Who: Hunter and MK What: Meetings! Horsies! Where: Outside Vegas, a professional photoshoot. When: Before the party. Warnings/Rating: Not a one.
For MK Robinson, work had fallen a little to the wayside since arriving in Las Vegas, much to her agent’s chagrin. She made appearances, of course, at parties and the like (because when would she ever pass those up?), but photoshoots and auditions hadn’t been top priority over the past few weeks. Oops. Her agent, a slightly impatient man with enough connections that MK couldn’t afford to lose him, set up a gig for her and pressed that if she didn’t show up, he would promptly kick her ass. Okay, maybe the terms were a little bit different, but that was how she interpreted it. An editorial piece for the June/July issue of Vanity Fair was nothing to frown at either, and though she did go out the night before, she made sure to take it carefully throughout the night, not going too overboard.
The shoot was early and at a ranch outside of the city. She arrived on the set looking tired and immediately beelined for the hair and make-up truck. A few other girls, ones she didn’t quite recognize, were there already, looking slightly less worn than MK looked and felt herself, but she waved at them all the same. Newbies, she thought with a roll of her eyes as the artists began on her look. The artistic director seemed to be going for modern-day jockey, which made MK roll her eyes again, but things could be worse. She could have to actually work for a living.
Twenty minutes later, she stepped out of the trailer with nothing to do. Her set call-time wasn’t for a little while, at least not before the other girls were finished. A little further away from the trailer were the stables, where there were some of the horses being used in the shoot waiting for handlers to come. MK approached the animals warily, but warmed up quickly when one of the horses came up to her. He nudged her with his large nose, and the redhead rubbed the fur gently with a smile.
Hunter had never been in a photoshoot in his life. He had the bones for it (not that he was aware) but nobody looked past the complexion of a man that worked in the sun, and he was just too filthy and ragged to be pretty at first glance. He blended into the crowd of employed by the ranch, which kept off from the crowd employed by the magazine as if there was some invisible line between them. When you worked with cosmetics and photography equipment you didn’t wear the same attire as someone that habitually walked through a horseyard. Hunter could tell the female models from everyone else a mile off, something about the skinny, seized-up way that they walked even when they weren’t in makeup, and twenty minutes in Hunter felt like he was the only man (forget that, only person) not waiting for one of them to drop an eyelash or ask for Evian. It was the first time Hunter realized how much beauty could equal power, and for some reason, it pissed him off.
Fortunately, Hunter was also making decent money working as a back-up hand for this hoopla, and that alleviated much of his irritation. Most of the trail horses weren’t pretty enough for this kind of work, so the vast majority of the string were fairly nervy around all this perfume and flashing lights. The trainer and the groomer were out there with the photographer, brushing specks of dirt off of shining coats and keeping the big black gelding and the blinding white mare in line, but the smaller horses, including the strawberry roan that took a liking to MK, were bored and waiting, very much the way she was.
Someone saw the model with the horse a ways off and shouted at Hunter, who was leading a placid sorrel quarter horse with white socks, and was nearest. “He’ll take your hand off,” he said, completely lying and grinning while he did it.
MK had never been one to segregate herself between people, even now, and had chatted up a few of the handlers when she first arrived. Some of them were gruff, no nonsense men, but she spoke to them all the same. If she could deal with Roger Darman’s certain kind of dad-like charm, she could deal with anyone. Still, she hadn’t paid much heed to people when she floated over to the stables, not knowing or caring what she should or shouldn’t be doing. When a voice close by called over, however, she turned in the direction with her hand still petting the horse gently.
“Will he? Well, I like a little risk. It’s the handsome ones that always cause the most trouble, isn’t it?” She turned back to the horse then, almost like she was posing him the question, smiling just as much as the guy pulling the horse into the stable was. “He looks totally vicious,” she teased, leaning up to scratch the horse behind the ear before stepping away completely. The horse, who was enjoying the attention as far as she was concerned, ninnied a bit when she moved away. Rolling her eyes with a grin, she began to run her fingers over his mane. “Does he have a name?”
Despite himself, Hunter was a little impressed that she was not intimidated by him. It was good to respect horses you didn’t know, however, so her brashness in that quarter didn’t earn her any points. The roan’s affection did. “Hold up,” Hunter told the sorrel that was following him with a large head over his shoulder. The horse obediently stopped and stayed put as Hunter ambled around the model’s shiny doodads and stepped up to the roan.
MK, who had turned back to focus on roan, tilted her head towards the guy approaching. “I think you’re gonna get me in trouble, handsome,” she said to the horse even as she continued to rake her fingers through his thick, coarse mane. He was beautiful, the horse, and she was hard pressed to turn her attention away from it. But she did and flashed the handler a warm, teasing smirk as a greeting. “Are you coming over here to read me the riot act? I promise he was being the bad one.”
Not too many people gave Hunter warm smiles like that right out the gate, and he gave her a look that was all wary confusion that lasted a split-second before he turned his attention to the horse. He moved around MK to the roan’s left side, and he gave him a pat on the shoulder so he’d know he was there before he took a look at the cinch and saddle. “Name’s Birdie,” he said, with his usual abhorrence of sentence subjects and with a grudging appreciation that she would care to ask. “Likes you ‘cause you’re not doused in that perfume stuff.” He turned and nodded his head at the small crowd of leggy models that were waiting for the photography equipment to be adjusted. He gave her a closer look, trying to understand what gave her the inhuman beauty that qualified her to have such a job, and couldn’t find it. “You’re not getting your pi’tcher taken with them?”
