by Alex Rosa
My feet nervously move forward. To where? I don’t know. I hear more words I worry I’m the reason for.
“Get her. I must have her.”
For some reason my legs pick up speed, and I want to run. Then everything happens so fast when I feel a sharp yank.
The vise grip of a hand on my arm has pointy acrylic nails that shine bright yellow as I swing my gaze to meet onyx eyes. She doesn’t look too pleased, but unfortunately she is undoubtedly pretty; her bleached-blond hair is tied in a high bun on top of her high-cheekboned head.
“Who are you?” she screeches through bright red lips.
Her rolling r catches my attention, but I feel like a child caught in a lie. “I’m sorry. I’m here with my boyfriend, Blake. I’m just here to watch him work.” Please don’t scratch my eyes out.
“Blake?” she questions, eyeing my white tank top and torn-up jeans. She turns to her right, where a man I didn’t notice before stands waiting on the sidelines, and she tuts as she stares. “I thought Blake was back with Marguerite?” she asks.
My face twists into anger at hearing the name of his ex-girlfriend, and I cannot fight back the feeling of nausea that seeps into my gut.
The man lets out more of a cackle than a laugh. “You never can trust the gossip you hear, Sophie! What are you doing to that poor girl?”
Still with a tight grip she practically cringes as she speaks. “Gio wants her.”
“Her?” the man squeals, revealing his flamboyant tendencies. “As a replacement? Is he nuts?”
She shrugs, and I’m starting to get annoyed that they seemed to have forgotten my existence. She answers him. “He says she is what he wants. Her eyes. Look at her eyes.”
I feel like a science project, or an alien found in the deserts of New Mexico, as the man leans in, eyeing me like a new species of human.
I come in peace . . .
“He’s right,” he quips. “Ipnotizzante.”
I know that word! Mesmerizing. It means mesmerizing.
She rolls her eyes and finally looks back at me. “Come with me. We have to get you ready.”
“Ready for wh—”
As she cuts me off, I’m whisked away. The hard yank of both of my arms turns my attempt at words into a gasp. I want to jump from one complaint to the next when it suddenly feels like tens of hands are groping my body as they push me around the corner behind a curtain.
How is this escalating so quickly? All I wanted was a private, secluded corner to cower in.
“Hey!” I squawk, overwhelmed as I tilt my head to the left and right, realizing that in fact three other pairs of hands have joined in.
The woman with the bright yellow nails barks at me—“Would you keep still!”—and as if forgetting my existence again, she turns to the handsome gay man with the bright purple bow tie from before. “We don’t even know if she’ll fit.” Her lack of faith in the situation is obvious in her tone.
He snaps back as he grabs for the hem of my shirt, touching my waist before pulling it over my head. “She has slender hips like Marielle, but it’s those thighs I worry about. Too much meat. Is this Gio’s idea of a joke?”
I snort, yanking my arm free from the woman’s grasp. “Stop this! Where’s Blake? I don’t want to do this, and I DO NOT have big thighs—”
My jaw being brusquely grabbed cuts off my words. It’s a commanding grasp, but there is an element of tenderness to it, too, in the delicate placement of the fingertips against my cheekbones that has my eyes going wide and my mouth shutting.
The electric hazel gaze I make contact with has me instantly petrified. The roundness and crinkles around his eyes offer a likable, almost childlike sensibility, but the gold flecks in his irises wield a stern sense of logic, not to mention that his overall beauty throws me. His thick, midnight-black hair is slicked back over his head, but with a delicate curling of hair flopping over his forehead, giving him a hip look that matches his perfectly manicured scruff. His stare, combined with his firm grip, exude authority, and I notice the silence of my new entourage. I assume he must be important.
“What is your name, cara mia?”
I wrinkle my nose at hearing his accent, and the Italian endearment. I had to take two years of Italian while at UCLA. My stomach does a somersault at its calm, deep tone, and I’m inclined to answer.
“Skyler Silva.”
