by Vicki Tharp
He turned on the light over the table and dug out the rolls of film he’d taken on the trip down. He’d burned through more rolls than he’d planned, but it had been his first time through the Smokey Mountains, and his first time that far from home, so he’d gotten carried away. He’d have to be more selective if his film supply was going to last. From the back of the camera, he stripped the roll he’d used up at the bar. More eager than he should have been to enlarge the shots he’d taken of Cora.
Behind him, Cora grunted and cussed as she struggled out of her jeans with her bum knee. He heard her clothes hit the linoleum as well as the shuffle of the sheets as she slid in. As tempted as he was to peek, he didn’t dare.
He wasn’t that much of a prick.
Besides, they’d built a fragile trust. He’d successfully navigated past the serial killer phase and if he was going to succeed at fitting in on the circuit, he couldn’t risk crushing his credibility.
“Okay,” she said at last. “I’m decent.”
He turned to see her lying in his bed. The thick blanket covered her up to her neck. It shouldn’t have been sexy, but with her long hair spilling out over his pillow and knowing full well what she was—and more importantly, wasn’t wearing—made him harder.
He turned back toward the table and adjusted himself. “Is this light going to keep you up?”
“You’re not coming to bed?” Her face scrunched up and that riotous laugh he liked so much filled the inside of the camper. “That came out all wrong. I didn’t mean ‘bed’ as in we’re sleeping together.”
He stared at her a moment too long and she must have thought he misunderstood because she quickly added, “I meant ‘bed’ as in I sleep on this side and you sleep way over there on the other side in a strictly platonic, no sex kind of way. It’s your trailer. I don’t want you sleeping on the cold floor.”
“I knew what you meant. And no. I’m not going to bed. I’ve got a bunch of work to do. If I get too tired I can crash over here. The table folds down and makes a bed.”
“Suit yourself.” She fluffed up his pillow and snuggled into it, her eyes drifting closed. He’d gathered up the rolls of film and had slid open the door to his bathroom-turned-darkroom when she asked, “Why are you being so nice to me?”
He glanced over. Cora’s eyes had gone soft and half-mast, her lashes brushing her cheek. She looked warm and cozy. The mountain of blankets did nothing to hide her sensuality. Ian wanted to reach for his camera, wanted to immortalize this moment. “Can’t a guy be nice?”
“In my experience, there’s usually an ulterior motive.”
Before he proved her right, before he did something stupid and crawled into bed with her, he said, “Get some sleep.”
By the time he’d prepped the dark room for developing, her eyes had drifted closed and her breathing had evened out. He closed the bathroom door behind him, turned on the red light, and stuffed an old towel under the door to protect the rolls of film as he stripped the negatives out of their plastic housings.
There was something he wanted from her, and tomorrow he’d have to tell Cora the truth.
* * *
Cora woke to the sun streaming through the dirty window of Ian’s camper, and the stomach-grumbling pop and snap of bacon frying.
She groaned and stretched. “Something smells good.”
“Bacon’s almost done,” Ian said, his voice gravelly that early in the morning. She ignored the delicious way that rumble raised the goosebumps on her arms. “Scrambled eggs okay?”
“Perfect.” She leaned over the edge of the bed and retrieved her jeans. “Please tell me that’s coffee I smell.”
“Instant, but yeah.”
She pulled her pants under the sheets and struggled to get them on. She was out of breath by the time she put her feet on the cold floor. Her knee twinged.
“How’s the leg?”
“Sore. Better though.”
He took a sip of his coffee and she stole it out of his hands. “Help yourself,” he said, the slow smile sliding across his face.
She drank some down and handed it back. “Just enough to tide me over until I can make one of my own. She pointed to the bathroom. “Do you mind?”
“Ahh...” His eyes darted toward the closed door and he shifted from foot to foot, looking like a kid who’d got caught looking at Playboy. “Give me a sec.”
