The Set Piece (6 page)

The swooshing as the patio door opened brought the conversation to an end. Tammy produced the dessert, sweet summer strawberries with whipped cream.

“Ah, my favorite,” Diego said, grabbing a bright red strawberry.

“Well, I knew you weren’t going to eat much with the photo shoot tomorrow.” Tammy picked up his half-eaten plate of food. “Shirt off, I gather?”

“No, but it’s skin-tight. And I wasn’t being vain.” He laughed. “I was talking too much.” He threw a shy glance at Amy.

They waited while Tammy cleared the plates and left. Then when she reappeared at the kitchen window, Diego put his hand on Amy’s. From inside they would look like any couple courting. Strategy had always been Diego’s strong suit, on and off the field.

“This evening went better than I hoped. I like the fact that there’s someone in my life that I don’t have to pretend with.” He considered her for a moment. “You don’t have to come tomorrow, but I think I would like to have you there anyway. Is that weird?”

“Then I’ll be there.”

Diego grinned his thousand-watt smile.

Amy realized she was invested in this job more than she thought she could be. The big bonus being that if she played her cards right she might never have to say, “Next guest in line, please,” ever again.

It was the picture-perfect ending to the fake date. She hadn’t gotten fired, the conversation was interesting, the chicken tasted far better than prawn potato chips, and Diego and she might actually be on the way to becoming friends. What was she worried about? She could totally do this.

CHAPTER 4

The tension started almost immediately
the next morning. Adidas sent a town car to take them to the photo shoot. Diego, Casey, and Amy piled into the backseat. Casey slid in first; then Diego helped Amy inside, but it became clear the three of them couldn’t all fit comfortably. They were crammed in like sardines, and Amy’s left leg, from hip to knee, rode Casey’s thigh next to her. It felt firm and warm under the thin material of her linen pants, and Amy tried to shut out that awareness. But she made no move to ease the pressure.

“I’ll get in front,” Casey said quickly, and slid out her door, taking a place with the driver up front. She let her back fall heavily against the seat and crossed her arms over her chest. “This is better. Shall we go?”

Amy took it all in. She would have to be careful about Casey. She had literally just taken her spot in the backseat and pushed her up with the “help.” Who could feel good about that? But that wasn’t the only thing she’d have to be careful of. Amy slid her hand down the empty space where Casey’s leg had been seconds before. She could still feel the heat where their bodies had touched.

Luckily, Diego gave an interview on his cellphone for the rest of the drive, and nobody had to make small talk. Amy couldn’t hear the questions the reporter posed, but Diego’s answers were perfect.

“Sometimes you go through a spell where you don’t score. Soccer’s just like that. Every sport is, I guess.” He sounded calm, but his foot tapped restlessly on the floor of the car. “No, I don’t credit Amy. I mean, she’s great and all that.” He smiled at her. “But I’m the same player that I was before I met her. That’s just how the game is. You can’t chase it. If you’re not doing well individually, then you got to find other ways to contribute. In the end, it’s about the team, not the individual.”

Amy stopped listening when she realized that she’d been staring at the back of Casey’s neck the whole time. Now she really took it in. Slender, strong, touchable.

She turned away and looked pensively out the window. As Diego had said, it was all about the team, and she was part of team Diego now. That meant there was no place for all these dangerous feelings that were starting to bubble up inside her.

The tension continued to escalate as soon as they walked into the studio. The Adidas advertising executives, Paul Knight, and Lucy Lewitt, Diego’s publicist, descended like vultures. Each one reached out to pull Diego into a corner for a private conversation. When they couldn’t all grab him at once, they turned their talons on Casey. “Could you please,” started every demand. The words shot at Casey as if they were pecking at her. In response, she flew around the studio ordering coffee, changing schedules, calling people to the set—all menial tasks they could have easily performed themselves. It was a pissing contest to see who had the most power in their little group, and Casey was their battlefield.

Diego was oblivious to it all. He threw Amy an air kiss as someone from Adidas took him into a dressing room to change for the shoot.

Amy caught the air kiss in her outstretched fist and brought it up to her lips. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Knight nodding ever so slightly to himself. Then she noticed a pretty young intern give Diego a hungry look and her a spiteful one. All good.

Lucy Lewitt sidled up to Amy and put a dainty hand on her shoulder. “You’re good for him.” Lucy’s voice was surprisingly childlike.

“And he’s good for me.”

Lucy smiled and continued, “We should get some shots of you two today for the Twitter feed. Do you mind?”

“Not at all.”

“Great. Casey?”

