A Fighting Man (4 page)

“I miss you,” I whispered to the dark.

* * * *

The day had finally arrived and my nervous stomach was in knots. Blaine looked exactly like I did.

We’d finally found a model the company had agreed on and we were going to finalize the deal that afternoon. We’d had to pull in a Brazilian model agency, but it had worked out in the end. I made sure there was a pitcher of water on the table, and plenty of glasses as Blaine paced the floor.

I hadn’t heard from Slater since the singing telegram two days ago, which worried me. He was either planning something worse or—well, I didn’t want to think about the ‘or.’

“I swear I’m going to be sick,” Blaine muttered.

“Just breathe. They liked the guy; it’s all going to go down perfectly. We worked hard on this one, Blaine.”

“You are so getting a raise.” Blaine tried to smile.

“I deserve it.” I winked. “I’ll show them in.”

The men crowded around the table and each took their seat as I made the rounds making sure each one had the campaign in front of them. The model was about six feet tall, with bulging arms, unbelievable abs and tattoos strategically placed on his biceps. I took my seat next to Blaine as the men looked over the ad campaign.

“As you can see, we went to great lengths to find just the right man to represent Rush,” Blaine began.

“Yes, he does look just as we wanted. Does he speak English?”

I blinked and Blaine kicked me under the table.

“His bio says he does,” I offered.

“Well, obviously we’ll need him to say a few lines. We want this whole campaign re-vamped, and your firm has given the best ideas so far. This energy drink is actually good for you, which really doesn’t scream ‘hip’ to the younger crowd.”

“Of course, Mr. Pritchard.” Blaine stood and walked around the table. “I think we’ve got just what you’ll need—and if not, we’ll get it. This model will be exactly what the campaign calls for.”

Blaine opened his mouth to continue when the conference room door opened and I heard a gasp from the men around the table. I turned and had to keep my own mouth shut.

Slater Cassidy was standing in the open doorway in all his glory.

Dammit, the man looked edible. Tight, faded jeans hugged him just right and he wore a rock band T-shirt, minus sleeves, exposing his massive biceps.

“Oh shit,” Slater gasped. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know you were in a meeting!”

I stood up quickly and eyed the men in the room. “Excuse us, please?”

I pulled Slater into the hallway, gaping at him.

“What are you doing?! We are in the middle of the most important presentation we’ve had!”

“I wanted to surprise you.” Slater grinned. “Surprise?”

I groaned in frustration. Damn Slater and his lopsided grins! I wanted to scream at him and I would have if the door to the conference room hadn’t opened.

“Casper, get back in here,” Blaine whispered. “And bring Slater.”

“What?” I choked.

“They want Slater.” Blaine raised his brows.

“They want…Slater? After all that work we did?”

“Slater? Could you…?” Blaine motioned to the room.

“Sure.”

Slater sauntered past me as I stood staring at Blaine, open-mouthed.

“Well? Come on!” Blaine hissed.

Mr. Pritchard was walking around Slater slowly, eyeing him.

“Could you take off your shirt, please?” he asked.

“I can drop trou if you want,” Slater grinned.

“NO!” I shouted.

All eyes turned to me and I swallowed hard.

“I thought you didn’t want nudity in your ad?” I managed weakly.

“Oh, I don’t. Doesn’t mean I wouldn’t want to see him naked,” Mr. Pritchard grinned.

I narrowed my eyes at the man. I was seriously contemplating jumping over the table and hitting him with the projector.

“This is him.” Pritchard nodded. “This is the guy I want.”

“Oh, well, Mr. Pritchard, Slater in on leave from the military—” Blaine began.

“Will it take more than a month?” Slater asked.

“I shouldn’t think so.”

“How much am I getting paid?”

“Well, we can discuss that over dinner if you’d like?”

Slater turned to look at me with a smile. “Of course. I’d like to bring Mr. Kennedy with me, however.”

“Oh? Why?”

“He just became my agent.”

* * * *

I waited until Mr. Pritchard had gotten into his limo and it turned the corner before unleashing my anger. I hit Slater with the folder I was holding. And then I hit him again, just because it felt so good.

“What were you thinking?!” I paced back and forth on the sidewalk. “I don’t know anything about being an agent! What is wrong with you?” I put my hand up. “The short list.”

