Scarlet Disaster by Colette Rhodes
Chapter 1
Christmas Eve
“So how come you wanted to come with me today?” Ria asked as we picked our way down the snow-covered sidewalk towards the tattoo studio. “I’m not complaining, but you sounded pretty eager considering you’re just going to be sitting there, probably bored.”
“I won’t be bored,” I told her confidently, clutching my hot chocolate that was already feeling more like tepid chocolate, but it was December in Alaska so I didn’t know what I’d expected. This is why I usually stayed in my house until April. “I’ve never seen anyone get a tattoo before and I want to watch. I’ve wanted to get something for the longest time.”
“Oh yeah?” Ria asked, waiting for me to elaborate. We’d been roommates for a while, but I’d always been cagey about my career, not wanting her to judge me. I should have known she wouldn’t. Ria had been very cool and open-minded about life, even before she got into a relationship with three men at the same time. Now she lived out in the woods with all her lovers like a freaking goddess.
I just wanted to find one man to love me for me, and she’d managed to find three. They were hot as fuck too, but I’d rather chew off my own arm than move out to the woods, so I wasn’t that jealous.
“I couldn’t get a tattoo while I was camming—I didn’t want anything identifiable, you know?—but now I’m not…” I trailed off, the subject still a bit of a sore spot. I mean, I felt good about my decision for the most part, but it had been my life since I was 20 and adjusting to a new reality was taking me longer than I thought.
“You’re not?”
“Originally, I put the camming on hold because of Frank.” Fucking Frank. “It didn’t work out with him, and I haven’t been in the mood to get sexy on camera since then.”
It was irritating as fuck that he’d been the one who’d asked me to stop, because it felt like he was dictating my decisions even though I’d been ready to stop camming anyway. I was ready to explore. To see the world in real life, not on the internet.
Frank had started off as a regular cam client, and I should have left it there. He’d suggested a more “girlfriend experience” type package with very generous compensation, and in a moment of weakness—or maybe loneliness—I agreed. The sexy stuff was still there, but there had been video calls talking about each other’s days, messages and pics throughout the day, some sexy, but not always. He’d assured me it was exclusive.
There was a reason I’d never indulged in anything like that before, and it’s because I knew I wouldn’t be able to maintain my professionalism if I actually liked the person. I’m not even sure I did like Frank, but the attention had been addictive after so long being on my own. Even during my doomed starter marriage straight out of high school, I’d never had anyone focus on me like that.
I could see now that I’d gotten too attached to Frank, too wrapped up in the fantasy of it all, which should have been an obvious risk since I’ve always been a romantic at heart. When he flew me to New York for a whirlwind trip of sex and pampering, it had seemed too good to be true.
I’m sure his wife would agree.
“I’m sorry, Lou,” Ria said, wrapping one arm around my shoulders and giving me a squeeze. “Was he an asshole? Do we need to go toilet paper a skyscraper in NYC?”
Every girl needed a friend like Ria.
She did her best to perk me up as we approached the tiny tattoo studio, only identifiable by the Mountain Ink sign above a nondescript black door. Nothing ominous about that.
“Don’t suppose your many, many lovers could introduce me to their friends?” I teased, trying to play along with her efforts to bolster me even though I was still feeling pretty surly about life in general, and immensely grinchy about all the Christmas shit everywhere.
Ria snorted, tossing out her coffee cup before pushing against the door to the studio. “Bold of you to think they have friends. Though, we’re sort of meeting one today, I guess…”
Considering her boyfriends lived out in the middle of the fucking woods like actual mountain men, that checked out. They were hardly the type to head down to the bar on a Friday night for a few drinks with the boys.
I briefly registered the clean, minimalist space all done in monochromatic colors with an exposed wood floor, but then my attention became fully engulfed by the god-like specimen of masculinity standing up to greet us.
He was so tall. I was a pretty petite woman anyway, but he must be at least 6-foot-five, with lean muscles visible through his fitted black t-shirt and dark jeans. His shirt scooped just low enough to see a hint of ink on his chest, and it covered almost every inch of his arms, all done in black that stood out against his pale skin. He had pitch black hair that was longer on the top and pushed to the side, and the most incredible eyes I had ever seen. They were green, but not the sort of dull olive green that I had. His eyes were like shiny emeralds.
