Page 35 of My Playboy Neighbor

Dom's phone buzzed again, this time with a text from Jake:Dom, we need to talk.Call me back.Urgent.

With a sigh, he dialed his agent's number.

"Finally," Jake said without preamble."Where the hell have you been?"

"Dealing with personal matters."

"Well, deal with them faster.We have a situation."Jake's voice was tense."I just got off the phone with Colleen Bryant.She wants to know why her photographer is no longer working on your campaign."

Dom's blood ran cold."What did you tell her?"

"Nothing, because I don't know what the hell happened.One day everything's fine, the next Maya Sunderly is requesting to be reassigned to other projects.Care to explain?"

He closed his eyes, guilt washing over him.Of course she would have had to explain her absence to Colleen.Of course there would be professional consequences to his personal meltdown.

"We had a disagreement about creative direction," he said carefully.

"Bullshit.Colleen said she specifically requested not to work with you anymore.What did you do?"

"We had different ideas about boundaries."

"Jesus Christ.Please tell me you didn't sleep with her."

Dom's silence was answer enough.

"For fuck's sake.Your career is hanging by a thread, and you're screwing around with the one photographer who might be able to save it?"

"It wasn't like that."

"Then what was it like?Because from where I'm sitting, it looks like you sabotaged the most important campaign of your career for a piece of ass."

"Don't."Dom's voice was deadly quiet."Don't talk about her like that."

Jake paused, clearly hearing something in Dom's tone that gave him pause."What’s going on?"

Dom couldn't answer.The truth was too complicated to explain over the phone to a man who measured everything in terms of profit and marketability.

"I need to fix this," he said instead.

"Fix what?The campaign or the girl?"

"Both."

Jake sighed heavily."Look, I don't know what went down between you two, but right now this shoot is your only shot at salvaging this mess.Whatever you did, whatever you said—you need to make it right.Because if this campaign fails, you're done.Not just temporarily sidelined, but completely finished."

After Jake hung up, Dom sat in the growing darkness, his agent's words echoing in his head.Maya was his only shot at saving his career, but more than that, she was the only person who'd ever looked at him and seen something worth saving.

And he'd thrown it all away because he was too scared to trust what she was offering.

Dom's laptop sat on his coffee table, still open to the folder Maya had sent him just after she left.He'd been avoiding it for two days, unable to face the evidence of his own vulnerability.Now, with nothing but empty hours stretching ahead of him, he found himself drawn to the screen.

The "Truth" folder contained dozens of images—professional shots from their sessions mixed with more intimate sketches and compositions.He clicked through them slowly, seeing himself through Maya's eyes for the first time.

There were images he didn't even remember her taking—candid shots of him between poses, moments when he'd forgotten to maintain his perfect facade.In Maya's lens, those unguarded moments weren't weaknesses to be hidden.They were revelations of humanity, glimpses of the man beneath the model.

One sketch in particular made him pause.It showed him in profile, his face turned toward an unseen light source, expression soft and vulnerable in a way he'd never allowed himself to be captured before.The artistry was stunning, but it was the obvious care in every line that undid him completely.

This wasn't exploitation.This was love made visible.

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