“What else was I supposed to say? The guy offered me a deal.” Slater grinned at me.

“Ugh! Do you not hear me? I don’t know anything about being an agent and now I have to go to dinner with you and act like one?”

“How hard can it be? You’ve gone through these deals before, right? I mean you could figure out what kind of contract I should be getting.”

“I do the ads, I don’t do anything else.” I sighed in frustration and threw up my hands. “I can’t do this. I’m not an agent. I don’t even have a license.”

“Maybe Officer Hung can put in a good word for you if you get caught,” Slater snickered. He held up a hand. “Just sit through dinner with me and listen, tell me if the deal is on the up and up. Once I hear it, I’ll say I have to think about it and then ask my mom, okay?”

“I can’t believe you did this,” I continued to pace. “Months we’ve been trying to find just the right guy and then you walk in and bam! That’s it. You’re the one.”

“I am disgustingly handsome.” Slater waggled his brows.

“AARGH!” I threw my hands in the air. “Do you realize I could have been fired for this? What if they hadn’t liked you, huh? What if they’d made Blaine fire me? Then what?”

“But they did like me. In fact, they loved me.” Slater took my hands. “So calm down. I promise I won’t ruin this deal for you.”

“Swear it, Slater.”

“I swear. Now, I need to get a suit.”

He grabbed my hand and started hauling me down the sidewalk. I pulled back and glared at him.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“Taking you with me. I need someone to tell me how hot I look.”

“Oh for fuck’s sake,” I sighed. My phone dinged and I looked at the text from Blaine.

They want the Brazilian for overseas ads with Slater.

“Great, just great.”

“What?”

“You’ll be working with Juan-Carlos.”

“Who?”

“The model we found from Brazil.”

“Whatever.” Slater hailed a cab. “Come on, cutie.”

“Don’t call me that,” I pursed my lips.

“Did you watch the movie?” Slater narrowed his eyes at me. A grin appeared seconds later when I fidgeted. “Yeah, you did.”

“That was not funny.”

“No time for talk!” Slater sing-songed as our cab arrived.

I sat in the cab looking blankly out the window as Slater told the cabbie where to go. Months of looking at models, months of work—and Slater Cassidy had strolled in and gotten the job. What the hell? Slater was on the phone with someone explaining the job offer. He sighed loudly and hung up, looking over at me.

“What?” I asked.

“Well, I’ve got official permission to do the ad, but I’m never going to live this down with the guys.”

“Payback,” I smiled broadly.

“It’s a small price to pay, Casper.” Slater turned in the seat to look at me. “It means I get to spend hours upon hours with you.”

I groaned.

* * * *

I sat at dinner in a daze. I’d spent two hours with Slater watching him try on suits, and I was already tired from all the hours I’d put in on this damn ad campaign. Slater was as charming as ever, and the deal they were giving him was more than fair. He’d get royalties from the sales and he was offered a contract.

A lucrative one.

It seemed so unfair. I love my job, and I know I don’t have the looks to get what Slater was getting. He is gorgeous. An Adonis—a tattooed Adonis, at that. Why the man has a boner for me I would never understand. Maybe when he got in the same room with Juan-Carlos De Pietro—yes, that sexy mouthful is his real name—the attention would shift from me to the other man.

Did I actually want that?

A hand landed on my thigh and I glared at Slater. He smiled and squeezed and went on with his side of the conversation. I could swear Pritchard was drooling over Slater. As soon as he’d mentioned he was a Ranger, you could practically see the arousal in the air. My gaydar wasn’t a hundred percent, but it was fully functional now. I found myself scooting closer to Slater as Pritchard’s eyes wandered over his exceptional body in a suit. I inhaled Slater’s cologne and fought the urge to squeeze my dick. Oh God, I was getting hard.

“Mr. Kennedy?”

My head snapped up and I smiled. “Yes?”

“I trust you find the deal we’ve offered quite lucrative?”

“I’ll have to look over it more thoroughly, but we will be in touch.”

“Don’t stay away too long.” Pritchard smiled, signaling the waiter.

“We wouldn’t dream of it.” I stood up and placed my napkin on the table. “Well, thank you very much for dinner. I should get Slater home to get his beauty rest.”

“Oh, he looks just fine to me.” Pritchard’s eyes wandered over Slater’s face and physique.

I wanted to puke.

