Naked Read online

  That wasn’t as good as it had been the first time. He was too self-conscious. I stepped closer, studying him. “No. Take it off.”

  This time I couldn’t pretend he didn’t make a sound. Alex twitched. I thought he’d say no, but then he reached over his shoulder to grab a handful of the shirt on his back, pull it upward and over his head. He clutched it for a half second before tossing it to the floor.

  “Beautiful.” I grabbed one of the dining-room chairs, seat tattered, carved wood dusty. I dragged it toward the window to his left. “Sit.”

  He laughed from deep in his throat, but moved without protest. With my camera still in one hand, I used the other to push him gently toward the light. Pliable, he moved, and I saw his smile, but focused on everything else.

  “I have an idea…it’s just…” I could not express it in words. Hardly ever could. “Tilt your chin just a little…yes. Perfect. Stay like that.”

  My camera whirred. Alex stayed still. I took another picture and moved nearer to get close up. Very close.

  “You smell good. What is it?”

  “It’s called Whip. I get it from Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab,” he said slowly, on an exhale.

  “It’s good.”

  The first time I’d ever seen him I’d thought how good-looking he was, but it had been a standard sort of pretty. Watching him get head from another man, seeing him come, remembering how it felt to climax with that picture in my head, layered that impression with a sexuality I hadn’t been very good at ignoring. Dangerous to me, that sexuality, because I’d been burned by that flame and would be forever scorched.

  Yet now I leaned closer. Looked into his eyes. “Will you do something for me?”

  He swallowed, meeting my gaze, and breathed out without saying anything. His assent came with a nod. I wanted to touch his face, but kept my hands tight on the camera, which made all of this safe.

  “Will you take off your shoes and socks?”

  He laughed, not nervously but with a small hint of surprise, then bent to do what I’d asked. He straightened, his gaze bold and inquiring and anticipatory.

  “Perfect.” I moved back a few steps. “Look out the window. Think about something…sexy.”

  “Wh-what?” He stuttered the word with a laugh.

  I looked at him over the camera. “Don’t tell me you can’t do sexy.”

  “I can do it.”

  Of course he could. He looked out the window, his body language shifting subtly. He slouched a little, one bare foot in front of the other, a man at ease with his body in a way that made him a natural model. I took a profile shot of him looking far away.

  When he put his hand up to his chest, fingertips just over his nipple, I almost dropped my camera. I kept myself from squeaking only by biting my tongue. Focus. Focus and snap the shot.

  It’s not real.

  If you look at it through a lens, it’s not real.

  Alex leaned back a little more in the chair, then gave me a lazy glance. “Yes?”

  “More.”

  The quality of his laughter changed. Got slow and low. This man had had an audience before. Maybe not one with a camera, but he wasn’t shy about being watched.

  “How much more do you want, Olivia?”

  “What can you give me, Alex?”

  He shifted, his hand sliding down his chest and belly to the button at his waist. Neither of us spoke. I held my breath, but couldn’t tell if he was holding his.

  This was not the sort of picture I normally took. Yet here we were, him before me with his hand ready to unsnap his jeans, and my camera ready. I licked my mouth. I raised the viewfinder to my eye and made it all not real.

  “Yes,” I told him in a hoarse, low voice I wished didn’t shake. “Do it.”

  He unsnapped and unzipped. He reached inside. His back arched, just a little, as his hand disappeared inside the denim.

  He made another noise and closed his eyes, bit down on his lower lip. I caught the flash of teeth. His hair fell forward, shielding him.

  Click.

  Snap.

  Nothing through the viewfinder is real. Except, of course, when it all is.

  His hand moved. I knew what he was doing, but the angle I shot from showed only a man, head bent, face closed in concentration. Naked chest. Naked feet. I moved, circling. His jeans had slid lower, showing the dimples at the base of his back and a hint of his ass.

  I pulled a stool in front of him. Got on it to shoot down, now the shot consisting of muscled, broad shoulders and the top of his head. I didn’t tell him how to move or what to do.

  Our breathing was very loud.

  I got off the stool to take a few more shots. Standing in front of him, I looked at his face, not at his cock in his hand. I wasn’t touching him, but I imagined I could feel him against me. I could smell him. I thought if I breathed in, I could taste him, too. I think I made a sound. Alex opened his eyes. They were naked, too.

  I knew why Patrick had warned me.

  This could go no place good. I would end up embarrassed, rejected. This wasn’t about a photo now. I put my eye to the camera again.

  He breathed out. “Do you want…”

  “I want all of it. Yes.”

  He sighed and shivered. His hand moved, stroking. And through the tiny square of glass, I watched him, and I made the pictures in my head real.

  I moved closer, meaning to take another shot. His hand captured my wrist. I didn’t pull away. Inches apart, I looked into his eyes and saw an invitation that became a request when he took my hand and placed it under his.

  He moved mine along his cock, very, very slowly. Up. Down. He was so hard, so hot beneath my palm.

  It wasn’t the first time I’d had a man’s cock in my hand, but I’d never been holding a camera with the other. I’d never been helpless to pull away, frozen in my own arousal. I lost myself in his dark gray eyes.

  He took my camera from my hand and put it on the windowsill. Alex pulled me closer. His hand moved mine, faster now, and he let out a small groan.

  He took my other hand, now empty, and put it on the back of his neck, where it curled in the softness of his hair. My fingers twined, tightly, instinctually, and he moaned at the pull. His head tipped back. His hand moved mine faster.

  I couldn’t pretend this wasn’t real anymore. It was all too real, too much, too focused. Who did this sort of thing?

  Apparently, I did.

  He let go of my hand when I moved it on my own, and when I pulled his hair again he gritted his teeth with a strangled gasp. I had never felt this before, power like this. To stand over a man who by all previous accounts should not have been aroused by my touch. To feel his cock stiffen more in my hand and hear the pace of his breath quicken…To watch him close his eyes…

  “Look at me,” I said.

  He did.

  I did not fall into orgasm from that look, but I came damn close.

  I let go of his cock and stepped back, two steps. Four. He shuddered and made a sound of protest, but he didn’t move.

  “What the fuck,” I said with a quaking, shaking voice, “is going on?”

  “Olivia—”

  I shook my head and stepped back again. “Why are you fucking with me?”

  “I’m not—I’m sorry,” he said quickly. “I just…Believe me, I didn’t think this would happen.”

  The breath hissed out of me and my shoulders slumped a little. “I think you’d better go.”

  “I like you, Olivia.”

  “You don’t even know me.”

  With a sigh, he took a step away. I didn’t like the distance between us any more than I had the lack of it, but again I stayed still. Alex put his hands on his hips.

  “I could get to know you.”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  He looked too sure of himself, too cocky. A man used to having his own way. “Why not?”

  “I don’t think we got started the right way, that’s all.” I gestured at the ch