Naked

  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
air, my face heating.

  He looked at the chair, too, and then back at me. “I’m sorry. That was…Believe me, I didn’t plan that.”

  I knew he hadn’t, any more than I had, but it had happened. Unexpected, utterly sexy…but unacceptable. And there was more to it than that.

  I swam for a minute in his gaze. I rocked a little bit, my entire equilibrium a mess. This was something I wanted and couldn’t convince myself not to want.

  I should’ve told him what I’d seen, him with Evan. Told him I knew about him and Patrick, too. But that meant admitting I’d been in the room, and how did I do that without sounding like some sort of crazy, horny pervo? Or a jealous ex-girlfriend?

  “Patrick said you don’t like girls,” I said at last, lamely.

  “Patrick,” Alex said, “doesn’t have a fucking clue.”

  Chapter

  07

  I hadn’t stopped him from walking out. It took me a few minutes of warring with myself to decide to follow. I found Alex outside beneath the fire escape, another unlit cigarette dangling from his mouth. He’d shrugged into his coat, slipped on unlaced boots.

  “Very James Dean,” I said.

  Alex didn’t say anything.

  I stopped myself from saying anything else. This, our second kiss, was harder, a little rougher, a lot sloppier. Alex pulled me closer. His hands found my ass, covered by the length of my thick wool coat, but I felt them there. Heat. All of him was heat, and hardness. The air was so cold it burned my throat when I gasped, but his breath warmed me.

  He warmed me.

  He’d propped open the back door and now we both moved through it, kicking the doorstop out of the way so the heavy metal door clanged closed behind us. Still kissing, we went down the hall, where he kicked open his door, too, catching it neatly with one hand before it could hit the wall.

  We stopped kissing then, for a moment. I needed to breathe. I needed to give my neck a rest, too, from the angle. He was taller than me, and I was wearing flats. I drew in a shaky breath.

  Alex put a hand to the top button of his peacoat. I shook all over when he slipped the button from its mooring and parted the wool, just so. I could see a piece of bare flesh beneath. Another button slipped out of its slot beneath his capable fingers.

  More naked flesh.

  Upstairs, I’d paused only long enough to pull on my coat and boots. Beneath, I wore my paint-spattered clothes. I was already naked under his gaze. I felt naked. I wanted to be naked.

  Alex undid another button. Now I could see his chest was entirely bare. He took off his coat and tossed it to the side while I stood unmoving. Without the frantic kissing molding us together, my focus had scattered. I had too much time to think.

  Alex took the final few steps to cross the distance between us. He looked down at me, his eyes searching mine. I thought one of us should speak, but neither did. This time when he kissed me it was slow and deliberate, no confusing his intentions…or his preferences.

  His fingers crept over my hips to bunch the hem of my shirt. Higher, a little higher, the fabric whispered over my belly. Cool air brushed my skin. I shivered again, a fever chill.

  “Touch me,” he said.

  His chest was warm when I splayed my fingers over the smooth skin. I put my palms flat over his nipples. I felt his heart beating, the rise and fall of his chest with every breath. I curled my fingers, the nails digging ever so lightly into his skin.

  His groan arrowed straight between my legs. Alex put a hand over mine, the one over his heart. I thought he meant me to pull away, that I’d hurt him, but he only curled my fingers a little harder against him. My fingernails dented his flesh.

  I could’ve cut him. Gouged. I could’ve made him bleed just then, and though it never would have occurred to me to do something like that in the midst of any sort of passion, I looked into his eyes and could see him thinking about it.

  “Alex…”

  He kissed me again. Alex had furnished the apartment with a flat-screen TV hung on the wall and a full-size futon covered with giant pillows in cases of all different colors. It was only a few steps away from us, but I wasn’t sure I could make it even there. I thought I might just fall down on the bare wooden floor and pull him on top of me.

  Somehow we made it at least a couple steps closer. He’d kept my hand a prisoner against his chest, but now Alex paused. He pulled away. He let go of my hand, let go of the bunched fabric at my hip. He stepped back and looked me over, head to toe. He looked at me, his smile wicked and sexy. His gaze knowing.

  He didn’t know me. Couldn’t know me. But I wanted him to.

  “I wanted to do this since the first time I saw you.” His hands closed on my hips again and slid beneath, across my belly.

  He lifted my T-shirt off over my head. I wore a lacy bra that matched my orange satin panties, the color brighter against my skin than I remembered.

  “Unzip,” he said.

  I did. The denim slid from my hips and into his hands, and he pulled my jeans off my legs one at a time while I rested a hand on his shoulder to keep my balance.

