Alphas of Seduction

by Victoria Blue

  Tressa laughed at my explanation. “And then you two just happened to spend the night together consoling each other.”

  The truth was far less appealing than my excuse. The model I’d shot that day had told me over a few too many drinks that her mother had died recently, and I’d sort of implied that I understood how that felt. Well, I’d done more than implied.

  But not to get her into bed. Christ, I was a man-whore, but I didn’t need to kill off my own mother to get a woman.

  Closing my eyes, I asked, “What do you want to keep your mouth shut about this, Tressa? Tell me so I can get back to my life.”

  Just then I heard a voice and knew things had just gotten so much worse. “Why is it every time I see you, Ethan, you aren’t wearing a shirt? Doesn’t your job require you to wear clothes?”

  I looked up at the screen and saw my mother staring back at me. Her blue eyes seemed to sparkle just like they had when I was a little boy. A hint of a smile told me maybe she wasn’t furious with me.

  “It’s not even ten in the morning, Mom. Remember, I’m not in the country at the moment.”

  She nodded and gave me a warm smile. “Oh, that’s right. How is the shoot going, honey?”

  Smiling, I tried to stifle a chuckle. I’d had a great time, and very little of it had to do with taking pictures.

  “Great, Mom.”

  She began to talk about the next time I’d be back in New York and abruptly stopped. “Did you get yet another tattoo?”

  I looked down at my arms and torso and smiled. Lifting my left arm, I pointed to the sleeve I’d just had completed in the past month. “Yeah. What do you think?”

  She didn’t answer and instead simply smiled for a moment. “I remember when you were a baby. You had the softest skin. I used to blow raspberries on your belly and arms, and you’d giggle so cute.”

  Her reminiscing about my time as a baby made me roll my eyes. Twenty-five years old and she’d never accepted that I was a grown man. She seemed fine with my sisters, but with me, I was still her baby. Even though we were all the same age.

  “Well, I better go, Mom.”

  Her expression turned dark, and she shook her head. “Not until we have a conversation about how disturbing it is for me to hear of my untimely demise, Ethan Stone. Imagine my surprise when I heard at the art museum opening last week that my son is telling people I’ve passed on. Perhaps you can explain what that’s about?”

  I sat silently, so she said, “You know, your father would be furious if he heard about this. He still thinks you should go back to school and finish getting your business degree so you can take over Stone Worldwide. I’ve made excuses for you because I like to think you’re taking after me with your photography, but I’m not a fool, Ethan.”

  “I’m sorry, Mom. I’m sure the person simply misunderstood what I meant. I promise it won’t happen again.”

  She smiled again and shook her head. “Ethan, your father never resorted to these kinds of antics and never had to worry about attracting women. You’ve been blessed with his looks, so you don’t have to act that way either to find a nice girl.”

  The last thing I wanted was a nice girl. Nice girls were boring.

  “From the way he talks, there wasn’t anyone before you.”

  “Don’t try that flattery on me. I know you better.”

  “Things were different back then, Mom. You wouldn’t understand.”

  “Things like that don’t change, Ethan. Now I will keep this latest issue between us, but if I get the sense that you aren’t taking your job seriously, I will tell him.”

  “What about Tressa? She probably called him at work to tell him this afternoon.”

  “She won’t say a thing. Now be a good son and tell me we’ll see you back home here soon.”

  “I will, Mom.”

  She leaned in and frowned. “And tell me you’ll find a nice girl and settle down.”

  I didn’t want to lie to her face, so I smiled and said, “Love you. Tell Dad and Diana I said hi and I’ll see them soon.”

  “I love you, honey. See you soon.”

  My mother walked away and Tressa’s head popped up onto the screen. “I’ll just add this to the list of things I can blackmail you with. Don’t worry. I won’t tell Dad. Unlike you, Ethan, I love our father.”

  Once more, I rolled my eyes. “Did I ever happen to mention that you’re my least favorite sister?”