“Molto bella!” His hand leaves my face, leaving a lukewarm impression. He points to the ceiling, in a charming way that a foreigner might do, but there’s something entrancing about his intensity. “Sky, like your eyes. Blue, and crystal-clear.”
I chew my lip, nervous all of a sudden, and I realize that besides my bra, I’m naked from the waist up. I’ve been too distracted by all that has gone on, and I quickly cover my plain-Jane black bra. I wonder where Blake might be, thinking that shouting for him might be juvenile.
The man before me lets out a hearty laugh that makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up. He bites back his smile as he waves his other hand, which I now notice holds a camera with a large lens and even larger flash attached. It looks like a heavy piece of technology, but he waves it like it’s a feather. The maneuver commands all the hands to leave my body and the people to scatter. I reach for the button on my jeans, realizing it’s undone. I must have been mere moments away from being in just my skivvies.
“Pardon me for my rudeness. Sometimes I get ahead of myself,” he adds, as if that’s a good enough excuse for what’s happened, and I’m not sure if that was even an apology.
“Rudeness is right! I just came to watch my boyfriend work! Where are my clothes?”
I don’t necessarily find his behavior angering, but my voice comes out outraged. I can’t focus. I feel bombarded, thrown off guard, and erratic. I need to get a grip.
I take in a quick breath, examining the stranger, noticing his strong, square jaw behind the thick stubble on his face. Jeez, I thought Blake was handsome, and he still is, but this man looks like “Artsy European Ken.” I note his fitted maroon dress shirt, which has a stylish minuscule print on the fabric. I want to roll my eyes. Pretty people make me uncomfortable.
Finally, getting ahold of myself, I see his eyes soften as he attempts to hide a smile. It’s charming how his eyes look so kind in his surprisingly young face, but there’s something knowing about his stare, too.
“Skyler, per favore—please, just one moment.”
I get the sinking feeling he’s hiding his laughter. I release a chuff, frustrated at the fact that hearing him say my name commands my immediate attention, but it feels odd hearing it said so crisply by a stranger.
“Just tell me what’s going on? Per favore.” I mimic him with the most basic phrase of Italian I know.
“Don’t you want to know who I am?” he teases, toying with my patience. He gives me a small smile, and I find its bashful curve adorable when set in such a masculine face, scruff and all. I hold back my mirroring smile, and I question why this feels funny.
With my arms crossed over my chest, I take a deliberate step back. I’m too close, less than an arm’s length away. I tilt my head to the side, faking sweetness. “Who are you?” I must admit at this point I’m curious.
As if the distance I put between us serves more to his advantage than to mine, his free hand scratches at his chin as he blatantly lets his eyes meticulously calculate my body—but that’s exactly what his gaze is: calculating. It makes me nervous, sure, but it isn’t the way Blake looks at me: devouring, salacious, hungry, loving. No, this man’s look is practically mathematical, as if his eyes are solving the trigonometry of my body.
His eyes spring back to mine and widen infinitesimally, as if in gleeful anticipation, but it’s slight. “My name is Giovanni Vigilucci—it’s a mouthful, and a name only a mother could love.” He licks his lips as he pauses a beat, as if expecting me to laugh at his j
oke, but I stand unmoving. He clears his throat while nonchalantly running a hand through his stark hair, regaining his balance. “Everyone calls me Gio. I am but the humble photographer.”
Humble? Why do I doubt that?
I clench my jaw, even though I should have assumed the latter by his handheld equipment, and make a mental note to Google him later. Maybe he’s famous and I’m the one who looks like the idiot.
Does this make him Blake’s boss, be it for an afternoon? I should probably be polite, but there’s nothing I can do to stop my involuntary eyebrow scrunch.
“Nice to meet you, Gio, but this still doesn’t explain what’s happening.” I let out a sigh, remembering I’ve been neglecting my textbooks for far too long, and want nothing to do with playing dress-up. I ache for home and normality.
“Your skin is flawless and lightly toned. It’s nearly perfect. Has anyone ever told you that?”
