Skin (9 page)

“Just relax. Be yourself. Don’t try to impress him. Don’t worry if he doesn’t like something you say or do. All relationships are improved when the two people involved are honest, both with themselves and each other.”

Robin studied her own features in the mirror. “Before this,” she motioned to the ruined side of her face, “I had several really good relationships. Keeping a relationship going is an art…maybe that’s where I fall down. But you have to get one to learn how to keep it. And you’re sending off signals that would confuse the hell out of any guy.”

Tania’s mouth fell open. “Wait. You just said I was too eager.”

“And too confused. He wasn’t there the whole time, so he didn’t see the gambit of emotions flashing across your face for the last hour. Just calm down. If it’s meant to be, it’s meant to be.” She shrugged.

“And the shark and guppy comment?” Tania said drily. Inside, she just felt tired, like her first foray had been bad enough that she should go to her room and forget all about Kane.

“He’s a big, sexy male, and he knows it. You are a tiny, sexy female, and you don’t know it.”

Tania smiled. “I can see that.”

“Sharks have their purposes in the ecosystem, too. Maybe he’s learning to be a relationship man… Look, all I’m saying is I wouldn’t want you to jump into anything and get hurt.” She walked to the door. “Now, let’s go finish our meal.”

With the second person in as many hours warning her to tread carefully, Tania realized they just might know what they were talking about. Subdued, she returned to her chair and finished her plate.

“Tania, are you ready for a session tonight?”

Unfortunately, Jenna’s question appeared to fall into a moment of silence at the table.

Tania froze. She worked to keep her face calm, but inside, her mind screamed
hell no!
The last thing she wanted was a third woman warning her to back off. She’d gotten the message. She chewed slowly while she considered her answer. The therapist would analyze everything she said, a failing of the profession.

“I’m really tired tonight. How about in the morning?” she said quietly.

She felt the heat of Jenna’s gaze as she cut up a piece of chicken and ate it. When she raised her gaze to look at the therapist, Jenna smiled. “Sure, sounds good. How about a breakfast meeting? 7-ish?”

“That’s early, but sure…at least I’ll be awake for tomorrow’s class.”

Jenna smiled. “Good. Until the morning then.” With a smile at everyone, Jenna stood up and took her leave.

Almost instantly, a tension Tania hadn’t been aware of before eased. The teacher left the room and the kids were now relaxing. She grinned.

“Hey, what are you smiling at?” Robin asked with a big smile. “You appear to be in a good mood.”

“Yeah, I pushed that meeting off until the morning.” Tania grinned. Maybe she shouldn’t have, but she needed rest from the emotional overload, and a part of her wanted to see if Kane had plans for the evening and if they included her. As that was the wrong thing to be waiting for, she decided to go up to her room. Standing up, she excused herself. “I have homework to do.”

Kane looked up at her. “Are you going to go through the pictures?”

She nodded. “Yes, to see if I can find any worth keeping.”

“Do you need help?” he asked, half-straightening from his chair.

“No.” At the surprised look on his face, she gave a small laugh. “At least not at this stage. There are hundreds of shots, and I’m most likely to delete ninety percent of them. When the numbers get down to something reasonable, then I’ll show you and you can go through the ones I think might work.”

He grinned. “In other words, you don’t want me to see the less-than-stellar pictures.”

“So true.” She waved goodbye to the others and headed up to her room. Once inside, she brought out her laptop and started downloading the pictures. She had no idea how many she’d taken; only that she’d gone madly click-happy. The file was huge. She walked to the side counter and made herself a cup of coffee. She could have stayed longer, but she was happy to have time alone, time to find her balance again. Having one’s behavior pointed out took a bit of adjustment. At twenty-four, she wasn’t a kid any longer, but apparently she still didn’t know how to behave in public. She could put the blame for that squarely on Kane’s shoulders.

Kane’s beautiful shoulders.

If she had to do a photography class and would not be able to choose her own subject, Kane made a hell of a second choice.

Hell, who was she kidding, Kane
was
her first choice.

Finally, the file was downloaded. She sat down with her coffee, opened her image program, and quickly started sorting through the pictures. She did a quick go-through and deleted the ones that were obviously junk, then went back through the remaining hundred. She created a file titled “Project” and dropped several good images into that folder. There was one of Kane standing and staring at the sailboat. She loved the way the camera had caught the wistfulness in his eyes. She plowed through the next group and picked out a couple that caught his hard jaw as he stared at something off screen. She chose the images that spoke to her. They said something about Kane, the man. The camera loved him, making it that much harder to sort through the last thirty images in the file. When she was done, she turned her attention to the group of pictures she’d taken while he’d worked out.

That was when she understood how the camera not only loved Kane, but that his body was made for this. All the beautifully defined muscles, the ripples as they moved and shifted…she wished for the first time that she had a video camera. He was a man in motion. Such a connection. In one shot, his jaw clenched, and his eyes were so focused. There was one of his bicep, the muscle so smooth and shiny but hard and tense with the effort he was exerting.