  “It’s less favorite, and yes, you’ve mentioned it once or twice. Now be nice and stop killing off our mother or you should expect the long arm of Tristan Stone to reach across the ocean and pluck you right off whatever beach you’re spending your days on.”

  The screen went dark and I cracked my neck and shoulders. This was why I spent my time on another continent.

  I knew my mother well enough to understand that her request for me to find a nice girl to settle down with was more than a hopeful wish. It seemed that my time as a single man enjoying life now had an expiration date.

  But the last thing I wanted to do was settle down with anyone. I was only twenty-five, for God’s sake. Why the hell did I need to stop living like I wanted to?

  The answer to that was simple. I knew all too well what could happen if I didn’t appear to be conforming to the life I was expected to live as the only son of Tristan and Nina Stone.

  I also knew that perception was reality, so maybe all I had to do was look like I was settling down. My parents would be happy, and that would mean I could continue living my life like I wanted.

  Pleased with my brilliant plan, I walked out onto the balcony and looked down on the beach below filled with gorgeous women in barely there string bikinis. All I needed to do was find one who could pull off the nice thing and make my family believe I was living the life they wanted me to.

  And if she was anything other than a nice girl in private, all the better.

  Chapter 2

  Summer

  For the third time in five minutes, Julia Carmon, the editor of Belle magazine and my boss, explained how important the beach shoot that day was to the May swimsuit issue eight months from now. I didn’t need to have her lecture me yet again, but I knew better than to interrupt her. I’d done that once and had no intention of making that mistake a second time.

  “I don’t want any screw-ups, Summer. You make sure the models are on time for this shoot or you’re going to have a lot of time on your hands. Do you understand me?”

  She didn’t have to threaten me with unemployment. I understood her just fine.

  “Yes. You don’t have to worry. The models and the photographer and everything will be perfect. I have this, Julia. You can relax and know that things are under control here.”

  “You better,” she snapped. “If I have to jump on a plane and fly nearly a goddamned day to that damn beach, heads will roll, and yours will be the first one.”

  “You don’t have to worry. I’ll call you when it’s all over, and I promise you’ll be thrilled, Julia.”

  My boss gave her usual harrumph ending to our conversation and then the call ended without even the hint of a polite goodbye. And thus was my life. I loved my job, but I hated my boss. With a passion. Like the kind of hate you have when someone kills your entire family.

  Well, not exactly that kind of hate. My hate for Julia was more like the kind of feeling you experience when you have to spend any amount of time around someone who is the most miserable and nasty person you’ve ever met. You know the feeling. Your stomach cramps up and makes you want to double over. Your chest tightens, and you want to tell them to go fuck themselves.

  Yeah, that’s what my boss made me feel.

  I knew I had to pay my dues, though. This wasn’t my first job out of school, and I understood full well how lucky I was to be the assistant to the editor of Belle magazine. This was one of the first rungs on my ladder to success, so I had to suffer through Julia and her constant mood swings for better things in the future.

  Actually, her
mood stayed the same with me all the time. Completely and utterly nasty. I might like it if her mood swung to something else sometimes.

  I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “The lower rungs are tough, Summer, but you’re tougher. You can handle this.”

  In all honesty, the toughest part of the job was dealing with my boss. My responsibilities this morning involved making sure all the models got to where they needed to be on time and the photographer got all the pictures he would need. It wasn’t exactly rocket science, and for a girl who’d graduated summa cum laude from Bryn Mawr, it wouldn’t be hard at all.

  I mean, how difficult could it ever be to corral a bunch of giant stick figures onto the beach? All I’d need was a single sandwich and I could probably lead them like the Pied Piper halfway around the world.

