Dirty Old Men [And Other Stories] (Zane Presents) (32 page)

Outside the door of the hotel suite, Jason Polk had walked down the hallway and doubled back just in time to satisfy his suspicions. And he had heard enough. Once it got deadly quiet inside the room, he didn’t need to be a rocket scientist to figure out what was going on in there.

He nodded to himself and mumbled, “Okay…fuck ’em both.” Then he headed to the elevators to walk outside and catch a smoke.

“So the man is laying the pipe to her,” he continued to mumble, while awaiting the elevator’s arrival at the penthouse level. “Oh well. Somebody has to fuck her.”

But they could at least do this shit somewhere else and not on my time and professional space,
he reasoned.
And at least now I know this damn girl ain’t innocent. None of them are innocent in this business.

He reminded himself for the twentieth time to remain professional, and not to get too involved with any heartbreaking models that he worked with.

When Jason returned to the room, nearly an hour later, Arnold let him into the suite. He was neatly dressed as if nothing had happened.

“That was a long-ass smoke, Mr. Cameraman. I guess you had a lot on your mind out there,” he noted.

Jason smiled it off. “Well, you told me to take a break, right? So that’s what I did.”

He was forcing himself to take the high road and remain professional.

Arnold nodded. “Well, let me go on and get out of your hair,” he told his dutiful photographer. Then he looked back to Gabrielle. She was all wrapped
up in her golden robe on the bed, just as she was when Jason had started the shoot that evening.

“You two have a good time and finish up what you need for the shoot in here,” the boss told her. He looked back to Jason and added, “I’m sorry for disturbing you.”

Jason nodded and thought,
Yeah, save it for the birds.

When Arnold left them alone inside the room again, the flirtations between the photographer and model were no longer the same.

“So, where were we?” Gabrielle asked him. She attempted to start over where they had left off. But her energy seemed forced now, with a contrived smile. Or at least that’s how Jason read it. Since her innocence had been foiled, he had no more patience with her. It was only a job now.

“All right, well, we don’t have much time left before we end up in here all night. So let’s just undo the robe and take a walk around the room to see what jumps out at us.”

Gabrielle stared at him from the bed and hesitated as if she were awaiting a punch line. But when Jason detached his camera from the tripod to carry it around the room with him, she got the point. The man was all business now. His pleasure had been taken away.

At his private studio on the east side of Detroit, Jason developed the film from his five-hour shoot with Gabrielle in his small darkroom. He was still impressed with how photogenic she was.

“Damn, she photographs well!” he exclaimed. “And she doesn’t even know what the hell she’s doing yet.”

He figured his boss had found himself a winner in more ways than one. Nearly every picture of her looked good. So he began to separate the shots with the best stories. And his pants began to harden during the process.

“Damn, that’s never happened before,” he told himself. He rubbed his hard-on along the length of his jeans. “I guess you’re trying to tell me something. Are you the one?” he spoke to Gabrielle through her dozens of developed pictures.

He continued to rub his hard-on and sifted through the photos until he could no longer take it. He took a walk to his small bathroom and washed his hands in the sink, before pulling his pants and drawers down to masturbate with a glob of hand lotion.

“Are you the one to drive me crazy?” he asked himself as he worked his manhood. “But first, we gotta get rid of the boss. You’ll get rid of him for me,
won’t you?
You’ll do that for me,
right?
” he asked while he jerked himself.

Right as he reached the point of climax, his cell phone rang.

Jason looked down at the number on the phone that was attached to his pants. He grimaced.

“What the hell do you want this fast?” he questioned, reading Arnold Whittingham Jr.’s number. “I’m still working on this shit.”

He figured he’d call the publisher back as soon as he finished his business of fantasizing about Gabrielle.

“
Aaahhhhhh,
that’s the way it’s supposed to
feel,
right
there,
” he expressed as he aimed his cum into the open toilet.

He squeezed it all out and wiped himself off before he washed and dried his hands to call back his boss. “Hey, it’s Jason. I’m still working on picking them all out.”

“Good, so you’re there at the studio then. We’re on our way over,” the publisher responded to him in haste.

Jason frowned. “
Who’s
on the way over?”

“Gabrielle and me. She wanted to look at the raw pictures with us.”

“Hi, Jason. It was fun working with you again yesterday,” Gabrielle spoke into the cell phone on speaker mode.

Jason paused and thought it over.
They’re setting me the hell up with this shit,
he told himself.
Now he wants to rub the shit in my face that he’s fucking his star model.
Nevertheless, he was curious to see her again. And it wasn’t as if he could stop them. They were already on their way to his studio.

“Aaahh…all right, I guess I’ll see you guys when you get here.”

As soon as he hung up the line, he snapped, “Shit! Now how do I prepare for this.”

He decided to pull out his photography albums of his favorite models who could compete with Gabrielle. He wanted to show her that she was hardly
the only fine fish in the sea. By knocking her off her high horse with the boss, maybe he would have his own shot at her in a few more months.

When Arnold and Gabrielle arrived in the black Bentley, Jason invited them in with his favorite model albums strategically placed around the room, where they could easily be flipped through.

