Tragic

Elise smiles, maybe for the first time since I got here. "Good girl. I was hoping you'd react like that. Ronin is my brother, but he's a twenty-two-year-old guy, you know? They are what they are, and something tells me you need stability right now, am I right?"

I nod. "Yes, I'd very much like to be stable."

"Well, twenty-two-year-old guys aren't known for their stability, if you get my meaning. Antoine was a lot older than me when we met and even then, it took me almost a year to trust him, so I get it." She lets out a deep breath and closes her eyes for an extended period of time. "It was very hard to trust that he would take care of me and to be perfectly honest, I still have panic attacks over it because we never married. So, think about it all very carefully." She pauses. "And if I could make one suggestion?"

"Yeah, sure."

"Be careful how much time you spend in Ronin's apartment. You have a place, I gave you that place, so use it. Please."

I think about this for a moment and it's like she's reading my mind.

"Yeah, OK."

Her face lights up. "Yeah?"

"I can see the wisdom in that. I crave some private space so bad, I can't even explain it."

She leans over and hugs me and then Ronin is up next to me. "What's going on? Girl hugs are a bad sign."

Chapter Twenty-Four - RONIN

Leave it to my sister to f**k everything up. Dammit. Rook is so skittish, she really is like a bird in that respect. Ready to take flight at the slightest hint that something is up. And can I blame her? If I had her past I'd be skittish too. Hell, I damn near did have her past and I am just barely recovered from it. It took Elise and me years to get over that shit.

But I do not want her down in the studio apartment.

We walk across the large lower terrace and I shake my head.

"What?" she asks.

"I just don't like the idea of you being down here alone. It's too far away, it's dark, it's creepy, it's—"

"It's four stories up and there's a keypad on the studio door."

I smile as I take her hand. She's brave. "I know, but it's far."

"Far from where?"

"Far from me, you little shit." She squeezes my hand and I feel a little better because she's still sending some token I-like-you signals.

I open the door and find the light switch on the side of the wall, not ready to leave her yet.

"So what should I expect tomorrow?"

"Well," I say, trying my best not to ravish her mouth as I watch her chew on her lip. "If you sign the contract then we'll do a practice shoot, in private, well, semi-private. All the technicians will be there and probably two or three photographers."

"Why so many?"

"Antoine likes to get a bunch of angles, and he can only work one camera at a time, so he makes the other guys come in sometimes. Since we're planning on using you for TRAGIC, he'll want as many views as he can get."

"Will you be there with me? Or will I be alone?"

"I'll definitely be there, Gidget. We're submitting the two of us together for the contract."

"So I'll be naked with you?"

I tread carefully. "That's not quite how it works. It's all about the mood of the models."

She walks back to the bedroom and starts fixing the covers on the bed.

"Does that bother you?" I ask. "If I see your body?"

"I'm nervous," she confesses. "I've never done anything like this before, I'm not sure what to expect."

"Well, after tomorrow you'll know exactly what to expect. I won't let anything happen to you, OK?"

"OK," she says. "Thanks for walking me home and—" She stops abruptly. "Well, thanks for everything really."

I back away before I tackle her and rip that adorable little Gidget outfit right off her body. She catches me staring and smiles. "I'm on to you, Larue."

"Yeah," I say, closing the distance between us despite my inner warnings. I wrap both hands around her hips and pull her a little closer. "I don't see how you're on to me when I'm innocent, I have nothing to hide."

"Well, I appreciate the Gidget outfit anyway. It's very cute. And I really expected you to come back with the blue nightie, so it was a huge step up in my mind."

I grin like an idiot picturing me dressing her up in that nightie and then taking her to dinner.

"Ah, I see your mind spinning with that thought. So, I appreciate your self-control in that area."

I back away again, because I see the stop sign she's getting ready to put up. "Tomorrow we'll do the cherry tree shoot. It will be completely different than what you experienced today, OK?"

"Well, that's if I sign the contract, right? I have to sign that first."

My eyes dart to the papers she set down in the nightstand and I have a moment of hope that she'll wake up in the morning and say screw this contract. But that will never happen, so I just exhale a long breath and force myself to smile. "Yeah, but I think you'll sign it, don't you?"

She studies me for a moment and her brows crease a little in thought. "I need the money," she says almost apologetically.

"Yeah, I get it."

"Well—"

"OK, goodnight, Rook." I turn and walk out of the garden apartment and make my way back upstairs. Maybe she will walk away from that contract tomorrow, who knows? I wish she would, because the minute she signs it I have to treat her like all the other models and I have a feeling she's not going to like that one bit.