Shut Up and Model for Me (14 page)

I shut the door, and Britain drives away.

Chapter Twelve

Evan

The bartender slides me my second tequila shot rimmed with salt, along with a lime wedge. Without a second’s hesitation, I down it, slamming the glass on the counter and biting into the sour fruit.

My shoes are off and hiding by the door. Beats thrum along with the pulsing array of lights. Andrea, Delilah, Britain, and Adam are somewhere on the dance floor, or so I think. When a hand presses against the small of my back, I start and spin around.

“Calm down, stranger.” In the shadow of eerie lights, I can barely make out Adam’s crooked grin. “Just me.”

I turn back to the bar in attempt to flag down more service, my body warm and aching for more booze. “What’s up?”

“I came over to ask if you’d like to join me. Looks like you need to need to let go of something.”

I release a wry chuckle. “What could have possibly given that away?”

I finally catch the bartenders attention, and he slides me another shot, which I down.

“You want to talk about it before you drink yourself into delirium?” he asks.

I scoff. “With you? Unlikely.”

“It’s Dallas, isn’t it?” When I shake my head, he continues. “Come on, Rylan. I hardly even see the two of you and it’s obvious.”

Rylan. I forgot that Adam doesn’t even know my real name. I’m just a façade of a girl to him.

I pull off my feelings for Dallas like they are nothing. “I
guess
you could say I’m into him,” I yell over the music. “Come on, Adam. My shoots make me sexually frustrated. That’s all I am. I just want to fuck his brains out, and I can’t, because he has a mother-fucking girlfriend.”

“Is your mouth always this filthy, or is this just the alcohol talking?”

“Fuck you, asshole.”

He leans close until I’m sandwiched between his hips and the bar. “Do you want to fuck Dallas because you find him particularly attractive, or just because he’s
your
model?”

I open my mouth to respond, but find no words. Is he coming on to me, or am I just drunk? I study his physique. Tan, broad, blonde… “Are you like, a surfer or something?”

Oh my god, did I really just say that? Way to sound like the dumbest valley girl bitch ever, Evan.

He grins, “Used to be. Why do you ask?”

“I’d just like to watch you ride a wave is all.” Wow. Runaway mouth. At least I’m being honest.

“Do you want to dance with me or not?”

“Fuck it.” I slam my third glass down and hold out my hand, which he takes and uses to pull me to the dance floor. God, I haven’t danced in years. Maybe since prom, sadly enough. Evan doesn’t dance. Evan sacrificed her freedom to get dolled up and go out long ago. Which was a stupid idea, considering how dark it is in this club. No one would recognize Rylan Willow in a place like this.

Adam pulls me to him, and I soon find a rhythm to the beat. I wrap my arms around his shoulders and take in the sensation of him grinding against me, the air heavily with the smell of sweat and sex and cigarettes.

I want to lose myself.

I pull on his neck until he drops his head and I capture his lips with mine. When he breaks away, I ask him if he wants to get out of here.

Britain watches me from the bar as she gulps down water. She shrugs her shoulders, as if to ask where I’m going.

I wave goodbye to her and take Adam’s hand.

^^^^

We decide on my place, since Adam has to be at the studio tomorrow anyway.

He shuts the door to my room and throws me on my bed. I don’t even have time to react before he’s on top of me, pulling my dress up and over my head and my panties to my ankles. The boy wastes no time, retrieving a condom from his pocket and stripping. He tears open the package and rolls it on, pries open my legs, and slams his cock into me.

I cry out and grip on the headboard. Before he sets a steady pace, he bends forward and bites down on my nipple. I drown myself in the rough, thrilling pain of it, begging him to fuck me.

He flips me over, digs his fingers into the flesh of my ass, and complies.

Dallas

I’ve already run six miles this morning and could run another ten. It’s a healthy way to channel sexual frustration, but I decide to give myself a break and grab coffee after my shower. I text Britain to see if she’s up so I can grab my paycheck. She texts back and tells me to come over, so I get in my car and head to the studio.

“In here,” she calls from the dressing room when I walk inside. She’s sitting on the makeup counter, watching Delilah get her hair done.

“Good morning,” I say, setting my coffee down.

Delilah glares at me.

