“You can go out the front,” he says.
“Are you sure?” I ask. “It might look sus if a girl is seen leaving your house in the middle of the night.”
“That wouldn’t look sus at all,” he says, emphasizing the age gap in our slang. “But it might look bad if someone catches you trampling my hydrangeas.”
“Good point,” I say before walking out the front door. My car is parked around the corner, but I don’t mind the walk. I can use all the fresh air I can get after whatever the fuck just happened.
Chapter 4
Zane
Call me crazy,but I don’t think I realized how overdue I was for a good lay.
I’m sure it’s hard to believe, being in the modeling industry, that sex isn’t usually at the top of my list of priorities. Modeling isn’t all photos and publicity. It’s meetings. It’s working out until I want to crawl not just into my bed but under my bed so no one can find me. It’s phone calls and Zoom meetings and dieting. So. Much. Dieting.
All that said, my night with the little Polaroid Minx was a nice way to relieve myself of all that stress. A good way to start the week, even if it did cost me a couple grand for a new pergola.
I’m barely through the door at work the next morning when I’m called out.
“Well, look at you,” my friend Caleb, aka Cal, says, falling into step with me as I head for the elevator.
“Why are we looking at me?” I ask, taking a sip of my almond milk latte.
“Because you got laid last night,” he grins.
“And how do you know that?” I ask.
“Because you have that ‘walk of shame’ look written all over your face,” he says and I narrow my eyes at him with a look.
“How can I do the walk of shame from my own home?” I ask as we step into the elevator.
“So you did get laid…” he says as the door closes.
“I did,” I say with a smirk as I take a sip of my coffee. “No shame, though.”
“So who was she?” he asks. Cal is kind of a chick. I don’t mean that in a physical or even preferential way. He’s the same age as me, a similar build, but instead of modeling underwear, he models firehoses. He’s a calendar boy, as I like to call it. I give him shit for it all the time, but Cal can dish it back.
“Hell if I know,” I say. “But don’t worry, I destroyed the evidence.”
“There’s evidence?” he asks.
“Was. Past tense. I smashed it into smithereens,” I say, vaguely telling the story to keep my friend on his toes.
“Smashed what?” he presses.
“Her camera,” I state, giving him another breadcrumb.
“Oh god, a psycho mega-fan? You really gotta step up security on that shit, Z. Those chicks are grade-A psycho. I’m talking about padded-room level. Anything for a chance with the Zane Calloway.”
He’s patronizing me. This is how our friendship works. Luckily, I’m thick-skinned.
“She’s paparazzi. Not sure if she was a fan though; she might be now.”
I hold back the smirk as I literally watch my friend’s brain short circuit.
“You fucked a camera creep?!” he blurts out as the door opens.
“She wasn’t a creep,” I correct him. The term he’s using is a typical label for paparazzi. I’ve tossed the nickname around a few times myself, but something about it in reference to the girl last night stings in a way that I don’t like. “She was actually pretty hot.”
