The Grace of a Thousand Stars (PREQUEL)

Chapter 6- Monsters & Magic

Rick? Just like how Ines called me yesterday, completely unaware. At the thought of the woman, I paused to wonder what she was doing right now. Was she bored without me? Was she exploring the house? The sight of her wandering around the house in my clothes excited me for some reason as I couldn't help but want to hurry up and return home to see her.

I've never had such entertaining conversations with a person as I did with her. When I spoke to her, whatever it was that we spoke about, time seemed to fly by, and even before the conversation ended, I wondered what she would find to speak about next. It was the oddest but most entertaining conversations.

Thinking back on it, I was surprised at how much I'd laughed and smiled with her. It was almost scary how she was able to evoke such reactions out of me with no effort.

But I knew, more than anything, that there were shadows following in her every step, a looming threat that she was terrified of to the point of getting nightmares. I was curious, but I was also, I hated to admit, almost fearful, that if I were to let my curiosity get the better of me, she'd no longer be able to smile at me as she had been doing.

"Alaric?" Ezra curiously called, snapping me out of my thoughts.

"Sorry. You were saying?" I quickly tuned back in, looking at the photographer.

"Right, we've got your outfits for the shoot ready. You can change into them and then the make-up artist will be with you shortly," Nodding, I went to get changed, absent-mindedely moving as my thoughts were infested with one woman, and one woman only.

I'd never wanted work to end as badly as I do right now.

Wearing a royal blue suit jacket with nothing underneath, my chest was left exposed as I wore the trousers of the same colour, folding the sleeves before slipping into the black dress shoes. My dyed brown hair was sprayed with water to leave it hanging around my face in perfect ringlets, all carefully placed as I was told to move as little as possible.

"Perfect! Just like that! You're a natural, Rick!" He really needs to stop calling me that, I sounded 10 years older than I actually was.

Nevertheless, I changed my positions around as he continued to take pictures of me, the white flashes of light quickly letting me grow accustomed to them. I sat on the edge of the black box, hands placed between my legs as I looked at the camera with a serious look, changing a moment later to perch one leg up, resting my elbow on it as my chin rested on my palm.

"Woo! You look like a dream!" This photographer was really good at hyping up his models, but in this case, I almost laughed aloud at him, holding it back well as I continued to pose for the cameras, just as they all liked.

Not long after, the shoot was finally over as I was handed a towel to wipe all the ticklish droplets of water off of my face and body. And as I was in my changing room, getting back into my original outfit, a plain black shirt and slacks, someone knocked on the door.

"Yes." I called as Ezra poked his head in.

"I'm nearly done," I said.

"No, it's not that. It doesn't matter how long you take anyway; You've not got anything else on your schedule today. But that's not the point, someone's here to see you."

"Here? At my work place?" I raised a brow, pausing in slipping my watch on.

"Yeah, it's Malachi Kingston..."

"Who?"

"You know, Malachi Kingston, the owner of Kingston Entertainment, the company that has the famous Ines Agua under them, you were just researching about her today." And I paused, wondering if this was real or not.