Where the fuck had this guy come from? They did not make them like this around these parts. They did not make them like this on Earth.
My libido, which had been lying dormant for the past few weeks with a wounded ego, slowly stuttered back to life, revving up like an old lawnmower that needed a few pulls to get going.
“Nate, this is my friend, Lou. She came along to observe, I hope that’s okay. She’s working her way up to getting some ink of her own,” Ria said, her voice sounding far away. I wasn’t used to flirting with men in real life, without Scarlet as a cover, and I suddenly felt like an awkward teenager again.
Why hadn’t I dressed better for this? My options were pretty limited for winter anyway, but I’d chosen my bright white parka and fluro pink beanie and matching gloves to brighten my mood and now I was regretting not picking something more sophisticated to go with my black fleece-lined leggings and black snow boots. I had a full face of makeup on out of habit, but without the wig and the contacts, I felt kind of… plain.
“I certainly hope you’ll come to me for your first tattoo,” Nate said in a low voice, his unusually bright green eyes trained on me. I nodded mutely. I’d probably agree to anything he asked me at that moment. Ria could close her eyes. I could be quiet.
This was going to be a very long couple of hours.
* * *
I had three New Year’s resolutions for this year: sell my house, start my world adventure, and have sex with a penis that was attached to a real man, not suctioned to whatever hard surface I had handy.
Oh, and overhaul my career and get a tattoo.
I didn’t think that was asking for too much. I’d spent Christmas Day and the subsequent week in my house alone, figuring out what my next steps would be, and these were the goals I’d decided on. The house needed some work, and the travel couldn’t happen until it sold, but a real-life penis shouldn’t be hard to find, right?
I could do this. Normal people used dating apps all the time.
Lou, 25.
Totally nailed that part. Now to come up with a funny, flirty bio that summed up my personality in 500 characters or less.
Hi. I’m an ex-camgirl who has barely had sex with actual humans in my life, and I’m going to be leaving town soon forever, so this is strictly a temporary I-need-penis arrangement. K thx bye.
Too forward?
Too forward.
These winter nights are long and cold, I’m looking for someone to keep me cozy. Fiery redhead. Yoga fanatic. Fairbanks → anywhere and everywhere.
That sounded pretty flirty. And ‘yoga fanatic’ was a solid code for ‘flexible enough to get my feet behind my ears’.
My thumb hovered over the ‘save’ button as I chewed nervously on my lip, trying to talk myself into doing it. The pictures I’d chosen were cute—a combination of selfies and posed, but not too posed, photos Ria had taken of me in New York before I’d had my heart and pride crushed, but they looked weird to me. I had practically lived my life on camera for years, but it was never me. It was blonde bombshell ‘Scarlet’, not regular redheaded Lou.
I didn’t know how to be myself—on camera or off.
I tapped my screen agitatedly with my cherry-colored nails for a few moments before closing the app without saving. This was stupid. I was planning on leaving Fairbanks as soon as I could get the house fixed up and sold anyway. If I wanted a one-night stand, I could just go to a bar like a regular person. No awkward sexting required.
My phone buzzed in my hands and I glanced down, rolling my eyes to find yet another message from Frank. He was persistent, I had to give him that. It had been a couple of months since I’d gotten back from New York, and he was still messaging me.
Frank:
I’d like to talk to you, Scarlet.
Oh, would he now? The fucking asshole. I should just block him, I don’t know why I didn’t. Okay, maybe I did. I’d gotten used to his attention in the weeks we’d been “together” and I was lonely. So even though I never replied, I didn’t block his number either. Or send back the cash he kept transferring me.
Before Frank, I’d been content with solo cam work. Some live shows, sexy content creation, plus a few regulars I did private shows with who had become like friends to me over the years. Nothing… girlfriendy. God, a teeny bit of attention and now I was panting after more like an eager puppy. I was embarrassed for myself.
