by Kennedy Fox
Great. Just effing great.
Merry effing Christmas, Ben.
Chapter Two
Ben made the mistake of rage texting a few buddies about the moving company’s fuck-up, and word spread by the time he got to the base the next morning.
His buddy Kent who he’d gone through Hell Week with found him just before he was going into his appointment with the psychologist. “Sleep well?”
“Shut up,” he growled.
The shrink popped her head out of her office just as he said that, and Kent busted a gut laughing at him.
He held his hands wide. “Hey, doc. I’m definitely super chill and not grumpy at all.”
She smirked at him and gestured for him to come inside.
Kent grabbed his arm. “Come find me after, I’ve got a proposal for you.”
His buddy was always running some kind of angle, and usually Ben was interested, but looking at a long two-week break with nothing but an empty apartment to twirl around in…yeah, he’d be game for almost anything.
It turned out, having a major moving company mishap was the perfect thing to spend an hour talking about with a psychologist, and by the time Ben was done, he was calmer and more open to being razzed.
He found Kent in the gym.
“Feeling better?”
Ben rolled his lower lip between his teeth, thinking about how much he wanted to share. “Session was good—if that’s what you mean. I’m cleared for leave and then back to work after the break.”
“Good.”
“It was a rough tour,” he added as he picked up a set of dumbbells.
“We heard.” Kent was on another team and would be heading overseas for his own rotation soon. “What made you decide to try to move remotely during that hell?”
A motivating mix of shame and anger. “I broke up with that girl I was seeing.”
“Ah.”
“She’d already moved on to my roommate, it turns out.”
Kent dropped the bar he was holding. “Fuck off. That mechanic from the Air Force?”
“That’s the one.”
“This is why you only room with other SEALs, man.”
Ben shook his head. A SEAL was just as likely to tap pussy on offer, too. “All done with roommates for a while.”
“Don’t blame you.”
“So, I’m looking for shit to do while on leave, if you still have that proposal for me.” Ben grinned. “Is it some kind of grueling manual labor?”
Kent’s uncle ran a roofing business and was known to employ guys in their spare time.
“Not exactly. How do you feel about taking your clothes off in public?”
Ben groaned. “I’m not interested in your private stripper game, man.”
“I don’t do that anymore.” Kent grinned. He had zero shame.
Shaking his head, Ben could only laugh. “All right, then what is it this time, you nudist? Medical research?”
“Art.”
That wasn’t what he expected to hear. “What do you mean?”
“It’s a sweet gig. You just sit there and hold still. Like sniper training, but you mostly just focus on making sure your dick doesn’t shrink—or grow. It’s important that it not grow.”
“Is that a big problem?” Ben couldn’t resist digging into his friend a bit. “You get naked in public and your dick grows?”
“Big problem indeed,” Kent boasted. “Emphasis on the big.”
“I walked right into that.”
“But the issue is,” the other man kept going. “Is that I’m going to my ma’s for Christmas, and she wants me to come up a few days early. So as much as it’s hard to say goodbye to six hundred bucks—”
Now he had Ben’s attention. “How much?”
Kent gave him a look like yeah, no shit. “It pays a hundred and fifty a night, my man. These are rich fucking people. And they want serious models.”
“So how the fuck did you get past them?”
“Fuck you.”
“Right back at you, you exhibitionist freak.” But there was no heat in his words, and they both knew it. Ben rolled his neck. “It’s really no big deal?”
“Like going to the doctor.”
Ben could do that. Plus, it wasn’t like he had anything else to do right now. And an extra six hundred bucks would buy him a new mattress—one that had zero history of him being cheated on, too. Or if his furniture didn’t arrive by Christmas, he could spend that coin on a hotel room for a few nights.
Chelsea arrived so early, the art studio wasn’t open yet when she walked by the first time. She headed to the coffee shop on the next block and got a salted mocha to celebrate the start of her holiday break.
By the time she got back to the studio, the front door was unlocked.
She signed in at the desk, then headed into the back. She’d attended a few drop-in classes over the fall, so she knew the routine. Sign the waiver. Grab a spot. The wood donkeys—an adjustable easel attached to a bench-like seat—were scratched up and covered in paint.
It still gave her a thrill to spend time in the space, like she was a real artist.
She set up her newsprint pad, then carefully selected her sketching materials for the evening. Conte, charcoal, and black pens. She was still figuring out her preferred method for quickly capturing the human form.
The room quickly filled up, and she exchanged smiles with the other students. The atmosphere was as she expected it to be. Professional but warm. Collegial.
At the top of the hour, the instructor introduced herself, then gave them a quick overview of the plan for the four-day intensive program. They would use the same model for all four evenings, working on their progressions from quick sketches through to a finished, detailed drawing. Tonight, the instructor would guide the model through a variety of poses, but starting the next night, the participants were invited to requests poses for up to half an hour each. “Take your time today in figuring out what you want to draw over the next three nights. Be open to a new form, something you haven’t tried before. Ready?”
When everyone nodded, she gestured to the anteroom at the side where the models got ready, and their subject for the night stepped out.