On the other side of the set, Casey turned to her with a withering look that was lost on Lucy.

“Could you please get the Adidas people to get Amy some gear? One of those aerodynamic tops that Diego is changing into, I think.” She dismissed Casey with a wave of her hand.

“I can do that,” Amy said quickly. Her developing feelings for Casey aside, she didn’t like the way that Lucy was treating her. It reeked too much of the Reggie treatment, which she hoped she had left behind her in the Valley Arms.

“Don’t be silly, dear. That’s her job.”

“I’m pretty sure it isn’t.”

“Of course it is.” Lucy laughed as if Amy were crazy.

Amy scanned the room. She had no idea who to approach for the clothes and so in the end had to go to Casey, herself. She touched her lightly on her arm.

“Sorry, but who do I ask?”

Casey sighed. “I don’t need you fighting my battles for me.” Her tone could cut glass.

“I didn’t do it for you. I did it for me. I’ve been there.” Finally, she said something that wasn’t a lie. “Just because you work for someone, or in this case don’t work for them, doesn’t make them better than you.” Amy looked into Casey’s eyes. No thawing.

Casey did check out the room, however. “Francine? Sorry to bother you. Do we have any of those Adidas tops that Diego is wearing that would fit her?” She pointed at Amy.

Her? How hard would it have been to use my name? Same amount of letters and all.

A heavyset woman tugged at the measuring tape around her neck and pursed her lips. “Hmm, let me call over to wardrobe?”

“Thank you, Francine.” Casey inclined her head to the woman, who smiled back at her.

“Thanks, Casey,” Amy added, noting that the Adidas team seemed to really like her.

When Diego came back from the make-up chair, all heads, including Amy’s, turned in his direction.

“Ta-da!” He threw his arms up high over his head in his excitement. The skin-tight Adidas workout shirt and compression shorts hugged his body and showed off the long, lean muscles of an incredibly fit soccer player. Francine waddled over to Diego to tie off the shirt in the back to make it even tighter. Washboard abs leaped to life under the material, and the young intern giggled with appreciation.

“Too tight? Can you move?” Francine asked and ran her hand all the way around Diego’s waist.

“Barely. But I’m good.”

Francine touched him a few more times, and Amy got the feeling that she was enjoying her job almost too much. Amy didn’t blame her. The outfit left nothing to the imagination, and frankly, no one’s imagination could do any better. He was the cover boy of ancient Greek aesthetics with his Adonis body.

“Okay! Let’s do this thing!” he said.

A palpable energy pulsed through the room. Everyone smiled at Diego and then at each other. Amy remembered her college soccer coach’s favorite quote. “A really good player doesn’t even have to touch the ball to affect the game. She just needs to make everyone else believe that when the ball comes to them, they can put it in the back of the net.” Diego had done just that.

A tall, thin man with glasses slapped Diego on the back and took him to the green screen that dominated the back third of the room.

“That’s Ryan, the creative director. A good director always makes the talent feel comfortable, but Ryan takes it to a whole new level,” a soft voice said directly behind Amy. She didn’t need to turn around to know it was Knight. That creepy feeling she had for him had reached her even before his words. “I think he has a little something for our boy. Can you take care of it?”

“I’ll try.” That’s what he was paying her for after all, but taking care of it didn’t sit well with Amy as she moved toward Diego. If Ryan did like Diego, a fake girlfriend wasn’t going fool him. Queers knew their own. Ryan kept his hand on Diego’s shoulder as he ran though the poses on the shot list. As the hand began to slide down Diego’s back, Amy saw Knight flinch, so she sidled in between them and Ryan was forced off to the side.

“This whole set-up is amazing,” Amy said.

Diego met her gaze as embarrassment flashed in his eyes. Amy realized that he liked Ryan’s attention, but understood he shouldn’t allow himself to. Her heart went out to him, and she touched his arm.

“Diego, we’re ready for you. Could you take your place, please?” Ryan said curtly, breaking up the moment.

Diego stood in front of the screen with his arm stretched out, palm up. Ryan positioned the new hi-tech Adidas ball, which registered the speed and trajectory of a strike, on the palm of his hand.

“Pull up the star field,” Ryan said to a man hovering over a computer.

A million twinkling stars popped into existence behind Diego on the screen. With a simple click of a mouse, Diego was a superman hovering in space offering the ball to the consumer. Diego’s jaw was set, but the glint in his eye seemed to say, “Buy the ball, train hard, and you, too, can play like me.”

“Excellent,” Ryan said. Amy stood looking over his shoulder.

“He’s a natural,” she said.