I threw my phone down on the couch and let myself into my bedroom to get ready for the day. Five years of camming had given me a strict morning routine that I didn’t think I’d ever be able to break. Always get ready in the morning—makeup on, hair ready to hide under a wig, sexy outfit laid out, ready to go. Some clients wanted to talk early in the day, and I never wanted to be unprepared. Besides, even when I wasn’t actively talking to someone, I still had to create content.
Content, content, content.Content is king.
While I closed my camgirl profiles, I was maintaining Scarlet on mainstream social media platforms. They were clean anyway, nothing on there would get my account deleted, and I had half a million followers, a lot of whom had been there since the beginning. And in a weird way, they were my friends. I’d worried them enough by stopping my live shows, the least I could do was post a few cute pics to let everyone know I was alive.
Besides, those half a million followers had been a source of revenue in the past, but they were going to be how I paid my bills going forward.
I sat down at the vanity and carefully applied my makeup, making my cheekbones look sharper, my lips fuller, and my eyes appear wider. Cute, I decided, looking at my reflection. Photo time.
I pulled my hair up just enough to tuck into the wig cap for a quick pic. The blonde wig felt like it weighed a hundred pounds as I pulled it on and fussed with it in the mirror to get it straight and make the sweepy bangs fall nicely. It used to feel like slipping into a sexier second skin, but now it sort of felt like manacles that I voluntarily shackled on each day.
The ring light in front of an oatmeal-colored sheet I’d hung from the ceiling to take pictures in front of, and I hooked up my phone and tugged down my chunky knitted sweater on one side to mostly hide my pale pink panties. Standing in frame, I looked down to hide the fact that I wasn’t wearing my contacts and laughed like my bent knee was the funniest thing I’d ever seen, using the clicker hooked up to my phone that was discreetly tucked up my sleeve to take a few different pictures, adjusting my poses slightly until I was satisfied I had a good range to choose from.
Another day in the office.
Pulling the phone off the tripod, I flipped through until I found one I liked before running it through a couple of different editing apps to make my skin glowier and my thighs smoother. Every single time I posted a picture, I swore I wasn’t going to edit it, but I always ended up doing it anyway. Because everyone else was doing it, right? I couldn’t be the only one who wasn’t.
I quickly typed up a generic caption about sweater weather before I hit post, knowing I needed to come up with some longer video content later, but not in the mood to do it just then.
I had more exciting things to focus on today.
Satisfied, I put the wig back on the mannequin and fussed with my natural red hair, fluffing it out until it looked presentable again. Today was a big day, after all. Today was the start of something new. I’d spent the last few weeks in limbo, but I was officially ready to put the past behind me, and getting a tattoo was one of the ways I was doing that.
Step one: Tattoo. Step two: Do all the things I’d only dreamed of when I’d been bouncing around from house-to-house with my shitty mom or crashing on my grandparents’ couch. Or when I’d been in a loveless marriage I had no business being in, or when I’d been going through the motions in the years since, spending more time as Scarlet than Lou. Or worse, when I’d been staying in a lavish hotel in New York, mistaking lust for love.
Step three: Be happy.
* * *
You’ve got this.
I took a deep breath of the freezing cold air before letting myself into Mountain Ink, taking in the small but bright space, the gallery of framed artwork dominating the back wall.
I’d felt a lot braver about this when I was just chilling alone in my house.
I’d wanted a tattoo for years, but I’d always been paranoid about putting anything on my body that would make me identifiable under the wig. In the beginning, I’d been worried that my ex-husband or his friends would see me on those sites and I’d have to deal with their judgment, and after a while, it had just been easier to pretend I was a whole different person.
No more pretending. Or at least, like, a lot less pretending. Baby steps.
“Lou,” Nate greeted me, standing up from the small desk in the corner he’d been working at.
Oh my god, it should actually be illegal to look like him. He was like the sexy bad boy vampire in every TV show—artfully messy black hair, piercing green eyes, and the world’s sharpest jawline. And that ink. It covered almost every visible inch of him, peeking out over the top of his black henley and all the way down those roped forearms.
So fucking hot.
“Hi,” I said lamely as I pulled off my winter layers, wondering where all my sexual confidence had gone. I was not a shy woman, but this guy turned me into mush. Or maybe Lou was actually a shy woman, and I could only be sexy when I was channeling Scarlet.
