“I’m meeting with the head chef at Fernando’s today to go over the menu for the launch. Is there anything you would like to have? Leo mentioned his favorites from there are the arancini and mini-cannoli. What about you?”
Fernando’s? One of the most sought-after restaurants in Chicago, is going to cater a party in a bookstore? Oh right, Drake was a co-owner. Leo calling in a favor, for me? “I’ve never been so I don’t know. I trust your judgment.”
I look up to see Leo standing over my desk, his impatience clear. “I have to go Miguel. Leo is waiting.”
“Any questions at all, do not hesitate to call me or text me during the interview with Janikowski.”
“Okay.”
Ending the call, I send a message to Jenny that we’re leaving now. If she needs anything to text me. “Two minutes. I’m shutting down.”
“Did you call for a car?”
Shit, he sees the answer. “We will get a cab then.”
“Where are we going anyway?”
“Shopping, if you are cringing over the photos I do not trust you to bring the several changes of clothes that will be needed.”
“I don’t have a picture on the back of the book for a reason. I’m—uh” The words dissolve on my tongue with Leo’s warning bearing down on me. No way am I going to say because I didn’t want my fat face on the cover. “Okay.”
Leo is eyeing me like he knows what I was going to say. He lets it go then goes back to his phone. A cabbie brakes hard in front of us, Leo opens the door and pushes me in. All the resistance I had dissolves because the root of it all was I didn’t want to be seen, looked at and judged and found lacking because I wasn’t beautiful. Only Leo thinks I’m beautiful, a man who has fucked the contents of a high fashion lingerie catalog, women with one percent body fat and bodies to die for, and he thinks I’m beautiful. Tension flows out of me in one long slow sigh.
***
Leo
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The day I thought would be a trial, an obligation of my own creation for setting up the photo shoot in the first place has become well worth my time away from work. It started off deliciously erotic in the dressing room when Alexa refused to try on the clothes. They were too expensive, she couldn’t afford them, and she refused to allow me to buy them. I sent Lydia on a break, telling her to give me fifteen minutes to settle things. Lydia only smiled before she said Alexa seemed pretty mad. I was going to need longer than fifteen minutes, to just text her when everything was sorted.