CHAPTER FOURTEEN

UP THE CREEK

Christina and Mark didn’t tell Trevor where they were going for lunch, which was why they were so surprised when he showed up at their restaurant. He dropped himself into their booth, threw his bag across the bench, and stretched his legs out so far Christina was positive he would trip a waitress… but maybe that was his plan.

“Hey kids,” he said casually.

Mark gave him a funny look, but managed to be polite enough to ask without an attitude, “What are you doing here?”

Trevor shook his hand at Mark like he didn’t realize he was interrupting a date. “I’m angry,” he said simply.

“Of course you are. A whole morning wasted! What exactly happened with Alexander and Dominic anyway? Christina’s convinced Alexander refused to pose with her,” Mark explained.

Trevor nodded. “Sorry, Christina. Try not to take it personally. I don’t think it had much to do with how you modeled or how you look.”

“Then what was it about?”

Trevor shook his head. “I don’t know. Considering how urgently Alexander wanted to leave the set, I’d say he simply had some other place else he wanted to be and he chose to say it was your bad modeling that was driving him away rather than take responsibility for what he was doing. Dominic certainly didn’t want him to leave us in the lurch, hence the extended argument. You see, Alexander broke the conditions of his contact with Capier when he walked out today.”

“How’s Collin taking that?”

“I haven’t been able to talk to him.”

“Maybe Laura knows where he is,” Mark said, retrieving his cell phone and finding Laura’s profile. He programmed her number and put his phone to his ear. Within a few rings, Mark hung up. “Yeah, she’s not answering either.”

Trevor chuckled, “Lover’s quarrel?”

“LOVER’S QUARREL?” Christina and Mark blurted at the exact same time.

“Huh?” Trevor said. “You didn’t know? Collin and Laura have been together for a couple of years. They're a weird couple, eh?”

“Laura? With who? As far as I knew she was single!” Christina blurted.

Mark looked as perplexed as Christina. “Yeah, Trevor, Laura has been chasing me since I started working for Capier.”

“What? Well, then I guess they broke up."

“I didn’t know she was ever with Collin,” Mark continued.

“Really? Back in the day, they were all over each other. The marriage issue must have finally done them in.”

“What?”

“It’s not an uncommon story. She wanted to get married—he kept putting her off. I knew they were fighting about it, but it’s been a long time since I had a personal conversation with Collin.”

Christina could hardly keep her astonishment in check. “But Mark and Collin are nothing like each other. How could she be interested in both of them? Collin’s a…”

“Player?” Trevor supplied.

Actually, Christina would have said ‘womanizer,’ but she couldn't say something like that about her boss’s boss, who hired a little nobody administrative assistant as a model? Saying even one word that might be interpreted as a slander was out of the question. She closed her mouth and waited for someone else to continue the conversation.

Luckily, Mark rescued her. “It’s not so weird. Collin’s unpredictable and Laura is a control freak. She probably got fed up with his crap and decided to go for someone who was more ‘her type.’ Me. Or maybe it was the other way around. Maybe Collin decided he didn’t want to be with her for the same reason I did.”

“What was that?” Trevor asked.

“I didn’t want a girl I had to schedule time with.”

“How ironic,” Trevor said thoughtfully, taking his feet out of the aisle and putting them under the table. “That you should end up with Christina; a girl you not only had to schedule a date with but also had to pay for.”

Christina lifted her eyebrows and said frostily, “I thought we’d been through this.”

“Sorry,” Trevor said breaking from his reverie. “I didn’t mean to insult you. Don’t take what I said personally. I have a lot on my mind. I need to talk to Collin about the photoshoot because Alexander broke his contract. He says he won’t come back to work until we have found a replacement for you, but I don’t think we have time to find someone who suits Alexander. That is a tough job when you have all the time in the world. We need to have these shots done as soon as possible so we will have time to film a commercial before the end of the summer.”

Christina sighed and looked away. She wanted to be helpful, but she didn’t know how. She couldn’t force Alexander to cooperate.

“So far, all of the shots Alexander has done for Capier he has done solo. Could it be that he doesn’t like sharing the stage?” Mark suggested.

