by Hazel Parker
I let out the deep breath I was holding. I wasn’t aware anyone nearing forty could still have a body like that. He’s so hot that it’s crazy! I thought, just before I began wondering why my butt was wet. Fearing the worst, I quickly wiped the fog from the big mirror over the vanity and turned around. “Oh, shit!” I laughed, as I realized the towel I wrapped myself in didn’t cover even half of my ass. I’d been flashing my naked body to him the whole time I’d been facing the door. No wonder he sounded so uncomfortable, I giggled to myself, oh well, it’s only fair. I saw his, after all!
*****
My hair dried, my makeup light, and my other best jeans on under my knee-high brown leather boots and beneath my green angora wool sweater, I felt ready to face the world, if not quite Warren. I couldn’t put things off though. All I could do was be my naturally cool self and just hope I don’t start blushing for no reason.
Downstairs in the kitchen, I could hear Warren and Vanessa, although it sounded more like just Vanessa listing all the things she was going to take care of today to make Warren’s life slide by a little more smoothly. I took a deep breath and tried to picture anything but Warren’s penis. Only then did I step forward.
“Okay, that’s fine,” I heard him announce as I walked in the room. “One more thing,” he continued to Vanessa as he waved me closer, holding up a steaming coffee cup for me, “can you get Angus to fit a lock to the second-floor bathroom door, please. Today?”
Vanessa looked over to me as I took the cup from Warren, then back at him, before allowing a big grin to spread across her face. “Sure thing, boss,” she smirked.
“Something to eat before we go?” Warren turned to me, ignoring Vanessa as she turned and trotted out.
“Ugh,” I grimaced, taking a sip of my coffee, “I can’t even think about food this early.”
A smile played across Warren’s sexy lips. “Me either,” he said. “Slows you down. Bring your coffee, though, and let’s get started.”
In truth, I was quite happy to be working in the darkroom today. I felt sure that every time I accidentally pictured him, any part of him, it was being broadcast in a clear thought bubble above my head for anyone to see. The less time I spent looking at his gorgeous face or toned body, the better.
He led me through to, what I was starting to realize, was the back of the house. This was provided that the driveway we pulled up on last night was actually the front. As we forged deeper into the bowels of his residence, he pointed out his storeroom, his camera room – which was exactly that, a room in which he stored the hundreds of cameras he’d collected over the years – and his shooting stage. It became obvious that the lower floor of this ancient abode had been carefully remodeled beyond the kitchen to make the place into a fully operative, high-tech studio. And the walls were covered with his pictures, but on this floor, he seemed to shy away from the nude or semi-nude shots he’d taken of famous women. These walls wore scenic photographs, clothed portraits, and some of the work he’d done over the years in Ethiopia, Kuwait, and other war-torn or poverty-stricken hot spots when he was younger.
“Don’t you miss doing this kind of thing?” I heard myself asking him, as we neared the darkroom.
“You mean would I rather be photographing starving people and dying children in the heat and dust, or glamorous, naked celebrities in an air-conditioned studio?”
“I guess?”
He thought about it, turning and looking at me as he turned the question over in his mind. He kept staring at me, like he was searching my face for the answer. “Ask me another time,” he finally smiled, before throwing back the bolt and sliding through the revolving, lightproof door, to his developing room.
I followed him inside to find the red light on, giving us a low glow to see by. He had shots hanging from strings that crisscrossed the ceiling; shots piled up next to the trays of developing fluid that lay on the desks. There were photographs everywhere. How many pictures does he take in a day? I asked myself. And these are just the ones on film. He probably takes three times as many more with his digital cameras.
“Here,” he said, passing me a blank print, “My eyes failed me last night, so I had to go to bed before I got around to finishing these few up. Go ahead and develop a print for me, could you? Let me see if they taught you correctly at that fancy college.”
“Are you sure?” I asked him. I didn’t want to be the one responsible for screwing up what might be a masterpiece.