MK could read people easily, or so she liked to think, and the wary confusion just brought another smile to her face, this one meant to comfort him or say ‘Hey, I’m not just putting on some act.’ Since, y’know, she wasn’t. The company she kept spoke to how she liked to talk to all types of people, and this man didn’t seem too bad. She shrugged in response to his question before deciding to elaborate. “It helps to know the photographer. Gives you a later call time,” she teased, an impish smile growing on her face. The photographer was thankfully an old friend from back in L.A. and knew of her “little” party habit so he allowed her a little extra time. “He’s beautiful,” she said, turning back to the horse again. “Have you been working with him long?” She wasn’t well-versed in like, horse training, but she knew that there was a lot to go into it and usually a constant person around it rather than a group of people that traded off.
Hunter was not a difficult person to read. He didn’t say very much, but just like a dog wagged its tail or bared its teeth, he had his own language. His clothing, frayed in some places and bleached by sun and dirt, was all the same fit closely, and his fingernails showed traces of paint while his boots couldn’t have been farther from style. This man was going for a very specific kind of attention, and the message was clear: if he didn’t get it, he wasn’t going to cry. He didn’t attempt to hide what he was, nor did he attempt to conceal his ignorance when she spoke. (“Call time”?) Hunter turned his attention back to the horse, it required less effort.
“Nope. New in town. They’re short-handed,” he said, now turning his chin toward the ranch hands grouped to one side in the same gesture he used for the models a few seconds ago. “He’s checkin’ for snacks in your pockets.” He said, as the horse lipped her hip. “Gonna muss your fine things up,” he warned, more grudgingly honest than his first warning.
“I am, too. New in town, that is.” She shrugged, shooting him a look that conveyed her mixed bag of emotions towards the city. Las Vegas was still nothing like home to her, not like New York had been when she was a kid or Seattle became during that year she really didn’t like to discuss. “What do you think of Sin City so far then? Your cup of tea?” MK jumped a little when the horse began sniffing around her hip, surprised that the horse was so bold rather than a concern over the clothes. It was the creative director’s idea to bring live animals into the shoot, if the clothes got messed up MK felt it was on them. Whatever.
She stepped back anyway, begrudingly, after a final pat to Birdie’s wide muzzle. “Does he always just sniff girls for their goodies?” she asked with a teasing tone. “He’s got balls. I like him.” No one would ever call MK the most appropriate person in the world, that was sure.
Hunter spread his mouth out in a wicked grin. “He doesn’t, actually. Gelding. That’s why he’s so friendly.” Hunter had been in this business long enough not to wince at the thought of it, and he stepped up past the horse’s shoulder and brought an arm up in a proprietary way to pat the horse on the cheek. Disappointed there were no snacks to be had, the horse turned his head, left a cold snuffle on Hunter’s ear, and dropped his nose to the ground to look for something to eat down there. Hunter shrugged his opinion of Sin City into his plaid shirt. “No. People are nuts. Work here, though. Nobody bothers me.” He liked that last part best, and decided to leave out mention of the girl that talked in his head. This gig paid and he wanted to keep it that way. He paused, stared at her for a second, then obviously decided to give in to convention. “You?”
“Poor bastard. You poor little thing,” she said with a quiet laugh turning to the horse again. Gelding sounded painful, and she pulled a little face for Birdie’s sake before brushing off the clothes subconsciously. It wasn’t like she was worried particularly, but she also wasn’t very much in the mood to be chastised about something so stupid so early in the morning. She stepped for the styrofoam cup of coffee she left on a nearby wooden crate before turning back to the man and his horse. “Vegas is fine, though it’s so goddamn hot. I still miss L.A. a little, but I’m making do. So, you came here for work, that’s it?” Because it was the same for her, sort of. Minus the teenager chirping in the back of her brain constantly, but she wouldn’t say that. People already whispered about her issues.
Birdie did not seem all that worried about her concern, but Hunter always approved when people were kind to his animals, and something about his hawkish expression eased slightly as he gave the horse another pat and gave his halter a little tug to point him off in the right direction, where the other hands were putting up a makeshift paddock. He nodded slowly. “Work, yeah. Change a scene,” he added, and it was obvious that he moved around quite a lot. He had not yet heard any whispering about her, therefore, and the makeup did a good job of hiding her fatigue. He found her an oddity, but no more. “Better get back,” he said, prefacing his departure. He eyed her sideways and then said, “Name’s Hunter.” As if she had just asked.
She gave the all-knowing nod and a noise of agreement at the back of her throat, as if she knew exactly about changes of scene. And she did, really, especially following Seattle. Ever since she was a kid, she found it hard to stick to just one place, and recently, she struggled even more with that. “Changing scenes is really good,” was all she said about that, nodding again with approval. “Oh, yeah, of course! I’m Maddie Kate, but everyone calls me MK. Easier that way, et cetera. But yeah, go ahead, get back. I should probably let them finish me up.” She motioned to herself, with her hair still in pins and parts of her wardrobe missing. She sipped from her styrofoam cup again before offering him another smile, all warm and charm. “Nice meeting you, Hunter. I’ll see you out there?”
Hunter was not immune to the charm, not hardly. It was growing on him, kind of like horse nuzzles and puppy tail wags, and he gave her a little dip of his head before clucking his tongue at the horse that had brought him and swinging back into the saddle. Back to work.