“I’m still amazed you’re up.”
“Shut up.” I step to the side and let him in. “Coffee?”
“Tea, thanks. You can keep your bloody coffee.” He hangs his jacket on the hooks in the hall and follows me into the kitchen, looking around. “I see you’ve added some femininity to this place.”
“Believe me, it was by force,” I reply dryly and hand him his tea. “Here.”
“Thanks. Did you tell him yet?”
I shake my head and lead him into the front room. I sink onto the sofa and tuck my legs beneath me. “What am I supposed to say? ‘Oh, hey, baby, I forgot to tell you that your conniving, gold-digging bitch-whore of an ex-wife dropped by my place three weeks ago and threatened me unless I pay her two and a half million’?”
“It pretty much sums it up.” A smile teases his lips, and I smack him with a throw pillow, narrowly missing his tea.
“It’s just so good right now, like we’re finally where we’re supposed to be, and I’m scared it’ll ruin everything. I know I have to though. I think she’s keeping tabs on me.”
Tyler looks at me, a frown marring his features. “What do you mean, keeping tabs on you?”
“It’s totally irrational, but when I went home the day after we left London, there was a letter from her in my mail. All it said was, ‘Tick tock.’ I bet she knew I wasn’t home. There was no postmark and it was handwritten. And it was sitting on top of the pile. It had only just been delivered.”
“Are you sure it wasn’t a couple of days old?”
I shake my head. “No. The mailman had already been by when I went back to my house. It was definitely delivered that day.”
He runs his fingers over his lips, looking away thoughtfully. “That was what, a few days ago now?”
“Yep. And now there’s only one week until she’ll go to the press with who I am.”
“She might be bluffing.”
The look he gives me tells me that even he knows it’s farfetched.
“No. She’ll go, and she’ll expose me, and she’ll get paid a stupid amount of money for breaking the story about the whore Aaron Stone is dating.”
Now he hits me with a pillow. “Don’t call yourself that. You’re not a whore.”
I smile wryly. “Maybe not now. I was though. Don’t argue with me, Ty,” I add when he opens his mouth again. “I’m not sugarcoating shit. You’re one of the few people who know what I did for a living, so please don’t wrap it in fluffy crap either. It’s the blunt and ugly reality of my existence. It’s who I was. I’m not ashamed of it, but I’m ashamed of the fact it could destroy Stone.”
“Stone is a huge company, Dayton, and even if your past got out, it would take a lot to bring it down.”
“A lot Naomi could do. I don’t know her half as well as you do, yet you’re the one underestimating what she could do. She won’t stop until she’s destroyed the company and exposed every last one of my skeletons all because she wants to get to Aaron.”
“You really think Aaron will let that happen?” Tyler puts his mug on the table and shifts to face me. “Aaron will protect you as fiercely as he’ll protect the company, maybe even more so. You have to tell him.”
“I know.” I run my fingers through my hair and sigh, resting my elbow on the back of the sofa. “I just… I gave him such a hard time about keeping her a secret and now I’m doing the exact same thing. That makes me a raging bitch, Ty.”
“No. It makes you someone who’s afraid of hurting the person you love. Just like he was.”
I swallow. “I guess you’re right. I have a week left and no idea how I’m supposed to pay her off, so I don’t have a choice. I’ll tell him when he gets back from work tonight.”
He reaches over and squeezes my knee. “Good choice. Now, let’s go shoot you and put together some shit-hot pictures that’ll get you a superstar agent.”
I watch as he grabs his bag and stand. “Doesn’t it make you feel awkward, shooting your cousin’s girlfriend?”
“Do you feel awkward with me doing it?”
“A little, yeah.”
“Then don’t think of me as that. You won’t see my face anyway. I’ll be behind a camera. Pretend you don’t know me and this will be fine.” He points to the canvas on the bedroom wall. “See that? You’re a natural. Now take off that robe and let’s get to work.”
***
I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to looking at pictures of myself. If I’ll ever accept myself the way the camera sees it.
And it’s not even confidence. It’s…strange. Twenty-four is an old age to get into modeling—okay, so I’m three days away from twenty-five, but let’s not think about that right now—but I don’t look twenty-four. I’ve always looked a couple of years younger, and right now, that’s something that could work in my favor.
“I don’t know why you didn’t do this before.”
“Because it wasn’t my thing. It still isn’t, I don’t think.” I swipe my finger across the laptop screen and the picture flicks to the next one. I’m kneeling on the bed, my back to the camera, and my robe is sliding off my shoulder. I’m glancing over it and looking down, and I kind of get it.
I can do sexy pretty well. I’m just used to sexy-between-the-sheets.
“These are brilliant. At least the ones after you killed your giggles are.”
I laugh again at the memory. So the awkwardness was more awkward than I’d anticipated, and I spent the first hour in and out of random fits of giggles. There are a few shots of me laughing in various positions, and they’re probably my favorites because of how natural they are.
“Can I see those again?” I ask.
Tyler nods and taps the screen a few times. We sectioned them off and went through the images in batches, and when the folder comes up, I smile. I flick through them to find my favorite.
My knees are bent and I’m leaning forward, laughing. One hand is on my thigh and the other is curved around the neck of my robe and it’s tugging it down, exposing my bra on one side.
“Can you edit this and print it?” My cheeks flush a little. “I mean…”
“It’s a gorgeous photo and you want it for Aaron.”
“Um, yes.” I laugh. “Look at me, all shy. That man is ruining me.”