Chapter 19 #2
I arched a brow as something occurred to me.
Running through my mental contacts in Los Angeles, I pulled out my laptop and began scrolling through them.
I smiled as one in particular popped out to me.
Sending out two emails, I had my assistant from the downtown office call just to tell them to check their system.
In five minutes, I had everything I wanted sent out and I left the small jet bedroom, offering Marco a look before holding up my phone so he checked his own.
I didn’t want to tell him what I had planned out loud because I thought it would be a fun surprise.
Honestly, it was a shot in the dark on whether Marco would think it was a good idea.
As he read over it, he offered me an interested look and nodded.
Fantastic. Sitting across from Maya in a leather white seat, I watched her play hangman with Sai and Ledger.
I could see that she was sketching in the corners of the paper whenever they got distracted.
I smiled. Yeah, I had a feeling she would love this.
“Where are we going?” she asked for the fifth adorable time. Henry offered me an amused look before turning around to face her, where she sat between Anani and Sai.
Marco and Atlas had very much wanted to come with but had decided to stay back with Ledger to plan for tonight.
Apparently, and I hadn’t realized so, Ledger was absolutely fantastic at accounting for problems that could occur at this stupid fucking Dragon Council event we were going to.
What drove me crazy the most? There were no female dragons and she had to meet other flights.
I didn’t want any more dragons near her.
Wasn’t six enough? I really felt like it was enough.
As we pulled up to a massive skyscraper, an attendant awaited us.
I easily slid out of the car and handed the keys along with a few bills over before opening Maya’s door to take her elegant hand.
She had changed into a lighter weather outfit and it was almost painful how perfect she looked.
Her light yellow off the shoulder top highlighted how stunning her golden skin tone was paired with a white snakeskin skirt and thin flip flops.
The woman was almost hypnotizing to look at. She didn’t realize it either of course.
“Croy,” she grinned, bouncing slightly as we entered past a group of crowds that snapped photos of us.
I knew that they hadn’t been there for Maya originally but they sure as hell were now.
This building was always filled with artistic directors throughout the city and housed some of the major fashion and art magazines in the city, including Vogue.
“Patience,” I offered quietly, loving her enthusiasm.
“Mr. Lee,” a female voice chimed as a soft annoyed sound came from Maya. I grinned at that as my contact’s gaze fell on Maya, immediately I saw excitement flash in her gaze. Yeah. I should have probably accounted for that to a larger extent.
“Is this her?” she asked eagerly, “I saw her spread, but this is so exciting! How are you, dear? My name is Alanza, I’m the creative director upstairs at Vogue, when Mr. Lee said you wanted to stop by, I was thrilled.”
Maya blushed and tucked the piece of pink hair behind her ear. “You work at Vogue?” I could see the excitement spark her eyes and I knew I had done something right.
Alanza nodded as Maya offered me a massive smile. I explained finally, “I figured that while we were here I would arrange for you to meet with the creative director and the fashion department to see if that would be something you would be interested in, since you’ve mentioned it before--”
Maya hugged me, flinging her entire body into my arms, as I chuckled, I could hear the others talking quietly, clearly happy at her reaction. I know I sure as hell was. My wolf was fucking thrilled we had made our mate so damn happy and it echoed my exact feelings towards the situation.
Then Maya was off, Alanza taking her elbow as we followed after.
I tried to keep my eyes off her sexy ass in that damn white skirt.
Still, once we entered the elevator, it was a struggle to not press her up into that wall and go back to devouring her.
I could practically hear the soft little moans she would make as I ran my fingers over her perfect skin.
I was starting to realize that skirts were particularly dangerous.
I mean shit, I could just lift that skirt over her perfect ass and… this was going to be a very long day.
As Alanza began to walk her along the different departments, I watched as Maya easily charmed the entire floor.
How could you not be charmed by her though?
My eyes narrowed slightly on any male gazes that followed her, luckily there weren’t many.
One of the reasons the idea of her in this industry appealed to me.
Well, that and because she was extremely creative and I figured this would be a good place to start since she talked about these magazines so often.
Mainly how ridiculous their titles were for their articles, so much so, that I was sort of hoping she would say something about it.
I would love to see their reaction to her opinions.
It was clear though, it was about more than the titles to Maya.