“Maybe that’s the problem. It’s possible he doesn’t think our project is a priority because he’s not the star. All the shots taken either focus on both him and Christina equally or they highlight Christina while he’s left in the background. This phone is for women, so we need to show a woman using one which means he can’t do the shoot without a female partner. Like I said, finding someone who can model with Alexander is challenging. When I saw Collin’s pictures of you, Christina, I thought we had practically struck gold. You would look good with anybody… Which,” Trevor said meaningfully, “is why I think it would be faster to replace Alexander than to replace you.”

“With who?” Mark asked.

Trevor’s eyes literally twinkled. “Mark,” he said smoothly. “Do you remember the promise you made me in exchange for letting you live in my condo?”

“You don’t mean—”

“Oh, but I do,” Trevor said, fishing through his bag and withdrawing a magazine. “Christina, have a look at this.”

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Christina took the copy of Teen Wish and examined the cover. It was the prom issue.

Christina gaped.

Mark laughed when he saw it. “Where did you dig that up?”

“Dig it up? I keep a copy with me at all times,” Trevor proclaimed noisily.

“Of course you do,” Mark drawled. “How many years ago was that, anyway?"

“Five,” Christina answered, looking at the date on the issue.

She flipped open the cover and found a younger Mark staring back at her. There he was on almost every other page sporting tuxedos and a fashionably messy hairstyle. He wasn’t the main attraction, but merely an accessory to the girls who were modeling prom dresses. She could not believe how good he looked. Not only that but as she combed further into the issue, she found a picture of him that had been mounted on one of her school friend's walls. She remembered seeing the photo years and years ago and thinking he was hotter than the usual teen heartthrob, but naturally, completely untouchable, so not worth thinking about.

Christina turned to Mark and said, “This photo was up on my friend Shellie’s wall when I was still in junior high.”

“Really?” he asked, looking completely aghast.

“Yeah, really. Don’t blush, Mark. You looked hot.”

“Which is why I want him to take Alexander’s place,” Trevor said.

Christina stared at Trevor. “Can you do that?”

“Well, since I can’t seem to get in touch with Collin, I guess I can do whatever I think is best. It would be a hassle to have to rebook all the locations and to rehire the temporary staff. The best thing is just to dress Mark up like Alexander—sans turtleneck of course—and to just get on with it.” Trevor added, “Mark looks terrible in turtlenecks.”

Christina couldn’t believe what Trevor was suggesting. Switching Alexander for Mark would make the photo shoot fun, the opposite of hell on earth. Her pulse was already racing at the very idea.

“The best part is that Mark has modeled for me numerous times and I know he can deliver what Collin wants. And since I let him live in my place rent-free, he can’t turn me down.”

“Is that true?” Christina asked.

“Yes,” Mark said slowly.

“So,” Trevor said with a note of finality, “Eat up and we’ll head back to the set. I want to finish the coffee shop pictures before the end of the day. I’ll show Collin the pictures once we’re finished. He’ll like not having to dish out the big bucks for Alexander—especially when he’s such a pain in the neck.”

***

Trevor swapped Alexander’s turtleneck for a white button-up-the-front shirt. “Mark’s dark, see?” Trevor said, pulling a shirt out of the makeshift wardrobe. “So, we need a white shirt to contrast his coloring. He’s not as tall as Alexander though, so he needs to wear a different size of trousers.”

“Are you faking an English accent?” Christina suddenly asked.

Trevor smiled. “Not intentionally. I work with a lot of Brits. It rubs off." Then he jumped back into work. He thumbed through the spare clothes. “Hmm… nothing that would fit Mark.”

Mark snorted. “Excuse me for being short.”

“Well, what you’re wearing isn’t suitable. A cat has better fashion sense than you.”

“You only think that because a cat runs around in the buff,” Mark retorted and Christina silently agreed Trevor’s modesty left something to be desired.

“You’ll have to wear mine. Switch me,” Trevor said, immediately unbuttoning his own black pants. He didn’t even give Christina a chance to turn around. Apparently, he didn’t mind if she saw his shiny black briefs.

Christina bolted out of the trailer. “Whoa,” she said, leaning against the door after she clamped it shut.

“Hey,” Mindy said coming up to her. “Trevor said we had to find a different shirt for you, too. What are you doing out here wearing the same thing?”

