Read Beauty and the Geek (Gone Geek Book 1) for Free Online

rustling over the mic.
    Stephen ended the call and tossed his phone across the couch. It bounced off and onto the floor.
    Fuck.
    He already wanted to snatch it back, call her, tell her he’d changed his mind.
    But that would be falling into the same pattern that had never yielded what he needed. If he did that, she’d become another line on his list, and he didn’t want to add another.
    Instead, he got to his feet and went to his desktop. He deleted his user account on the adult site and uninstalled all of his chat clients. All of them. It took about fifteen minutes, but after two reboots—he was clean.
    Going cold turkey like this would suck, but he had to change his habits or this would keep happening. At least his mom would have one less way to bug him about coming home to visit. She’d discovered Skype four months ago, and it was the bane of his existence.
    Pam couldn’t contact him now. At least not without putting herself out there.
    Had she even been in that picture?
    The only way Pam, or whoever she was, had of contacting him, was his phone. He poured himself a drink and downed it, not yet ready to face the awful reality.
    He’d fallen for a woman he’d never met—wouldn’t know her if he passed her on the street—and once again, he wasn’t good enough. The only difference was this time it was worse. This time, he’d thought his face wouldn’t matter. Turned out he wasn’t worth getting even that far.
     

 
    4.
    Tamara held still while the techs stripped the suit off her. A good six hours of going through standing and fighting stances shouldn’t make her sweat, but the sensor-lined suit didn’t breathe at all. It was a good thing today’s agenda didn’t require her brain because her head wasn’t in today’s job. It was stuck in last night. That phone call. Fixing things with Piper.
    Her heart withered a bit more.
    How much could she fuck things up in one day?
    A lot, apparently.
    “Good job.”
    The director gave her a high five and handed her a towel.
    “Did we get it all?” She scrubbed her face and chest. The sports bra and shorts stuck to her like a second skin, but she’d had it worse. For appearances sake, she needed to at least seem interested what they were doing.
    “Yeah, want to see?” The director led her around to the screens where thousands of images in 3D form were captured in individual stills. Each one was her. Caught in thousands upon thousands of micro-movements.
    “So cool.”
    In time, the designers would mold and shape her 3D renderings into whatever the character was supposed to look like and be. Every time she did one of these body doubles the technology was better. A little more cutting edge. And she loved it. Even if the pay was crap and the hours were long. At least these guys always treated her well.
    They talked through the schedule for tomorrow before everyone started packing up. She grabbed her water and bag and slipped out the side door into the L.A. afternoon before anyone could ask her about Legend and Adam.
    The weight of the last two days came crashing back down.
    Tamara checked her phone just in case.
    Stephen was silent.
    Piper was ignoring her.
    Miranda was...conveniently busy.
    The only person taking her calls was Rashae.
    Tamara sighed, hooked her ear piece on and hit dial on Rashae’s number.
    “What?” she said after a single ring.
    “Hello to you, too.”
    “I’m busy. Some of us work for a living. What’s up?”
    “I’m leaving work. Which work are you working on?”
    “The fun job.”
    “Which fun job?” Tamara laughed. The only other person who really got her multiple jobs was Rashae, in part because their lines of business rivaled each other in number, depending on the given week.
    “I’ve got a Black Widow bodysuit due to mail out in…six hours. What do you want?”
    “Ah, today’s a sewing day?” Tamara unlocked her car and threw her bag into the passenger seat.
    “Talked to Piper?”
    “She’s not answering