my shoulders nicely. I could thank my mother for having good hair. I quickly dabbed concealer on the dark circles beneath my eyes and applied lip gloss. There. Much better. Standing back, I gave myself one last look. Not bad. I was far from a supermodel, but I looked decent. I glanced at the clock.
I shoved my feet into my only pair of heels—nude pumps that I pretended went with everything—and stumbled toward the door. Between the fitted skirt, tight down to my knees, and this damn girdle cutting off my circulation, walking was going to be a challenge today. Quickly grabbing the tray of muffins I’d baked last night as a gesture of goodwill for my new boss and coworkers, I launched myself out the apartment door.
A warm July breeze danced around my ankles as I walked outside onto the bustling street. A swarm of yellow cabs roared past me. The scents of car exhaust, warm bread, and stale urine crammed the air, fighting for attention. A hot dog vendor on my right smiled as I walked past. A bike messenger zipped down the road, nearly hitting me as I crossed the street, and the MetLife building loomed in the distance. I was overpowered with an enormous sense of homesickness. This place was nothing like Tennessee.
Even after living here a few weeks, I didn’t see how the roar of New York traffic was something I’d ever get used to. Some days I wondered if I’d bitten off more than I could chew, yet I kept moving forward, kept putting one foot in front of the other.
When I arrived at work with my tray of muffins I was already late, so I shuffled as quickly as my heels in plush carpeting would allow and made a mad dash toward the executive assistant’s suite outside the boss’s office. A few heads looked up as I hurried past, and I wondered if my heart could give out at the ripe old age of twenty- two.
Deep, exotic perfumes mingling with the aroma of leather filled my nose and I stifled a sneeze. The agency itself was all modern, with thick opaque glass and steel beams, looking very chic and high-end. The twentieth floor provided gorgeous views of Central Park in the distance. I loved looking at those leafy green treetops. I never knew you could miss seeing trees, but New York made that possible.
The top of my desk was littered with at least a dozen Post-it notes, each one containing some nearly illegible message written in Fiona’s messy handwriting. Crap. She’d clearly been at work for a while. Why she preferred to communicate solely on yellow scraps of sticky paper was beyond me. She never emailed me—she’d either yell something from her office or scrawl it on a Post-it when I wasn’t around. It was my job to decipher the meanings. I peeled up the first one from my desk, which was fairly clear. It said,
I dropped into my seat to start organizing her notes in case I needed to refer back to one later. I shoved one note that was presumably written in hieroglyphics into my plastic-sleeved binder and then set about dealing with the rest of them. First things first, I tried to figure out which Ben she meant. Checking the database, I saw our office had three Bens. Two of them hadn’t booked a job in several months, so by process of elimination I assumed she was referring to Ben Shaw, one of our most popular models. I took a deep breath and dialed his number.
“Yeah,” a deep voice answered.
“Um, yes, hi. This is Emmy Clarke from Status. Fiona would like to see you today.”
“Okay.” He sounded mildly annoyed. “What time?”
I opened her calendar, silently cursing myself for not having that information ready. Thankfully my computer cooperated and quickly loaded the information. She was free all morning. “You can come in any time before noon.”
“Sure,” he replied. “I’ll be in later this morning.” He hung up without saying good-bye.
I sighed and returned the phone to its receiver. Okay then. Task one complete. That wasn’t so bad.
Now to take care of the few emails I had. I liked being privy to the inner workings of a modeling agency, and Status Model Management was one of the more powerful New York agencies, often winning seven-figure contracts with major advertisers. It had a fleet of fresh new faces to feed any executive’s desire. The unique thing, though, was that my boss, Fiona, who ran the agency, represented only male models. Fiona made it widely known she didn’t work well with females. She’d once said it was too much estrogen, or something like that.
As Fiona’s assistant, my job description included maintaining the agency database of models and passing their info on to her for specific jobs. Requests would come in for certain looks, hair color, eye color, height, and weight, and I would comb through the files to find the right beautiful men for the job before sending their headshots and files over to Fiona for approval. The position certainly had its perks. Ogling delicious man candy daily was the main one. Did that make me shallow? No. I didn’t think so. I’d had a bunch of crappy jobs and crappier relationships before all of this. If I wanted to be surrounded by completely delicious and highly unattainable men all day, I felt that was a God-given right. And getting paid to boot—yes, please. Sign me up.
It was my job to know the nitty-gritty details of each model, to help determine which one was right for each type of job—editorial, high fashion, fitness, lifestyle—before giving their comp cards to Fiona. This entitled me to intimate information on the couple hundred or so young men we worked with. Their shoe sizes, personality quirks, and even little-known facts, like that Nico couldn’t work with Sebastian because they’d once dated and it had ended badly. Or that Leo had a phobia about anything fluffy and couldn’t be around tulle or feathers.
I made sure things ran smoothly on set, and many times the photographers were worse than the models— demanding and pissy, with a tendency to degrade the models when they couldn’t get the shots they wanted. I’d already learned part of my job would be to act as a mediator, helping to smooth things over and finding out about the expectations of the photographer and explaining them to the model.
Of course, my biggest challenge was dealing with Fiona Stone, the ultra-British, ultra-bitchy head of Status Models. She was truly a rare breed. Somewhere between thirty and forty, she was stunningly beautiful. She definitely fit in among the pretty people working at the agency. Smart as a whip at business, but with the social skills and politeness of a mosquito. She was cunning, conniving, and most of all, ruthless. She negotiated hard for her models, often earning them higher rates and better contracts. But she ruled with an iron, though well- manicured, fist. And I had the distinct pleasure of dealing with her day in and day out. Lucky me.
My little desk sat right outside her office. From her immaculate red leather perch, she could glance up whenever she wanted and see my computer screen and whatever I might be looking at. So online shopping, catching up on Facebook, and personal emails were all a big no-no.
I’d applauded myself that I wasn’t the receptionist out front or one of the production assistants. They seemed even more miserable than I was. Nope, I’d landed the executive assistant position—yay me! Rolling my eyes, I remembered how extremely self-conscious I had been my first day among all the toned and stylish women already working here. Little did I know that working for Fiona would prove to be a special kind of torture. She criticized everything, from my brown hair to my nonexistent sense of style to my southern accent.
My first Friday night, I’d gone out to happy hour with Gunnar and a few of the other assistants. He’d informed me that Fiona didn’t hate me, that the sharp tongue was just part of her way. Apparently I’d already lasted longer than her previous three assistants combined. Gunnar was a production assistant and occasionally worked with Fiona, too, so he knew what I was talking about. After that pep talk, I’d convinced myself I could endure anything. I would win her over. I would succeed where others had failed. No way was I going to hang it up and crawl away with my tail between my legs. No ma’am. This was my first real job, and in New York City no less. I would make this work. And with the promise of the travel schedule taking us to Paris and Milan soon, I wanted to make this work. Back home, no one got opportunities like this. I would be stupid to quit just because I didn’t like my boss.
Fiona’s British accent cut through my thoughts like a siren. “Stop drooling over that boy, and get your arse in here.”
“Yes, Miss Stone?” I asked.
“Do you know what time it is?” Her expensively clad foot tapped the floor and she didn’t bother looking up from her computer screen.
Oh, shit. Was this a trick question? “Uh, it’s ten o’clock—”
She leaned back in her chair, peering at me intently. “And?”
