A/N: Happy Update Day!
Once my feet were secured into the Death Boots, Gabriel stood up and enveloped me into his arms as I remained perched on top of the stool. His breath fanned warmly over my ear as I wrapped my own arms around his torso. Hugging him unabashed in front of others exhilarated me and filled me with a warmth. I loved being his girlfriend, but the elation was bittersweet. Once the job wrapped up in a couple hours, the magic would evaporate. The clock would strike twelve, and my beautiful gown would turn back to rags as the carriage morphed to a pumpkin once more. At least I had the upcoming book covers to look forward to being my souvenir glass slipper.
I felt a stare from across the studio on me as Gabriel took my hands and helped me stand. Thankfully he did, because the moment my feet were under me, my ankle gave out. I gasped as the sudden sensation of free falling overcame me, even if it was for a split second and only a handful of inches. Gabriel's hold on my arms kept me from losing my balance and tipping over.
"Whoa there, Trouble." He situated himself beside me, holding onto one hand as his arm closest to me wrapped around my waist to support me. "Heel to toe like you usually do. Don't clomp like a horse. That's my girl," he cooed encouragingly.
A few more stumbles overtook me b the time we walked the short distance to where Mr. Blackbourne stood. I was walked tip toed, and my feet already screamed for relief. How did women do this on a regular basis? Why did some subject themselves to this torture all day?
Gabriel handed me off to Mr. Blackbourne after pressing a chaste kiss to my ear. The moment Mr. Blackbourne let go of the scaffolding, North was there to take his place and support the framework. The exchange among the three of them was seamless and appeared to be rehearsed.
"Kota needs some touch up," Gabriel whispered to me before peeling away to crouch before Kota, who was kneeling with his chin tucked against his chest and his hands palm up on his thighs. His knees were spread wide, and he looked like he was meditating.
Mr. Blackbourne took my hand and waist like Gabriel had before, and I was sure he could feel my nervous shaking wracking through my entire body. "Miss Sorenson?" He tipped his head to force me to look directly into his steel grey eyes.
"I'm not sure I can do this," I admitted immediately, knowing I could not hide anything from his gaze. "I'm sorry, Mr. Blackbourne." I was a disappointment.
"What makes you say that?" he asked. His tone held no disapproval or disgust toward me, but a curious inquiry. "From what I have gathered, you have performed with excellence these past two days. Why are you doubting yourself now?'
I caught myself before I bit my lip, knowing he would pull it right back out from in between my teeth. "I can't even stand by myself right now. What if my ankle injury from the first week of school keeps me from wearing shoes like these ever again?" Even though I knew how to fall from heights without killing myself, the spill I took from the second floor at Ashley Water High School at Friday Fall still managed to bruise bone. The lasting damage from that must be why my feet wanted to buckle sideways constantly. "I think I'm broken beyond repair."
Mr. Blackbourne's fingers curled into the satin robe at my waist. "You aren't broken, Sang Sorenson. Your injury from the beginning of the school year has made a full recovery. The soft tissue around your ankle are simply not accustomed to such footwear. With practice, your muscles and tendons will strengthen.
I could see myself stumbling through Nathan's house in heels until I became decent at walking gracefully, though I would make sure no one was around to witness. Yet, the guys tried to make it a point to never leave me on my own, so that plan just got shot out of the sky. Why would I need to be proficient in wearing stiletto heels to begin with? Other than to avoid embarrassing myself when I had to model in front of a camera…
My thoughts must have been spelled out clearly on my face, for Mr. Blackbourne leaned in close to me and whispered, "Shall I make arrangements to take you out for ballroom dancing to practice?"
Every single ballroom scene from every Disney Princess movie played in my mind's eye in the span of a second. Then my imagination replaced the princely figures with a man in a grey suit and black rimmed glasses on his nose, not a single hair on his head misplaced. He was stunning and twirling perfection, leading me in flowing gowns across a pristine and shining dance floor…
My ankle collapsed again as I lost my focus on balancing on top of the pointed spikes under my heels. Mr. Blackbourne's grip on my waist kept me from falling into a jumbled heap of barely clothed limbs on the floor. My cheeks were burning in yet another blush as I thanked him and regained my footing.