He shut off the burner and disappeared into the bathroom, closing the door firmly behind him. Cora leaned against the counter and plucked a piece of bacon out of the pan. Hot. Hot. Hot. It scalded. She quickly chewed and swallowed it down. Best hangover food ever.
Inside the bathroom, Ian thumped around, a cabinet door banged closed and then another. Cora crossed her legs. She really, really, really had to pee. “You almost done in there?”
The bathroom door slid open and Ian stepped out with several stuffed manila folders held against his chest. “All yours,” he said as he dumped the folders on the dining table.
Inside his bathroom, he’d strung multiple rows of clothes line between the shower walls and had three deep trays of liquid on the shower pan. A chemical smell burned her nose and an eerie red light bathed the bathroom, reminding her of the set of a horror movie. “Is this your idea of mood lighting, Ian? It looks like a bordello in here. Or are those trays of chemicals how you dissolve your victims?”
Ian rushed over and turned off the red light and switched on the overhead light. “Sorry. The bathroom doubles as my darkroom, not as my way to dispose of the dead bodies. I’d need a lot more room for that. Good thing my camper is small and you’re too cute to kill.”
“Funny.”
She closed the door and used his facilities unable to get the ‘you’re too cute’ part out of her head. Turning on the faucet she splashed water on her face, appreciating not having to go out in the cold to clean up. Who was she kidding? With how low the temps had dropped the night before, all of her jugs of water had to be frozen solid by now.
She came out to find Ian sitting at the table, with a couple mugs of coffee and two plates of food going cold. “You didn’t have to wait for me.”
He picked up his fork as she sat and picked up hers. “My ma did manage to beat a few manners into me.”
“Speaking of beating...” She pointed with her fork at the bruising and scuff mark on his cheek. “You didn’t do too bad out there for a city slicker. How’s the face.”
“Fine. When I was a kid, my brothers routinely did worse damage before breakfast. This is nothing.”
“That’s where you learned to fight?”
Something dark flashed in his eyes, but then his expression softened, and he shrugged like it didn’t matter. Cora didn’t buy it.
“Do or die. Right?” he said.
She studied him, not taking her eyes off his as she reached for her coffee, knocking it over. “Sorry.” Cora scrambled to her feet and grabbed for the folders trying to save them from the river of coffee flowing their way. “I’m such a klutz.”
Ian went for a rag as photographs slipped from the folders and fell onto the floor. Cora ignored the pain in her leg as she got on her hands and knees beneath the table. “Quick, toss me a rag.”
He slapped one in her hand and used one of his own to wipe the top of the table. More coffee splattered onto the floor and she sopped it up, gathering up the three photos that had fallen face down. She dabbed at the coffee that had landed on the backs of the pictures.
“You need another rag?” Ian asked.
“I think I’m good.” She scooted out from beneath the table.
Ian’s eyes went round and he snatched the photos out of her hand. He didn’t even bother checking to make sure there wasn’t any liquid on the front of them before shoving them back into one of the manila folders.
Her stomach rolled over and it had nothing to do with the fact she’d had too much to drink the night before. What was up with the photos?
Ian sat back down and tucked back into his food, unwill
ing to meet her eye. “Eat before it gets cold.”
Cora sat, though for the first time since they’d met, a tickle of unease gnawed in her gut. She didn’t take him for a serial killer, or even dangerous. If she had, she never would have been sitting there, much less spent the night there. The fact that he hadn’t tried to make a pass supported her instincts.
But not being dangerous didn’t mean he wasn’t hiding something.
The silence grew oppressive as they ate, until her gut was so knotted she couldn’t force another bite. She pushed her half-eaten meal away. “Did I do something wrong?”
Ian pushed the eggs around on his plate. “No. It’s fine.” Instead of looking up at her, his gaze landed on the manila folder. What didn’t he want her to see? She reached for the folder, but he beat her to it and slid it to his side of the table.
“Why can’t I see the pictures?”
“I’m protective of my work.”
