We ended last chapter with Mia irritated with Maddy’s icky fiance, and we begin this one a very long description of a sexy man’s tattoos/sexy body. The man is being photographed by the guy who hired Mia:
I stood stock-still where the limo driver had suggested when he parked and pointed at the tent on the beach. He said my boss was behind the camera. I hadn’t anticipated my client would also be the man taking the pictures for the campaign.
Did we not know her boss was the photographer? Is this supposed to be a shock?
“Bella donna,” he said, grasping my shoulders in a warm embrace and leaning forward and air kissing both cheeks. “I am Angel D’Amico, and you are more beautiful than I anticipated when my wife said we must have you for our campaign.”
At the mention of his wife, a statuesque Latina exited a white tent, her brown skin glimmering in the sunlight. A fiery red sarong-style halter dress wrapped around her curvaceous form and flapped in the breeze.
Mia describes how young and attractive her bosses look. Can you imagine if Mia had to work for a single second with people who weren’t ridiculously attractive?
Speaking of which:
“Tai, come. Meet your partner for the month.”
Partner? Millie hadn’t said anything about having a partner. Just as I was about to question his comment, the man they called Tai moved to meet us. When I say moved, really the entire Earth might as well have split open and separated, carving out a path for him. All sound seemed to disappear, and the entire environment zeroed in on nothing but this man’s progression across the sand. He was breathtaking. The muscles in his giant thighs pulsed and tensed with each step.
I can now only imagine Tai as a sexy Godzilla. His movements have absolutely no other explanation. Mia tells us again how how gorgeous he is, and is confident the ocean probably weeps to have this perfect male inside of it. I don’t think Mia can compete with the ocean.
“You’re radiant. I will enjoy working you,” he said, but his eyes said far more than “working” with me. Wait… What?
“You mean working with me?” I clarified, shaking my head.
Before Tai can answer, Mia reiterates how sexy he is and tells us that he looks like the Rock and that he is Samoan.
Huge, latte-colored skin, darkened even more by the sun’s tropical rays, tattooed, only Tai seemed far more traditional in his Samoan features and heritage than the actor.
Tai puckered his sexy lips together and smirked. “No, that’s not at all what I meant.”
Damn. This month was going to be one helluva ride. Hopefully that ride included being on top of or under a six foot godlike Samoan man named Tai.
Am I out of line when I say I don’t get why Mia is so sure he’s Samoan? She doesn’t mention an accent, and I sincerely doubt Mia has a deep knowledge of Samoan names. Granted, there’s a large Samoan population in Hawaii…but would Mia know that?
Also I’m getting so tired of how Mia constantly refers to the men she sleeps with and/or works for as their nationality/ethnicity (think Alec and Hector). I think doing it some of the time makes sense (my husband and I will still refer to the other’s nationality sometimes since we’ve from different countries), but the frequency is starting to bug me. Like multiple times in one chapter let alone one page? For someone whose background we haven’t even confirmed yet (like Tai himself has said nothing)? It’s lazy writing, but I’m also worried there’s an element of exoticism here because it’s so sexualized.
Like I am so thrilled to have hot characters of different races/ethnicities/nationalities introduced, go Calendar Girl for trying, but I do not want that to be these characters to be completely defined by that. I also feel like there’s a difference to talking about Alec’s French accent to Tai’s “latte-colored skin/Samoan features”. One feels like it has more dangerous connotations to me than the other. I’m super curious to get all of your thoughts on this in the comments since I’m still working out my thoughts on this.
The next morning, Mia wakes up from a dream about a “sexy Samoan” only to go outside and find Tai surfing. There’s also this whole interlude where she thinks about how surfing reminds her of Wes and re-re-re-re-reiterates how she’s going to live her life and she’s not ready to be with him yet.
That was most definitely my cue to flirt back. “You gonna teach me how to ride?” I arched a brow into a fine point. His mouth pushed into that delectable purse as his eyes seemed to walk all over my bikini-clad curves.
“I’ll teach you how to ride all day and all night, girlie.” When he said the word girlie, it didn’t sound the way a woman said it to her best friend. No, from him it sounded more like a growl, where he enunciated the “grrr” sound, giving it a “grrrllleee” vibe.
I don’t care what Mia says, I can only hear it from one girlfriend to another now.
Anyway, they fucking immediately start having sex. Well, after this:
His dark eyes turned pitch black. Lust swirled in those inky depths, and my feminine side jumped for joy and did the chicken dance.
Nothing says about to get down to business quite like doing the chicken dance.
Mia tells us how aggressive and dominant Tai is and how sexy it is. He calls her ‘girlie’ the whole time, which is probably as annoying to me as Alec’s ‘ma jolie.’ Why can’t anyone just call her by her fucking name ever! He also consistently refers to Mia’s ‘flower’ and tells her that it smells like ‘liquid sunshine’ which is NOT A SMELL OR A THING THAT EXISTS.
We also get the signature Calendar Girl nonsensical sex-talk:
“Sugar.”
“Soaked.”
“Mmm.”
“All day.”
“Eat you all day.”
When Audrey Carlan is writing these, I wonder how she decides on which random words and phrases will make it into the sex scenes. I hope she draws them out of a hat. That would be so fun!
Mia notices that Tai, like Wes, smells like the ocean and she feels a little sad, but tells herself to enjoy “the sexy Samoan” while she can.
