Beautiful Burn (The Maddox Brothers, #4)(27)

Sterling laughed once. “I remember that story.” He was quiet for half a second. “You’re right. We’re f*cked.”

I closed my eyes. My lips skimmed the speaker as I spoke. “This is not we. I don’t want to talk to you anymore, Sterling. You’re on your own.”

“Ellie…”

I hung up the phone and sighed, pushing away from the desk and gathering my things for lunch with Jojo.

She was standing by the door waiting for me when I rounded the corner. I followed her to her Outback and ducked inside, hugging myself for warmth. Jojo seemed oblivious to the cold, twisting the ignition like she wasn’t wearing huge sleeping bags for gloves.

“You brought your camera, right?” she asked.

I held up my bag.

“I figured we’d try Camp’s Café. The food isn’t farm-to-table or organic or any of that shit, so it’s tourist free, and one of the quieter places, so I can show you some tricks on your Nikon. I’m excited to see what you can do. You seem like a natural.”

I laughed once.

“What?” Jojo asked, pulling out onto the road and poking at the heater setting with her mittens.

“That’s what Finley said. My sister.”

“Well, she was right. Maybe we can start covering things other than the farmer’s market and wandering wildlife.”

Jojo parked in the alley in a space meant for the townhouses spanning the entire block. She didn’t seem to be worried, stepping out and slamming the car door. We walked together, and I followed her past dumpsters and oil vats through a dirty screen door into the back kitchen.

“Jojo!” one of the cooks called.

Jojo waved, and then gestured for me to follow her past the pantry area, beyond the grill, and then the cash register.

“The same!” Jojo called. “Two!”

The woman behind the counter nodded and yelled back to her staff. “Two Jojos!”

We pulled off our coats, scarves, gloves, and hats, and sat them beside us in a booth by the window.

“You have your own sandwich? That’s kind of cool.”

“Not really. I just order the same thing every time, and you’re going to love it, too. A fried biscuit with avocado, a medium fried egg on top, and their special sauce. It’s Korean or something, which is weird for a country cooking kind of place, but it’s f—it’s good. Trust me.”

I frowned. That didn’t sound appetizing at all, but it was a free meal and better than turkey meat on plain wheat bread, so I wasn’t going to complain.

I handed Jojo my camera, and she told me all about exposure, aperture, shutter speed, and ISO. She had me play around with the different creative modes on the camera—the P, A, S, and M—showed me how they were used, and then educated me on why they were superior to the icon modes.

By the time I scarfed down the weird but delicious Jojo biscuit, I was already adjusting the camera and taking a few shots of the café and outside.

Jojo clicked through them, shaking her head. I bit my nails, waiting for judgment.

“Ridiculous,” she said. She handed me back my camera. “You really have an eye. Wick is going to shit, because he’s getting ready to lose his assistant.”

“No,” I said, waving her away. “Really?”

Jojo grinned, putting her elbows on the table and leaning in. “Really. You’ll still be helping at the office and cleaning his coffee table, I’m sure, but you’re going to be great. I can tell.”

“I’m not a journalist. I can’t write. I paid someone to do my papers in college.”

Jojo made a face. “You had to write papers for a degree in ceramics?”

I closed my eyes, embarrassed. “Yes.”

Jojo cackled, and I laughed with her, really laughed, for the first time in a long time.

“Thank you,” I said, trying to catch my breath. “I didn’t know I could laugh like that sober.”

Jojo rested her chin on the heel of her hand. “I know you’re supposed to be some kind of family f*ck-up, but you’re not that bad. I can’t imagine you’ve changed that much in a month.”

“It’s amazing what detox and responsibility will do for a girl,” I said, only half-teasing.

“You’ve been doing so well. Not one slip-up.”

“It’s hard to drink or buy weed when you’re broke. And even if I had, I wouldn’t tell my boss.”

“I’m not your boss, and you’re not a liar. It’s not just about the money, Ellie, and it’s kind of sad, because I’ve been watching you work so hard, you’re still waiting to get it wrong.”

“That’s not true,” I said, shaking my head and fidgeting with my water glass.

Jojo breathed out a small laugh, and then began gathering her things. “Let’s go. You have work to do.”

Jojo dropped me off a block from the magazine, and I bent down, glaring at her through the open passenger side window. The exhaust was puffing from the back of her car, and my breath didn’t look much different.

“Really? Is this photography Survivor? It’s like nine degrees.”

Jojo waved at me. “There are some interesting things this way. I want to see how you see it.”

“Fine.”