Eight
Trina
Then
* * *
After New Year’s Eve, I spent days seeking as much information as I could find on Robert Madrid. His name was mentioned in a handful of local modeling agency catalogs, and once I found the name and address of Whisk Agency, where he seemed to work, I took the subway and strolled around the neighborhood.
Zane’s warning about girls having to test their morals every once in a while, still lingered, so before I ever made contact, I did what I could to make sure this man was legit.
The building’s entryway was modern, all glass and white marble floors and white cushioned chairs held together by gleaming gold metal.
The agency itself was located on the twentieth floor of the building, but the building’s lobby sent relief coursing through me and washed away my largest concerns.
Whisk Agency was legit. The model Anna Molin was one of their clients. She appeared in makeup commercials for luxury makeup brands I hoped to one day be able to afford. She was on billboards and the sides of buses modeling underwear and swimsuits in the spring and summer months and covered in thick, cable sweaters and plaid button up shirts in the fall and winter.
She was a beautiful model from Brazil, and I wanted to be her. And then more famous.
It was with only a small remaining amount of trepidation that I picked up the phone on January sixth, giving Robert a few days to get back to work after the New Year, and made the call.
To my further appeasement, he was incredibly professional, and when I told him I received his name and number through Zane, he scheduled me into his office for an initial consultation and meeting on his first available appointment. Which happened to be almost two weeks away.
Thrilled, I spent the next two weeks mulling over more books and websites and videos on modeling and posing, how to adjust my frame to allow light to hit me better, how to smile or shift my eyes to appear either sultry or fierce.
Stella giggled every time I passed a mirror and struck a pose, but even she noticed a fresh quickness to my step.
My customers at Laredo’s apparently noticed the difference as well, because my tips increased substantially. It left me with an extra small chunk I squirreled away into a tin can I kept under my bed, slowly growing my savings and a smaller coffee tin for “splurge” funds.
When my appointment came, set late on a Friday afternoon at Whisk Agency, I ensured I’d spent an appropriate amount of time curling my blond hair and working on my makeup to look a few years older.
I was wearing my best dress and tights.
Wearing an ultra-long white shirtdress, I left the collar opened and the top couple buttons undone.
It wasn’t enough to reveal cleavage, but enough to see skin tone and my collarbone.
My heels were in my shoulder bag so I could put them on as soon as I reached the building.
My heavy, gray snow boots clunked on the slushy sidewalks, remnants of snow earlier from in the week, but like life in Deer Creek, New Yorkers prepared for the weather and went on about life as usual.
It was one of the only similarities between the two places I’d been able to find in the last six months.
My nerves were at an all-time high by the time I reached the building. If everything Zane had told me about, and everything I’d read about on Whisk, was true, this had the potential to be my big break. I desperately needed it. How amazing would it be to not only start off the new year with this opportunity, but also to be able to phone my parents and let them know?
I had to nail this appointment.
Taking a few minutes, I changed into my heels on the covered and dry sidewalk, before doing a quick makeup scan with my compact mirror. All done and looking as good as I was going to, there was nothing left than to go for it.
Summoning up all the confidence I had, which was approximately the size of a mustard seed, and faking everything else I needed, I curled my hands around the brass handle on the glass door and opened the door.
Instantly, I was hit with a blast of heat as I stepped into the lobby and headed straight for the lobby’s receptionist desk.
“Hello,”
I said, already digging into my purse for my driver’s license. Robert had told me I’d need to show ID to be allowed on the elevator. “Trina Mills. I’m here to see Mr. Madrid?”
I cringed at the way I phrased it more like a question than a statement. If the woman behind the desk, beautifully and stylishly coiffed but old enough to be my mother noticed, she said nothing.
“Sign here,”
she said, pushing a blotter toward me for visitors. “And take this badge with you. It must be visible at all times.”
She glanced at my ID, nodded, and picked up the phone. “Mr. Madrid, your appointment is here. A Miss Mills? Excellent. She’s on her way.”
She set down the phone and gave me a quick glance, with a barely-there smile, pointing at the elevators. “Twentieth floor, second bank of elevators to your right. Sign out when you leave.”
“Okay. Thank you.”
I tucked my license into my purse and grabbed the badge, clipping it to my purse as I walked to where she gestured.
As soon as the elevator doors closed shut behind me, my stomach rolled. By the time the elevator slowed to a halt, I was one more floor away from expelling my nerves all over my feet.
“Goodness,”
I muttered, and pressed a hand to my stomach. “You can do this.”