“How are you feeling?” he asked, his smooth low voice doing things to me that usually required the assistance of battery-operated devices.
“A little nervous, but not too bad,” I replied. Honestly, I was probably more nervous about acting cool in front of Nate for a few hours than I was about getting something permanently inked into my skin. I already knew he was good—Ria’s tattoo was awesome, and he’d sent me a bunch of pictures of his work over the past few days when we’d been finalizing the design.
“Good. Nothing to be nervous about.”
He cleared his throat, and I could have sworn he was checking me out for a moment. I didn’t think I was ugly—I took care of my body and skin since my appearance was central to my income, and I used henna dye to make my naturally reddish brown hair a glossy shade of crimson—but Nate was fine as hell and could probably have any woman he wanted. I couldn’t help but think I would look a lot more attractive if I was in costume.
“Here, I have the final design for you to look at,” Nate said, shaking his head slightly and handing me a sketch. We’d been going back and forth messaging over the past couple of weeks to make sure it was exactly what I wanted, and I couldn’t have asked for anything better.
“It’s perfect,” I breathed, staring at the drawing in awe. It was a phoenix, shooting up out of flames like a rocket. It was a rebirth, but it wasn’t the slow, unfurling kind. It was rapid and dramatic, like I wanted my own new adventure to be.
“And you still want it on your hip and thigh?” Nate asked, his voice dropping an octave as his eyes ran down the length of my leggings.
Well, now. Maybe Lou did have it in her to seduce a man.
“Uh yes, my hip and down my thigh,” I breathed, remembering that questions usually required answers. God, I had zero chill around this guy. “I hope this will be okay,” I added, plucking at the long tunic top I was wearing over my leggings. “For modesty.”
Nate’s answering grin was a little wicked as he nodded, and something flipped low in my stomach at his expression. “Sure. Get yourself comfortable and lie down on the table.”
He turned his back and I found myself disappointed that he wasn’t going to watch me strip. Boo for professionalism. I pulled off my boots, socks, and leggings, before pulling the socks back on. It was warm in here, but not that warm. It was a fucking miracle I’d left my house in this weather, honestly.
Never again. Next Christmas, I’d be lying on a beach somewhere, tanning my ass in a thong, sipping mojitos, reminiscing about how good it felt to set my snow boots on fire.
I’d picked my skimpiest thong for today, figuring I wouldn’t want material rubbing on the tattoo, and anything more substantial would only get in the way, though I was semi questioning how wise that choice was now. I was already feeling a little frisky just from being in the same room as Nate. Who knew what kind of state I’d be in after he had his hands all over me for a couple of hours? I’d just keep my thighs clenched. Like, all the way clenched.
I climbed on the table and lay on my back, pulling the top between my legs but high over my hip to keep the skin there exposed, twisting slightly so my legs lay to one side and Nate could see his canvas.
There was so much ass out. So much. People had paid good money to see my ass over the years, so I decided to roll with it. Maybe Nate was an ass man.
He sucked in a tiny breath as he turned around, and I decided he was at least a little bit of an ass man.
“I’m, uh, just going to prep your skin then apply the transfer, okay?”
His head was tipped forward to examine my leg, but he lifted his eyes to look at my face and my breath caught a little bit. He was objectively attractive, but it was more than that. Like he had an aura about him or something, something a little bit superhuman, that made it almost impossible to look away.
I nodded mutely in response to whatever he’d said, zero idea of what I’d agreed to.
Nate’s movements were quick and efficient as he encouraged me to lie on my side facing away from him. I forced myself to examine the drawings on the wall instead of obsessing over what the 6-foot-something fallen angel behind me was doing as he applied the transfer to my hip and thigh, his hands heating up my flesh even through the gloves.
As much as I wanted to go full hussy and throw myself at him, I had another session planned for tomorrow to finish the outline and it would be mighty uncomfortable to sit through that if I embarrassed myself now. Full hussy would have to wait.
“Alright, take a look and make sure you’re happy with it,” Nate rumbled. I swore my skin missed the feel of his hands the second he removed them.
Touch-starved. I was just touch-starved.
