Brush Strokes

Tanya spends hours at a time
painting renditions of the masculine—and very nude—glory that is
Joe, her gorgeous blue-eyed model. The things an artist has to
suffer for her craft. When he offers to help her learn how to
improve her work, simple lessons in touching and learning his body,
she’s willing to suffer that much more…for the sake of her craft,
of course.

When tragedy strikes, her
career is left dangling by a thin thread. The secret she’s
harbored—that she’s been unable to finish her artwork—is exposed.
Now she has little more than twenty-four hours to not only create
the best piece of her life, but also finish it in time to be shown
or lose everything she’s tried to build.

What began as erotic lessons
in art becomes a study in love and perseverance that Joe will never
let her forget.

WARNING: This e-book contains matters
of a sexual nature and adult language, which some may find
offensive and which is not appropriate for a young audience. This
book is for ADULTS ONLY.

This is a work of fiction. Names,
characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s
imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as
real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or
persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Black Dawn Fiction

Smashwords Edition

Brush Strokes

Copyright © 2012 by Dee
Carney

ISBN: 978-1-4764-624-2

Edited by Cari Quinn

Cover by Mina Carter

All rights reserved.
eBooks are not transferable.
No part of this book may be used or reproduced electronically
or in print without written permission, except in the case of brief
quotations embodied in reviews.

Chapter One

If Tanya looked up and met the force
behind his blue eyes, she’d lose her nerve. She let her fingers see
him instead. Feel every line, every ridge of muscle. Trace
unyielding bone, memorize soft hairs.

Joe
. She loved that his name was so simple. She wanted to hum the
syllable, taste how it felt against her tongue as she learned his
body. His soft breath, fragrant with the combination of spearmint
and cinnamon, brushed against her face. Standing this close to him,
she wouldn’t allow herself the pleasure of calling to
him.

She was supposed to be concentrating.
Learning how best to immortalize him, but nothing about his
proposed method wanted to work. Sure, between her thighs ached with
longing, her panties growing damp with need, but her role as his
employer demanded she fight back the sensual urgings. To disregard
her psyche’s whispers that he welcomed her touch as much as she
relished delivering it. To ignore a neglected libido that demanded
attention.

Her hands dropped away from his chest
and she blew out a frustrated breath. “This isn’t
working.”

Joe caught her wrists and
dragged her quite willing hands back up until they rested on his
pecs again. Firm, muscled,
oh-holy-wow
pecs. “Close your eyes
and try harder. Stop being bashful and learn what’s in front of
you.”

For two months now, the man spent two
days a week, three to six hours each session modeling in the nude
before her. “Bashful” didn’t exist anymore.

She did as he instructed, but the
slow, methodic thump of his heartbeat beneath her palms made her
want to stop and rest there for far longer than propriety allowed.
For no better reason than to distract herself, she spread her
fingers, sliding through the soft curls resting there. Only that
was worse. The soft tickle resulted in an urge to rub against him
with rough abandon. While that might alleviate the itch, what her
continued exploration of his body stoked elsewhere might rage out
of control.

“
Joe,” she said with an
edgy whine.
This is killing me.
“I don’t think this is helpful, at
all.”

She opened her eyes in time to catch
the sexy curl of his upper lip. “You haven’t even given it a
chance, Tanya.”

“
Whose idea was this
again?” she muttered. Like she had anyone but herself to blame. Joe
took her moaning and groaning about the lack of texture, the
missing emotion from her paintings and offered her a new way to
experience him besides just visually. He offered himself; all of
him—in all of his masculine splendor.

Had he asked, he would have found out
just how well she knew his body. No woman with a beating pulse
could have ignored the erotic way his muscles pulled when he
stretched his arms overhead. The pose he adopted for her latest
painting showed off every ripple in his abdomen, each cord in his
back. She enjoyed the splay of goose bumps dotting his skin on
cooler days, memorized the path rivulets of sweat followed on
warmer ones. When she ventured too close, the earthy hint of his
cologne awakened her senses, the smell of acrylic and canvas fading
away until the only thing she knew was him.

“
The problem,” Joe murmured
huskily, “is that you’ve relied too long on your eyes to capture
images for you.” His hands came to rest on top of hers, blanketing
her in his warmth. She started when he dragged her palms down in
decadent languidness. “Your art has lost its luster, maybe its
vividness, because there are so many other senses to enhance what
you do, but you ignore them.”

She tried to steady her breathing.
Focus intently on the way her rich brown sugar colored skin
contrasted against the pale beige undertones of his. He guided her
over the silky curls of black hair on his chest. He had the right
amount of hair on him too. Just thick enough to proclaim his
masculinity, but sparse enough to show off hours of work at the
gym.