I rub at the goose bumps forming on my arms.
He takes a confident step forward, and extends his free hand in order to touch my bare stomach. I take a deliberate step back. What is it with this guy? Hasn’t he ever heard of personal space?
As if reading my mind, because heaven forbid my face should reveal my emotions, he lets out a small laugh as I lift my hand to signal him to stop.
“Yeah, my boyfriend has said that to me before.” I try for indifference with a ringing tone of don’t mess with me, and I’m sure to enunciate the word boyfriend.
He rubs at his jaw, amused. “Scusi. I am to assume you are not used to this business. I don’t mean to put my hands on you so freely. Please do not take it the wrong way. I just . . . you’re very beautiful . . . and different from what I normally encounter.” He pauses, as if choosing to change tack. “Blake, he is your . . . boyfriend?”
I nod, still wishing I were wearing a shirt. “Yes.” It’s the only word I can manage.
He hums, looking me over more quickly. “You’re not a model, are you?”
Could this be anymore awkward? I hug myself tighter, feeling inadequate all of a sudden. This isn’t my world. “Is it that obvious?”
Catching me off guard, because his movement is so quick, he closes the distance between us to cup my jaw even more delicately than before, and with a featherlike touch, he brushes his thumb over my flushed cheek.
“The pink to your cheeks—are you embarrassed, bella? That won’t do. I didn’t mean it that way.” I want to step away, but I find his tone oddly reassuring in a world I have no idea how to handle. “I meant it in such way as to ask if you’d like to be a model this afternoon?”
I shake my head, freeing my face from his grasp, knowing very well that the light pink has turned scarlet. “No. No way.”
“Are you a college student?”
His tone has shifted, and I find its change intriguing. I tilt my head, figuring him out in a nanosecond. “Yes.”
“Marielle, the model that I had scheduled tonight, has no-showed. Would you like to stand in for her?”
I give him a stern look. “What does me being a college student have to do with this?”
He gives me a tight smile, as if to say You think you’ve figured me out; well, I think I have you figured out too. “First things first, Skyler. I need to know if you’d be willing to help out.”
I wrinkle my nose, getting impatient. “You’re toying with me.”
His deep laugh feels mocking this time, but he shakes his head as if to dismiss my embarrassment. “How about this: I want you to work this photo shoot for lots of reasons. Your eyes, they say so much. Your hair is full and exotic. And your skin is enchanting; its color, with its porcelain smoothness . . .” He grins, and gets dangerously close again, raising his hand to my hipbone, right above the hem of my jeans at a peeking bruise. “Except here. But we can cover that up.”
I’m annoyed instantly, turning my body away from his pointing. “I play soccer for my school.”
“Ah, fútbol! My favorite, but we can get to know each other at a different time, which I’d like.” He raises a brow, as if testing my attitude. “I just need to know, Skyler, if you want to help out now.”
What is the appropriate response? My expression must say it all as he finally adds, “I can pay you a good amount of money that could help with those pesky student loans.”
I knew it. "You can’t bribe me.”
He chuckles, but I get the sense that eventually he’ll be the one getting impatient with me. “Skyler, do you want to help or not?”
“What do I have to do?” Please tell me there is clothing involved.
“Lucky for you, this is a jeans advert, but I want it provocative. I want you in that pair of jeans, and nothing else.” He points to a pair hanging over the curtain.
I go wide-eyed.
“That is, if you fit. If you don’t, well, then we might be wasting both our time.”
His tone feels like a dare, and I immediately feel challenged to fit into the jeans of whichever prissy model was supposed to wear them. “Let me see.”
I reach over to grab for the hanging, dark blue pair of designer jeans, and I know the moment I touch them they’re way out of my price range.
I turn around to see Gio still staring. “Do you mind?”
He pouts to conceal another unreadable emotion. “No, Skyler. I’m going to watch, because you might as well get used it.”
I get the sinking feeling that what he’s said has a double meaning, but I decide to take it as another challenge.
