AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“This is just kohl! It’s not going to poke your eyes out. You need to hold still.”
Two girls held his shoulders and kept him in place while Marnie locked his jaw with her firm grip.
“Stay. Still,” she ordered, and pressed the pencil over his skin. After one stroke, she moved away, and he opened his eyes. “Hmm… your eyes are a little more hooded than I thought. Maybe we should use mascara instead. Hand me the lash curler.”
“What is that?” Rick asked, almost fearful.
“A tool that will curl your eyelashes.” Marnie showed him the tool, and he retreated from his seat.
“Okay, nowthatis what’s going to poke my eyes out,” he declared.
“Nonsense,” the makeup artist said. “Now look up.”
He did and recoiled when Marnie placed the curler above his eyes. Exasperated, she said to him, “Can you relax? I won’t hurt you.”
After another attempt, Rick pushed back, and Marnie growled in frustration.
“Charlie!” Marnie exclaimed. “Can you get through to him?”
Charlie stepped forward and took the curler from Marnie. The girls behind Rick moved aside as she approached him. He straightened when she got close. Without a word, she raised his chin with her finger to face him upward.
“Now,close your eyes and think pleasant thoughts,” she murmured.
Rick’s eyes rounded at her suggestion. The grin he threw at her made her toes curl. “That, I can do.”
Rolling her eyes, she clipped between his eyelashes and pinched with the device, successfully crimping them in place. His lashes were too short to really see the difference, so she went ahead with the liner.
“Just like that,” she whispered. “Nice and easy. I’m almost done.”
“Take your time,” he said. “I’m in no hurry for you to go.”
She ignored the fuzzy emotions from his affection and paid attention to working when he finally quieted down. In that moment, she was painfully aware of their proximity, and the warmth from his breath against her hand. When he was this close, she only wanted to get even closer, but she couldn’t let her desires take away her resolve to put herself first.
She couldn’t break because he smelled nice and said all the right things. He’d hurt her, and she needed more time to heal before letting him back in. But to his credit, he was on the right track.
Charlie let Marnie apply the rest. Lightly tinted lip gloss, airbrushing, eyebrow trimming and shaping. By the end of it, he looked like a different person. Definitely made up, and a little too creepily clean for Charlie’s taste.
His signature tousled, devil-may-care look stood out. She hated the clean jawline and appreciated the coarse scruff he usually sported.
“Alright. Looks good,” Marnie announced. “Now we can get on with the poses.”
“Poses?” Rick asked, confused. “I thought it was just headshots. Why do I need to pose?”
“Headshot poses.”
Marnie went over to explain to him the many ways to look atthe camera. Charlie enjoyed his facial reactions to Marnie as she talked. She felt for him; he had arrived right when they opened and it was already noon and they barely got to finishing his makeup.
Rick doing this meant a lot to her. It was out of his comfort zone, as he had made it clear, but he did it for her.
Being behind the camera was different from the front. Charlie spent a good amount of her early adult life in the front, while Rick became an expert from behind.
As she watched her staff fuss over Rick, she felt a tug on her sleeves. Jessa, their social media girl, was the no-nonsense person they needed. She took charge and became the interim office manager. From the look on her face, Charlie knew something was amiss.
“What’s wrong?” Charlie asked.
Jessa’s smile had an edge. That didn’t look good. “Charlie, if I may be direct.”
“Of course.”
