Total pages in book: 125
Estimated words: 119964 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 600(@200wpm)___ 480(@250wpm)___ 400(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 119964 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 600(@200wpm)___ 480(@250wpm)___ 400(@300wpm)
What can I say about Chess Copper? The woman is capable of bringing me to my knees. I know this about five minutes after getting naked for her.
No one is more surprised than me. The prickly photographer my team hired to shoot our annual charity calendar isn’t my usual type. She’s defense to my offense, a challenge at every turn. But when I’m with her, all the regrets and darkness goes away. She makes life fun.
I want to know Chess, be close to her. Which is a bad idea.
Chess is looking for a relationship. I’ve never given a woman more than one night. But when fate leaves Chess without a home, I step up and offer her mine. We’re roommates now. Friends without benefits. But it’s getting harder to keep our hands off each other. And the longer we live together the more I realize she’s becoming my everything.
Trick is… Now that I’ve made her believe I’m a bad bet, how do I convince her to give this player a true shot at forever?
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
One
Chess
When the promise of spending hours in the presence of hot, fit, and famous naked men fails to excite me, it’s time to concede that I’ve hit a new level of apathy.
Last year, I’d been in a similar situation—all the naked men, so much hotness to immortalize in pictures—and I practically jumped out of my skin with anticipation. Much like my friend James is right now.
“I think you’re going to have to give me a ‘bitch, be cool’ lecture,” James says as he slowly blows a tendril of smoke into the air.
Curled up on a rattan love seat on the opposite side of my balcony so I don’t get a face full of his cigarette smoke, I can’t help but laugh. “Why is that?”
James, resplendent in a lime-green suit, complete with acid yellow bow tie, rolls his eyes. “Don’t be coy, Chess. It isn’t a good look on you.”
I’m mildly interested in knowing what “coy” looks like on me, but I don’t bite; I know perfectly well why James is freaking out. It’s cute, though he’d hate it if I told him so.
Instead, I shrug and flick a dead fern leaf off the seat cushion. “You’re seriously this excited because we’re going to photograph a bunch of naked football players?” I shake my head, as if I’m completely clueless. “We work with some of the most beautiful people in the world. The body is nothing more than shapes and shadows to me at this point.”
Not that this will matter to James. The moment I’d told him we were doing a calendar shoot for New Orleans’s NFL team, that all the top players would be participating not only in a photoshoot but a nude one, James had gone into fanboy hissy-fit mode. For him, that usually means chain-smoking and talking nonstop.
At this point, James is so worked up, he doesn’t seem to notice that I’m leading him along. He snorts as he takes another drag, squinting at me through the smoke.
“Naked I can handle. Shit, I kept it together quite nicely when I had to stick rhinestones on Gianna’s breasts, with her nipples all but staring at me while I worked.”
“They were fantastic breasts,” I admit, remembering the stunning model and how James had turned beet red up to the roots of his auburn hair.
James is in charge of makeup and styling for our models. He’s a consummate professional, but he’s not immune. Some of the models, be they women or men, turn him on.
Unlike me; I’ve been so apathetic this past year, I’m fairly certain a guy could wave his dick in my face during a shoot and I wouldn’t respond. Professionalism aside, it’s not exactly a good thing. In truth, it’s a little worrisome.
Years of shitty dating experiences and not one glimmer of commitment have left me feeling defective and brittle. On the bright side, I have a job I love and a loft condo in New Orleans, my favorite city. My life is fulfilling and, frankly, just getting warmed up. Still, I can’t seem to escape these bouts of lethargy.
James, unaware of my inner turmoil, nods as if remembering Gianna, but then sighs. “Tits are nothing compared to this torment, Chess. We’re talking NFL players here. My home team.” He fans himself. “Jesus, I might actually blush, or fucking stammer, or something equally mortifying.”
“Ah, right.” As if I’d forgotten what an extreme football fan James is. During the season, he goes on about team records and playoff chances and who fucked up what play, or who is his complete hero because of one win, until I’m ready to tear my arm off just to hit him with it. “The struggle is real, eh?”