“Sure! Be right back.” I take the loafers and walk off set, heading toward the back corner where the shoe closet is located. “Closet” doesn’t do the enormous space justice, but as the shoe collection grew, the name stuck.
Per usual, the room is dim and silent. The only time it’s needed is during shoot days, and we’ve been so busy with Milan prep, there’s been less and less formal photography. Everyone is busy with their individual tasks, so the crew today is small. One model, Esme, Peyton, and me.
I breathe in deep through my nose. After a busy morning, the quiet feels loud, in a blissful sort of way. I release my breath on a long exhale and turn to the side, fumbling for the light switch on the right side of the room. I shuffle forward so I don’t run into the wall, and run into warmth instead.
“Oof.”
Shit.“I’m sorry, I?—”
And all at once, I know that the cedarwood and leather scent isn’t the shoes. It’sGiovanni.
Colliding with him in the dark, feeling his breath on my forehead, reminds me that we’ve been here before. And instead of pulling away, I’m pulled under, into a memory of the first time we met. In this very room.
“Did this closet get smaller?”I asked the mystery man I just bumped into.
A deep voice responded. “Must be a design flaw.”
After two months on the job, I was confident I hadn’t heard this voice yet. I picked up a hint of an accent, just a light melodicsomethingdusted on top of his words. I wondered what department he worked in—who was he?
I began to panic as soon as I realized I was carrying freshly-dyed satin heels. “Fuck. I mean, oops. I came in here to put these away on the drying rack. Did I get any dye on your shirt?”
“If you did, I’ll just call it avant-garde.”
I grinned. “Perfect. I’ve always wanted my debut line to be stain-forward.”
“And I’ve always wanted to model.” The stranger flipped on the light, and… Of course, he had to be attractive. Why wouldn’t he be? My life was already chaotic enough, why not throw in a hot colleague with a lethal accent?
“Tessa.” The past loosens its hold on me with the sound of my name from Giovanni’s lips. “Did this closet get smaller?” he asks quietly.
“Design flaw,” I whisper.
“No dye this time, though.”
I wonder if we’re both remembering what we werebefore. The friendly teasing. The almost-flirty compliments.
I swallow. “Yeah. Well, I prefer my disasters to be limited to appliqué shapes now.”
Giovanni breathes out a laugh and shakes his head. We stand toe to toe, frozen in place. My head stays tilted up toward him, his eyes still locked on mine. The loafers start to feel heavy in my hands, but the complicated emotions coursing through my body feel heavier.
He hums before turning away and flipping on the light. When he faces me again, a rueful smile is on his face.
Squinting from the brightness, I quickly place the loafers on the shoe rack before locating the studded stilettos on the back shelf. As I reach for the heels, the door creaks open. Distant chatter sounds from the floor until the door closes, and I breathe a sigh of relief at being alone again. But when I turn around, Giovanni’s still standing there, a wistful look in his eyes.
“We had fun sometimes, didn’t we?”
My lips part in surprise as my heart falls to my stomach. After a moment of thoughtful silence, a gentle smile graces my lips. “Occasionally.”
Giovanni nods. “See you at the shop,” he says, the door closing behind him.
I stay in the closet for a few minutes, needing a bit of time to parse through my emotions and remember how to move my feet. When I rejoin the girls on the floor, I hand Esme the studded heels in silence.
Peyton frowns. “You good?”
I’m not sure how to conveyno, I just experienced an unwanted rush of nostalgia with the man who hurt me deeply two years ago, so I shrug.
“We have thirty minutes left with photography.” All three of us straighten at the sound of Lamont’s voice. His skin glistens under the fluorescent lighting with some sort of golden body shimmer. “Less talking, more working. Tessa, come with me.”
I speedwalk behind him in an attempt to keep up. Even though he’s much shorter and nearly thirty years older than I am, he’s very quick on his leather Ferragamo Oxford-clad feet. Hell, I run marathons, but somehow my quads always burn after chasing him around. As we pass by rows of garment racks, I manage to snag a notebook off a table.