I go for the button on my jeans, finding it ironic I’m unbuttoning the button I had just secured. I stare at him as I undress, making sure his eyes don’t do anything I don’t approve of.
What I find most odd about the situation is that I should obviously have a problem with a man asking me to undress in front of him, but I don’t. There’s something in the way he holds himself that oozes authority, in a professional way. Maybe it’s the slicked-back strands of his thick Italian hair, or his toned arms that fold themselves over his broad chest, or even his perfectly trimmed face, well-manicured where it needs to be—no, it’s none of those things. It’s his eyes; the static electric gold that tells me to trust him, in all senses—with the camera that I have not seen him use yet, and in general. He can’t be over thirty, and I find his overall presence impressive.
Now down to my underwear, I pray to God my antagonistic attitude will have not been for nothing as I slip my admittedly muscular leg into the jeans. Please fit.
“Gio, has anyone ever told you you’re kind of bossy?” I say as I put one leg into the jeans.
With our eyes still locked, as if taking notes on each other, his lips switch. “No. Usually no one has the guts, but then again, good thing I am the boss.”
I snort, which makes him laugh, and I wonder if the two of us are forming an unlikely friendship, defiance and all.
After buttoning the jeans, I release a gleeful, unladylike squeal as I prance around the small space, which Gio seems to disapprove of with an eyebrow raise. I place both hands on my hips, not caring about my bra and jeans ensemble, to shriek, “They fit!”
Take that, model bitches!
“Perfetto! I’d ask you to take off your bra, but I can tell that will take time. But do me a favor and turn around.”
I feel my breath catch in my throat, knowing that the idea of being naked in any form in front of strangers doesn’t sit well with me, but I do as I’m told. I turn around, finding it funny that Gio does certainly wield some magic with his words and charm.
He takes in a slow, deep breath. “Molto bella. You have the most beautiful dimples in your lower back, my most favorite part on a woman. You’re perfect.”
“. . . who’s perfect?”
My eyes go wide as the smooth voice I have come to love sounds as Blake rounds the corner of the makeshift curtain wall. How did I get here again?<
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“Skyler! What are you doing? Gio? What the hell?”
Gio, as if well versed in this situation, lets out a string of more deep, skin-tingling laughs, and I’m back to covering myself. “Blake! Calm yourself, and convince your beautiful girlfriend to model for me today . . . with you!”
Blake’s look matches the one I gave the moment I was whisked away into this predicament, but I do note his hard, bare chest on display in all its glory above his own fitted pair of navy jeans. I even admire his handsomely bare feet.
“Where’s Marielle?” Blake asks, his tone calmer than I’d expect, and I wish he’d yank my arm hard, and take me home, angry at the situation, but instead he seems open to the scenario unfolding before him.
“Marielle did not show, and look how lucky we ended up being, because you brought your lovely girlfriend.”
“She isn’t a model, Gio. She’s a premed student.”
Gio shoots me an inquisitive look before turning back to Blake. “She’s even more perfect than Marielle. She might be what the campaign needs; edgy and out of the norm. And to be honest, I’d like to use her again.”
Again? I haven’t even agreed to doing this photo shoot. Also, what annoys me more than the situation is the fact that it’s starting to feel like these men are bartering a deal with my body when I’m standing right here.
Blake chews the inside of his cheek as if thinking it over. “Why?”
Gio smiles wickedly. “She’s your lover, isn’t she? You of all people should be able to understand her beauty. Not to mention her lovely back, and those dimples above her ass.”
The nerve!
The moment Blake tilts his head in such a way as if to say I can’t deny that, I interrupt, angry and exasperated. I’m frustrated, and now I want to annoy them both.
“Excuse me! I don’t know how things work around here, but I will not be talked about like a piece of meat. I make my own decisions, thank you very much.” I’m finding that in Blake’s presence, and even Gio’s, I no longer shy away from showing my body as I jab Gio in the shoulder. “If you want me to work, how much were you going to pay Marielle?”