She seemed to be extremely interested and that was all I could ask for.
“So this is where we set up the spreads for each month's issue,” Alanza explained as we walked into a very colorful disorganized room that had Maya nearly spinning in circles.
Some of the individuals there were staring openly at her in realization.
Probably because the spread that was currently being worked on for October featured her.
“Wait...” She arched her brows, “You are putting me on the cover?”
Alanza nodded, “Everyone will want to read it considering who you are.”
Maya looked at the photo of herself and tilted her head. I could see the wheels turning in her head and an odd look shaded her eyes as she nibbled her lip.
“Do you not like it?” Alanza asked, looking suddenly panicked.
“I do!” Maya turned towards her and placed a comforting hand on her shoulder.
It was fascinating watching Maya interact with others outside of us.
You could see the compassion radiating from her.
Then she offered a shy smile, “Could you put the photo of my boys and I on the front instead? I know it’s supposed to be representative of who I am, and honestly, they are a huge part of that. ”
My heart swelled making me feel like a total fucking softie as Anani shifted at my side, knowing he probably wanted to snatch her up. Instead, we all stayed where we were and let her do her thing. Even though I wanted to kiss the shit out of her immensely after saying something so damn cute.
Alanza’s eyes widened slightly as she looked to one of the women standing nearby. The woman looked nervously at Maya, “We could, we had avoided it because it’s a bit controversial and didn’t want to make you feel like we were exploiting you at all.”
Ah. Wasn’t that fascinating. I was pretty damn positive that most people didn’t give a fuck in this industry about exploiting one another. However, Maya was always a different story.
Maya spoke softly with a friendly smile, “Trust me, it’s completely okay.”
“Well I have some fantastic options.” The younger woman turned and began pulling forth pictures.
I could literally feel the excitement amp up and I moved over Maya’s shoulders as she began to sort through pictures.
One jumped out to me far more than the others, I placed my fingers on it as she turned her focus on it.
“I love that,” she chimed.
I did as well. It was less of a posed picture but Maya was smiling and everyone was offering her different levels of affection.
You could quite literally see how much each of us cared about her.
I wanted that picture blown up and framed in her room so whenever she felt insecure she could look at that and remember how we felt about her.
“This one,” she commented softly, “can you get me a copy by chance? It’s amazing.”
“Of course,” Alanza promised. As we left the room, Henry stayed back with the others a moment to no doubt make sure the contracts and photograph release forms were up to date.
I followed Maya like a fucking pup as we passed office after office, my eyes tracing the authentic happiness that beamed from her face.
I would have asked Maya if she wanted to see the other companies in the building but I had a feeling that Alanza would kill me if I tried to take Maya away from her.
“Would you like to see one of the shoots we have going on?” Alanza asked curiously.
Christ. I would lose my mind if she wanted to go into modeling.
Maybe this was a bad idea. I did not want her on display for the entire world.
Fuck, Marco would have my fucking head. It wasn’t often I came across someone who was more dominant than myself, but Marco was, for sure.
I could have probably tried to supersede him but frankly I didn’t want that kind of bad blood and he did a fantastic job taking care of everyone, so I followed suit.
Plus, it left me far more time to be focused on Maya.
“Sure,” Maya chirped as the three of us walked up a set of stairs to enter into a massive industrial room. There were several shoots going on but I could hear excitement and energy from one end of the room, no doubt featuring a higher name.
“Alanza,” I stated after passing two of the large sets going on, “we are going to need to leave fairly soon actually.”
Maya was looking a bit tired so I could see slight relief at that.
Alanza nodded, “No problem, do you have time for one more thing? I heard you are planning to go to an event tonight and if you don’t have a dress yet, we have some that you may like.
I know the designers would be thrilled to see you in them. ”
“Maya?” I asked, wanting to make sure she wasn’t too tired.
“I would love to take a look,” Maya nodded as I pressed a gentle hand to her back. I had no idea what Marco had been planning for her to wear but as Henry joined us he seemed to agree with her sorting through the dresses available.
As I took a chair near the large fitting room, I watched her sort through designer dresses.
I started cursing every designer from Chanel to Versace when I realized just how fucking little material all of them had.
This was going to go badly…well, either bad or end in me tackling her to the ground and marking her soft neck with my mating mark.
Guess we would see.