I cock my head. “Bad morning?” but before she can respond, Britain holds out an envelope.

“Thanks,” I say, taking it from her.

“Evan won’t be up for a few hours,” Britain says. Delilah scoffs.

“That’s okay. I brought shit to study.”

“Great.” Britain holds up her finger. “Actually, before you do, you mind running an errand for me? We’re out of hairspray, and there are a couple bottles in the bathroom next to the bedrooms. You know where it is, right?”

Evan’s bedroom door is closed when I passed it. Ten o’clock and she’s still out—I guess the club was fun. I shuffle around through a bunch of girlie crap in the bathroom before I find a two pack of hairspray and grab it.

When I’m back in the hall, Evan’s door opens, but she isn’t the one to walk out. I freeze in my steps.

Adam yawns and pushes back his hair, turning my way. He spots me and nods, walking around me and into the bathroom.

What the
fuck
?

I creep to Evan’s open door. She stands by the window with her back to me in nothing but booty shorts and pulls a tank top over her head. She shakes her hair out and turns around. When she spots me, her face falls into shock.

“Dallas?”

She fucked Adam. Evan
fucked
Adam.

“What are you doing here?”

I hold up the hairspray. “Running an errand.” Before she can respond, I leave her doorway and walk down the hall as fast I can before I punch a hole in the wall.

She’s not yours to be angry over. She’s not yours to be angry over.

She fucked Adam.

I storm back into the dressing room and slam the hairsprays down on the counter. Britain jumps. She lifts up a crumpled plastic bottle, liquid seeping from the lip of the cap. “Whoa there, super Hulk. You were supposed to get the aerosol cans.”

“The
what
?”

“Aerosol. You know, the hairspray in the metal cans?”

“I don’t even know what the fuck you’re talking about.”

“Calm down, dude.”

“I’m not going back up there.”

Her eyes widen. “Oh, shit. You saw…” her mouth snaps shut, and she nods rapidly before she says, “Why don’t you go take a swim? It’ll cool you down.”

“Cool me down from
what
?”

“I’m your boss. Just do what I say and don’t argue with me, okay?”

I growl and spin, punching open the dressing room door. I listen to Britain because I can’t think of what else I can do—other than run some more. But I know running won’t work. I tried running already.

I tried running and now I feel even worse.

She fucked Adam
.

Maybe I should wait for him to come into the studio, and then what? Start a fight with him—over Evan? I can’t do that, because she isn’t mine.

She isn’t mine.

At the pool, I strip to my boxers. I don’t know how long I’m swimming laps for, but when I finally rest at the edge of the pool, the sun is in the middle of the sky.

I pick up my phone resting on the concrete. No missed calls from Tricia. No texts.

“I’m in love with her,” I say out loud, because out loud is the only way I can convince myself that I really feel this way.

I’m in love with Evan Cosette.

Chapter Thirteen

Evan

Adam acts like there is nothing different between us when I see him in the dressing room an hour after he left my bed.

Thank God.

Not that last night was a mistake, because it wasn’t. I needed a bit of sex in my life—it’s been way too long and I’ve been way too sexually frustrated as of late. I mean, it would have been better if Adam was courteous enough to get me off….

“You.” Britain points to me and snaps her fingers. “My office. Now.”

Britain looks pretty serious. The gossip must be juicy.

She ushers me out of the dressing room and into the bathroom, shutting the door behind her and locking it. She spins toward me, and to my surprise, she looks pissed. “What the fuck were you thinking, sleeping with Adam?”

“I…
what
? Did you hear us or something?”

“Oh Christ, Evan. Everyone knows!” she spits.

I sit on the toilet. “I’m confused. Does this have to do with not sleeping with coworkers? Because I don’t remember us ever establishing that rule.”

“No, you moron. This has to do with Delilah being in love with Adam.”

My jaw drops. “Excuse me?”

“But you wouldn’t know that, because you’ve been a bit self-centered over the past couple of months.”

I stand. “What the
fuck
, Brit? I’m sorry that wanting to get into a good grad school has made me self-centered. I can’t be hanging out with you guys every fucking second.”

