The simple fish design was quick to tattoo.
The tattoo artist cleaned the area, applied the ointment, and tactfully left the room.
The faint scent of antiseptic and the slightly acrid smell of special ink lingered in the air.
After the tattoo was finished, Jett Westgate sat up calmly. A simple line drawing of a little fish in red ink now rested on his left breast, near his heart.
He took her hand and placed it over his heart. "Valentine, this is my Christmas present to you."
"From now on, for every beat of my heart, I will love you for one second."
Each heartbeat was a declaration of love. As long as he lived, his love would flow with every pulse, eternal, until the very end of his life.
It wasn't that she had never heard sweet nothings, or that she had never received more expensive gifts.
But never before had she been struck to her very soul like this, in a way that was almost brutish, a vow sealed with life itself.
He had carved her into his very heartbeat.