Happy with the stencil, I settled myself in for a long couple of hours, picking up my phone as a distraction before putting it down again. Surprisingly, the pain wasn’t nearly as bad as I’d imagined it would be, and I took a few pics of my lower body for my channel, annoyed I hadn’t worn the wig to film reaction shots of my face.
I rolled onto my back at Nate’s urging, which gave me a much better view of him. Dangerous, on all levels. The expression he wore while he was concentrating had temptation written all over it, brows slightly furrowed, eyes narrowed, looking all focused and professional.
Logically, I knew that was a good thing because he had a needle in my skin, but I also desperately wanted to unravel him and find out what got him going. I’d literally made it my job to find out what got people hot.
I was going to blame my urges on that.
“So, is Lou short for anything?” Nate asked casually after a silence that had gone well beyond awkward. It wasn’t ‘can I spread you out and eat your pussy until you scream?’, the question I’d been hoping for, but small talk was good too.
I huffed a quiet laugh, careful to keep my leg still. “Louisiana.”
It really could not suit me less. Louisiana sounded like an innocent, country girl who made sweet tea for her sorority sisters.
“I wasn’t expecting Louisiana,” Nate admitted. His head was bent low over my thigh so I couldn’t really see his face, but it sort of looked like he was smiling.
“I went through drug withdrawals as a newborn, which tells you a lot about my mama and her decision-making skills,” I replied wryly. She was a real peach of a woman, which was why I hadn’t seen her in years.
Nate looked up, no trace of a smile on his face. In fact, he looked like he was ready to go to war on my behalf, and something in my chest fluttered at his reaction. Probably a mixture of being attention starved and never really having anyone in my corner.
“What about your dad?” he asked.
“Never met him,” I said easily. I doubted my mom had spent more than three minutes with the root cause of my daddy issues either. “My grandparents helped out a lot. I would live with them for a bit, then go back to my mom when she got her shit together. It didn’t last long—she’d meet a man and everything would all fall apart again.”
“You sound so calm about it,” Nate observed, brow furrowed. I was more confused about why I was laying myself bare for a guy I’d just met, honestly. Something about him made me want to open up, which was not a sensation I had… ever.
Maybe it was a therapy vibe of just chilling in this chair with one other person in the room.
“I’ve had time to come to terms with it,” I said lightly, wincing as Nate began on my hip bone. “My grandparents died when I was in high school. Mom stuck around until graduation. I think she’s in Arizona now.”
“You don’t keep in touch?” he asked, tilting his head to examine his work. Did he like what he was working with? It had been years since I’d felt even remotely self-conscious about my body, but I was second guessing myself now.
“Hard no,” I told him. “I’m a firm believer in cutting toxicity out of your life, DNA be damned.”
“I can get behind that.”
“What about you?” I asked. “Any overly personal stories you’d like to share with a stranger?”
That was flirty, right? Totally flirty. Wig-free, no contact lenses in, no fake name, flirting like a goddamn pro. Nailed it.
“My family is pretty ordinary, just big. I’m the youngest of eight.”
“Eight?!” I squeaked. “That’s a lot of people.”
My brain would shut down living with that many people. Just reject my surroundings and go into hermit mode. I used to get overwhelmed just staying with my grandparents. With my mom, she was mostly out doing… whatever it was she would do. My grandparents had been home all the time, and it had been an adjustment living with other people in the house.
“In fairness, we didn’t all live at home at the same time. The eldest two had already moved out by the time I was born,” Nate said, leaning in close. Could he smell me? His nose twitched like he could smell something. I hadn’t put my coconut lotion on my leg because of the tattoo, but it was lathered on the rest of my body. “My oldest brother, Chase, lives not far from here. I spent a lot of time with him growing up. In recent years, I’ve been traveling mostly.”
“Where?” I asked instantly, cringing internally at how eager I sounded. Be cool, Lou. I’ve wanted to travel my whole life, but instead I’d gotten married straight out of high school because I hadn’t quite broken free of my loser mother yet. She’d told me it was a good idea to marry my high school sweetheart, and I believed her.
In hindsight, she’d been planning on leaving the state the second she was able, and marrying me off was her way of easing her guilt about abandoning me.
