“Oh, yeah.”
“I wish I could see this play out in person. Keep me posted, Jus.”
Knox
Going in, I figured I’d endure a morning’s torture to prove myself to Ashley and be done with this whole photoshoot crap. Why had I even resisted it in the first place? Such an easy thing to do to stay in Ashley’s good graces. To my surprise, I left the photoshoot praying I’d get called back to be the groom.
Holding Callie’s beautiful face, being so near her for a good hour, and looking into her eyes, hearing her laughter, smelling her perfume—she’d done something to me. I wanted her. And I wanted to get to know her. I had to see if I could get her out of my head before this hot-blooded feeling I had for her became a permanent condition.
I tried to convince myself this was just hormones. And, yeah, it was hormones. I felt like a seventeen-year-old again. Hormones egged on by loneliness and the presence of a beautiful, witty woman. I wanted to sleep with her. I’d just met her, but I ached for her. Sex with her was the cure. If it was no good to mediocre, that was easy. If it was fantastic? I could deal with that.
Was I in love with Ashley? Yes. I had been for years. That didn’t mean I’d been a choirboy. Or had to be now, while she was with Lazer. At the moment, there were no obligations. I was free to hook up.
After the longest afternoon in human history, I got a call from Peter. “Congratulations! If you want the job, you’re our groom. The decision was unanimous.” He gave me the details and told me he expected to shoot for the next two to three days, if I was available.
I couldn’t hold my smile down as I accepted the role and thanked him profusely. The me from two days ago would be ashamed and shocked by this turn of events.
“The shoot starts promptly at seven at Flash. Be prepared. If the weather’s good, we’ll go on location,” Peter said. “See you tomorrow. Get a good night’s sleep. We don’t want any bags under your eyes.”
Seven. That meant I’d have to catch the six o’clock ferry. Damn if I was going to do that too many days in a row. I pulled my phone out and booked a hotel for the next several nights. I’d go home tonight, but I was going to spend the next few nights in the city.
Callie
I reported to work at seven. I parked in the garage and walked across the sky bridge to Flash’s office full of optimism and anticipation. I loved my job. I looked forward to a grueling day of shooting. I loved this life. And I was eager and, admittedly, a little nervous to see who they’d picked to be my groom. I knew who I wanted it to be.
The parking garage was already filling when I arrived. Flash employees, young, trendy, and friendly, streamed in. I had to admit—I had butterflies as I entered the building and checked in at the lobby reception desk, resisting the urge to look over my shoulder to see if he was there, Knox. The receptionist gave me a temporary badge and called someone from makeup to come get me.
I wasn’t above looking around to see who showed up for the shoot this morning. Though if Peter was half the photographer I believed he was, and if he had as much say in the matter as I suspected he did, I was pretty confident who the groom would be. Which hadn’t stopped me from spending the better part of night wondering, mentally chanting, Knox, Knox, Knox, as if my sheer mental fortitude could bring about my desires. But then, why not? Leave nothing to chance. Determination and positive thinking had worked for me so far. If it was meant to be, he’d be here. If not?
It shouldn’t matter who my model groom was. This was just a job. On the other hand, a good male model that I sparked with would make me look good. Looking good would lead to more jobs—more high-profile jobs. It was in my best interests to get the best man—no, best groom—for the job.
And that shoot yesterday was like none other I’d been on. Yes, I’ve had professional chemistry with many of the guys I’ve modeled with. I’ve had a lot of fun laughing and joking, and even flirting, with many men during shoots. But nothing like what I felt yesterday. That was off-the-charts professional and personal chemistry. I wanted to see him again. Badly. Achingly badly. Like a teenage girl with the crush of the century. I couldn’t get him out of my mind.
If I wasn’t so sure he’d get the job, I would have bent my own rules and let him grab a quick bite with me in the cafeteria when he asked yesterday. At least given him my number. If he was determined enough, he could get hold of me. But it was never good to be too easy to get. No, playing hard to get, to a certain flirtatious extent, only made me more attractive. All’s fair in love and war. He was a warrior, right? Let him figure out the rules and find a way to win my affections.
