Taking Shots (Assassins, #1)(3)

After packing everything on the carts, they started pushing them down the hall towards the car. After three trips, they had everything packed, so they started walking towards their cars when Harper’s phone rang, Elli didn’t even stay back to listen. She kept walking with a wave to Harper as she cooed into the phone.

Once in her F-150 (hey, trucks aren’t just for boys), she drove off towards the west end of Nashville to get on the interstate. She’d planned to ask Harper if she could stay the night with her since she was stupid tired and didn’t want to drive for forty five minutes, but since it looked like Harper was gonna be busy, she decided to go home. Elli hit the interstate, preparing herself for the drive. It was probably good that she was going home. She had forgotten to call Ally, her neighbor, to let the dog out.

When Elli had bought the old country home outside of Nashville five years ago, it had seemed like a great idea. The studio had been open for two years. It was thriving and she wanted a home, not some apartment or condo. So she bought it, didn’t even look at anything else. This was the house for her. After five years, it wasn’t the old country home she had bought, it was a masterpiece. Everything was redone, the décor classic and beautiful. Whenever Elli’s dad came to visit, he would always say that it was like he was standing in sunshine because it was so bright. She smiled just thinking of her home. She was proud of both her studio and house. They showed she was doing something with her life, that she didn’t need her family’s money, that she was successful after losing her stint on Broadway, and that she could live without Justin.

She pulled into her round driveway, grabbing all her bags. Even before getting to the door, she heard her pug running down the hall, and then the barking started.

“I know, Adler. I’m home, darling, hold on.” Elli opened the door and her forty pound pug attacked her, well, tried to anyways. She laughed as she threw her keys in the basket by the door, before bending down to her puppy, who was struggling to breathe.

“Oh, my goodness, Adler, honey, breathe, darling.” Elli petted him until he calmed down, kissed the top of his head, and then locked the door as her house phone rang. She didn’t answer it, since it would be her mother, and Elli was not in the mood to talk to her. After the machine picked it up and her mother’s voice rang over the machine, telling her to call her, she pushed delete before going to the kitchen for some dinner. She decided on a frozen dinner, since she didn’t feel like cooking, and went to get her laptop while it heated up.

Elli walked through her bright yellow living room. She always loved the décor in here. The yellow accenting the black wrap around couches that had yellow throw pillows that matched the walls. Her extremely large TV - a gift from her father because she loved watching the away games in HD - hung above her mantel that held pictures of her nieces and nephews. She smiled as she passed them to get her laptop. She loved her nieces and nephews and couldn’t wait to take them to the park next weekend for their monthly visit.

After getting her laptop and returning to the bar, she loaded the pictures from her camera as she got a fork and napkin. She sat down at the bar, food and laptop in front of her. She had taken over three thousand shots of the Assassins, good amount, lots of work ahead of her. She inhaled her frozen pasta meal, realizing she was hungrier than she thought as she looked over the pictures. They were good shots, real good. Only a few were crappy. But with Photoshop, she could fix them with no problem.

As she went from picture to picture, Elli stopped at Shea Adler’s pictures. Gosh, he was so stinking gorgeous. He had the most amazing eyes she’d ever seen. They were such a gorgeous shade of blue, so bright, and so happy. He probably had a beautiful girlfriend at home, with a dog and a nine bedroom house with all the fixings. He just looked like he was happy. When she came to the pictures of him in the suit, it was breathtaking, really. The suit was black with a purple vest underneath and the hockey stick that he held was so slick looking. But you really didn’t look at the stick or the suit, you looked at his eyes.

Good golly, they were mesmerizing.

Not that Elli would admit this to anyone, but while she worked that night, she always came back to the pictures of Shea, looking at his beautiful eyes, his hard body, wishing that she was the girlfriend at his house waiting for him to get home so they could sit on the couch, cuddling as they watched highlights from the games that night, while Adler lay beside them along with Shea’s dog. Elli smiled at the thought and then rolled her eyes.

As if that would ever happen.





“Not only did I run into the goal, but the wall too!”

Shea Adler sat with the side of his face in his hand. His glasses were crooked but he didn’t care. He was beyond embarrassed about what happened that day at the photo shoot the Assassins’ had.

“I can’t stand it when I get new contacts. They eff my eyes all to hell. God, it was so embarrassing, Grace, so embarrassing.”

His twin sister laughed on the other end as Shea rolled his eyes, dropping his hand from his face to get up for a drink of water.

“I don’t know why you’re so embarrassed, Shea, it was only the guys.”

“And the staff!”

“Okay, and the staff, so what?”

“And the photo people!”

“So? You’re never embarrassed about anything. What aren’t you telling me?”