She held out her hand and wiggled her fingers at him, not really expecting he would let her see them, but determined to try. “Let me see.”
He picked up the folders, indecision warring in his green eyes. Then he held it out to her. She took hold, but he didn’t let them go.
“What?” she asked.
“Just...” He sighed and shook his head. “It’s not what it looks like.”
Still he didn’t let go.
What could be so bad that he didn’t want her to see? The hairs on the back of her neck stood up one by one and she suppressed the shiver. “Did you sneak pictures of me while I was changing last night?”
He sat up straight. “What? No.” Still, he had that hand-caught-in-the-cookie-jar look on his face.
“Is it pornography?”
His face softened. He almost smiled. “No.”
She gave the folder a little tug. “Then let me see.”
Finally, he relented. His color went pale then shifted to light green as if he might get sick. She pushed her plate aside and he busied himself by clearing the table and cleaning up. She flipped through the photos. Scenery shots. Mountains and Magnolias and morning mist. Sun and moon and long ribbons of road. Every shot more stunning than the last.
She glanced up at him as he leaned back against the counter, an arm over his chest, his chin in his hand as he watched her reactions. “These...” She didn’t have the words to describe how the photographs made her feel.
But it was more than just a feeling. Through his photographs, she saw the world through his eyes, like peeping through a crack in the door and seeing his soul. “I don’t think I’ll ever look at a rusted out old truck the same way again. It’s...beautiful. The lines, the light, the...”
Ian lowered his arms and rested his hands on the counter behind him, a grimace on his face.
“Why would you have a problem with me seeing these? They’re extraordinary.”
His knuckles got white as he gripped the counter and the pulse at the base of his neck thrummed. He cleared his throat. “Keep going.”
She thumbed through a couple more photographs, then one of them stuck to the photograph below it. With care, she peeled them apart. It took her a few seconds before what she saw registered. “Ohmygod.”
4
Ian rushed over and slid into the seat across from Cora, her hair still adorably sleep-tousled and her makeup smudged. “It’s not what you think.”
“I don’t know what to say.”
Ian didn’t know if she’d whispered her words or if it was the blood rushing past his ears that made her difficult to hear. “I can explain.”
She glanced up at him, her expression unreadable. He couldn’t blow this. He didn’t have the time or the money to find another circuit to follow if all this went to shit. But when he opened his mouth to speak, the words wouldn’t flow. They stuck on the back of his tongue nearly choking him.
Looking back down at the photo, Cora ran a light finger over her image. “Is this the way you saw me?” Awe coated her words, not anger. When she glanced back up at him it was with wonder, not wrath.
He scooted around to her side of the table and she slid over to accommodate him. “When you climbed up on that table, I just knew I had to capture the...the...”
“Essence?” Cora supplied.
Cora’s blue eyes met his. They were the clear blue of a summer sky at dawn. When had he ever seen such warmth, such understanding staring back at him? “Exactly.” He glanced at her mouth, at the way her tongue traced her bottom lip.
Don’t you dare kiss her.
He leaned away. He didn’t want her to think he was a pervert. He scratched at the stubble on his jaw. After three days on the road, he desperately needed a shave.
She still held the picture in her hand. In the shot, he’d caught her with her hands above her head, her head down as the moves and the music touched her. In the background behind her, the shutter had snapped as someone’s fist connected with Levi’s face. A cowboy hat forever hanging in mid-air.
Her eyes roved all over as if taking in every minute detail. “I like how the darkness plays against the light. How the innocence of the dancing contrasts with the brutality of the fight.”
She ran her finger over the curve of her hip, the exact spot where he’d like to lay his hand. “I look so uninhibited, so fun, so free.”
So beautiful. “What were you thinking when that shot was taken?”
A soft laugh huffed out of her mouth. “Everything and nothing. My mind closed off to the world except for the music. I let the beat and the beer take me away.”