“
It’s one thing to memorize
anatomy,” Joe continued, “but another altogether to recreate its
majesty. Every time you put your brush against the canvas, that’s
what you are doing. Recreating.”

She finally found the courage to look
into his eyes. Watching what her hands were doing on him made her
head swim, so she dropped her gaze again. “You make me sound like
I’m playing God or something.”

He chuckled, a sound that vibrated
through his chest. “All I’m saying is that you need to close your
eyes if you’re going to learn me well enough to capture me on
canvas. Give your other senses a chance. Touch. Smell.
Taste…”

“
Taste?” Her gaze rose to
meet his.

“
Taste.”

Her throat dried with anticipation,
her mind whirling with the suggestion of what he wanted. What she
wanted too. His gaze dropped to her mouth, and he leaned closer.
“Taste, Tanya.”

She took an involuntary step back
despite a little voice in the back of her mind urging her forward.
“Uh, maybe I should start with baby steps.”

Something—
anything
—to slow this down. Why hadn't she foreseen where this might
lead from the second he proposed helping her out with a tactual
technique? Except, maybe she had. Now that the reality of taking
things further with Joe stared her in the face, her nerve lost
ground.

His enticing smile morphed into a
wicked grin. “Baby steps? Okay then, I think I can handle that.” He
kept up the delicious slide of skin on skin contact. “The first
step, a tiny one, can be touch. Are you okay with that?”

She laughed, the tremor in that sound
an instant betrayal of her true emotions. Did he have any idea
whatsoever how he drove her to distraction like this? “I guess,”
she conceded.

“
Good. Now concentrate this
time.”

Maybe if she kept her eyes open,
arousing thoughts wouldn’t flood her mind. If she stared into clear
blue eyes, blinking slowly, noticing the fine flecks of silver in
his irises...or if she studied the fine structure of his nose that
tapered down before dropping off to make room for lips ready with a
quick smile. A mouth when parted encouraged her to use her tongue
to explore it.

She shook loose the
thoughts.

Perhaps eyes closed were in
order.

Oh yes. Closed. This way allowed her
the privilege of skimming his warm skin. Rounding where his abdomen
met his back. Touching each bump along his spine, the angled frames
of his shoulder blades. Back down to narrow hips. A thin
waist.

Joe stepped closer. Perhaps maybe an
inch of space separated them. Without opening her eyes, her
instincts, some part of her that defined femininity recognized the
shift in her environment. Grasped on to the electric static
generated between their bodies.

His presence wrapped around her like a
familiar blanket until her breathing eased. It matched the slow
rise and fall of his chest, she realized idly. His breath fanned
over her cheek. Suddenly, her dry lips needed her moist tongue to
run over them for some sort of relief.

“
Are you starting to get it
now?”

“
Mmm,” she hummed, almost
unwilling to break the hypnotic spell. Elastic skin. Fine hairs.
Strong muscles. And when she drifted lower, his stomach expanded
and contracted. The rhythmic movement lulled her erratic heartbeat
into developing a smooth, easy pace. She pressed her fingers
harder, enjoying the synchronization of his breath and his body’s
autonomic motions. A rich pathway of curls snaked down his
mid-abdomen. She dragged her finger through its density, stopping
when his hair fanned out.

She’d been staring at this man for too
long, far too intently to not recognize the pubic thatch resting
above a well-formed cock even without spying it now. Some of her
previous models leaned toward shaving most, if not all of the hair
there, but Joe kept himself as God intended. She loved that; not
just as an artist hoping to recreate the beauty of man, but as a
woman, who didn’t go for men who needed to prove their feminine
sides with manicured nails and shaved eyebrows. Au natural suited
her just fine, thank you very much.

“
Why’d you
stop?”

His voice yanked her out of her
thoughts. Tanya exhaled slowly. “There’s more to explore
here.”

“
Ah.”

Joe’s amused one word
response sent a rush of heat over her cheeks. They both knew damned
good and well why she stopped. Did he really expect her to touch
down
there?
Never
mind that she’d pay an arm and a leg to do so, but come on, they
were both supposed to be behaving as professionals.

Her hands trailed over gooseflesh as
she stepped around him to his side, the pads of her fingers ran
over his hip and then met the small of his back. She’d already
traced ridges on his spine, her fingers searching for some of them
hidden beneath his flesh, so she moved to the tip of his crease,
right between his rounded buttocks. While she didn’t quite have the
nerve to touch his sex yet, this she would enjoy with great
relish.

Spreading him apart, one of them
moaned first, but she couldn’t quite tell who. Blood rushed through
her ears, filling the quiet space of her mind with an incredible
hum. A pulse in her neck beat with unrestrained excitement. At the
same time, she held her breath and her head swam.