  Chuckling to myself over my skinny model joke, I headed down to the staging area to begin gathering up the models. Today’s shoot had five scheduled, which wasn’t many at all. I hadn’t checked the name of the photographer, but rarely did they present any problems. In fact, the only issues I’d ever had on any of these assignments was the rare model-boyfriend relationship blowup. Those tended to be a nightmare, so I hoped we’d have none of that today. The last thing I wanted to deal with was some weepy model with her nose running all over her face or some despondent boyfriend who just found out he’d been replaced and his girlfriend just got around to telling him after he traveled halfway around the world to see her.

  I stepped out of the hotel into the morning heat and saw three of the five models. So far, I was batting six hundred. Not bad.

  Waving at the leggiest brunette I’d ever seen, I yelled over, “Emma, can you come over here?”

  Naturally, she was named Emma. Trendy, ugly older name perfect for one of the most beautiful women in the world. Only women who had been named by mothers channeling their hippy sides had names like mine.

  Summer. I’d loved my name when I was a child. It was only when I got to school that I realized that nobody else was named after a season. I guess it could have been worse. That girl named Apple in my second-grade class had a long haul to look forward to with her name. Not trendy, old, or lyrical, it sounded stupid and offered no good nicknames. Who wanted to be called App?

  Emma trotted over to where I stood and flashed me a perfect smile as she looked down at me and all my five foot six stature. She towered over me at nearly six foot, so I had to crane my neck to look up at her.

  “Did you see Sarah and Ashley before you came down? We need to start on time. Have you seen the photographer yet?” I asked as the woman stared down at me with a vacant look in her eyes.

  “I don’t think so. Let me ask Maddie.”

  Before I could get her to clarify exactly what that answer referred to—the models or the photographer—she turned around and yelled, “Did you see Sarah or Ash this morning, Maddie? Summer’s looking for them.”

  Maddie simply shook her head, making her blond hair swing around her shoulders. So much for her helping.

  Emma turned back to face me and shrugged. “She hasn’t seen them, either.”

  “What about the photographer?”

  Suddenly, the vacant look in Emma’s eyes disappeared, replaced by a sparkle I knew couldn’t have anything to do with me since she was now looking over my head at something behind me. I turned around and saw a man as he strode through the hotel door. Tall, he wore a white button-down shirt and tan pants and looked like he belonged at a model shoot himself.

  Just not one I had to manage.

  “I think you have the wrong location. I saw a shoot a little farther down the beach,” I said as he stopped to give Emma the once-over.

  The man stopped gazing at Emma like she held the answer to some long mystery he’d pondered and smiled at me in a way that made me feel like I was melting. “I’m the photographer, but thanks for the compliment.”

  The photographer?

  The idea that this guy had been blessed far too many times in life instantly ran through my head. Gorgeous looks and body, talent enough to snag an assignment with Belle magazine, and he got to work with models all the time?

  He was probably the cockiest son of a bitch going, too. Ugh. Just what I needed. Was it so much to ask that this shoot go smoothly so Julia didn’t tear me a new one afterward?

  “Ready to make some magic, girls?” he said as he walked away without even giving me a chance to introduce myself.

  Emma giggled and started to follow him out onto the beach, but I stopped her and asked, “Who is this guy? What’s his name?”

  She looked at me like I’d grown another head. “That’s Ethan Stone. He’s done some of the biggest shoots in the business this year. Shouldn’t you know that?”

  As the words Fuck you, Emma rushed through my mind, she turned on her heel and hurried over to where this Ethan Stone stood on the sand. Yes, I knew the name and what he’d accomplished this year, but I’d never seen a picture of him, so no, I didn’t know that was him.

  And I didn’t need Emma the stick figure to point that fact out.

  Sarah and Ashley came through the door behind me full of giggles and smiles and ran out to join the other models and Ethan. At least I didn’t need to be model wrangler this morning.

  “Okay, we’ve got the models, the photographer, the stylist, and me, your host for this lovely day. Models, please follow me to get changed into your outfits. We don’t have all day, so let’s get this going!”