He was beautiful.
Chelsea’s brain caught her instinctive, visceral reaction before it could spin out of control, and translated it into more appropriate observations. Six-foot-something and well proportioned. One big hand clenched a Terry cotton robe shut as the other ruffled nervously through his golden brown hair. Short on the sides, clipped on top, almost enough to tame soft curls. Almost, but not quite. The glint of bronzed five o’clock shadow on his jaw was a rough contrast to his boyish mop-top. Not that he looked particularly young. There were lines at the corners of his eyes, around his mouth.
Chelsea put him around thirty, maybe a little bit older.
“Everyone, this is Ben. Thanks for joining us today. I’ll get you to take a seat on the platform, please.”
He ducked his head and waved with the hand that had just disheveled his hair, then followed the instructor’s prompt, shrugging out of the robe before settling into the first position.
Ben didn’t have any problem being naked. His body looked good, objectively, and more importantly, it was powerful. As long as he didn’t think too hard about what was being scratched on the boards around the room, he’d be fine. But those thoughts were right there, jumping up and down in his mind. How many of them were drawing his cock? Was that even allowed? And were they being generous? Could the instructor sense how weirdly nervous he was? And how the hell did Kent do this?
He’d been naked for five minutes already, and he’d spent the entire time staring at the ceiling. It was a good position to start in, at least, while the instructor talked about his body as if he were a mannequin.
His wingspan was apparently longer than most, and his feet were extra big. Don’t think about your cock. He bit back a laugh that threatened and focused his thoughts on his empty apartment, and the lady next-do
or who watched that popular Navy SEAL television series apparently around the clock. She’d been up late the night before, the sound of the episodes bouncing through the wall at him—a strange reminder of where he’d just come from, although the reality of what he did wasn’t always the same as depicted in film and TV.
He’d spent the night on the very nice parquet floor, with only the quilt from his grandparents and his rucksack as a makeshift bed. It was decent as far as impromptu nests went, but it wasn’t his real furniture, which, he found out today, had been marked with the wrong barcodes and shipped to Washington State on someone else’s move.
A mistake that would be rectified soon, he was assured.
But it was a Friday night now, and he doubted it would be solved over the weekend. And then the following week was a mad rush towards Christmas, so if that shipping container was going to arrive and be unpacked without someone being paid double-time, he a pretty narrow window.
The chances of him having a proper bed before Christmas were not good.
His weird neighbor was listening to the same TV show again when he woke up at dawn. He had jetlag and a date with a doc as his excuse, what was hers?
“We’ll dim the lights now,” the instructor said, dragging Ben’s attention back to the present. Christ, had he almost fallen asleep? Maybe it had been a mistake to take this on from Kent. He should have spent the evening finding more comfortable bedding. Or just another bed. “And we’ll get Ben to sit up, so we can work on long shadows.”
She moved around him, flicking on a spotlight against his back.
At least this way, his cock was thrust into darkness.
The light flooded around him, catching a bit of dust in the air between him and the artists in front of him.
He listened to the instructor as she guided him to cross one leg over the other, his ankle resting on his knee.
As she spoke, he blinked, re-focusing his attention for the first time on the other people in the room. Right in front of him was an elderly man, furiously drawing in short, sharp gestures. And just to his left was a woman maybe Ben’s own age, with shiny dark hair. Her lower lip was caught between her teeth in concentration as she frowned at her easel, then she released it just before she flicked her gaze back towards him.
A strange wild feeling crawled through Ben’s midsection as her eyes flared. He was back-lit. Could she see him looking at her? Feel his own gaze locked on her mouth, that sweet pink strawberry pout she’d just had her even, white teeth pressed into, and now—Jesus—she swiped the tip of her tongue against?
Against his thigh, his cock thickened.
He jerked his gaze back to the old man.
One fucking job, Ben. The dick can’t grow.
In his chest, his heart hammered with unexpected disquiet. He didn’t know that woman, had never seen her before, and while she was pretty, she wasn’t fucking Cleopatra.
Even as he said that in his head, something feral in the back of his mind demanded that he look back in her direction, soak up another look, just to be sure that she wasn’t some kind of ethereal queen. She was not. He was quite sure of that, and even if he did want to look at her again (he did, of course), he wouldn’t. Because his cock needed not to grow.
“We’ll get you to turn now, Ben,” the instructor said smoothly. “To your right, please.”
Away from the strawberry pink mouth. As a cock-softening measure, he forced himself to think of his empty, sad apartment, and twisted to his right.
Chapter Three
Chelsea checked her watch. Hannah was fifteen minutes late for their Saturday morning brunch, which wasn’t that unusual—her sister sometimes got stuck into work and lost track of time—but Hannah was heading out of town with her boyfriend this afternoon, and this was the only bit of family holiday time Chelsea would have.
Usually, the Doyle clan all converged on her parents’ house in Carlsbad, but both of her brothers had pregnant wives this year who didn’t want to fly. So instead, her parents were on an extended road trip, visiting one brother in Texas first, then heading to Florida to ring in the new year with another.