“It’s okay,” he replied softly, maybe sensing my trepidation.
I took the film from him and went about exposing it, searing the image into the photographic paper, before dropping that paper into the developing tray. I picked up the tongs and gently flicked it about in the fluid, a habit I’d picked up and always did as I waited to see the image appear. Soon enough, a picture began to form.
“Oh, my God!” I shrieked, turning to hit Warren on the shoulder as he started laughing. “You asshole!” I tried to stifle a giggle as I saw a huge and fully engorged male member becoming clearer and clearer on the paper in front of me.
“I’m sorry,” he managed, between sobs of laughter, “it’s a prank we used to play back when I was in college. I couldn’t resist. I’m afraid I do it to all my interns. Probably shouldn’t tell Clive or your father.”
I couldn’t help feeling infected by his carefree, joyous amusement. And, I couldn’t stop myself from smiling along, despite trying to remain professional as I rinsed, fixed, and rinsed the paper again. I hung it on the drying line with a peg, proud for the world to see. “It’s not you, is it?” I asked, feeling a surge of warmth fill me at the thought that it might be. I realized too that I was using a flirty tone, trying unconsciously to sound suggestive and intrigued, like I was definitely interested.
“Huh? No,” he said. His laughter faded, but he still had a smile on his face. “I didn’t think that would be the best idea.”
“I don’t know,” I said, turning to him. I turned my face up towards his, as he looked down at me, and suddenly realized we were within inches of touching. I could almost feel his soft breath caressing the skin on my face. “From what I saw in the bathroom this morning, you’ve got nothing to be ashamed of.”
His face took on a surprised expression, while I felt a predatory smile curl around my lips. I wasn’t sure where this was coming from, but I decided to go with it. The throbbing in my clit was beating so hard that I struggled to resist the need to rub my thighs together or touch myself. I told myself that I could pretty much do or say anything to him at that moment and he’d be unable to resist.
“I thought you turned around before you saw anything,” he said. He was still cool and calm, in control, but I could see a hint of discomfort creeping in. I edged a fraction closer and spoke into his slightly parted lips.
“I think you also thought I had no idea you were checking out my naked ass in there.”
“Mary-Jane, please,” he whispered back with a tremble in his voice, like he was struggling to keep himself under control.
I let my hand fall from the table it lay on, to drop down between us. Remembering my dream, I blindly, accidentally, groped about until I touched him; touched his pants. In a blinding flash, he had a grip on my elbows. He turned me away from him just as quickly, one hand coming to my throat and the other encircling my stomach, pulling me close to him. My heart was suddenly in my mouth, pounding frantically, and I think I stopped breathing. I had no idea what was about to happen to me, but, as he yanked me hard against him, I felt the unmistakable shape of his hard cock pressing against my ass, the length of him landing perfectly between my cheeks.
Despite the fear, I felt my pussy grow wet as he pressed against me, throbbing slowly. I didn’t move. I wanted him. I wanted him to take me, to take my virginity, and if he wanted, to just do it fast and hard from behind. He had my blessing.
“I don’t know what you’re trying to do,” he growled in my ear.
Liar, I thought to myself.
�
�I don’t know what you’re trying to do, Mary-Jane, but stop it. I invited you over here to work, as a favor to my friend, your uncle. If you’re not mature enough to understand that, I can send you back home tonight.”
My heart was still pounding, but my breathing had returned, as a hoarse panting. Is he really not attracted to me after all? I screamed inside my head. Have I misread this whole thing? He must be fucking Vanessa if he has no interest in me. My brain was spinning and I felt stupid. Stupid and embarrassed. “I… I’m sorry Warren. I was just teasing you. After the bathroom and the dick pic… I was just having some fun.”
He let go of me and stepped back. I turned back to him and stepped backward too, looking for a bench to lean against.
“I have to apologize, Mary-Jane,” he began, a far more normal tone in his voice. “If I led you on, I’m sorry. It’s not my place and I shouldn’t be betraying the trust your parents and uncle have put in me to take care of you.”