Kota's solo shots featured a lot of his back in every ensemble of clothing he wore. Mr. Blackbourne explained to me that Kota's character was the Fallen Angel, and the photo editor was going to superimpose wings into the images. He must have thought the explanation was necessary because he caught me blatantly staring at the details of Kota's back, how the lean muscles underneath the skin rippled when he moved. Between Gabriel and Ms. Christine's magic, the costumes he had to wear accented the inverted triangle shape of his torso in just the right ways. Who knew that backs could be so attractive and could give me urges to reach out and try to touch?
Gabriel said he wanted to mess around at first and glue some feathers on Kota's shoulder blades. But he admitted Ms. Christine vetoed that idea with the reasoning that it would take too much time in between costumes to clean up, and we needed to have faith in the guy doctoring up the photos.
Mr. Blackbourne walked me around the studio several times as Kota finished up his slot so I could gained more confidence in wearing the shoes I wore. At first he had to clutch firmly around my waist to keep me upright, but by the time Ms. Christine ordered Kota to strip down to his pants, and for Luke and North to readjust lights and equipment, all I needed was to have my hand tucked into the crook of Mr. Blackbourne's elbow. He commended me on how quickly I adjusted, but I could not tell if the compliment was sincere or if he was just trying to boost my self-esteem before I went before the camera.
He quickly and efficiently rubbed the baby oil over my limbs before handing me a black mini skirt and a backless white blouse to change into. I managed to slip the skirt on without stabbing holes into the material from the Death Heels.
When I emerged from behind the changing screen North pressed a pair of pills I recognized as over-the-counter pain relief medication. "Your turn, Sang Baby, but take these first. You'll want them to kick in before your feel fall off." I nodded and obediently swallowed them dry. "Shit. Let me find you some water."
My hand shot forward and clutched at his bare bicep to keep him from rushing away. "It's fine. I don't want to hold things up."
His brown eyes flitted back and forth between my own. "You sure? You need water for pills."
I smiled, touched by his concern. "Thank you, but I'm a big girl now and can take medicine by myself. If you want to have a bottle nearly to keep me hydrated, though, I wouldn't mind."
North grunted before running the back of his fingers down my cheek. I leaned into his touch, savoring the contact even if his knuckles were calloused.
"Don't fuck up her makeup!" Gabriel hollered from across the studio.
The vampire before me palmed the back of my neck and pulled me toward him until his lips collided with my own. "Go do your thing, Sang Baby," he said huskily after our mouths broke contact.
"Thank you, North Star."
In front of the lights, my feet managed to behave and support my weight. "Gabriel," Ms. Christine called out as she inspected me through the camera lens. "I'm going to have my usual makeup girl call you so you can each her how to do this 'freshly kissed' effect. This is too good."
"Huh?" Gabriel raised his eyebrows. "What eff-"
North cut him off with a karate chop to the top of Gabriel's head and followed it up with a glare. "He can't. Trade secret," North replied to the photographer.
My solo shots had me in mostly backless shirts. After the white blouse, I changed into a black one that was little more than a vest. Gabriel had to pull out the doubled sided tape again to keep me from falling out of it. The shirts were paired with skirts of various lengths, all of them black. Toward the end, the skirts were replaced by jeans that hung low on my hips, then my own pair of leather pants that hugged my butt and thighs like they were a second skin.
I had to remove the boots to slip my legs into the jeans and leather, and my arches screamed at me, protesting their abuse. I wondered what it would take to convince Kota to rub the soreness away from my feet once we were back at Sunnyvale Court. Knowing him, I just needed to ask, and he would happily oblige if he did not have more Academy work lined up. I silently prayed he did not have more work to do after we were done here, not for my own selfish desire for a foot rub, but because this job was exhausting enough and he was sure to be as tired as I was.
Ms. Christine had me pose with numerous different props. We started off with a variety of different crosses, some plain and others ornate and sparkling with jewels. Then we moved on to the more awkward items, like wooden stakes and leather whips. I knew better than to go flinging the long length of cow hide around in fear I would hurt someone or simply knock myself off balance while standing on the spikey heeled boots.
