Yours Truly, Taddy (12 page)
Uncertain if I’d go through with it or not, I found myself showered and ready the next morning, as if my subconscious had wanted me to move forward with the photo shoot.
There was a knock at the door. Blake was still asleep. Dang those pills knocked him out. I went to answer it.
“Coming,” I tied the robe around my waist and turned the knob, expecting to see Fabian with his make-up kit and clothes for today.
“Salut,” Leon greeted me, taller than I remembered.
“Hi,” I managed back at him.
Holding a large lollypop in his hand, he appeared nervous. “May I come in?”
I stepped back, giving him space to enter.
Leon glanced at the flowers. “I did not know if you had a favorite flower. Red is your favorite color but I did not want to send the wrong message, twice.”
“Thank you. They’re lovely, and the card’s message was touching.” I pointed to the prop in his hand. “So we’re really doing a Candy Land theme, huh?”
“Oui.” He stepped closer and handed me the lollypop. It was a scepter carved from colorful wood. “Master made this for you. He’s transformed the entire ballroom downstairs into the Lollipop Woods.”
My heartbeat quickened at the thought that today I’d get to live out my childhood dream.
“Taddy, I am sorry for taking advantage of you and our situation.”
“Don’t be silly. You didn’t. I encouraged you to have sex with me.”
“I should have told you about Fabian,” he lowered his voice.
“True, perhaps you thought you’d never see him again.” I reached for him.
He nodded slowly, taking me into his arms. It felt good to have him hold me again. That citrus smell of his was back. I loved that. “Do you have regrets?”
“None.” To be honest, I didn’t want to know if Leon regretted sleeping with me. That would crush me into a million pieces. Regardless, I asked anyway. “And do you?”
His forehead touched mine lovingly. “You were my first woman.”
“What?”
“Fabian is the only person I have ever had sex with.”
Whoa!
I wasn’t expecting him to say that. “For a newbie, you certainly were pretty darn good, considering we were floating with little sunlight.”
“Merci beaucoup.”
“Don’t get all proud or anything. It’s not like I have nothing to compare you against.”
Well, other than yesterday when I sat on your boyfriend’s face.
“You are an amazing person, Mademoiselle. Boys at the university will fight over you.”
“Did you enjoy being with the opposite sex?”
“Very much,” he answered and then he kissed me. Pulling my body against his, our tongues interlaced, I couldn’t resist this man. We’re a lot alike, I supposed. Curious about life. We beat to our own drum.
“You don’t have to do the photos if you don’t want to. Fabian and I can look for new jobs when we get back to Paris.”
“Don’t be foolish.” I slipped on a pair of sandals. “I thought about it, Leon, and I want to do the pictures. But not for the reasons you think.”
“Why then?”
“Something you said to me in the water about embracing what I have. I’m happy to be alive and that we met. You’ve changed my life in ways I don’t think you’ll ever know.”
“I feel the same way about you, Mademoiselle.”
“One day when I’m not so young, I’ll look back at the photos and wish I had liked myself a little bit more than I do right now.”
“You are wise.”
“Ha! Not really. I also need the money, and I figured having this nude pictorial out there for the world to see is the first step in accepting who I really am.”
“And who is that?”
“Why…Miss Taddy Brill, of course.”
During the shoot, as I stood naked in front of Leon, Fabian and Gustave I realized why I didn’t like having my picture taken before. I’d never given myself the permission to feel pretty, until now.
My last time having sex with Leon was under that tree. Somehow, that made our time together even more special. I wondered if I’d always be Leon’s first and only girl. Something deep down inside me said, yes. At least, that’s what I’d told myself.
A week later, school started. With Blake at my side and a dozen or so other students around us we sat and listened to the professor of our morning class talk about Brand Marketing. According to his business savvy insights, luxury goods were on the rise and professionals were in high demand.
“We should start a firm repping handbags and stuff,” Blake said in my ear. His sores from the fire were healing nicely.
“I like the sound of that,” I said. As Blake listened to the lecture, I returned to an email I was writing on my laptop…
Hey Leon, Fabian, and Gustave,
Thank you for sending me copies of the photos and letting me decide which ones go to print. When I stare at them, I don’t recognize myself. I’m convinced you hired a body-double to pose after my besties and I left Eden. Hehehe.
In all seriousness, I was touched by the respect and care you showed me that day. You three are true gentlemen, making me regret all of the horrible things I’ve ever said about Frenchmen. Thank you for that.
In your previous email, you mentioned that another magazine in the States wants to run the photos in tandem with Claire La Femme. You tell that Mr. Hefner there is not enough money in the world to have my face in his publication. Let’s keep the photos exclusive to Europe.
Before I forget, Lex, Vive, Blake, and I are coming to Paris for Thanksgiving. Seems I’ll be seeing the three of you very soon.
Yours Truly,
Taddy
PS, Fabian, we still have some unfinished matters to attend to. I’m curious, remember.
Join Avery’s fans in a buddy read online at Goodreads
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/1754827-yours-truly-taddy-discussion-group-buddy-read
and get the dialogue going by asking the following questions:
1. If booked on a photo shoot far from home, would you bring your besties with you? Or go alone?
2. Have you ever had a false perception about someone’s sexual orientation? Were you surprised to learn that they were not what you thought?
3. What’s your fantasy? Maybe it’s acting out a childhood game like Candy Land or having three men worship you at the same time!
Be sure to leave your review at:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20567969-yours-truly-taddy
Add the next installment in The Undergrad Years #3 featuring Blake Morgan in
XO, Blake
to your TBR shelf or I’ll never speak to you again, (wink).
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20567999-xo-blake
Aren’t you dying to know who Taddy Brill got her happily ever after with ten years later? Gurl, I thought so. I’ll give you three clues. He’s hung like an anaconda, one of the richest men in the world, and goes by the nickname Big Daddy. Find out how Taddy met her man in my full length contemporary romance novel
Unscrupulous
(The Manhattanites #2)
http://averyaster.com/unscrupulous
New York Times
and
USA Today
bestselling author Avery Aster writes the naughty romantic soap opera series of full-length, stand-alone novels,
The Manhattanites
and its juicy prequel companion
The Undergrad Years
.
Talk Supe Book Reviews says that Avery’s narrative voice is a throwback to Judith Krantz, weaving dazzling tales of love, glitz, and drama while Ever After Romance reports Avery’s characters are like Sex and the City on steroids but younger and sexier. Avery graduated from New York University and lives on the Upper East Side.
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