The makeup artist who came to get me was harried. “We have to get you in the chair and made up for the shoot ASAP. Peter made a snap decision—outdoor on location today. The weather’s perfect for it. This time of year, you can’t take nice weather for granted.”
That was true all year in Seattle.
She sighed. “This way. We’ll get you made up and your hair styled, but there will be a lot of touch-up required in the field. Makeup for outdoor lighting can be tricky.”
“Where are we shooting? Do you know?”
“Rumor has it we’re headed for the lower Snoqualmie Falls area. Peter’s buds with a ton of wedding and engagement photographers. It’s a popular spot for engagement shoots. He wants to bring that romanticism and northwest feel to the shots for this event. Locals will recognize the location. Everyone else will be entranced by the magic Peter can work with a shoot.” She was clearly in awe of Peter’s talents.
“Snoqualmie Falls,” I said. “Didn’t it snow up there last night? I heard something on the radio.”
“Wouldn’t surprise me,” the assistant said. “It’s supposedly spring. But someone needs to tell winter to cool it.” She showed me to the chair.
I flew through hair and makeup and was left to find my way to the studio while they packed their brushes and styling wands.
The studio was in a state of organized chaos.
Peter was ordering assistants around in a perfect imitation of a good-natured dictator. “The dresses! We can’t afford to leave a single one behind. Betsy, do we have all the accessories?” He spun around suddenly. “Ah! Callie, I knew I was forgetting something.” He winked. “We can’t forget our bride. You look beautiful.” He inspected my makeup job. “Darla captured the look I want perfectly.”
“She’s a pro,” I agreed.
“Glad you’re here, Callie. Hope you brought a jacket.” His face lit up. “We’re heading to the mountains to shoot today. See what we can get. I’m going to upstage my engagement portrait friends.” He laughed, apparently delighted with his evil aspirations.
“Thinking of changing focus?” I stared at the bustle around me.
“Proving my versatility. And that I can get out of the studio and still do a damn fine job. Most of the time, the outdoor shots we feature on Flash are provided by the manufacturers. This shoot is my turn to showcase my talents and shut up my friends who are always on my case about what a cushy corporate job I have.”
“I’m all for shutting up critics.”
“That’s why I like you.” Peter took my arm and handed me off to an assistant. “Take our bride to the van. Make sure she has something warm to wear between shots.”
The assistant rolled her eyes when she thought Peter wasn’t looking. “Do you have a coat?”
“I have a light jacket.”
She shook her head. “Not good enough. We have blankets and space heaters, but you’ll want a coat. Come on. We’ll see what we can find in the sample room. I think we had a coat event a few months ago. There should be a few samples left. Unless they were a mirage, I saw a couple the other day.”
We made a quick stop by Flash’s sample room—the warehouse-like room where they stored all the samples manufactures sent them and didn’t want returned. A place stacked high with clothing racks, boxes, and bins, looking very much like the staging area for a garage sale. It was what was in those bins, though, that m
ade me salivate—sparkling jewelry, current boutique clothes, purses, shoes. Heaven, just heaven.
The assistant knew her way around. She maneuvered through the clutter to a rack of coats, eyed my size, and pulled a beautiful knee-length faux-fur-trimmed white coat that looked fit for a bride from the rack. She handed it to me. “This should do.”
I slipped it on, feeling the luxury of the soft lining of the sleeves against my bare skin. “Perfect.” I looked down at it, admiring, and did a half twirl.
She flashed me a thumbs-up. “Too bad for you we’re doing a summer wedding shoot. They had snow in the mountains overnight.”
I nodded. “I heard that this morning.”
“Winter is hanging on forever this year.”
I snuggled into the coat. I begged to differ. After a long cold spell in my career, and love life, things were looking up.
“This way.” She led me back through the lobby to the street.