Mr. Blackbourne had to step in and get very hands on with me when I had to handle a katana. Thankfully, the blade was not sharpened, so when Mr. Blackbourne gave me a crash course on how to properly hold the samurai sword, the chances of me accidentally slicing his arm off was minimal. Though, knowing my magnetism for trouble and bad luck in my time in South Carolina, I wouldn't have been too surprised if I unwittingly found a way to decapitate my violin teacher.
I silently hoped his life insurance policy was current.
Before I realized how much time had passed or how many hundreds of camera clicks sounded, North joined me on the set.
Ms. Christine called for a "hungry look" from the tall, dark, and handsome specimen pressed up against me. Unlike earlier in the day, there were no issues with him producing the right expression immediately. I knew his favorite color was black, and I was wearing lots of it. Even with the metallic silver contacts back in, he looked like he was ravenous and could eat me alive.
I was ordered to hug, hang, and crawl all over North's bare chested physique for the camera, making me feel like a monkey on a jungle gym. He stood there stoically, like an immovable pillar, never budging under my weight.
The energy in the air changed when we got to the biting phase of the duo shots. Ms. Christine asked me multiple times if I was okay with it, and every time I assured her I was fine. So North was ordered to apply his teeth to my fingers (I was glad Nathan wasn't there to witness that), wrist, and ear. Ms. Christine squealed when North went the extra mile and gently pulled my lower ear lobe, stretching the soft skin away from my head. My neurons were already alight with his close proximity and state of half-nakedness, but I swore fireworks were going off between us when he had to bite my neck. I desperately wanted to release control over myself and revisit our activities from when North and I first went to the beach together, but the commands to look this way, tilt our heads the other direction, don't move and hover right there… Those helped me from clamping my own teeth down onto North's skin to leave bruises.
When Kota's turn with me came up, North excused himself and rushed up the stairs to the dressing room, ignoring Luke and Gabriel's snickers.
My time with Kota started with him similarly bare chested. The only article adorning the upper half of his body was that black strap collar with the spiked studs around his neck. The accessory was almost enough to detract from his emerald green eyes and sharp cheekbones that no longer hid behind the frames of his glasses. Almost.
"Hi, Kota." I stepped up to him and smiled meekly. With his height and my relative shortness, my nose came even with his bare chest. It was nicely defined.
"Hi, Sang," he greeted me back with his cheeks tinged pink.
Kota did not put on a pair of shoes the entire time. I was mortified I would accidentally step on his bare feet with the Death Heels and impale him, turning the assignment into a medical emergency. In my efforts to avoid his toes, I wound up stumbling even more. I had outright slipped and sprawled all over the white floor twice on my time with Kota. Both times, the clamor was met with a chorus of, "Sang!" before half a dozen arms pull me back upright. I cringed, worried I was wasting valuable time and making Ms. Christine mad for the lack of productivity. Once she confirmed I wasn't hurt, she merely chuckled and tossed me a bone by getting me to adjust the pose into something more stable.
The poses with Kota were vastly different. They lacked the cuddly and intimacy I was use to with the other guys. Ms. Christine had me tugging on the collar as if I were choking him, but that wasn't as odd as the time he had to look straight up at the ceiling, exposing his throat to me as I leaned into him, sticking my tongue out as for as it anatomically could to lick the spiked studs. When I wasn't rolling my eyes toward my ear to look into the camera lens, my gaze was transfixed on his bobbing Adam's apple. Kota did a lot of kneeling in that meditating position as I stood over him in various ways. The props I used earlier came back, mainly the whip, to which we circled around Kota's torso and arms. Mr. Blackbourne informed me I was supposed to be emanating an aura of dominance, and the poses were suggestive of Kota surrendering all control and power to me. I managed to school my features by pretending to be Mr. Blackbourne as he stalked around the music room during my violin lessons, channeling the intimidation and demand for obedience. Of course, this never was admitted aloud to anyone else I die from embarrassment.