Which left Chelsea and Hannah in California—and Hannah was off to meet her boyfriend’s family, just as soon as she finished her lab work at the university and had brunch with her big sister.
Chelsea stepped out from the restaurant’s entrance alcove to see if she got spot her favorite little scientist, and almost ran into a brick wall of a chest.
“Sorry!” She squeaked the apology and jumped back.
Then she looked up and did a double-take. The chest belonged to the model from the night before, Ben.
“Hey.” He gave her a slow, earnest smile. “It’s Ben. From the life drawing class.”
“I remember,” she blurted out.
“I didn’t get your name last night.”
“Chelsea.”
He repeated her name and nodded. Then he glanced at the restaurant.
“I’m waiting for my sister,” she said. “Brunch.”
“Nice.”
It would be, if she had company.
He opened his mouth to say something else, but before he could get it out, Hannah sprinted up to them. And stopped, abruptly, looking back and forth between her sister and this very handsome man, naked curiosity all over her face.
Chelsea gave her a warning look.
Hannah ignored it. “Hi,” she said, beaming at Ben. “I’m Chelsea’s sister. Hannah. And you are?”
“Ben,” he said, drawing his name out, like that was the only answer she was going to get and he knew she wanted more.
A wild giggle crawled up Chelsea’s throat, and she pressed her lips together. Ben looked back at her, like he sensed her amusement, and winked. “I’ll let you get to your brunch. Nice to see you again.”
He stepped around them and kept going in the direction he was heading when she stumbled into his path.
“Who is Ben?” Hannah demanded to know as Chelsea dragged her into the restaurant and gave her name for the reservation.
She didn’t answer, so when they were seated, Hannah asked again. “That hottie—what’s the story?”
Chelsea took a deep breath. “He’s the model in an art class I’m taking.”
“Nice!”
Very. “Mmm-hmm.”
“He’s into you.”
She laughed. “Uh, no.”
“Yep. He was looking at you like he wanted you for brunch.”
“You’re imagining things. I stumbled into him while waiting for you. We’ve literally exchanged maybe twenty words in total.”
“Who needs words when someone looks like that?”
“Well, since I signed a waiver saying I wouldn’t objectify him for looking like that, we would need a lot of words because talking is the only thing we could do.”
Hannah made a face. “That sucks. What’s the worst that could happen if you ask him out?”
“I’d be banned from that art studio for life, and he probably wouldn’t be able to be a model again. Which isn’t fair for him, it’s not his fault that he has dimples.” And big, warm brown eyes. “I’ll get over it.”
“So you like him.”
Aw, crap. She’d said too much. “I don’t even know the guy. I’m pretending this conversation is not happening.”
“I don’t think you should. I think we should find a loophole so you can get laid for Christmas.”
“That’s not a thing.”
“Of course it is. This is your classic girl meets boy, but he's naked and she’s signed a waiver to only care about that in a professional capacity kind of story. It has to have a happy ending where they fall in love.”
Chelsea snorted. “Now we’re going to fall in love?” She picked up her menu. “Come on, let’s order something decadent, because this is my only Christmas celebration meal.”
Hannah waggled her eyebrows. “Until Ben invites you to sample his Yule log.”
“You’re fired as a sister and as a wing-woman.
I think I might get the waffles.”
“He wants to get your waffle.” Hannah raised her hands to fend off the next protest. “Huevos Rancheros for me, the best sister and wing-woman in the world. And when we’re done here, I want to see a copy of that waiver. I’ll find you a good loophole.”
Chapter Four
Ben found the second night of modeling easier than the first. The students had a chance to request poses this time, and a lot of those positions had him sitting and standing with his back to the room.
A strange, humming awareness sizzled through him when the instructor asked the pretty brunette—Chelsea, who had brunch with her sister just around the corner from his apartment—what pose she wanted next.
“Sitting, please, in profile, with his arm bent up…” she trailed off, and Ben glanced in her direction.
She smiled, and the apples of her cheeks turned pink.
Down, dick.
“Like…” She put her fist to her chin, miming The Thinker pose.
He settled into what he thought she wanted, which meant he couldn’t see her, but the instructor praised him, and then he held very still for a very long time.
As soon as the class ended, Chelsea gathered all of her supplies and tucked them into her portfolio case, and got the heck out of there before Ben appeared.
She couldn’t get the conversation with Hannah out of her head, and it was absolute nonsense. The stuff of fluffy holiday movies, not real life, and she couldn’t risk blushing the way she had when it had been her turn to pick a pose for him.
She needed to get her shit together. A hot chocolate might help, so she hightailed it to the coffee shop. There was a line, but it moved reasonably fast, and before too long she had a very festive-smelling cocoa to go.
As far as Saturday night plans went, strolling home with a hot chocolate was a bit lonely, but she had a big day of shopping planned for the next morning. It was the final Farmer’s Market day before Christmas.
She was so distracted with thoughts of her shopping list that she didn’t notice the man walking a half block ahead of her until he turned onto her street.