“Let’s just give them a minute,” Christina said, shaking her head.

Within half an hour, Christina and Mark were ready to go. Christina’s wardrobe had been altered so that her blouse and coat were gone. Instead, she was wearing a black off-the-shoulder sweater and a scarf around her neck. Trevor liked the change because he said it made her more feminine. Plus, she had been wearing something similar in the initial pictures Collin took.

So, there was Christina up against the wall for a second time, but unlike the last time, it was Mark pushing her instead of Alexander. It was lucky... sort of. With the change, she was uncomfortable in a completely different way. She’d never seen Mark pretend before, and so she wasn’t sure how much of his behavior was real or for the benefit of Trevor’s camera. Were his eyes always dark, full of passion and awareness? Had his hand always felt confident when she held it before? Did the two of them always get along so well? Did he always look at her with such awareness and did she just not see it before?

It was then Christina realized the flush on her cheeks wasn’t one of her brain-induced rushes. It was quite the opposite——the real thing. Mark might not be able to tell when she was real, but Trevor did. He always shot off his camera shutter insanely at the most inopportune moments—right when Mark’s gaze got too intense for Christina and she was about to look away. It made Christina blush even more furiously to have her heart exposed like that. But whenever she looked at the crew, it was just business as usual for them. They were selling phones. They didn’t know it was her real heart on the line.

Trevor had a lot of poses up his figurative sleeve and he did rounds of more poses than she could count before he called it a day.

Christina was completely drained. She stretched her arms and cocked her neck hoping to hear a satisfying crack.

“I don’t feel like doing dinner tonight,” Christina told Mark as he gave her a bottle of water. “I’m beat and by now, I’m probably too emotionally frazzled to appear in public.”

“That’s okay. I’m not really in the mood anymore either,” he said shortly.

“All right then,” Christina said, wondering about his dark mood. Maybe he didn’t really want to pose after all. “I’m going to change.”

Christina turned to go into the trailer and was surprised to see Mark walking behind her. She peeked around at him a couple of times and looked at him meaningfully trying to communicate to him that she wanted to go alone because she was obviously going to change into her street clothes. But he didn’t seem to catch the hint and kept right on following her.

At the door, she stopped, “Mark I…”

Mark reached past her and opened the door. “After you,” he said, steering her into the trailer.

Christina felt lost as she stumbled into the empty trailer. What did he need to talk to her about that couldn’t wait until after she had taken her wretched wig off? Regardless, she couldn’t wait to start getting comfortable. Whatever. If he wanted to watch, it wouldn't be the first time.

“What is it?” she asked him as she stepped up to her dressing table and started unscrewing the backs of her earrings. She set them on the table as Mark gradually came up behind her and started rubbing her shoulders.

“You’re tired, aren’t you?” he whispered as he drew back the curtain of her hair and began kissing her ear.

Christina could see their reflection in the mirror as he worked his way down her neck. His kisses were soft and his breath warm. Christina’s legs felt wobbly; she didn’t know if she could keep standing. One of his hands went to the back of her throat and tugged her scarf free. He wrapped it between his fingers, to keep it from falling. Christina felt so weak she couldn’t keep her eyes open. But even as his arms encircled her and he pulled her around to face him, somehow she couldn’t lose sight of where they were.

“Mark,” she sighed. “Do you really think this is a good place? What if someone walks in on us?”

His dark eyes locked on hers and he asked roughly, “Don’t you want me to touch you?" He kissed her again and she could sense his desperation for her. It was in every one of his motions.

She didn’t know what to do. She felt like such a tramp. How could she make out with her boss at work? It seemed so sleazy, except for the pounding of her heart. She was so excited by him that she didn’t know if she could push him away.

Knock! Knock! Knock!

Christina thrust Mark off her and quickly turned around to continue taking off her jewelry. She was just in time because Trevor and Mindy came crashing into the trailer talking about how great work had been that day. Christina was beet-red, but she acted as if nothing happened. She was pretty sure they hadn’t seen anything, but when she looked at Mark… she saw she had offended him.

He stalked behind a Chinese screen to change his clothing and when he emerged, he didn’t look the least bit happier. Before he left the trailer entirely, he gave Christina a look that was both disappointed and extremely frustrated.