“All over,” Nate chuckled. It was a deep, raspy sound that set off another round of butterflies in my gut. “I started traveling around the States, then South America, then Europe, but I hopped around a lot. I got back from Greece a couple of months ago.”
“And you came back here?” I replied incredulously. Not that Alaska wasn’t beautiful in its own way, but give me sun drenched beaches over snow covered mountains any day.
“My family is here,” Nate said with a grimace. “They think I should settle down in the area. They’re probably right.”
Hello. Settle right down with me, big guy. Let me come to your rescue.
No, that wasn’t strictly what I wanted. Boyfriend-slash-potential-husband? Sure. But I didn’t want to live in this town for the rest of my life and pop out a bunch of babies. The very idea made my uterus shrivel up in terror.
“Anyway, I guess we’ll see what happens,” Nate continued. “I’ve tried to make a go of it here before and it didn’t work. I ended up backpacking through Peru two months later.”
Obviously Nate was definitely not boyfriend material, but that worked out pretty well in my favor.
I’d just casually suggest mutually beneficial, no strings attached sex tomorrow when the tattoo was finished. Despite the big game I talked—and walked—on camera, I’d only been with my ex-husband and that asshole Frank in real life, and I really could use some decent in-person sex to prove to me that the whole concept wasn’t a write-off.
Nate looked like he’d do better than decent. Nate was probably packing the Womb Ruiner 5000 under those dark jeans, and knew exactly how to use it.
Besides, if I managed to snag a little one-on-one time with Nate, then I wouldn’t have to do the whole pick-up-a-guy-at-the-bar thing that I’d been low-key panicking about.
“I’m going traveling in a couple of months,” I told him, trying to seem a lot cooler and worldlier than I was.
“Oh yeah? Where to?” Nate asked, immediately perking up. He definitely didn’t sound like someone who was one hundred percent settled, the travel bug wasn’t completely out of his system.
“Everywhere,” I replied decisively. If Frank had given me anything, it was the desire to explore. He’d taken me to a fancy sushi restaurant in Manhattan, and now I was determined to eat fresh sushi in Japan. We’d eaten incredible pasta one night at a rooftop restaurant, and I wanted to eat pasta under the stars in Italy. I wanted to drink sangria in Spain, and scuba dive the Great Barrier Reef. I was going to do all of those things.
“Everywhere is a great place to start,” Nate replied with a slow, sinful smile that made my toes curl a little.
“Not too ambitious?” I teased. Ria had looked at me like I was bonkers.
“No such thing,” Nate said, shaking his head. “When I first left Alaska, I thought I’d roadtrip for a while and that’d be it.”
He smiled a little wistfully, and I wondered what a young Nate had been like. Not that he was old now, but he definitely had a few years on me.
“The more I saw, the more I wanted to see. The more new people I met, the more I wanted to meet. It’s an addictive feeling,” he sighed, leaning forward as he began working on an intricate part of the design. I glanced down the line of my body, noting that my skin had instantly broken out in goosebumps when he’d moved in closer. My body had not got the memo that we were trying to be discreet.
“Where was your favorite place you traveled to?” I asked, my voice breathier than before despite my silent reminders to myself.
Nate hummed as he considered the question. “Depends on my mood. There are a few places where I ended up staying longer than I intended because I hadn’t got enough of them. On my last trip to Europe it was Toledo, Spain and Rothenburg, Germany. In Asia, I ended up staying around Ubud in Bali for a few months when I’d only planned to be there a week. In the States, it was Charleston.”
I mentally added all of those places to my ever-growing list of destinations, planning on adding them to my travel Pinterest board later.
“Bali,” I sighed dreamily. “Maybe I’ll go there first. I want to go somewhere hot. Like, really fucking hot. Like wear bikinis all day and throw out my pants kind of hot.”
Was I deliberately putting the idea of me with no pants in his head to test the waters? Yes. Yes, I was. A vain part of me needed to know if Lou was an even remotely attractive prospect on my own—no wig, no contacts, no performance. Just me.
Nate grunted in acknowledgment, angling himself slightly away in a move that was absolutely meant to end the conversation, and I had to accept that maybe Lou didn’t have it in her to seduce a man after all. Or at least not a man like Nate.
The realization stung more than I thought it would.