  By the time the shoot had finished, I was questioning whether I really wanted to keep this job. Maybe it would be better if Julia fired me. At least then I could find a position that didn’t involve so many models. Between getting them to the shoot and then making sure they did exactly as the photographer wanted, it felt more like directing recess at a daycare than managing a photo shoot.

  Then again, the job did give me the chance to travel the world. That was a good thing. It was just what I had to do in those exotic places that I wasn’t sure I liked anymore.

  I made my obligatory call to my boss as I gathered up the last of the wardrobe changes and the sun began to dip below the horizon. At least I had good news to give her.

  “Julia, the shoot went off without a hitch. The models looked gorgeous, and the pictures are going to be incredible. I just know it.”

  “Wonderful! Now tell me the truth. Did you have any problems at all? I want to know if you did, Summer.”

  She always asked that, and when I first began as her assistant, I used to tell her the truth. Now I was a lot smarter. Julia didn’t need to know about the breakdown Ashley had that shut down the shoot for a half hour when she stubbed her toe on a shell and fell face first into the sand. She also didn’t need to know that I was pretty sure Ethan Stone saw his job as his own buffet of potential women to have sex with, even if he did seem to have some talent at taking pictures.

  Nope. She didn’t need to know about any of the minor issues I handled all day. All Julia needed to know about today’s shoot was that it had been a success. What it took to get it to that place could be kept behind the curtain like a magician’s secrets.

  “Nothing out of the ordinary that I couldn’t handle. Trust me. You’re going to love what we did here today. I can’t wait to hear how you don’t know which shot to use for the cover. It was that good.”

  “Excellent! Well, I want you on a plane and back here first thing Monday morning. We’ve got a lot of work to get done so that issue looks as good as you think it can.”

  I didn’t protest her order to be back in New York not even forty-eight hours from that moment, even though just the thought of another twelve-hour flight made me groan. Since it was eight o’clock Sydney time, that meant I’d have exactly…

  My brain was too tired to figure that out. All I knew was I’d have less than a day to relax before I had to go back to work.

  The lower rungs are tough, Summer, but you’re tougher. You can handle this.

  Chapter 3

  Ethan
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br />   The hotel bar sat practically empty, even though it wasn’t yet midnight. I’d worked far too fucking hard on the shoot that day to not enjoy myself, but at the moment, the only people who joined me were a middle-aged couple at the end of the bar who couldn’t keep their hands off one another.

  I gave the guy a wink as if to say, “Good for you, man,” and told the bartender to get them both a drink on me. Although I wasn’t enjoying myself, that didn’t mean I didn’t like seeing other people having a good time.

  My conversation with my mother from earlier that morning settled back into my brain, and I sadly realized I likely wouldn’t be having many more good times if I didn’t find some way to fool my family into thinking I’d settled down. Twenty-five and they wanted me to act like I was twice that age. Christ.

  Normally, I’d be taking advantage of the perks of my job and enjoying the company of one of the models by this point in the night. That’s what I should have been doing instead of stewing over a beer that tasted like a wallaby’s ass.

  All I had to do was find someone who could look the part of a nice girl for long enough to fool my family. She’d have a good time in the process courtesy of yours truly, and then when we parted ways, my parents and sisters would feel bad that I was all heartbroken and let me live my life.

  The plan was foolproof. Now all I had to do was find the perfect girl. Since I’d be sleeping with her, even for a short time, she had to be at least good-looking. More importantly, she had to appear to be nice.

  Nice. Even the sound of the word in my head made me cringe.

  I think I resented my father over this settling-down-with-a-nice-girl thing the most. From all the stories I’d ever heard, my mother was the quintessential nice girl when she was young, so she could be expected to think I should find someone just like her. My sisters had the same excuse, although I had a sneaking suspicion that Tressa was anything but nice when she wasn’t around all of us.

  And Diana? Well, she’d been a nice girl and what the hell had that gotten her? Nothing good.