Two large white vans were parked in the loading zone in front of the building, hazard lights flashing. One, a panel van, was being hurriedly loaded. The other, a passenger van, was filling with staff.
I got onboard. No groom. All right, fate. Stop toying with me. I found a seat on the building side of the van where I could watch the action and look for my groom. Someone in the seat behind me asked me a question. I turned to answer it. She started chatting, momentarily diverting my assiduous groom-watching detail.
“Is this seat taken?”
Knox. How had he slipped past me so quickly? I had to hold my smile down. Yes. I turned to him. “If it isn’t the last groom. Help yourself.” I patted the seat next to me.
“Who are you calling last groom? I’m number one.” He slid in next to me.
“You were last up to bat yesterday. But you certainly beat out the competition. I suppose that gives you a weak claim on number one.”
He leaned so close that I could feel his body heat and smell his cologne. He whispered, “Touché. I had to win if I wanted to see you again.”
He was smooth.
“You aren’t surprised to see me. You expected me to win, to be your photoshoot groom,” he said, totally cocky. “We have chemistry, you and I.”
“Yes, we do,” I whispered back. “Great, professional chemistry. We look good on camera together. We make each other look good.”
He looked momentarily crestfallen and taken aback. No, I wasn’t putty in his hands. Maybe he was used to that. Good. I was different. Elusive. His flirting bounced off me. Not really, but he didn’t know that.
His cocky look returned soon enough. “We are pretty hot on camera, aren’t we? Undeniable professional chemistry is still chemistry.”
I was unable to hold my laugh in. Which only encouraged him. He was being deliberately over the top. It was written all over his face.
“I’m determined to eat lunch with you today.” His grin was positively roguish. “On location, it will be hard to escape me.”
“So you’re behind this field trip to the mountains?”
“I don’t have that much pull. But I know how to seize an opportunity.”
Okay, pulse, settle down.
More people boarded. The van was filling up quickly now.
He put his arm on the back of the seat, where I was intensely aware of it. “Why does it feel like we’re heading to summer camp?”
“I think you mean winter camp,” I said. “It snowed last night.”
His eyes were dark as his gaze ran over me. “Yeah, the coat should have been my first clue. But I like summer camp better—bikinis and water fun.”
I rolled my eyes and tried to ignore how hot it suddenly was on the bus. “Speaking of this coat…” I tried to shrug out of it.
He gallantly came to my aid.
“I hope you brought a coat,” I said. “Outdoor shoots can be brutal.”
He raised an eyebrow. “I know my way around extreme temperatures.”
“I bet you do,” I said.
Peter and his cadre of assistants piled onto the bus, interrupting further flirting with Knox. “Let’s get this show on the road. We only have so many hours to catch the light.”
9
Knox
You want to know the irony of my situation? I’d learned a great deal about how to date and flirt from Ashley. She’d made me a better dating man. I relied on Ashley’s coaching. I just hadn’t realized how much until now.
I’d hit a brick wall with Callie. Professional chemistry—what the hell was that? I couldn’t read her. Was I winning or failing? Scoring points? Getting any closer to scoring period?
I could have used Ashley’s advice. When I was on match dates, I’d been free to call her whenever, even in the middle of a date. I had a few times, though not for the kind of help I desperately needed now. After being turned down flat by Callie yesterday, I had to fight the urge to turn to Ashley for a date postmortem, even though the shoot hadn’t been a date.
I couldn’t help staring at Callie. I laughed at her jokes. Felt my insides flip every time she smiled at me. And felt more comfortable with her than I had with any woman since I could remember, even Ashley.
That struck me as odd. I was as comfortable with Callie as if I’d known her as long as I’d known Ashley. But Callie remained immune to my charms. I was in danger of going desperate puppy dog, as Ashley called it, around Callie. I wanted to impress her so damn much. Never appear desperate—that was one of Ashley’s nuggets of advice. Make the other person commit to their interest before you show too much of your hand.
That was all fine and good in theory. In practice? If I wasn’t careful, I was going to bomb out with Callie again today and become her lap dog. But I had to admit, being her lap dog wouldn’t be the worst way to go.
