Bared

by Jill Shalvis

  “What?”

  “Do it.”

  “But…I’ll be uncovered.”

  “Your knees will shield your breasts from the camera.”

  But what about from him? Holding her breath, trying not to picture how hard her nipples were or how her belly rose and fell with her every erratic breath, she did what he’d asked, she lifted her arms and tossed back her head.

  A little.

  “More,” he commanded in that silky voice that was so utterly captivating and tyrannical at the same time. “Expose your throat. Thrust your breasts out. Sacrifice yourself, Amber. You know you love to do that.” He peered out from his camera and gave her a long, assessing look. “Unless there’s some reason why you wouldn’t.”

  Oh boy. “Of course not.” Breathing as if she’d been running, she “sacrificed” herself, throwing out her arms, tossing back her head, thrusting out her breasts, and over the roar of the blood in her ears, she heard a hiss of breath. She had no idea if it was Rafe—who else—and wasn’t sure if she wanted to know because it sounded so…primal.

  “Hold that,” he said.

  She tried not to think about how much of her he could see while she held the pose. All around her was the scent of the forest and above her came the sound of the rain.

  And the clicking of his shutter.

  “A little bit more.” His voice was both low and husky, and utterly hypnotic. “Open your eyes wide. Like that. Now your mouth, pant a little, like you’re both petrified and aroused beyond belief—Yeah, just like that.”

  If he only knew she was petrified and aroused beyond belief, despite the fact that Jen and the other techs were still watching and that Stone had come back down the path holding a white umbrella in his hand—

  A sharp bolt of lightning startled a gasp out of her, the following boom of thunder nearly stopped her heart and she hugged herself again, breaking out of the strange trance Rafe’s voice had put her in.

  Rafe took one last shot of her like that before lowering the camera. “The rain I didn’t care about. But the electrical storm we’ll have to wait out. I don’t want to get struck by lightning. Break time,” he said when she just sat there staring at him.

  She stood on legs that were still a little shaky, grateful when Jen came forward with a soft, silky white robe that she wrapped around herself as quickly as she could.

  “Did you get it?” Stone asked Rafe.

  Emma strained to hear his answer, hoping against hope that he’d indeed gotten whatever it was he felt he’d been looking for, that the shoot was done and over with so that she could fly home to her little world of work, work and more work, with only the occasional dream about this venture into a world she’d had no idea existed.

  It had been shocking, being so exposed to perfect strangers. Shocking and erotic.

  Amber would laugh at that. Her sister definitely didn’t consider what she did erotic, but rather manipulative. And she loved that—loved manipulating men into little panting puppies.

  That didn’t appeal to Emma and, now that it was over and the cameras were being set into their cases, she was trying to tell herself that she hadn’t felt anything but humiliation.

  But deep down, she knew the truth.

  “I can’t be sure,” Rafe said with a frustrated shake of his wet head. “I want to come back when the storm passes.”

  They were coming back.

  She was coming back.

  3

  BY THAT AFTERNOON, they all realized the storm wasn’t going anywhere.

  If Rafe wanted the virginal shot in the tropical forest of Kauai for the calendar—and he did—then he couldn’t take the chance by leaving now. He’d have to deal with the weather and work around it.

  Fine. He’d do whatever it took to finish this job, to get what he wanted. Retirement. He could indulge himself instead of dealing with other people’s schedules and needs. He could ride his bike down the coast of California if he felt like it, maybe from Santa Barbara to his new home in Los Angeles, the one he’d bought three months ago and had hardly unpacked or bought furniture for. He’d catch up with old friends. He’d visit with his sisters Carolyn and Tessa, both of whom he was extremely close to.

  He’d get himself a big, sloppy, happy puppy for his new place. Not exactly the wife and kids his family had been campaigning for, but he’d work on that as well.

  But first up, dealing with Emma, the Amber substitute. And even though his gut said that the film he’d shot earlier would be breathtaking, he wanted more, just to be sure. With the rain now coming down in cupfuls, he stalked out to the set as the dark afternoon gave way to evening. The gazebo was empty, but he could see how she would look there on the bench, wet and dewy, surrounded by candles, glowing and just a touch nervous.

  She had that last down and if anything had convinced him she wasn’t Amber, it had been the look in her eyes when he’d asked her to spread her arms and toss back her head.

  Amber loved exposing her body and would have done so with abandon.

  Queen Emma…she clearly wasn’t used to any such thing. She’d trembled and shivered, and he might have felt guilty, except that she’d come here of her own free will, for whatever reason.

  It still made no sense. Why the hell didn’t she tell him who she was? Did she really think she could play him?

  Nobody played him.

  Why would she want to?

  He didn’t know, didn’t care as long as she did the job. He pulled out his radio and called Stone. “The lightning is gone. Let’s do this.”

  DESPITE THE DELUGE OF RAIN, the air was hot and humid, so, that when Emma got out of the shower, she couldn’t get dry. She’d been working on her laptop in her hotel room, taking her script on a wild and sexy turn she hadn’t seen coming. In a way, she supposed she could thank Amber and Rafe for that. This afternoon’s session had let something loose in Emma.