  Alex’s hands cupped my ass. He held me still as his lips tickled my stomach. My hand went from his shoulder to his hair.

  His mouth moved over the satin of my panties. Wet heat from his breath filtered through the fabric. I glanced over my shoulder at the futon, waiting for us.

  His hand in mine, I led him there, tossed aside pillows and pushed him down onto the cushions. I crawled up his body to straddle him. His cock pressed the front of his jeans.

  I stroked him. Another stroke. Alex arched with a small hiss of indrawn breath. His eyes closed briefly, taking the pleasure.

  I could feel him, hot and thick, but the material between us had to go. I unzipped, unbuttoned. I eased his pants down, though they were already so low I could see the jut of his hip bones.

  I freed his cock and stroked it again, skin on skin. He shuddered and made a small noise I wanted to eat, that’s how delicious it was. If I was going to do this, I wasn’t going to falter. No hesitation, no worries. I knew what I was in for—which was more than I could say about a lot of things in life.

  I lifted my body to slide off his jeans, then straddled him again. Alex put his hands behind his head. He watched me stroke him a couple more times, but then moved to capture my wrist in one hand.

  “Wait.” He pulled me down on top of him to kiss my mouth. We rolled, facing each other. His knee moved between my legs, his thigh pressed against my cunt. My panties slid against my flesh, hot and slick.

  “I don’t want to finish before we even start,” he said into my mouth.

  I licked the corner of his lips, which had a habit of twisting up when he was being wicked. “That wouldn’t be so good.”

  His hand moved between us. His finger found my clit through the soft material covering it, and circled there. Pleasure stabbed me, unexpected. My body jerked.

  Gray eyes stared at me. His fingertip circled, circled. “I want to make sure I remember what I’m doing.”

  “I think you’re doing all right.” Each word dripped from my mouth, slow and smooth.

  His palm pressed flat to my belly. I lay back, nerves on fire. Alex slid his fingers along the hem of my panties and then beneath. “Like this?”

  “Yes…” It was all I could manage to say.

  “Good.” His hand shifted, moved lower. His finger probed me gently. Slid inside. “This?”

  “Yes.”

  He stopped just long enough to draw the satin off my body, only seconds passing, but long enough that when he touched me again it was electric. He lay on his side, propped on his elbow, staring at my face while his fingertips kept up their magic.

  “Stop,” I said after a moment, my voice quavering. “I don’t want to finish too quickly.”

  He laughed and kissed me. Though I’d said for him to stop, he only slowed. He nuzzled my ear. “I just realized…I don’t have any condoms.”

  I’d closed my eyes, giving in t
o the pleasure, but they snapped open now. I sat, my heart pounding so fast the room spun for a second or two. I grabbed his shoulder. I thought I might tip over then, from pressing my body against his hand, but I held off my orgasm with a few deep breaths.

  “Well, shit,” I said.

  “Yeah, I suck.” He kissed me until my mouth opened and I tasted him. His hand moved again. “I want to watch you come.”

  He could’ve recited the alphabet and I’d have found it arousing at that point, but those words were the sexiest thing any man had ever said to me. I reached between us to stroke him, and Alex bit the inside of his cheek.

  “I want to watch you, too.”

  This had started sort of desperately, in a back-clawing, up-against-the-wall-fuck sort of way. It could’ve been awkward now that the urgency had softened, but it wasn’t. I wouldn’t let it be, and Alex didn’t make it.

  We wriggled and shifted until we were face-to-face, hands moving in time. My soft laugh eased into a moan. His laugh sounded a little strained and he bent his head for a moment, eyes closed, before he kissed my neck, my throat, the tops of my breasts.

  His hand moved faster. I was skating close to the edge, my body tensing. My hand on him moved faster, too. In sync. He groaned, and I recognized the sound and his expression—I’d seen it once before, after all.

  The memory, still so fresh, locked me up tight for a second, but only just that long. We kissed. His moan filled my mouth. He shook a little.

  “So close,” he whispered. His fingers slowed, perfectly easing me over the edge without forcing me over, letting me find my own way in my own time.

  Orgasm flooded me with warmth and I let it sweep me away. Alex buried his face into the curve of my shoulder and followed a moment after me. His teeth found my skin but didn’t bite, even though I arched into it, my body reeling with pleasure. He came between us, against my belly, the sensation startling and intimate.

  Messy, too, but as I fell back with a satisfied sigh onto the pillows, I didn’t care. “Wow.”

  He collapsed more slowly, ending up on his back, his shoulder pressing mine. “Mmm-hmm.”

  I took a few seconds to catch my breath, then turned to face him. “I haven’t done anything like that since high school.”