Page 246 of As The Shifter World Turns

“Why’s that?” Archer asked as he stared over his coffee mug at my mate.

“I’ll have to cut and run. Gotta big job tomorrow. I’m going to grab my bag and head to the airport. Sorry, babe, but you know how it is.”

“No, I don’t. I don’t know how it is. Tell me, Martin, how is it?” People at the surrounding tables stared at us and whispered behind their hands.

“Don’t be like that. They said you’d be jealous of me working late and on weekends, and I didn’t believe them.”

“Who said that?” I snapped.

“The guys I work with.”

“You’re wrong. It’s not that you’re working long hours. It’s that when you’re with us, your head is elsewhere. And your phone is glued to your hand.”

“You’re being unreasonable. Where are Toby and Charlie? I want to say goodbye before I leave.”

“Jungleland,” Ivor told him.

“I’ll see you at home in a few days. We can talk then.” He stalked off and I rested my head on the table. What happened to the man I mated? The one who was the best dad to Toby and welcomed Charlie into our lives. He’d vanished.

110

BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR

Martin

When I agreed to do this modeling thing I assumed it would be a catalog shoot and done. I knew from an old colleague whose kid was in a bunch of catalogs that the money from that wasn’t great—definitely not great enough to pay a bill, but given my finances it would be good enough.

How wrong I’d been about the entire situation. Stormy, as it turned out, was as big of a deal as he thought he was and that was saying something. He had initially wanted me only for a show he was doing and not so much a model to be seen in his clothing. That morphed quickly into a nearly full time gig.

I didn’t hate the work itself. I just had to put on weird clothing and look confident in it—done. At least that had been working for me so far. It was all the rest of it that was starting to wear me down. I had to beonall the time. Frown in Stormy’s clothing—unacceptable. Look like I wasn't having fun for a magazine shoot—hell no. Say no to a booking—kiss of death. Thismaybe I will give it a gojob had morphed into my entire life.

And it was great. I had enough money to save for a house, I was able to afford Cadillac medical insurance for my family, and I didn’t have to worry about over-spending because I wanted a cup of coffee from the fancy place.

“You ready, Mart?” I hated that George, the agent Stormy connected me with, called me that, but sacrifices needed to be made if I was going to give my family what they needed.

“Yeah. Where’s the shoot?” We were doing anauthenticlayout or something. I wasn’t altogether sure. The call came in while I was on vacation and I was more concerned with getting a flight quickly enoughso I didn’t lose my opportunity. This career was short lived according to George and I needed to make the most of it.

“Low Brow,” he said. It was only after I arrived that I figured out it was a new bar designed to look like a hole in the wall dive bar. They spent gobs of money to make it appear like a shitty, run-down, sticky-floor kinda place no one wanted to be caught in. Had they pitched the idea to me, I’d have thought they were trying to lose their money. The place was packed, a line around the block, proving that my instincts should stay the eff away from bar ownership.

“You’re just gonna chill with some other models and they’re going to capture it all on film.” He made it sound easy. It was not.

Three other men were wearing clothes from the same collection I was. It was weird looking if you asked me, but I wasn’t the one paying the bill. They plied us with shots and beers and quarters for pool, the photographers following us around as we pretended to just be a random group of besties hanging out at the bar.

It was last call when George dropped me off at the hotel and the next morning my head felt like it had been run over by a steam roller. At least my bank account was full.

I checked my phone to see what time it was and it was dead. Getting out of bed to plug it in sucked, but I managed and took some pain pills and downed a glass of water while I was up. I didn’t have any place to be until—I wasn’t sure, but it wasn’t now. I fell back into bed and let sleep take over.

The next time I woke it was two in the afternoon and housekeeping was knocking on the door. I sent them on their way and grabbed my phone to see if George had texted me my schedule.

He had. But also Neil and Toby had sent me picture after picture of them at the park, Charlie in half of them. They looked like they were having so much fun and I longed to be with them, but I couldn’t. I needed to be here, working, bringing home the bacon as it were.

Bacon. Maybe I needed to go hunt down some bacon. I still felt like shit, but the greasy goodness sounded perfect.

I put hearts on a bunch of the pictures and padded into the bathroom to brush my nasty ass teeth and take a shower.

My phone was pinging nonstop as I came out of the bathroom.

George. He had twenty questions for me, but instead of asking them in one bloc he entered them one at a time. It was his way of controlling me and making sure I didn’t just not hear or see the notification. He should’ve seen that being jobless made that added step not necessary. If he asked me to freaking fly, I would. He wasn’t my boss per se, but if he didn’t want me working, I wasn’t going to be working which made him even more powerful than if he was.

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