  Then Stone had called her and told her to report back to the set, costume on. She hadn’t even hung up the phone before her heart had started a heavy beat.

  She was going back. Costume on. For once, her own work flew right out of her head and she had a flash of what it would feel like if the people in her world could see what she was about to do.

  Amber would get a big kick out of her uptight and slightly prudish twin blushing nonstop. Her mother, a prestigious author, would probably take one look at Emma’s costume and have a fatal heart attack, because in her eyes, Emma was already compromising her talents by writing for a soap opera. What was it she’d called Emma’s work? Oh yes, a waste of trees.

  Seeing Emma now would just confirm what she’d always known—that her daughters were some odd and inexplicable mutation of the family genes. Her mother would blame Amber, of course, citing that she’d been a bad influence from infanthood, which indeed she had. Emma had gotten really good at being in the middle of those two. If her mother ever found out about this, Emma would manage to smooth it out somehow, as she always did. But she couldn’t concentrate on that now, not while looking at her costume lying innocently on the bed.

  Stone had told her not to worry about her hair, that they wanted it long and loose and damp. Well, good, because that’s what she had to work with at the moment—long and loose and damp. Dropping her sundress, she slid back into the thong, grimaced at herself in the mirror as she wrapped the white material across her breasts like a bandeau, and then put on the silk robe Jen had given her.

  Emma still felt naked.

  She glanced back at her laptop on the hotel bed, where she’d worked all afternoon. Live And Love had been in a ratings slump for months, and she’d tried to help fix it by putting their fan-favorite leads in romantic pairings.

  But oddly enough, fans didn’t necessarily want sweet, traditional romance. According to their letters—buckets and buckets of letters—they wanted steamy, hot sex. That had worried their head writer, which in turn had worried Emma a little—okay, it had worried her a lot, because she wasn’t very good at steamy, hot s
ex. But she’d given it a shot this afternoon.

  Guess that meant she could use this trip as a research tax write-off.

  Holding the robe open, she took another peek at herself in the mirror. Her sexy twin looked back—a tall, willowy brunette with wild, light amber eyes and a see-through outfit that brought to mind all sorts of wicked things.

  Oh boy.

  With renewed anticipation, she tied her robe, slipped into her sandals and braved the storm to head toward the set.

  And her evening of research.

  Walking through the hotel lobby in her white silk robe, she noticed that no one even glanced her way. So much for knocking people over with her newfound sexuality. Trying to get into playing Amber, she swung her hips a little more and tossed back her hair, but only succeeded in tripping down the front stairs as she headed outside into the falling night.

  The path was lit but it was still an eerie and strange feeling, walking through the heavy, drumming rain with no one accompanying her but her own thoughts. The growth beneath her feet squished like a sponge as she moved. The night seemed noisy, with the sound of rain hitting leaves and the squawk of the occasional bird combining to bring chills to her skin.

  Wet now, she reached the set. Protected by the gazebo, candles flickered on the floor, the benches, even hung from the arches, sending up a warm glow, and in the middle, bent over his camera, was Rafe.

  The scene took her breath. He took her breath. His shirt was plastered to his big, tough body, his jeans looked as if they’d been made to fit him like a soft glove, though she doubted there was an inch of softness anywhere on him.

  She hadn’t made a sound, and yet, he lifted his head as she came into the clearing. His dark hair was wet and wavy, hitting just past his collar. As she watched, he lifted a hand and pushed the hair away from his face. A face that was also wet.

  His expression was shuttered and, not for the first time, she wondered at what his and Amber’s relationship was like. Clearly she wasn’t his favorite person in the world—not even close.

  “You came,” he said.

  She stepped beneath the protection of the gazebo. “Did you think I wouldn’t?”

  “Of course I did. I thought you’d make me rant and rave, or even beg, like you did in the Amazon.”

  The thought of this strong, proud man begging was quite the image.

  “In fact, I was so sure of it, I told Stone and Jen to take their time, that you certainly would.” He gestured with his head to the bench. “Let’s get this over with.”

  “Where’s the lighting?”

  “The candles will provide the only lighting this time.”

  “It’s beautiful,” she said, mesmerized by the glow, by the look of concentration on his lean, rugged face. As a workaholic, she had to admit to feeling attracted to any man who felt so strongly about his work.

  Or maybe it was simply the power he held over her, the power to make her do as she normally wouldn’t, to bring out the sexuality and sensuality deep within her, two things she would have sworn she was lacking.

  The rain was hitting the gazebo with a steady rhythm that was better than any music. With the darkening evening, a mist had rolled in, surrounding them, making her feel as though they were the only two people on the planet.

  She shivered and had no idea what she felt, exactly. Fear? Nerves? Arousal?

  All of the above?

  He was looking at her, looking through her, or so it felt. What does he see when he looks at me like that? She wondered a little wildly. She hoped it was Amber.

  Feeling self-conscious, she moved toward the bench, but he stopped her.

  “The robe.” He held out his hand for it.

  Oh yeah, the robe. She began to work her fumbling fingers on the tie that she’d knotted while back in her hotel room. But now the material was wet and that, combined with the way Rafe’s proximity unnerved her, meant she couldn’t get the knot undone.