Ryan studied her for a moment. “Yes, he’s perfect,” he said, finally. Amy caught the double meaning. He was telling her that he knew about Diego’s true nature.

“I know.” She raised her eyebrows and smiled to give her statement an enigmatic twist. Then she walked away to make sure she had the last word.
Knight’s crazy if he thinks this is going to work.

Soon, though, the excitement of the shoot overtook her concerns. Camera’s clicked; Ryan shouted directions. Diego laughed and chatted his way through the morning. No wonder everyone wanted a piece of him. People just felt better when he was around.

At one point, Francine reappeared, thrust several items of clothing into Amy’s arms and pointed to the small dressing room. Amy held up a tiny shirt.

“Um. I’m not sure this is my size.”

“It’s close enough,” Francine said. “They’re made to show off the body. Go try it on. You might like what you see. I know Diego will.”

Amy did as she was told. She wriggled into the shorts and then squeezed the shirt down over her chest inch by inch. It was ridiculously tight, exposing every flaw. Amy had believed that she was more or less in shape from all her jogging and bike riding. The shirt cupped her breasts and stomach like a glove. Sadly, it also exposed how soft she had become in the two years since she’d left the soccer field and instituted Margarita Mondays at the bar. She considered her reflection in the mirror.
I would rather go out there naked than in these clothes.

There was a soft tap on the dressing room door. “They’re ready for you.” Casey’s voice drifted in, void of all emotion.

“Sorry, but can you tell Francine that I need another shirt? I’m not coming out like this.”

Casey yanked open the door without warning. Her gaze traveled up and down Amy’s body as if she were a sculptor looking at a lump of untapped marble. “You look fine.”

Amy, in a knee jerk reaction, rapidly pushed the door shut in her face. “Casey, can you please tell Francine to get me a looser shirt.” In her embarrassment, she ordered Casey around like everyone else.

A quick look in the mirror told her what she already knew. Her face and arms were a deep red. She hadn’t meant to be that curt with Casey, but she also hadn’t intended for anyone to see her like this.

Casey had heard her loud and clear. A hand clutching a bright green Adidas training tee slipped around the dressing room door a few minutes later.

“Thanks,” Amy mumbled.

Casey said nothing.

“Time is money, sweetie.” Lucy came knocking on the door moments later. The T-shirt was a much better look for her. The bright color made her complexion glow, and it was just loose enough to hide her flaws without creating a tent effect. Lucy took her by the elbow and guided her to the hair and make-up station a few feet away.

“There you go,” she said, directing Amy into the chair. “Pull her hair back and stay natural, I think. Maybe even out her tone and define her eyes a little bit more,” she told the stylist.

Amy usually got ready in the morning in under ten minutes and was surprised how much she enjoyed being pampered. Her hair was restyled as a messy ponytail that looked like she had pulled her hair into a scrunchie that morning without a thought. The make-up girl designed a natural look that Amy soon realized was anything but artless. She checked her reflection in the mirror. Success! She looked like she put the F in fun.

When she finally made it to the green screen, Diego gave a low whistle. “You look great.”

“Who knew,” she said casually, but secretly she glowed with her transformation. She looked around to see if Casey had noticed, but she was talking to another woman with her back to her.

“Okay.” Lucy marched center stage to take control. “So you play soccer too, Amy?”

“I do.”

“Can you do that…what’s it called? That thing where you bounce the ball on your foot and your leg?”

“You mean juggling?”

“Yes, that.”

“I can.”

Lucy clapped her hands in delight. “So clear back everyone and let them juggle.” No one moved. The crew looked to Ryan, who looked to Knight, who nodded. Amy wouldn’t have guessed that Knight out of all these people was the top of the power pyramid, but a simple nod from him got everyone moving. Before she knew it, she and Diego were bobbing the ball back and forth to each other in front of the extended green screen. Diego, at first, had given her simple transfers with no spin right to her feet.

“You’re going easy on me,” she said. She flipped the ball behind her back to heel kick it over to Diego.

Diego’s eyes widened, and some of the studio guys whistled and clapped.

“Game on!” Diego cried, and matched her trick with one of his own. The ball flew between them like lightning, and very soon she was outclassed. The camera clicked at a steady rate until Ryan called from the back of the room. “That’s a wrap, guys. We got what we need.”

So had Amy. When she tapped the ball to the production assistant, she looked up to see the first crack in Casey’s persona. The chill was still in her eyes, but her expression was thoughtful. Amy met her gaze, trying to get beyond her defenses. She would have given all the money she now had in the bank to know what that look meant.