That Rex Gotta Roar - Julia Mills Page 0,11

it.

Y'all ready for this? Hope you're sittin' down, 'cause what I'm about to tell you is gonna blow your mind. Our statuesque, elegant, over-the-top-dignified, and always put together even when she was pickin' weeds Mockingbird really, truly, was a model.

No, I'm not even pullin' your leg a little bit. Paris, Milan, every fashion capital of the world and then some, that's were our girl used to stomp the runways for every designer from Chanel to Lagerfeld. Long, straight hair, so-black-it-looked-blue-in-the-right-light with streaks of platinum that have been there since the day she was born became her trademark. Heck, Vidal Sassoon even named a style after her in the eighties. No, seriously, just ask her. Moni ain't shy. She won't bring up her success, but the girl will sure enough tell you the whole story if you ask - even the shitty parts.

Yep, there were those, too. Being a Shifter’s great in so very many ways. Absolutely the best. Unless you happen to be in the public eye. Then the whole ‘Shifters don’t age like everybody else’ thing can jump up and bite you right in the ass.

And, for Moni, it did.

The green-eyed monster, named Envy, can be a problem whether you grow feathers and wings, get furry and howl at the moon, or are human and make kick-ass chocolate chip cookies. (Sorry, I'm gettin' hungry.) But in the modeling world, jealousy is worse than Bruce Banner without a Snicker bar at three in the afternoon. (I really need to get some food.) It's big, green, and out of control.

You see, while Monique's colleagues – those she worked with, who called her a friend to her face then talked shit about her behind her back – were getting Botox to hide their crow's feet and chemical peels to erase their laugh lines, our drop-dead gorgeous Mockingbird was still as flawless as the first day she walked into Ford Models in nineteen – whatever-whatever, and it was all natural. And, worst of all, the other models knew she hadn't so much as looked up the number of a plastic surgeon.

(Like I was gonna tell you her age. That's just rude, and she'd kick my ass. Mostly, I'm keeping it to myself because she'd whoop my butt. Also, it's rude, don'tcha know?)

But my girl is strong. Moni would never in a million or so years give in to peer pressure or petty bullshit. Oh, hell, no. Our Mockingbird dug the pointy tips of her five-inch stiletto heels into every runway she could. There was no way – no how she was going to back down.

Years passed, and she was still the most sought-after model on four continents. I think the girl was on a plane damn near as much as I was. Moni left all the other models, young and old, in the trail of her signature body spray and a cloud of face powder bearing her name.

Then the bird droppings hit the fan.

I had taken a layover in the Bahamas on my way back from a shoot in the Argentinian Rain Forest to spend some time with my bestie-from-another-nestie. It had been ages since either one of us took a day off or even laid eyes on one another.

So, there we were, sitting on the patio of her suite, and drinking something fruity with an extremely high alcohol content. I hear the unmistakable sound of a camera shutter clicking like a ticker-tape. Tuning in with my super-duper enhanced Canary hearing, (Cassandra will tell you that she heard the noise first, but she's full of birdseed. Do not believe her.) zeroed in on the dipshit paparazzi.

Coming in from the left while Moni went in from the right, I was a split-second later than my girl, but the show I got to see was well worth being second in a two-person race. Jerking the butthead up by the seat of his cargo shorts, Moni snarled through her perfectly white, sharper-than-a-blade teeth, “What the fuck do you think you’re doin’, Asshole?”

Instantly crappin' in his short pants, freaking out at being confronted by a pissed-off six-foot woman who could pick him up like he was made of feathers, the dude spilled his guts. (Both literally and figurative. Yep, you guessed it. Before he got around to telling Monique who'd hired him, the photographer threw up everything but his own toes. Talk about gross.)

He detailed who had hired him and that they wanted proof that she’d sold her soul to the Devil to stay young