the scars I was covering and what had happened to make Kytten hurt herself. And why Mimic would blame himself.

When I was done, I put some cream on the tattoo and wrapped it in plastic so she could pull her jeans up. We walked together to the register, and I gave Kytten her total. She held out the money, but when I reached for it, she pulled her hand back.

“Please don’t think awful of my brother. He’s always been so protective of me, and well, things happened that neither of us had any control over. He hasn’t quite accepted that children aren’t responsible for the actions of adults.”

“It’s really none of my business.”

She sighed and set the money on the counter. “Give him a chance, okay?”

Before I could answer, she slipped outside the door and into the truck of the man I assumed was Keys. She waved as they drove off, and I wondered what her story was. Was it similar to mine, or worse?

I’d never hurt myself, but some of the girls had. A few of us wanted to stay together after we escaped, but because we were so young, they split many of us up.

Three of us were placed together in the foster home Alice and I ran from. The third girl was Jenny. She hadn’t done well in the Trick Pony or out of it. She’d taken her life not long after.

We all had our demons and our own ways of coping with them. I would never judge someone else for doing whatever they could to process their trauma. Even if it meant leaving this world.

There were plenty of times I had thought about it. Then I would think of my mother, and the idea of one day seeing her again pulled me through.

I cleaned up my station and was putting the extra ink away when I heard the front door again. My shoulders dropped in despair as I realized my day of dealing with Mimic wasn’t done.

Why couldn’t he just leave me alone? The day was done; the door was locked—wait, I had locked the door, right? Slowly, I tiptoed out to the main area, and a man stood at the counter.

“I’m sorry, we’re closed for the evening.”

“Door was still open; light was still on.”

He wasn’t bad looking. He wasn’t as tall as Mimic, but his shoulders were wider. The cut he wore was different, too. More faded, dirtier. “Hours on the door are clear.”

“If you didn’t want anyone coming in, you should have locked the door,” he said with a grin that didn’t look friendly. It was a grin I recognized. I’d seen it on other men. Older men who thought they had a right to do what they pleased because they had money to pay for their sins.

“There are cameras all over this room. And they’re monitored twenty-four seven.”

He looked at the ceiling. I wasn’t lying; there were cameras, but Gunner had never said anything about them being monitored. I assumed that, like everywhere else, they were there for viewing after the fact.

He pulled something out of his pocket. “This nifty little device makes sure no one can see a thing.” He held up a small plastic box about the size of a cigarette lighter. It had two lights; one of which was green. It was lit up, letting me know it was activated.

“Indie. Indigo, wake up, honey.”

I opened my eyes to Gunner so close to my face that I jerked it back and hit it on the floor. I groaned loudly, my hand reaching for my head.

“Don’t touch it, sweetheart. Patch needs to take a look.”

“Get out of my way so I can.”