Melting the Ice(130)
She opened the door and shut it behind her before she did something incredibly stupid, like bursting into tears or asking him why he didn’t care enough about her to do this one thing that meant the world to her.
A taxi was just pulling around the corner, so she hailed it and it stopped. She’d gotten lucky, was hoping she wasn’t going to have to stand there under the windows of his apartment for twenty minutes waiting for an available cab. She climbed in and gave the driver her address, then sat back and thought about which of her models she was going to use for the print advertising.
There was no time to wallow in her misery, no time to think about herself. She had to get moving on the advertising campaign. Work had to take precedence.
When she got back to her apartment, she went to her model portfolios and brought them up on her computer, searching through each face, studying each body, imagining them wearing the briefs.
She’d have to scrap the shoot the way she’d envisioned it. Without Drew, it would no longer make sense. She’d have to come up with something else, something equally enticing.
Reaching into her bag for her sketchbook, she propped her feet up on the table and closed her eyes, letting her imagination have free rein.
The only problem was, her mind had gone completely blank.
• • •
DREW LEANED AGAINST THE WINDOW LEDGE AND watched Carolina get into the taxi and drive away.
He was such a dick. It would have cost him nothing but a few hours of his time to go ahead and do the advertising campaign. They’d already run through it once. He knew what to expect. And then it would be over, she’d have what she wanted, and he could go on and do his thing.
But hell, what would he promote for her? Certainly not a damn winning image. He wasn’t a winner. Not this season, anyway. She should go in another direction, get some famous model whose face would sell millions for her.
He sat on his sofa and dropped his chin to his chest. He felt washed-up and finished, like a loser. And it had been a long damn time since he’d felt that way. In college, when he’d struggled it had taken a kick in the ass from Bill Briscoe to remind him why he was there in the first place, and all the things that were worth fighting for.
Bill would kick his ass right now if he could see him sitting here in the dark feeling sorry for himself, when he should be trying to figure out what the problem was with his play, or with his team’s play.
Instead, he was blaming the woman he cared about. But hell, he was grasping here, and what else did he have to grab on to other than Carolina as an excuse for everything that was fucked up so far about this season?
Something else Bill would likely kick his ass over.
His stomach tightened at the thought of not having Bill around to seek advice from.
He grabbed his phone and dialed Ginger Briscoe’s cell. She answered on the third ring.
“Well, hello, Drew. How are you?”
“I’m doing fine, Miss Ginger. And you?”
“Hanging in there.”
He didn’t want to ask the question, but he had to know. “How’s Bill doing?”
“Hang on just a second, Drew.”
He heard rustling, then a door closing.
“He’s sleeping right now, so I didn’t want my talkin’ to wake him up. It’s not good, Drew. Doctors think the next week or two at most.”
Drew took a deep breath. “I’m sorry, Miss Ginger.”
“Nothin’ for you to be sorry about. It’s just his time. The nice doctors down here have done all they could but there’s nothin’ left to be done. It’s in God’s hands now.”