My personal charisma was lost on her, my compliments taken at face value and as a matter of course. And why not? She was a beautiful model used to all kinds of guys hitting on her. She had to have defenses to screen out the douches. I didn’t want to be one of the douches.
The best I could do was engage her in conversation on the bus and hope for the best. As we headed east on I-90 toward the mountains, I learned what I could about her personal life. She was damningly enigmatic, playing it close to the chest, guarding her privacy and personal details. She seemed to relish being a woman of mystery. And I was frustrated being so near her, smelling her perfume—one of my favorites—and not making any progress.
I sat next to her, one arm resting on the back of the bench seat, my left hand rested on my knee. It would much rather be holding hers.
I nearly jumped when she turned slightly to face me and gently touched the fingers of my left hand with her right. “How long?”
“Enough years I’ve learned to deal with it,” I said.
“Have you?” Her eyes were full of sympathy and understanding, but not pity. She rested her hand over mine. Did she mean to drive me crazy? It was a simple touch, but intimate.
“I can do almost everything I used to.” I shrugged. “I don’t type as well as I did before. I was a damn good typist.”
“That’s an interesting skill to brag about.” She had such beautiful, emotive eyes.
It was too easy to get lost in them.
“A byproduct of taking piano lessons from the time I was four through high school. Something most people don’t think about,” I said. “I had good finger dexterity from an early age.”
“You were a piano prodigy?”
I snorted softly. “Not really. I was good. Better than most. I picked it up quickly and enjoyed it.”
“How are you on the piano now?” she asked.
“I can play ‘Chopsticks.’”
“And before?”
I shrugged. “I kept the guys entertained on base. Playing piano is like knowing a good party trick. It makes you popular. It makes you a rock star. It’s not something everyone can do. People are impressed. I mean, hell, it looks impressive when your fingers are flying across the keys, pounding away, and your bod
y is into it. I had years and years of classical training. I practiced my Hanons. I had speed.”
“I can imagine that,” she said in a seductive voice that made my pulse race.
She was that kind of woman, one with the power to turn men to putty. A sporty siren who even now gently wielded great power over me. I hoped she never realized how much. Her face was expressive, the curve of her smile seductive. I amused her. That was something.
“I had a good ear, too.” Something about her made me want to peacock and brag. “Name me a song and I could play it by ear. My buddies used to call it my superpower. It impressed the ladies. I used to write a bit of music, too. Just for the hell of it.”
“It’s frustrating for you. Now.” Her eyes sparkled. “Not being able to impress the ladies with your musical prowess and by-ear superpower?”
I shrugged. “It was my one superpower.”
“I can’t imagine that. Don’t be falsely modest. Women like confident guys. Men with superpowers. Men who strut their stuff and are a little cocky.” She hadn’t removed her hand from mine. I’d been intensely aware of it as I spoke. She squeezed my hand quickly and released it.
She held up her robotic arm, which was one of the coolest gadgets and prostheses I’d seen. “I never played. For obvious reasons. Though I think I could have been a virtuoso in the treble clef.” She did a flourish of the fingers of her right hand. “Bass, not so much. Prosthetics weren’t far enough along during my formative years.” She stared directly into my eyes with the same intensity she’d had at the shoot yesterday.
I’d memorized every fleck of color, every detail of them. Even knowing those eyes so well, I couldn’t look away. She had me under her spell.
“I bet you’re still good with the treble clef,” she said.
“I don’t play much anymore.”
“Why not?” She held my gaze. “You loved it, right? Life is too short not do what you love. To not love who you want. To not go for what you desire. To not try.
“There’s so much new technology now you could use. Learn to play bass with your right hand. Record a track and play it back while you play live with your right. Or learn to fudge chords with your left, something that doesn’t take as much speed and agility. Write your own music with bass clef music you can handle with your prosthetic fingers.” She studied me. “I mean, if you love it. If it gives you pleasure.” She caressed the last word.
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