She put one of her favorite photos into a different folder she named “Special”. Kane had just finished the workout; he’d collapsed back down to the mat. In her mind, she remembered the heaving chest, the quivering look at the hard muscle, but it was the look of relief, the look of pride, and that tinge of complacency as he realized he’d done it. He’d managed to complete his physically punishing workout again. He hadn’t let it beat him.

She knew it was a competition for him. A challenge to see if he was up to it or if he was going to wuss out. He would not appreciate her thoughts, she was sure, but he had such a sense of satisfaction around him that she could only cheer with him. As she went through the pictures from start to finish, it was as if she was there all over again. Seeing the pain, the effort he exerted, hearing the grunts and gasps as he struggled to make his body do what he wanted it to do.

His skin glowed in one particular picture. She considered it, wondering at the light that hit and bounced off his skin. A sheen of sweat had appeared just before she’d taken the shot and as she studied the next couple of pictures, she understood that the reflection had added something else to the picture. Like a mirror of what he was doing to himself.

She loved this one. Setting it aside, she moved through several more, but they were more mundane, showing his actions but not the highs and lows, not the emotion or the effort. They were technically good, but flat. She set them into another folder she named “Kane”.

She wouldn’t be keeping them but as they were good shots, just not great shots, she’d let him see them and decide for himself.

There were still a few more. Another one had an interesting light as it hit Kane’s back and the muscles gleaming in the shadows. Very inspiring.

She snorted. Who was she kidding? The man was damn sexy and maybe there was something wrong with her, but the sweaty, hardworking man apparently did it for her.

Who knew?

And wasn’t that something? She savored the warmth. Screw that, savored the
heat
coursing through her body as she stared at the pictures of Kane. Salivating was a bit much, but she had to admit, she wanted a taste of him.

She’d never thought to have gotten this far. Now that she had, everyone was warning her away.

Would having an affair with Kane be wrong? No.

And as she stared down at him, reality once again crashed down on her. She could sit here and dream all she wanted; it was still a hell of a long ways from actually lying down with the man.

She buried her face in her hands. She was a mess.

Of course she was. She was here in a goddamned therapy session, wasn’t she?

Wiping back the tears from the corner of her eyes, she finished sorting through the pictures. As she came back to the one that had set her off earlier, she copied it into a folder she named “Secret”. She almost felt dirty doing it, but if there was only one thing she could take away from this week, it was these pictures of Kane. Although he hadn’t said she could keep them after the project was done.

Sighing, she went to turn off her laptop when there was a casual knock on her door.

She stood up and walked to the door. “Who is it?” she asked. She hated peepholes and never used them to look outside. She’d seen too many movies showing horrors on the other side of the damn door.

“Kane.”

Oh shit.

She straightened her shirt, brushed her hair back off her face, and opened the door. “Hey.”

He smiled down at her. “Just came to see if you got through those photos. We’re both in the project, remember? You don’t have to do all the work.”

She laughed. “No, I won’t. I’m still not sure what this damn project is supposed to be or how it’s going to help.”

He started to step inside before he stopped and looked at her. “May I come in?”

*

Tania took a
deep breath and stepped aside. She followed him into her room. Here was another first. She’d never had a man in her bedroom, and she’d never had a man this close in a very long time.

“I’d like to see the pictures you took.”

She nodded and disconnected her laptop. “Fine. Do you want to go to the coffee shop and look at them?”

He tilted his head and motioned to the small table where the laptop rested. “I thought I could just look at them here. It won’t take long, will it?”

Disconcerted, she plugged in her laptop in. She shook her head. “No, it shouldn’t. I deleted the bulk of them.” She bent down, found the folder, and opened it.

He pulled the desk chair back far enough to be able to sit down. He leaned forward slightly and clicked through the images in her program. He studied each one carefully, stopping longer at one or two then moving past several as if they weren’t as visually impressive. She knew they weren’t all good, but she had to have something to start with.

He came to the end and studied the last one, the picture where he’d completed his workout, the pain, the suffering, but also the gain he’d achieved on so many levels.

“You’re very intuitive.”

She started. That’s the last thing she’d expected. “Pardon?”

He waved at the pictures. “In fact, I’d have to say you’re very gifted.”

He’d surprised her, too. “I’m good, but not
that
good.”

He snorted. “You see more behind a lens than you give yourself credit for.” He clicked back a couple of pictures. “While you were taking pictures, I couldn’t think of what you’d possibly find interesting when I was repeating the same movements over and over again. But you weren’t taking pictures of the movements, but of
me
as I went through them.”

She stared at him. “So? What else was I to take pictures of?”

He grinned. “That’s what I was trying to figure out. You captured more of me in these images than I thought was there to see.”

He stood up. “On top of it all, the play of light and dark is interesting.”

“We’re supposed to do a theme of some kind, a journey.” She studied the thumbnail pictures lined up in neat rows on the folder and twisted her lips. “There’s not much there to go on.”

“No,” he said in a deep voice. “But I suspect there’s enough.”

He walked to the door.

She trailed behind him. “Does that mean you understand the instructions Jenna gave us? About a theme?”

“It means that I think I’m beginning to.” He looked down at her. “Get some sleep, Tinkerbelle. You’re going to need it.”

Then he was gone.