She steps toward me, her face solemn. “Face the facts, Evan. You didn’t know that one of your best friends had feelings for a guy you just slept with, grad school or no grad school.” And with that, she spins on her heel and leaves me alone in the bathroom, feeling like the biggest tool imaginable.

I had no idea that Delilah was into Adam, and he obviously doesn’t either. I mean, how could he, with all of the faux flirting and sexual tension?

How can he separate what’s real and what isn’t?

I think of Dallas.

No, Dallas is different. Dallas isn’t single. I know that nothing between us is real. I know it.

I know it.

Heading to the dressing room, I pass Delilah in the hall, all made up for her shoot today. She sneers at me and stomps away. I call her name but she doesn’t stop. Doesn’t turn around.

Dammit. Dammit, I fucked up.

I head to my own set—the bedroom. Today, it’s made up with frilly white and pink, the walls decorated in posters of heart throbs and boy bands.

This is supposed to be Rylan’s room. The sight of it makes me gag.

Dallas sits in the plush arm chair in the corner of the room wearing nothing but boxers. His arms are crossed, and he glares at me.

I’m really getting sick of seeing this look today.

“And what the hell is wrong with
you
?” I snarl.

“Oh, nothing, just that we were supposed to be shooting—” he looks at his bare wrist dramatically, “I don’t know, an hour ago, but someone was too busy screwing all night that she couldn’t get out of bed in time.”

Heat rips through me, broiling my insides. “You know what, Dallas? You can go fuck yourself. My sex life is none of your business, and even if it were, it’s
an hour
. If your day is so packed with interesting shit to do, then why don’t you just leave?”

He jumps to his feet, hands balled into fists. For a second, I actually think that he’s going to listen to me before Britain comes into the room and shuts the door.

Dallas opens his mouth like he’s going to say something to her, but she cuts him off. “Okay, so today’s shoot is going to be private for obvious reasons.” She walks around the room and turns on the umbrella lighting, throwing a box of condoms on the nightstand.

Dallas nods toward the condoms and crosses his arms. “What are those for?”

“This shoot could get a little intense.” Britain shrugs. “Adam and Delilah needed them.”

“Of course, Adam needed one,” Dallas spits.

“Go suck a dick, Dallas.”

Britain snorts. “Okay, I don’t want to guess what the hell is going on with you two, but are you going to be able to manage to do this today?”

Dallas glares at me, bright eyes boring into mine, and finally says, “I’m good.”

I untie my bathrobe and let it fall to the floor. I wear nothing but a lacy pick push-up bra and a matching thong. Even in the heat of being pissed for whatever reason, Dallas’s eyes still rake over my body. Thrill courses through me.

“Okay, then. Get on the bed.”

^^^^

The first part of the shoot is straight-up painful. Dallas moves like a robot, and playing sexy with him is less fun than chewing on nails.

Britain can tell.

“Come the fuck on,” she says, dropping her camera. “Can the two of you do this or not, because you are wasting my time and yours.”

I’m lying beneath Dallas. He’s supposed to be moving his mouth over me sexily, like he’s done in
every other shoot
we’ve modeled in together. But instead it’s like he’s dragging his face over my chest against his will.

I push him away and sit up. “I can’t perform when he’s not even
trying
to turn me on.”

Dallas crosses his arms over his chest and raises an eyebrow. “You want me to turn
you
on?”

I shrug. “That’s how this has always worked, Dallas.”

“If you guys don’t figure it out in thirty seconds, I’m calling it quits,” Britain threatens.

“You think I’m supposed to magically pull a way to turn you on out of my ass?” he seethes through gritted teeth.

It’s my turn to cross my arms. “Something like that.”

Britain sighs. “Nineteen, eighteen, seventeen…”

“I’ve never fucked you before, Evan. I don’t know what your kinks are.”

“You’re telling me that, after shooting with me for a month and a half now, you have absolutely no idea what turns me on… I call total bullshit.”

“Six, five, four…”

The muscles in his jaw ripple, and his eyes burn with loathing. For a second, I think it’s over. We’re going to have to come back to this a different time because for some reason, Dallas thinks he owns my every movement. He thinks he owns my…

Suddenly he grabs my shoulders, pushing me down and over his lap. And then he smacks my ass. Hard.