When the doors dinged and opened, I stepped off the elevator, ensuring my steps were firm and confident. Spying the receptionist desk first, I headed straight toward it even though there was no one sitting behind the cherry wood and marble counter-height top.
I forced myself not to fidget with my purse string or the hem of my shirt, and instead, I surveyed the area. Richly colored woods, beautiful marble. Frosted glass walls with the same cherry-colored wood doors behind the reception desk. A hallway to the right. Couches that looked built more for design aesthetic than comfort to my left. Glass top tables at the edges of the two small couches and one in the middle created a sitting area that, while made with warm colors in tans and chocolate brown pillows, none of it said “get comfortable and stay a while.”
It was exactly what I expected from a modeling agency’s entrance. Everything was rich-looking, expensive, and screamed impersonal at the same time whispering, “Notice me.”
No way was I moving close to it.
A door opened down a hallway to my right, and I turned in the direction of the noise, hoping it was Robert Madrid. In an instant, I set my posture to how I’d been practicing for this moment for the last few weeks.
Shoulders back, breasts out, chin up, arms relaxed at my sides. I placed one foot in front of the other to elongate my legs and at the last second, as a shadow appeared from around the corner, I flipped my blond hair off my shoulder.
“Miss Mills,”
the man said, as he appeared.
He was stunningly handsome. Dressed in a well-fitted double-breasted black pinstripe suit, his shirt was stark white and his tie, a deep blood red.
He was at least a decade older than me. Old enough to be experienced and hot, young enough to not be anywhere close to my father in age. The lack of gray in his styled, dirty-blond hair and no wrinkles helped with the age.
“Mr. Madrid, I assume,”
I said, holding out my hand as he walked toward me. I swung my hips in one long stride of a step and reached him. “Trina Mills. Pleasure to meet you.”
“Trina. Please, call me Robert. This is all informal, anyway.”
He shook my offered hand but held himself back. His rich, blue eyes did a scan of my body, and I fought not to falter in my step or my nerves.
The last thing I needed was my hand trembling in his firm, but professional handshake.
“Lovely,”
he said. He grinned, showing off sparkling white teeth. His approval of my appearance loosened tension in my shoulders. “Zane was correct about you.”
“Thank you,”
I replied, my voice polite.
I was here to get approval on my looks after all, so the fact he’d inspected me didn’t bother me.
However, he held my hand a bit too long. I tugged, signaling for him to let go, but his smile widened and his grip didn’t falter. “Shall I show you to the room and we can get started? I know Zane mentioned I often photograph after hours, so I’m only allowed a short amount of time.”
“Sure.”
I shook my head and corrected myself. “Yes. Thank you, that would be lovely.”
Polite Trina. Be polite and professional.
Seeing as he still held my hand, he pulled me forward and then I was next to him. His hand released mine but instead of gesturing for me to follow him, he settled his hand at my lower back.
Warmth hit where he touched, followed by a slight chill.
Did all men touch models and women they photographed?
It wasn’t as if he was crossing a line, but the move felt too friendly, maybe? Like we hadn’t just met.
Regardless, I didn’t move away, but my posture stayed tight and tall as he guided us down the hallway and to the right. He then led me through an open door, and as soon as we stepped inside, my heart leaped and fluttered.
A photography room. Bright white lights were already set up, standing on top of and in front of a white background. In the center of the area was a gray one-armed chaise lounge. Comfortable, but not too cushy.
I turned to Robert and smiled unable to hide my excitement. “Thank you, again, so much for agreeing to meet with me.”
His eyes seemed to almost dance with the same excitement I had. “I believe the pleasure will prove itself to be all mine. Now, I prefer to have you comfortable before our first shoot, so why don’t you get settled in the chair, and for a few minutes, we’ll just talk, okay?”
“Thank you.”
I couldn’t hide my sigh of relief. Spying a small table next to us, I set down my purse and walked to the chair. Once seated, I crossed my ankles and settled my hands in my lap.
Robert went to where there was a stool by the wall, grabbed it, and picked up a camera with his other hand and brought both back so he was sitting in front of me. He sat down on the stool and settled his camera in his lap, the cover over the lens, straps hanging down as if he was in no hurry whatsoever.
“So, tell me about where you grew up,”
Robert asked, taking me by surprise. “Zane tells me you’re from the South?”
A smile formed on my cheeks, unable to be helped. It’d been forever since anyone had asked me about home. “Yes,”
I said easily, almost breathily. “I’m from a town called Deer Creek, in the mountains in North Carolina.
“What’s it like?”
