Page 5 of Breaking the Habit

“Your dad jokes should come with a warning,” Cobra cracked, snapping his fingers.

Levi held in the laughter that wanted to pop out. Just a few months in LA, and already this crew was becoming his family. He’d trained with plenty of MMA pros before, but he’d found a home in Holt Body Fitness that he hadn’t counted on.

Didn’t hurt, either, since Levi was one brother shy of being an orphan. He needed all the family he could get.

“I don’t really want to hear about your jealousy right now, guys,” Levi said, feigning displeasure. “I’m busy, okay? Besides, if you really wanted to talk shit about my jokes, then you’d have a photography joke ready, right now.”

“I don’t know any jokes about photography,” Lex said.

“Yeah, me neither. Because they haven’t been developed yet.”

Riley snort-laughed, and the guys erupted in a chorus of groans.

“How long were you sitting on that one?” Riley asked, showing off a toothy grin. It distracted him for a moment. He loved making people smile—especially when they tried really hard not to around him.

“Since yesterday,” he admitted.

“Must feel good to finally get it out.” She clucked her tongue, lowering her camera as she swept her gaze up and down his body. It was professional, but still, his skin itched with the urge to push it into a different realm.

He wasn’t usually so pushy. But he didn’t usually get to hang out with women like Riley. Something about her encouraged him to be brasher than normal. To demand her attention. Damn, he wanted her to notice him.

“You have no idea.” He winked at her, and that delicate blush stained her neck again.Score.

Riley gave him a few more directions—strike a power pose, get the biceps bulging, take a wide stance facing away from her—before she rested the camera against her shoulder and looked behind her.

“Okay, who’s next?”

Some of the wind went out of him. “We’re not done already, are we?”

“I work quick.” She sent him a tight smile, then looked back at the guys. “Cobra? What about your smart ass?”

Cobra pushed to standing, sauntering toward the backdrop. Levi snagged his track suit and headed toward the armchair Cobra had vacated. Those red lips knew how to toss an insult, and somehow, that was the sexiest part about her.

“Don’t worry. I’m sure your pictures will come out pretty,” Lex teased.

“Damn straight they will.” Levi huffed, stepping into his track pants. He left the jacket off for now. Travis tutted from the corner of the studio. Hands clasped behind his back, he’d been studying the portraits on the wall for almost too long. Levi strutted his way.

“Whatcha looking at?”

“Dude.” Travis glanced at him, jerking his thumb toward a portrait in black and white. “This is Riley’s work.”

Levi squinted at the picture, assaulted by different layers of intrigue. The composition of the piece was strange, somewhere between a head shot and a cry for help. The facial features looked gritty, somehow haunted. And only after staring at it for a while did he realize it was Riley. A side of her he couldn’t have imagined.

“Holy shit.” He swung his gaze over to Riley, where she and Cobra were laughing about something. Of course, she got along with everyone but him. “She’s kinda fucked up. But in the good way.”

“Check out this one.” Travis led him over to the wall right by the front door, where nine small prints hung, forming a square. The group of them told a story, though each print was different—a lonely beach, abandoned cars, the long elegant thighs of a model Levi didn’t know, and then the real sucker punch, the disenchanted scowl of a man sucking on a cigarette, studying something on the horizon. It was just a guy, but it was also way more than a guy. He didn’t know how to explain it.

“These are really good,” Levi murmured, his voice sticking to his throat.Goodwas an understatement. Her work made himfeel. Maybe a little bit too much.

“Told you I only work with the best.” Travis squeezed Levi’s shoulder before moving on to a different presentation of portraits. Levi drifted around the studio as Riley and Cobra continued taking pictures. When Cobra was done and Lex was up, Levi had seen damn near everything on the walls in the studio.

But it wasn’t until he found the picture hidden by the back door that his plan clicked into place.

The picture looked like any sunny day in Los Angeles. Cracked cement streets, palm trees along the boulevard, too many cars in the background. Except a very garish Easter Bunny lounged on a bench in the middle ground, a cigarette poised between two human fingers jutting out of the costume, and behind him a crazed man approached, muscles bulging, T-shirt ripped.

The image left him with so many questions. Hell, all of her work did. But this image in particular gave him a solid idea. Something between the Easter Bunny and the ripped T-shirt had triggered it.

“Travis.” Levi jogged over to his trainer, who was shucking the track suit before getting his pictures taken. “She needs to be the league photographer.”

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