“When we first entered the building, I thought maybe you lived here.”
“I do. Upstairs.” He indicated an open staircase off to the left. “Do you want a tour?”
The offer astounded her. Given how little was known of his private life, she guessed he guarded his privacy zealously. Should she feel honored that he’d offered her a glimpse? But at what price?
“Maybe later.”
Turning her back to him, she set her portfolio and purse on a nearby table and stripped off her jacket while she sorted through her conflicting moods. What had seemed like a daring lark at the Soho Grand Hotel no longer felt inconsequential.
“Although I’m sure your mind is racing,” Oliver said, “I can’t for the life of me tell what you’re thinking.”
That I’m completely out of my depth with you.
Sammi trembled as he strolled toward the worktable that held the cameras. What would he see? What would she betray of herself? Her inner turmoil? Her failures? All her life she’d taken for granted that she was beautiful. When he cracked her psyche and exposed her soul, would she be ugly? What could possibly be more terrifying? She wondered how many of his photographs existed. How many people were strong enough to keep a visual representation of their greatest failures and most shameful secrets?
It was a struggle to keep from rubbing at the goose bumps on her arms. “Where do you want me?” she asked, needing to get this over before her courage failed.
“Where would you feel most comfortable?”
She didn’t hesitate before striding toward the white screen. After twenty-five years there was nowhere she felt more at home than on set. Here, she became a girl next door, a seductress, a woman in love, a rag doll, a warrior, a free spirit, a crusader. Or any one of a thousand other incarnations. Finding the center of the backdrop, she turned to face Oliver and found him watching her, his right hand resting on a camera, as if halted amid the act of picking it up.
“How do you get people to open them up so that you can photograph them stripped down to their essence?”
“It’s different for every person. The key is to find the trigger that allows their guard to fall.”
“How do you make that happen?” While Sammi never hesitated when asked to pose in the nude, contemplating the exposure of her inner landscape made her woozy with anxiety. “How do you break down their walls?”
“Before the subject comes in to be photographed, I do a significant amount of research on them.”
“What sort of research?”
“Background on their personal and professional lives.”
Sammi shivered as she considered what her complicated relationship with her mother revealed about her. “I imagine you know exactly what to say to bring up all sorts of negative feelings.”
The way his expression hardened to stone at her remark told her she’d made a misstep.
“I’m not trying to hurt anyone,” he said at last, his flat tone not quite hiding his strong emotions. “The photoshoot isn’t successful if the client is unhappy.”
“That makes sense,” Sammi murmured. “So how do you use the information you gather?”
“I ask questions, get them to talk about pivotal moments in their lives.”
“What would you ask me?”
To her surprise he came away empty-handed from the table of camera equipment. “Why do you want to do this?”
“I want to see what you see when you look at me.”
As good as he was at controlling his facial expressions, her answer had obviously surprised him.
“Why do you care how I see you?”
“Because you make me feel…”
She moved in his direction, keen desire driving away common sense. She’d dated Ty for six months and never once slept with him, yet tonight she’d gone home with a virtual stranger, proving she wasn’t the frigid bitch he’d accused her of being.
“How do I make you feel?” Oliver prompted, hunger intensifying the bold blue of his eyes.
Lust tightened deep in her belly as she tunneled her fingertips beneath his bomber. Riding the hard muscles of his chest and upper arms, she slid the jacket off his broad shoulders and let it fall to the floor.
His strong fingers fanned over her hips, drawing her firmly against his hard planes. A hot ache flared between her thighs as her lower half settled against his. The hard thrust of his growing erection bumped against her as Oliver’s lips grazed along her neck. With a moan she tipped her head to the side and pressed her breasts into his hard chest, communicating her sharp need. Where she half expected anxiousness or doubts to surface, Sammi knew only the enticing shimmer of anticipation rising inside her.
“That tour you offered me earlier,” she said, one hand gliding beneath the hem of his T-shirt and discovering the hot silk of his skin while the fingers of her other hand raked into his thick hair. “I’m ready to take it.”
