Chapter 1: The First Whiskey and the First Suggestion
The air in my new apartment still smelled like bleach and somebody else’s life. Cardboard boxes slumped against the walls, defeated. I’d been in Kansas City for five days, and the shine was already wearing off. The job applications were piling up in my email sent folder, each one a tiny ghost haunting my laptop.
A text buzzed. Jake from the bar. He’d remembered my name.
He’d given me a free gin and tonic my third night in town, his smile a crooked flash of white in the dim light of his father’s place. Said he liked my accent. Said he could show me around. I’d figured it was a line, but right now, a line felt like a lifeline.
“Come by after nine,” his text read. “Tell Chuck you’re meeting me.”
The bar’s neon sign bled a dull red through the evening haze. Inside, the air was thick with the smell of stale beer and fried onions. Country music twanged softly from a jukebox. It wasn't the kind of place my marketing professors had pictured me networking in. Chuck, a grizzled walrus of a man behind the stick, just nodded me towards the back when I said Jake’s name.
The rear booth was a cave of dark leather and shadow. A single low-hanging chandelier cast a dim, honeyed light over the scarred table. Jax—he’d told me to call him Jax—was already there, one arm slung across the back of the booth. He unfolded himself as I approached, that same easy smirk playing on his lips.
“Cindy Blake. You came.”
“You invited me.”
“Lots of people get invited. Doesn’t mean they show.” He gestured for me to sit. He was thin, sharp angles under a black t-shirt, tattoos creeping down both arms in intricate, snarling patterns. He looked like trouble my mother had warned me about. My pulse thrummed a weak, traitorous agreement.
He didn’t ask what I wanted. He lifted a finger and a waitress appeared with two glasses of amber liquid, no ice. He slid one to me.
“What is it?”
“Whiskey. The good stuff. My dad keeps it for special guests.” He watched me, his eyes dark and unblinking. “Try it. Don’t sip it like a bird. Take a real drink.”
The glass was heavy. The smell hit me first—oak and smoke and a sharp, medicinal tang. I tilted it back and let the liquid touch my lips. It was a fire that started on my tongue and poured a slow, burning path down my throat. I coughed, my eyes watering.
Jax laughed, a low, pleased sound. “There you go. That’s a real taste.”
I set the glass down, my throat raw. “It’s strong.”
“Good things usually are.” He leaned forward, elbows on the table, closing the space between us. The noise of the bar faded into a distant hum. “So. Kansas City. How’s it treating the girl with the green eyes?”
“It’s… fine.” I traced the condensation on my glass. “Slower than I thought. The job thing.”
“Jobs.” He said the word like it was a joke. “Sitting in a cubicle, begging for a three percent raise. That what you went to school for?”
A flush crept up my neck. It was what I’d gone to school for. “It’s stable. It’s normal.”
“Normal.” His smirk widened. He reached across the table, not for my hand, but for my wrist. His fingers were long, cool. They settled lightly over my pulse point. I could feel my own heartbeat jumping against his touch. “Normal is for people who don’t have other options. You have options.”
“What options?”
He didn’t let go of my wrist. His thumb moved in a tiny, slow circle. “I’ve got friends. In different industries. Photography.Fashion. Some of it’s online, high-end stuff. They’re always looking for a certain… type.”
I took another drink of the whiskey. This time the burn was less of a shock. It was a warmth spreading in my stomach, a dulling of the sharp edges in the room. “What type?”
“The girl-next-door type. But not the boring one. The one you look at and wonder about.” His eyes traveled over my face, my hair, my bare shoulders. It wasn’t a boyfriend’s gaze. It was an appraisal. I should have pulled my wrist away. I didn’t. “That innocent look. That freshness. It’s a commodity. In the right hands, it’s worth a fortune.”
A fortune. The word hung in the smoky air. It whispered of rent paid on time, of student loans erased, of not having to call my parents with that tight, fake cheer in my voice.
“Modeling?” My voice sounded small.
“A kind of modeling.Adult. Tasteful, artistic. But adult.” He said it plainly, watching for my reaction. “The sites are exclusive. High subscription fees. It’s not the back-alley stuff you’re imagining. It’s a business. A lucrative one.”
I finally pulled my wrist back. The skin where he’d touched felt strangely cool. “I don’t know.”
“Of course you don’t. It’s new.” He leaned back, taking his warmth with him, becoming a silhouette against the dark wood. “Think about it. What’s your marketing degree really for? It’s for selling. This is just selling a different product. Yourself.Your image. On your terms.”
On my terms. That part hooked into something deep.Control. Agency. Everything I felt slipping away in this new city.
“I wouldn’t know where to start.”
“You start with me.” He finished his whiskey in one smooth tilt of his head. “I make the introductions. I vet the photographers. I take a manager’s cut, of course.Fifteen percent. For that, you get a guide.Protection. You don’t walk into the lion’s den alone.”
He signaled for two more drinks. The waitress brought them without a word. This time, I picked up the glass myself. The second drink went down easier. The room softened. Jax’s sharp edges seemed less dangerous, more… interesting. He was a door. A very dark, very forbidden door. All I had to do was push it open.
“What would I have to do?”
“A test shoot.Nothing crazy. Lingerie, maybe. See how you photograph. See if you can take direction.” He let the words settle. “The camera either loves you or it doesn’t. From where I’m sitting, I’d bet it loves you.”
The flattery was a blanket, smothering my doubts. He saw something in me. Something valuable. My professors had seen a competent student. My parents saw a daughter who needed caution. Jax saw an asset.
“Okay.” The word left my mouth before my brain could catch it.
His smile wasn’t kind. It was triumphant. “Okay.”
He slid out of the booth and stood. “Finish your drink. I’ll make a call.” He walked toward the back hall, pulling a phone from his pocket. I was alone with the empty glasses and the thud of my own heart.
I looked down at my hands.They were steady. I finished the whiskey, the heat of it finally comfortable inside me. It felt like a decision. It felt like a beginning, even as a cold, thin thread of fear wound itself around my spine.
He came back a few minutes later. “Tomorrow. Three PM. A studio downtown. I’ll pick you up.” He wrote an address on a napkin. His handwriting was jagged, rushed. “Wear something simple. Black. They’ll do your hair and makeup.”
“Tomorrow,” I echoed, folding the napkin into a tiny, thick square.
He walked me to the door, his hand a light pressure on the small of my back. The night air hit me, cool and shocking after the bar’s warmth.
“Welcome to the real world, Cindy Blake,” he said, his voice a low murmur by my ear. Then he turned and vanished back into the glow of the bar, leaving me on the sidewalk with a napkin in my fist and a new, uncertain fire in my blood.
The walk home was longer. The city sounds seemed louder. Every passing car felt like a witness. I clutched the napkin so tightly the edges cut into my palm. It wasn’t just an address. It was a threshold. And I had already agreed to step across it.