My gaze shifted, and although I hadn’t expected the personal tone of the questions, he’d wanted me relaxed. Perhaps he was trying to get me talking so I quit thinking so much.
With that realization settled, I told Robert everything about life in Deer Creek. He asked me more questions and I answered, and soon, as I was telling about how my high school backed up to a cornfield, something he found entertaining based on his quiet but sincere laugh. Before long, I realized he’d started taking pictures. Every time I smiled, or every time I was lost in thought about a question of his, the quiet click of the camera registered in my mind. Yet the conversation still naturally flowed, and I knew, every time he checked his camera screen at the back of his camera and grinned and nodded, I was doing well.
Yes. This was what I needed.
I thought we were done when Robert set the camera down on the stool and sauntered up to me. His finger trailed along my cheek but his eyes stayed on mine.
“You are beautiful,”
he said. “The photos I’ve taken are wonderful. Some of my best yet.”
I was no longer nervous, or thinking his behavior earlier might have been inappropriate, even as his finger drifted to my jaw, the side of my neck, and over my shoulder.
“Thank you.”
I grinned.
“Part of modeling, though Trina, is being comfortable in your skin.”
At his words, his finger on my neck drifted to the edge of my top, tugging lightly on it. My skin warmed from either his touch, or the lights, or perhaps the excitement. I didn’t know, but something new was buzzing beneath my flesh.
“I understand.”
His head tilted. “Do you? I would like a shot of you, softer than what we’ve taken, more natural. Would you mind unbuttoning your blouse for me?”
He must have registered my surprise because his finger disappeared and instead his hand settled on my shoulder. “Not nude, Trina. We’ll keep you covered. I’m looking for something a bit more mature, seductive, to show your range.”
Of course. It made sense. Models were photographed in almost nothing all the time anyway.
“It’s okay,”
I said. “What would you like me to do?”
His grin softened, along with his eyes, and I allowed Robert to do the work.
He unbuttoned my top, spreading it open, but he stayed true to his word. My bra stayed on and covered. He brushed my hair over my chest and then pushed off a shoulder of my shirt, but the entire time he adjusted me, whispering quietly and softly, he stayed professional, working on keeping me calm and relaxed.
Billboards and magazine spreads. I repeated my goal in my mind. I was reaching for my dream, obviously it might mean showing more skin than just from the throat up.
“Beautiful,”
Robert murmured, clicking away. He glanced at me occasionally and asked if I was okay, and with each nod, he seemed more pleased.
He was checking the back of the screen when I made a decision.
While he wasn’t looking at me, I dropped the rest of my top, and lifted my hair off my breast, letting it fall behind my shoulder.
His eyes jumped up at my movement, and his gaze settled on mine. “You okay?”
“Yes.”
I readjusted my position in the chair and gazed back at him. “I’m okay with all of this.”
“Lovely.”
With a quick nod, the camera was once again in front of his face. He took photo after photo of me, all from the waist up, some with my hair in front of my bra, some with it behind my shoulders. He moved close and tugged a bra strap off my shoulder and then stepped back and clicked away. And when he declared us done, there was only a professional gleam of approval shining on his face.
“You’re beautiful,”
he said, once I was redressed. He held out my purse to me, and I slid it up my shoulder. “The camera loves you. I won’t make promises I can’t deliver on, but I can tell you I haven’t been this excited about working with a model in a very long time.”
“Thank you.”
My voice went breathy again, surprised at his honest candor.
“I’d like to see you again next Friday. More photos, perhaps…even more natural?”
His eyebrows rose in question, one I quickly understood. I’d already made my decision. I was willing to do anything to reach my dreams.
I nodded. “Of course, that will be excellent. Same time?”
“Yes. I’ll see you back here, and if you have any questions in the meantime, please call me. Okay, Trina?”
“Okay Robert.”
“Wonderful.”
He pressed his hand to my hip and leaned in. Brushing his lips over my cheek so quickly I almost wondered if I imagined it, he whispered, “You’ll be a star, Trina beautiful. I’ll make sure of it.”
His hand squeezed my hip, and he dropped his hand. Then he stepped back.
The moment was beautiful. Excitement and hope were drumming through my veins in unprecedented measure.
So I let him guide me back to the elevator, lean in and give me another kiss on the cheek, this time I returned one to his, and we said our goodbyes.
When I returned to my apartment with Stella, I was so over-the-top excited about my afternoon, we were almost late for our shift at the diner.
I was thrilled. Living on cloud nine.
Robert Madrid was going to make me a star.
I was certain of it.