Page 4 of The Killer’s Mark

He slotted a needle into the machine. It was a one-round liner. A single needle he’d use for the outline and for anything intricate. He’d switch to a seven-mag soft-edge shader – two rows of seven needles – for texture and shading. He had other, more specialised needles, but he doubted he would need them.

Many years ago, when he’d worked part-time to supplement his studies and his extracurricular peccadillos, he’d have shaved the body part he was tattooing. Applied a barrier agent and affixed the transfer.

He was not that tattooist any more. Hadn’t been for over thirty years. He no longer used transfers. All his tattoos were freehand. And there was no need to shave the body part. The soles of the feet were hairless.

There were lots of nerve endings, though.

‘Are you ready?’ he asked.

The woman nodded.

He flicked a switch and the tattoo machine hummed into life. He held the woman’s foot with his left hand. Gentle but firm. He dipped the needle into the middle cup, then got to work.

The woman didn’t flinch. She didn’t cry out. She remained motionless as the needle pierced the sole of her foot three thousand times a minute. Through the constantly regenerating epidermis and into the permanent dermis. Each time the needle left the skin, it left behind a tiny amount of rich red ink. On its own, the single ink-filled hole was as relevant as a single pixel on a 5K television. But after a while, an image had formed.

The man switched needles. Twisted off the one-round liner and fitted the seven-mag shader. Added shadow and texture. Kept glancing up as he turned the one-dimensional drawing into a three-dimensional work of art.

A portrait.

A woman’s face. Her eyes were downcast, submissive. Her expression was open and inviting, yet demure and reserved. The hint of a smile, no more than a flicker, played on her lips.

The man spent a further hour refining the tattoo. A bit of shading here, a darker line there.

Dotting the i’s; crossing the t’s.

When he was satisfied, he leaned back and studied the tattoo. He smiled. He thought this was his best work yet, and they’d all been exceptional. It was why he would never be allowed to leave.

‘Do you want to see it?’ he asked the woman.

‘I do.’

He picked up a magnified mirror. Held it so she could see the sole of her right foot. And then she smiled too.

She said nothing for almost a minute. ‘It’s beautiful,’ she murmured eventually.

The man nodded. ‘I draw what I see.’

The woman couldn’t tear her eyes away from the image in the mirror. He’d perfectly captured her dimples – her ‘cheeky’ dimples, her mom used to call them – and her uneven front teeth. And he’d only used red. Red and shades of red. She didn’t know much about tattoos, and even less about portrait art, but she knew she was looking at an extraordinary piece of work. That it was smaller in diameter than a can of soda was even more impressive. So much detail in such a small tattoo.

‘How can I ever repay you?’ she asked.

‘We’ll never see each other again.’

The woman nodded. She knew that to be true. She and her tattoo were going away now. To a new life. A better life.

‘You’ll be taken from here to a private residence,’ the man said. ‘You’ll stay there until the tattoo is fully healed. Until then you won’t be allowed to stand, or bathe.’

‘For how long?’

He shrugged. ‘That depends on how fast you heal. For some it’s a couple of weeks, others a bit longer. Don’t be tempted to rush the natural process. If you pick the scabs, you’ll end up with scars, and scars distort the image. And you know what happens then?’

She did.

He removed his glove and washed his hands. Tapped out a text to the nurse. Five minutes later, there was a knock on the door. He unlocked it and let the nurse in. He was pushing a wheelchair, the leg ramp already raised.

‘This man is going to dress your wound,’ the tattooist explained to the woman. ‘Do as he says.’

They helped her into the chair.