Love and Deceit - Jade C. Jamison
Chapter One
This gig had started like any other…but it moved to awkward really fast. “Ivy, take off your bra, please.”
Long story short, I was a grad student. Not a starving one, but close. Over the years, though, I’d discovered I could earn good money modeling, and I’d found a niche posing for photos that wound up being used as covers for romance novels.
So when Greg Smithey—self-titled Photographer, Entrepreneur, Artiste—called and offered more than he usually paid me to pose, I just asked when. I already knew where. It would be at Greg’s studio, an old garage that had housed either a car dealership or vehicle repair service long before my time.
I arrived at Greg’s studio a few minutes early that fateful April day. The front of his place had huge windows, and there was no Open sign or anything indicating hours of operation, but I knew from years of working with him that the entrance would be unlocked until our shooting session began, so I pushed on the door and walked in.
The small lobby looked like any small business in Winchester, Colorado, with a tiny office off to the side, a couple of chairs, and a tall plant that could have been real. As I waited, I moved over to the plant to touch the soil to find out once and for all if it really was fake, but then Greg appeared in the doorway. “Ivy, you look stunning as always. Come on back. Shane’s already here.”
I followed him into the back where all the magic happened. The front area was a variety of screens and props and lights on poles. The back area—where the garage door still hung but had since been drywalled over (visible from the outside, though)—had bigger “set pieces,” for lack of a better word. There was a bed, two sofas, a variety of chairs, a motorcycle, and all sorts of other large props, half of which I’d posed with or on, as well as a shelving unit crammed full of smaller props, like handcuffs, masks, a riding crop, and other items I was sure had been used for at least one book cover. There was also a small area in the corner with a mirror and makeup table as well as a screen behind which models could go to change outfits.
“You look fantastic, by the way.” I glanced down at the denim jacket, red camisole underneath, jeans, and black boots, clothing he’d specifically requested I wear for the shoot. Maybe he was talking about my makeup and hair. “I told you we’ll be shooting outside first, right?”
“No.” Not that it mattered. As long as I wasn’t half-naked out there, I didn’t care.
He grinned and shrugged, pushing his glasses up his nose like he often did. “Eh. Sorry. We’re just gonna do it on the east side of the building. There are several places we can do it but the light right now is perfect, so I want to get started. Oh, by the way,” he said as we entered the back. I felt my mouth filling with saliva while my eyes took in the hot guy standing nearby. “This is Shane.”
Shane was…wow. Besides being gorgeous, he was tall. For the shoot, he wore a black leather jacket with a gray t-shirt underneath, black combat boots, and jeans that fit just right—not too snug, not too loose. His short black hair paired with a light beard and mustache made him seem polished but with a rebellious rugged streak. He was smiling but his dark eyebrows gave him a sexy brooding quality. In just half a minute I could tell that, when his face was at rest, he probably looked like he was contemplating heavy thoughts…perfect for a guy modeling to be a romantic hero.
I was smitten from the get-go.
The words wouldn’t come out of my mouth as I heard Greg’s voice as if it were echoing in a cave. “Shane, this is Ivy.”
Shane extended his hand to me, one that looked warm and strong, and I slipped my tinier one inside his. I managed to get out a sentence: “Nice to meet you.” I hoped I looked as calm as I was managing to act.
His smile grew larger as the left corner of his lip turned up more than the right. “Pleasure’s mine.” Goddamn, this man was hotter than the surface of the sun. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d found a guy this irresistible—and he was all mine for two whole hours.
I felt a grin