I didn’t know what to say, so I excused myself to the bathroom. Outside the darkroom, I leaned against the wall and tried to figure out what I was feeling. The intensity of the situation was almost overwhelming and I just didn’t want to ensure I didn’t cry. So, it’s not going to happen, I told myself, I should have known better. Come on MJ, pull yourself together and get on with what you came here to do: learn.
I stepped back into the darkroom and found Warren busying himself exposing more film. I opened my mouth to say something but he spoke first.
“Bring me that bottle of fixer, would you?” he asked, like things were back to normal. I did as he instructed and tried to emulate his attitude. Pretty soon, as we got on with the tasks at hand, it did feel normal and we managed to have a productive rest of the day.
*****
“And those shots of…?”
“The valley over in the next glen,” Warren helped me out.
“Yeah, those,” I bleated excitedly, “the composition, the use of light, amazing!”
I was talking to Vanessa over a light dinner of smoked Scottish salmon and salad, with more of Warrens fresh, home-made bread and a bottle of white wine. It was around five, so the beautiful assistant had elected to join us, but was possibly regretting that decision as I gushed on and on about the photographs we’d worked on, like some drugged-up groupie. She smiled at me and listened patiently to everything.
“Well, don’t sell your own developing skills short,” said Warren, warmly. “For someone born and raised in the digital age, she has a real eye for old-fashioned exposure, V.”
“Well, that’s great to hear,” grinned Vanessa. “I’m glad you guys managed to get so much done today.”
I felt Warren’s hand rest on my shoulder in a friendly way, but my mind still flashed back to him rejecting me, and I bristled a little. I wasn’t wrong, though, was I, I asked myself, I felt him hard and fully aroused against me. My head was still spinning a little and I was so confused. Right then, though, I just hoped Vanessa didn’t see me stiffen at Warren’s touch.
“Well, boss,” Vanessa said, after the little pause had grown just a heartbeat too long for my liking, “we have that thing. We’d better run if we want to be in Glasgow by seven.”
“Neat,” I jumped up. “Where are we going?”
“You’re staying here,” Warren said, standing so he was really towering over me, making me feel even more like a child. “I have this benefit to attend which really has very little to do with photography, so you wouldn’t learn anything. I need you to get to sleep early because I’m taking you out at six tomorrow morning.”
They got up and left before I could say much more. I wanted to protest, wanted to be included, but I realized it wouldn’t do much good to pout like a brat. Besides, I found myself thinking, it's probably just a ruse so they can get away and fuck. So, I resigned myself to staying home and surfing the web until I felt incredibly tired around 9 pm. Figuring I still hadn’t shaken the jet lag completely, I went to bed, hoping the morning embarrassment would stop any more of those fevered dreams.
Chapter Four
I chugged the last of my coffee and hurried after Warren as he opened the door to leave. Once outside, he unlocked the Jaguar and held the passenger door open for me. It was still dark as I ducked under the car’s roof, with the only light for miles around coming from the house we’d just left.
“Where’re we going?” I asked as he closed the door on me. “Don’t we need some cameras or something?”
“One: Wait and see,” he told me, as he slid into the driver’s seat. “Two: Vanessa will have made sure everything we’ll need is in the trunk already.” He pressed the start button and the engine burst into life, before settling down to an almost silent purr.
“Don’t you need to check to make sure she hasn’t forgotten anything?” I offered, as he shifted the car into drive.
“If I had to do that, she wouldn’t be much of an assistant, would she?” he answered, flooring the throttle and spinning the wheels to send us rocketing off down the farm track. Within no time, we were back on the same road Vanessa had been following the night she brought me here. Only this time, I was being taken further north.
Warren pointed out that we were within a stone’s throw of the oldest working whisky distillery in Scotland, and that it was the ease of access to his favorite scotch, as well as the achingly beautiful landscape, that prompted him to buy the house we were currently staying in, so many years ago. I confessed I wasn’t much of a spirit drinker. I’d enjoyed the good brandy the other night, but had never discovered a taste for the whiskeys I’d tried in college.