Other than licking Kota's collar, the most awkward pose between the two of us had to be when I had to shove the pointed toe of my boot under the strap of leather at his neck. Luke set up a stool for me to sit on to make sure I did not accidentally stab the heel of my shoe through his sternum and puncture a lung as he lay on the floor for the photo. The seat did ease some of my apprehension, but not alleviate it entirely. I shook the entire time, and it only got worse when Kota pet my calf and said he trusted me. The problem was I did not trust myself.
"There's all this collar play going on," Luke rambled on somewhere behind me. "Why don't we just hook a leash onto him?" A leash? Kota wasn't a dog. Did they expect me to walk him?
Ms. Christine snickered in between camera clicks. "I was considering one, but decided against it. I figured it was just a little too underground kinky to be displayed in public bookstores. Gotta keep things in perspective of the final product, you know?" Thus, Kota did not have to role play as Max on a walk.
Good news! Kota did not die that day from my clumsiness. He even managed to survive the part where North joined us for the trio shots. His Academy training kept his reflexes sharp enough to avoid the sharp point of my heels.
With the three of us together on the set, Luke and Mr. Blackbourne erected the scaffolding once more so Ms. Christine could get a bird's eye view of the three of us laying in a circle with our heads together. I thought it was a little cliché when Luke sprinkled blood red rose petals around us as accents. My aching feet were forgotten when the three of us were instructed to hold hands with each other, putting our fists up and in between our shoulders. That pose sent warm tingles down my spine, and I had to fight to keep the smile off my face as I indulged in the thought of us all connected together. If only I could find an opportunity to recreate this picture with all ten of us…
I was vaguely aware of people calling my name repeatedly, but I did not snap back into awareness until a commanding bark of, "Miss Sorenson!" split my ears. I jolted to an upright sitting position and nearly took out Luke who was hovering over me.
"You okay, Sweetie?" the blonde asked me, concern and worry evident in his chocolate eyes.
"Yeah?" I answered hesitantly. "Why wouldn't I be?"
Luke's hand gently wiped at the corner of my lips. "You were drooling."
My eyebrows climbed to my hairline as my eyes grew wide. "Oh my god. I'm so sorry!" I had fallen asleep while lying there on the white floor after Ms. Christine instructed me to 'gaze wistfully into the distance in the direction of the stairs.' How long had it been since I drifted off? How far back did I delay things? Did the assignment fail because of me? Ms. Christine had to be so disappointed in me. My skin flushed red and my heart sank to the floor when I thought of the disappointment I had to be in Mr. Blackbourne's eyes. Tears threatened to well up in my eyes, but I tried my hardest to keep the moisture locked away. If I ruined the makeup, I would only delay things more.
Kota lightly touched my elbow as he scooted closer to me. "It's alright, Sang. You're exhausted."
North sidled up to my other side, and I fought the urge to crawl into his lap. "You're not the only one, Baby," he said to me as he nodded toward the other side of the studio. I squinted into the darkness but could not see anything until Luke took out his cell phone and used the light from the screen to illuminate a figure slumped over some props. "Gabe has been out for the past fifteen minutes."
With some tilting of my head, I could see Gabriel draped over the crate, his elbow covering his eyes. His chest rhythmically rose and lowered with his breathing.
I looked up at Ms. Christine on the scaffolding. She had her chin resting in her palm and amusement twinkled in her eyes. "I'm sorry, ma'am," I apologized. "I did not mean to hold up progress."
"Oh, don't mind me," Ms. Christine answered with a smile. "We're in the home stretch anyways. This isn't the first time I've had people fall asleep on my set either. I'm starting to think I'm boring," she chuckled.
"Oh no! You're far from boring!" I squeaked.
"Thank you, Missy. But before we can move forward again, I'll need Gabriel to touch up your lip color."
My fingers gently prodded the edge of my lips trying to inspect them without a mirror at my disposal. I must have smudged the makeup when I took my unintended nap. Thankfully, it was a quick fix once Luke nudged Gabriel awake.