After shaking hands and saying our goodbyes, I dragged Slater outside and hailed a cab. I tapped my foot impatiently waiting for one to see me. Slater elbowed me and I glared at him.

“Now why are you mad?” he asked.

“Ever heard of the casting couch?” I retorted.

Slater’s eyes widened. “You don’t think he wants to bang me over a couch, do you?” He cracked up.

“This is not funny. You got the deal in your hand; take it to your mom and have her look it over.”

“What if I don’t want to do it?”

I turned slowly and my mouth dropped open. “Excuse me? If you back out, Blaine and I are sunk!”

“Really?”

“Yes!”

“Well, in that case, have dinner with me.”

“What?! That’s blackmail!”

“I prefer ‘coercion’.”

“Call it what you want, but that’s blackmail!”

“Is that a yes?”

“Oh my God!” I roared. “Unbelievable!”

“So tomorrow, six?”

Slater reached out a hand and whistled. A cab screeched to a stop in front of us and he opened the door for me.

“I’m not done being mad at you!” I shouted.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, Casper.”

The door closed and Slater waved his fingers at me as the cab pulled away from the curb. What the hell had just happened?

* * * *

My alarm went off and almost gave me a heart attack. I didn’t even realize I’d fallen asleep. I’d gotten home last night, jumped in the shower and fell on the bed.

Naked, apparently.

I groaned and shoved my head under the pillow. My phone went off seconds later and I slapped at the nightstand trying to feel for it. My palm landed on it and I brought it under the pillow with me.

“Hello?”

“Casper! Are you still asleep?”

I sat up, knocking the pillow to the floor.

“I’m awake, Blaine. What’s wrong?”

“You need to be at Pritchard’s office. Slater is going in to sign on the dotted line!”

I jumped out of bed and ran for the shower. I set the phone down as I turned the water on.

“How much time do I have?”

“An hour and a half. I’m sorry to throw this at you, but Slater said you needed to be there.”

Yeah and I knew why.

“Okay, I’ll be in as soon as that’s done.”

“Nope, take the day off. We’ve been working hard on this, Casper.”

“Slater told you about dinner, didn’t he?”

“Gotta go!”

I frowned at my phone as Blaine hung up. I showered, changed and was in a cab forty-five minutes later. I held the record for speed dressing. I watched the city fly by as I headed for Pritchard’s office. After Blaine had won an award for one of his ads, he’d been hired more often, for bigger clients. I loved the money that came my way, but boy was it exhausting.

I paid the cabbie and headed inside the building. It wasn’t as nice as Hawke, but it was up there. I checked my phone again for the info Blaine had texted me and stepped on the elevator.

I got off on the tenth floor and made my way down to the last office on the right. A woman sat at the desk and I smiled as I approached her.

“Hello, I’m—”

“Casper Kennedy.” She stood, extending her hand. “I’m Wanda Jackson. Mr. Pritchard said you’d be by this morning.” She eyed me curiously. “Did you run here?”

“Excuse me?”

“You look nervous, or hot, or sick. You’re not sick are you?”

“No, just nervous,” I blurted.

Wanda smiled at me and drew closer.

“Now why would you be nervous?” she asked. “Is it my boss?”

“No. He seems very nice.”

“Oh, he’s nice all right.” Wanda laughed. She sobered and eyed me from head to toe. “Are you out?”

“Excuse me?” I stammered.

“I can tell a gay man from a mile away. You are just all kinds of adorable.”

“Thanks?”

“How old are you sweetie?”

“Twenty-five.”

“Just my boss’ type. Well, age-wise. He likes the rough type.”

I raised a brow.

“I’m not rough-looking?”

We both exploded in laughter. I knew I was nowhere near rough-looking.

“Sweetie, I just want to pinch your cheeks,” Wanda crooned.

“Which ones?” I smiled.

“Oooh! Feisty! I like it! Now, tell me why you look like you might lose your breakfast.”

“The model.”

“Oh? You mean this one?” Wanda reached back and pulled a folder off her desk. “This was faxed over this morning.”

My jaw dropped to the floor. Slater was in camouflage pants, shirtless, with his muscles bulging in every damn direction. He must have been oiled because his body was shining and the tattoos seemed more vibrant.

“That is one hell of a fine man,” Wanda chuckled.

I blinked and looked at Wanda. “How do you do that?”