Idiot For Hire [On Hold]

9: He's All Yours

Idiot For Hire

Chapter Nine: He's All Yours

“List it off for me,” I said, looking at Nathan anxiously. This was his first big day on the job, and well… he wasn’t ready. He’d almost flooded my bathroom just the night before when I’d told him to turn the water on so I could take a shower. How? I don’t even know.

“Don’t talk to anyone, don’t look at anyone, stay out of the way, and do everything you say,” he said in a monotonous voice. “Chill out, Dree. I got this.”

“That’s exactly what you said last night right before you almost flooded my bathroom,” I pointed out sourly. “Excuse me for not trusting you.”

“Hey, that wasn’t my fault,” he said, pointing a finger at me as soon as I said that. “There’s something wrong with that showerhead. Freaking satanic piece of metal…” He muttered incoherently to himself.

I rolled my eyes. “I’m sure.” Looking out the tinted window of my limousine, I grimaced. “We’re here. Do we need to go through the rules again?”

“Oh, my God, no.”

“Are you sure?” I asked, but he wasn’t even paying attention. He was already getting out of the limo. I watched him through the window, wondering why my chauffer hadn’t made any attempt to open my door. I guess he’d just assumed Nathan would do it for me, which he did.

Nathan grabbed my hand and helped me out of the limo. “I’m positive,” he said, answering the question I thought he’d ignored. “Just relax and do your model thing. I can handle this.”

By the look on my face, it was obvious I wasn’t convinced, but it wasn’t like I could turn around and go home. My mother and Lawrence would kill me if I didn’t show up.

Realizing we were still holding hands, I quickly let go and laughed nervously. “Sorry. That’s starting to become a habit.”

Nathan just smiled. “I don’t mind. Ready to go in?”

I nodded, mentally trying to decipher his smile and comment. What was that supposed to mean? I tolerate it and I’m smiling because you’re my boss or I really don’t mind and I’m smiling because I like it? “Oh, my God, what’s going on with me?” I whispered to myself, momentarily forgetting Nathan was with me.

“What was that?” he asked.

“Nothing,” I replied, internally reprimanding myself. Since when was I so… awkward? “Let’s go in.”

Normally, I would’ve been pretty excited about this show. Lawrence was one of the few coordinators I didn’t hate with a fiery passion, and his pieces were some of the nicest I’d ever modeled. That day, however, pretty much all I could do was worry about how Nathan would handle this, although a small part of me did feel some excitement at the prospect of wearing that gorgeous red gown Lawrence had picked out for me.

“Adriana! So nice to see you, sweetheart,” Lawrence exclaimed the second I walked in, shuffling over to me. When he noticed Nathan, he grabbed me by the arm and pulled me aside. “Please tell me you talked to him about modeling, and he jumped for joy and offered to sell his heart and soul to the business.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Not exactly. He didn’t say yes, but he didn’t say no, either.” I’d tried to slyly plant the idea into his head, as Lawrence had suggested, but I didn’t think Nathan had really taken me seriously, although he didn’t completely denounce the idea, either.

Lawrence nodded emphatically. “We can work with that. Keep planting the seeds. We’ll get there.”

“I’ll try,” I said, trying not to look too amused at Lawrence’s insistence. Something told me it would take a lot more than just “planting the seeds” to get Nathan on that runway.