The shoot wrapped up after North, Kota, and I performed the obligatory compromising positions with me sandwiched between their hard, bare chests. I couldn't decide which pose was most embarrassing in the end: the one where I had to lick Kota's collar spikes again with North sinking his teeth into my shoulder, or where North had to make out with the knee of my leather pants while Kota nibbled onto the toes of my boot. Of course, I was wearing said pants and shoes while they did this.
The shoot wrapped up and the assignment concluded after we all helped to clean up.
"Can I burn these shoes, Meanie?" I asked once I managed to extract myself from the Death Heels. My feet sang a song of agony as I tried to slip my sandals onto them, and standing proved to be quite a chore once my arches realized they had to adjust to a different weight distribution.
"What? You don't like them?" Gabriel gasped in mock horror as he gathered the pair from my arms and shoved them into a box.
"I don't want to see them ever again," I sighed.
Once everything had been put away and we gave the garage a thorough sweep, we bid our farewells to Ms. Christine. She shook all our hands firmly with a giant grin on her face, but I noticed the dark circles under her eyes. She was just as tired as the rest of us, and I realized she was on her feet the most. "Thank you," I said to her. "This was fun, and I learned more than I could imagine."
"I'm the one who needs to thank you, Sang. You're a natural. Call me up if you ever need personal photos done. I expect to be the photographer at yours and Gabriel's wedding, alright?"
The hottest blush yet waved over me, the burn reaching all the way down to my toes. "W- wedding?" I stammered.
Gabriel materialized at my side and wrapped his arm around my waist before planting a wet and sloppy smooch on my cheek. "We haven't set a date yet," he said to Ms. Christine, "but we're certainly keeping your card."
Rendered speechless, Gabriel laughed at me and led me to the cars to depart.
Mr. Blackbourne joined us for dinner at Uncle's diner, but had to leave shortly after he finished his meal. Before he left, he pulled me aside and away from the others for a word. "You did exceptionally well, Miss Sorenson. I'm proud of you."
"I didn't mess everything up?" I asked, my nerves suddenly catching up to me to where I was shaking and biting my lip.
"No. This assignment was an amazing success because of you. You helped us out of a bind, and I am very thankful. I know I can rely on you, and you never disappoint." He placed his hands on my shoulders, rubbing them back and forth just enough to get my nerves to calm and shaking to cease. "You're beautiful and alluring, and no one else could have done those pictures justice."
One more blush overtook me at those words, and it only intensified when he brought the back of my hand to his lips for a gentlemanly and tender departing kiss. "Good night, Miss Sorenson."
"Good night, Mr. Blackbourne."
The rest of us retired back to Nathan's house when we were done at the diner. Nathan was already there and was excited to hear the report of the day's events. Kota was more than willing to massage my feet as we discussed different aspects of the weekend with each other. Kota was even kind enough to apply his foot rubbing talents to Gabriel after whining he did not get enough pampering for all the work he did. He promptly fell asleep minutes after Kota started.
At some point, I had also fallen asleep during the chatter, only waking long enough to register kisses on my forehead from Luke and North as they left for the evening, then to realize I was being carried to the bed in a cloud of spicy scent. I caught a brief glimpse of Gabriel, still sleeping, being carried similarly by Nathan right behind us. We both were deposited onto Nathan's bed and tucked in by Kota. I got more kisses on my cheeks before Kota and Nathan stepped out.
"Oy," Gabriel whispered drunkenly. "I want night-night kisses too."
"They left already, Meanie," I giggled.
"Shut up and come here, Trouble." He rolled to his side and curled around me. I wrapped my arm around him and tangled my legs among his own before placing a kiss on the tip of his nose. "Goodnight, Gabriel."
"Goodnight, Sang."
THE END
A/N: I wanted to call them "bitch boots" so badly. I had to go back and edit several times to change it to "Death Heels," chastising myself because Sang wouldn't use the same terminology I would. Gabe's right. She's too innocent. And I'm so ornery.
I'm sad I won't work with Ms. Christine anymore. She kinda grew on me and worked insanely well with the guys.
Up next! The Epilogue! Stay tuned.