“That’s because it was whiskey with an ‘e’,” he looked over at me as he drove. “I’ll show you some proper whisky – no ‘e’ – and it’ll change your life.”
“Well, that sounds promising,” I admitted, as we drove on into the blackness.
A little more than twenty minutes later, we were crawling quietly through a sleepy little town. We turned left at an intersection and started down a steep hill, and I saw we were heading for the ocean. The surrounding orange streetlamps reflected back off the huge, black sea, as it spread out before me. A faint light was starting to glow on the horizon behind it. Growing up in Missouri, I had never seen the sea. Even attending college in San Antonio, which was only a two-hour drive from the Gulf of Mexico, I’d still never made it to the beach. It looked ominous, threatening, vast, and utterly beautiful.
Reaching the bottom of the hill, Warren swung us left and we drove along a road that ran parallel with the coastline, the water’s edge only yards away, beyond a shoreline wall and across a pebbly beach, until he pulled into a vacant parking lot that faced the waves.
We stepped out of the warm car into the crisp morning air. It was so cold that I was watching my breath appearing as steam from my mouth, until I finally noticed the noise. As calm as the sea appeared, the thunderous rumble of the surf was constant and, when Warren pointed them out, I saw the waves crashing against the edge of the parking lot, sending sprays flying high into the air.
“See what you can catch as the waves break,” Warren said, opening the trunk and pulling out a long bag. He reached inside and pulled out a camera, then handed it to me. I took it from him carefully, appreciating it was a Nikon D5, probably the best professional digital SLR money can buy and, at more than six thousand dollars for the camera body alone, not something she was in a hurry to have to replace. “Slow shutter for the low light should make some interesting patterns, if you can hold it still enough.”
It was like the uncomfortableness of yesterday’s encounter had been totally forgotten. He was being cool and professional, leaving me no choice but to act the same way. I tried my best to time the slow shutter speed with the breakers as they splashed into the edge of the parking lot and, a few shots later, Warren suddenly stood beside me.
“Let me see what you got,” he ordered, taking the camera from me and examining my pictures in the little screen on the back of it. He seemed so excited, so k
een to see what I’d captured, I began to understand why he was so good at his job and how he had done it for so long.
“You need to see this,” he began, looking up at the sky and not telling me if my shots were good or bad. He grabbed my wrist and pulled me away with him. “As dawn breaks over the mountain behind us, the sea does the most amazing things.
I followed him and we trudged down onto the stone-covered beach. Warren had me set up a tripod as he fiddled with his Nikon. He seemed satisfied and handed it back to me, so I screwed it carefully onto the tripod.
He went back to it and I tried to question him as he fussed with placement, ISOs, aperture settings, and shutter speeds, but it felt like I was talking to a wall. He was in the zone. Finally, he turned back to me.
“Go ahead,” he beckoned, indicating that I should look through the viewfinder. I stepped up and peered through the lens. “Take a few more shots.”
I gingerly reached up and pressed the button a few times, then looked down at the screen on the back of the camera. Instead of darkness, the scene it showed was full of light. I could see the gray clouds as full, fluffy patterns in the sky, and the light catching the rolling waves on the sea. Hidden to the naked eye but looking just heavenly through his camera, I looked back at Warren, smiling at the fantastic sights he was showing me.
“Dawn is breaking,” he whispered to me, indicating the encroaching light behind us. “Back off the ISO a little and just shoot what you want.”
“Me?” I asked.
“Yes, you,” he snapped. “Settings, composition, that’s all the science of photography. Once that’s done, any idiot can push the button. I want to see if you can actually take a photograph. Shoot what you want to see captured!”
I concentrated and tried to focus on what I thought were the most striking moments. “Here,” I said. I was actually trembling as I showed him what I’d got.