  With a rough sound of impatience, he brushed her fingers aside, his own warm and sure, and undid the knot in record time. He didn’t stop there, but tugged the robe open, then off her, and tossed it out of the way, toward an empty chair near his camera. “Loosen that,” he said, nodding to the way she’d wrapped herself.

  Immediately she fought the urge to cover herself with her hands. As a woman who felt funny in a two-piece bathing suit and who always wore a bra, she simply wasn’t used to being so exposed to a man, much less the great outdoors.

  But neither the great outdoors nor the man cared. Rafe looked her over impassively from her long, damp and slightly tangled hair hanging over her shoulders, down her legs to her feet, which she’d slipped out of the sandals. Her body started that odd quiver thing again.

  Then she thought she saw it—a flash of heat in his eyes, her only sign that she really did look good enough to pull this off.

  There was some sort of forbidden excitement in that, and a sense of power as well, so that when he pointed to the bench again, she went to it.

  But nothing could stop the little feeling that she was the lamb being led to the slaughter.

  “Lie down,” he said in that demanding, yet somehow compelling, voice that could convince a nun to sin.

  She lay on her back and studied the stark white ceiling of the gazebo. The bench was a little chilly beneath her, but since her body felt so inexplicably hot, it was okay, and at least her entire backside was covered.

  “Arms up, over your head,” Rafe said from behind his camera, and when she complied, he lifted his head and just stared at her.

  “What?” Her arms were still stretched over her head, her body laid out like a sacrifice. “No good?”

  “No,” he said softly. “It’s good.” He kept staring at her as if he couldn’t quite believe it. “It’s amazing, actually.” He looked through his lenses. Then he took the camera off the tripod. “Arch up, just a little.”

  As she did, he came close, very close, shocking her when he put a knee on the bench near her hip and looked down at her through the camera from above. “This is the angle,” he whispered, and since he seemed to be talking to himself, not her, she remained silent.

  “Remember that shoot we did in Fiji, Amber?”

  His voice, so close, startled her, as did the question. “Um…”

  “You played that prank on me. You’ve always played pranks on me, hiding my unused film, unplugging the lights, using makeup to create chicken pox, but Fiji…that was what led to our first and last date.”

  They’d dated only once? Amber had insinuated there was much more than that. “Well—”

  “You handed me your robe, and underneath it you—” He broke off with a little laugh and pulled away from his camera to look directly at her. “Well, I don’t have to tell you—you remember what you did.”

  She only wished she did.

  “You always screw with my head, knowing damn well that when I’m on a job, I’m on it one hundred percent, no playing around.”

  She had the odd urge to apologize, to somehow alleviate his frustration with her, which was silly because he was talking to Amber, not her. But knowing that didn’t take away the urge.

  He added a candle near her opposite hip and lit it, his eyes dark with concentration. He ran his work-roughened fingers up her outstretched arm, moving it slightly to the right, then stared down at her again. He adjusted her other arm as well, so that her fingers brushed each other high above her head. Then he slid his fingers beneath one of her knees and lifted it slightly.

  Everything within her reacted to his touch in a way that shocked her. He was simply a photographer, simply a man doing his job. A man who hardly seemed to notice she was nearly nude—

  He slowly rearranged the loose, white material, draping it over her torso, her belly, curling it between her hip and the candle, then over one thigh.

  At the touch on her inner leg, she jerked and a sound escaped her, one that sounded…needy.

  Lord, she was bad at this, bad at being cool, calm,
sophisticated Amber, bad at being so blasé about what he could see of her. Her body hummed again, hummed and ached, and it made her close her eyes.

  A slight breeze brought a few drops of rain to hit her face, for which she was grateful. Research. Fun. She was doing one and having the other, she reminded herself. One weekend pretending to be wild and open and sexy. One little weekend.

  But really, this had to be the last time she bailed Amber out of trouble.

  Her mother would be happy to hear that. Unfortunately, the knowledge was little comfort to her at the moment, lying here in practically nothing.

  “Your eyes need to be open for the shot,” Rafe said, and when they flew open to stare at him, his shutter clicked.

  People were going to see this—her stretched out so open and vulnerable and…bare. They were going to see it and—

  “Remember New Mexico?” He was busy with his camera, not looking at her.

  “Well—”

  “It was our first shoot together. You were an hour late and hated your costume, so you staged that little tantrum that got me yelled at by the director.”

  Sounded like Amber.

  “You felt so bad you kissed me when we were done.” He stopped messing with his camera and looked right at her, still at her hip, still so close that now she could see that his eyes weren’t just dark, dark melting-chocolate brown but had little specks of gold in them that danced in the glow from the candles.

  Eyes that were now waiting for…something from her.

  “You said it would be our tradition,” he said. “Just you and me, and you promised to kiss me after every shoot.”

  Oh God.

  “You always have followed through on that promise, even when I didn’t want you to. So what I’m wondering now is, why haven’t you kissed me yet?” His vow was low and spellbinding, his eyes so fascinating she couldn’t tear hers away.

  Research, she told herself. Simple research. She could lean forward, kiss him and chalk it up to the wild, sexy experience she needed for her script.