His gaze met mine, and the air thickened, charged with the memory of the balcony.
“I see a lot of things people try to hide. ” His eyes flickered down to my mouth, and the unspoken was back, screaming between us.
I cleared my throat, forcing myself to pivot back to business. “So, the photographer for the wedding. Julian Vance?”
A flicker of something—disappointment?—crossed his face before it was replaced by his usual sardonic mask. “God, no. I don’t do weddings. Too much forced smiling. Julian is the artist. He uses my studio when he’s in the city. But I can walk you through his style. It’s all about the right perspective. ”
He led me to the center of the room where a camera stood on a tripod, aimed at a simple stool.
“The pretense of a wedding is perfection,” he said, his hand hovering over the camera. “The reality is chaos. Julian is good at capturing the beautiful moments inside that chaos. ”
He gestured for me to look through the viewfinder. I leaned in, my hands feeling clumsy as I gripped the cold metal body. The stool was just a stool. Plain, uninteresting.
“You’re looking, but you’re not seeing,” he murmured from directly behind me.
I froze as his body heat enveloped me. He was so close I could feel the warmth of his chest against my back, the faint scent of his skin—something clean and male and uniquely *him*—filling my senses.
“Let me show you,” he whispered, his voice a gravelly caress against my ear. His hands covered mine on the camera, his long, artist’s fingers interlacing with my own.
A tremor went through me. He guided my hands, adjusting a dial.
“This is the aperture,” he breathed, his thumb brushing over my pulse point.
My heart hammered a frantic rhythm against his touch. “You need to decide how much light you let in. ” He was talking about the camera. He had to be. But his words were weaving a different story. “Too little, and everything stays in the shadows. Too much, and you’re exposed. ”
His other hand settled on my waist, a firm, possessive weight that anchored me to him.
My breath hitched. I should have pushed him away.
I should have stepped back and reminded him of Marcus, of his sister, of the professional line we weren’t just crossing, but incinerating. But my body was a traitor, leaning into his touch.
“And the focus,” he continued, his lips now brushing the sensitive shell of my ear. I squeezed my eyes shut. “You have to choose what’s important. What you want to be sharp and clear…”
His hand slid from my waist, up my side, his thumb tracing the curve of my ribs just below my breast.
“…and what you’re willing to let blur into the background. ”