“Y-you’re not mad?” He thought he knew the answer, but he needed to hear it from her mouth to be certain.
She put a hand over his and gave it a light squeeze before pulling away. Sparks didn’t fly when they touched, but his heart gave his sternum a swift kick as if telling his body that it had better pay attention. His blood warmed in his veins, spreading throughout his chest. The skin on the back of his hand still holding the imprint of her touch.
He would like to think he would wash that hand again sometime, but he wasn’t making any promises.
She flipped through the rest of the photographs, then took the stack and tapped it on the table, straightening them out and handing them back to him. “You have an amazing talent. A gift even. That magazine you want to work for would be insane not to pick you.”
He smiled for the first time since she picked up the photographs. “Great. Now all I have to do is get the shots I need and wow the magazine editor like I did you. I just gotta find a way to fit in, or at the very least blend into the background.”
She leaned away and looked him up and down, her eye critical. “You’re never gonna blend in dressed like that.”
Again, with the clothes. He held his hands up. “This was the best I could do. I’m not a rodeo fashion expert.”
“Clearly,” she said, the amused, calculating smile taking the sting out of her words. “If you’re looking for your personal fashion expert, you’ve come to the right place.”
“You?” He didn’t dare tell her he’d been about to ask her for that very help. He’d let her think it had been her bright idea.
“I’ve been in rodeo all my life. If anyone can make you look like you fit in, it’s me.” She nudged his shoulder and he moved to let her out of the booth.
“I’ve gotta go take care of my horse,” she said. “Meet me back at my trailer in an hour.”
She still had socks on her feet, but her trailer was close, so he let her go. The door was almost closed when he called out. “What if I had other plans?”
Turning back, she stuck her head through the doorway. “Change them.”
* * *
As the largest newspaper in town, Ian targeted The El Paso Tribune as his best shot at an editor paying a decent rate for one of his photographs.
It was a long shot, though. Many of the larger papers had their own photographers on staff and buying from a freelancer wasn’t necessarily the norm. But after spending most of the
day shopping with Cora, he’d blown what little money he’d had left.
He waited outside the editor’s office, his new leather cowboy boots tight across the balls of his feet. Cora assured him they would stretch. The rat-a-tat-tat of the typewriters buzzed along. Phones rang non-stop and the hub-bub of all the voices nearly deafened him.
He placed his new black Stetson on the wood bench beside him and ran a hand through his hair, having a hard time getting used to the feel of the short haircut that she’d insisted would make him look less like a city hippie.
If he’d had any balls, he’d have reined in his spending, but she was having too much fun, and he’d enjoyed her company too much for him to cut the shopping short.
Now he was paying for thinking with his ego and his dick.
A door down the hall opened and a tall slender man with short-cropped white hair stuck his head out. “Mr. Murphy?”
“That’s me.” Ian gathered up his hat and folder of photos and walked down the hall, the unfamiliar clump of his boots tagging along. He stuck out his hand as he greeted the man. “Thanks for seeing me, Mr. Hakes.”
Hakes gave his hand an abbreviated shake as if he couldn’t spare the extra time to give it two good pumps. Hakes fell into his chair behind his desk and pointed to the one across from him. “Have a seat. I’m on a tight deadline. You’ve got five minutes.”
Ian explained who he was and that he hoped to sell some photos. With the shopping trip taking up most of the day, he hadn’t had any time to take any behind the scenes shots at the rodeo grounds that day, so he’d brought what he’d developed the night before. With the biggest day of the rodeo weekend coming up the next day, he didn’t even have a good photo to sell for tomorrow’s Sunday edition.
Except the ones he’d taken of Cora. He hadn’t even brought those.
Hakes held out his hand for Ian’s folder and leaned back in his squeaky chair. One by one he flipped through the photographs. Selecting several and laying them out on top of his tidy desk. His office wasn’t the cluttered, paper-filled mess that Ian had expected. Even the books in the case against the wall were neatly ordered by size and color of spine.