Gabrielle wore a light-brown sheepskin coat, with a fur hood and matching boots.

“Nice winter gear,” Jason told her. “That reminds me of a photo shoot I took of this hot French girl up in Canada a few years ago. I think I have her album over here somewhere.”

Gabrielle responded like clockwork. “Oh yeah, let me see it.”

Jason walked right over and grabbed it.

Arnold frowned at the idea. “Look, we don’t have time for that right now. We need to look at
her
pictures from yesterday. We’re on deadline here, remember?”

“Well, maybe I can invite you back over to look at some of my other work, when you have more time,” Jason offered to Gabrielle alone.

“Okay, I would like that.”

Arnold gave her a look, but held his thoughts. “All right, so what did you pick out for me to look at?”

Jason gave them the temporary album of Gabrielle’s photos, and he didn’t say a word. Arnold and the young model sat down on the sofa to view them.

“They all look so
good
,” Gabrielle gushed. “That’s good
work
.”

She looked up from the book at Jason and smiled.

“That’s what he gets paid the big bucks to do,” Arnold commented.

“Yeah, she takes great pictures, too. So I can’t take the credit for all of it.”

Gabrielle smiled again. “Thank you.”

Before they all got too comfortable inside the room, Arnold stood back up and was suddenly ready to leave. “All right, well, we’ll get back to you on it.”

Gabrielle didn’t seem ready to leave yet. She remained seated with her coat off.

“Let me see some of your other photo albums.”

As Jason moved to gather them for her, the boss responded, “For what?
We don’t have any time for that. I thought you told me you were hungry.”

“I mean, I am, but…”

Arnold cut her off, “Well, you better get this meal while you can
get it.
I have other things to do today.”

Jason shrugged. “I can order her something to eat. There’s plenty of restaurants that make deliveries around here.”

Arnold gave Jason a look suggesting he back off. He wanted to establish that Gabrielle was his playmate. There was no more need for secrecy.

“Look, now, the pretty lady said that she would accompany me to dinner this evening. Now if you don’t mind, Mr. Cameraman…”

Gabrielle got the point and stood up to leave.

“Well, yeah, I did promise him, so maybe another time. Okay, Jason?”

Jason shrugged again. “Sure.”

All he had was time. And he planned to work his way into her skin, little by little, like her pictures had worked their way into his skin. The young woman was toxic, and the erotic thoughts of her would not easily go away.

However, as the days turned to weeks, and the weeks turned into months, with Jason assigned to work with Gabrielle on several new projects, he grew increasingly testy about their relationship, mainly because he still could never seem to get close enough to touch her. The shit was driving him crazy, just as he had expected it would. Her developing photo album had quickly become his new favorite, and he was growing tired of jerking off to it. He wanted the real got’ damned thing!

But as he began to grow sour toward her, Gabrielle was finally forced to ask him, “Jason, why have you been so…
snappy
toward me lately? I thought that we were becoming good
friends.
What’s been up with you?”

She was even dropping the heavy-handed “friend” word on him, which was the kiss of death for any eager man with a crush on a woman. But it was no use. The old, sly boss, with his magazine, money and bullying attitude, had an obvious vise-lock
grip
on the damn girl. And Jason was finally fed up enough to say something to her about it. Her relationship with “Arnie” had not ended like he had expected it to
months
ago. So he let her have it. She had asked him for it.

“I mean, how long do you expect to sleep with him? Don’t you think
about having someone your own age? Wake up and smell the Starbucks. He has a
wife
and
four
grown kids! And you have no
future
with that man. I’m just being
real
here!”

At first, Gabrielle seemed shocked. She was speechless. But then she smiled, and her smile turned into a chuckle. Then her chuckle turned into a full laugh inside of Jason’s studio. The photographer couldn’t understand it.

“What the hell is so funny about that?” he asked.

“Well, for a minute there, it almost seemed like you were
jealous.
”

The idea seemed alien to her, as if she had no clue that Jason may have desired her.

He looked at her perplexed. “As a matter of fact, I
am
jealous,” he admitted. “I have to look at your pictures nearly every day now. And frankly, it’s killing me, especially with how you seem to act so open to me all of the time. Just act like a normal fucking
model,
if you don’t like me. You don’t have to bullshit me with the niceties. That’s only making things
worse.
So let’s just keep it professional, if you wanna keep going off and fucking that man.”

Gabrielle covered her face with both hands as if she were embarrassed by his outburst.

“Oh my
God!
Jason, I had no idea.
Honestly!
”

Jason calmed down a bit. Maybe he had overeacted. However, he had been waiting a long time for something to start off between them. And it never did.

“Yeah, I just needed to get my feelings out in the open. I’m sorry for going off on you like that.”

Gabrielle nodded and reached out to hold his hands. She seemed totally understanding of him now. “Well, have you ever told him?”

Jason frowned. “Of course not. Why would I tell him that? You two have had something going for a while now. I figured it would fade away after awhile. I mean, it’s all based on superficiality. It’s only skin deep.”

Gabrielle nodded, while still holding on to his hands.

“So, you figure that what you have for him is much deeper?”

Jason paused. “What?” He wasn’t able to follow her logic. Maybe she had mixed up her words.