“I couldn’t hold this position for the days it took to get the abs done, right?” Chris explained. “So he takes a few pictures and, bada bing, I’m out of there and at Steamer Lane on a board while he does the hard work. I’m just saying; it’s something to think about.”
“‘Bada bing’? You’ve been watching too many Scorsese movies.” He mouthed Get out as soon as Chris looked at him.
“Right. So, I’m outta here. Don’t worry about me for dinner.” He headed for the public entrance of the studio, sliding sunglasses over his eyes. “You kids have fun.” He laughed and dashed out the door as Matt lunged at him.
Matt locked the door behind his cousin. When he reentered the studio, Abby was studying the leg of her clay double. She had her pant leg tugged up and her calf exposed. The tiny frown between her eyebrows fascinated Matt, as he’d never seen it before.
“I’m still working on the legs, Pretty. I’ll get them right, I promise.”
“I don’t doubt it.” Abby wrapped an arm around her middle. “I wonder…” Her voice trailed off, reluctance mixed with excitement on her face.
“About what?”
Hectic color bloomed on Abby’s cheeks when she turned toward him. “Would photographs help you in finishing this sculpture? I mean, you work on it at all kinds of odd hours, and I’m not here all the time, and…” Abby’s voice trailed off as his expression went blank. “Never mind. Silly idea.” She plucked her overshirt off the stool on which it rested.
Matt covered her hand with his. “Wait, Abby. I was just thinking. It’s a good idea, if you’re sure you want to do it.”
Abby seemed to relax. “Okay, then. Where do you want me?”
“What—now?” Matt was startled, but the cool, clear eye of the artist within him started calculating shots and sizing up the areas of the sculpture with which he was still unsatisfied.
“Why not?” A thread of nervousness ran through her voice. “This summer is supposed to be all about change, and this is definitely something I’ve never done before.” She dropped her shirt back on the stool. “So, how do you want me?” A twisted grin raised one corner of Matt’s mouth, and his eyes twinkled with mirth. “Knock it off and take your damn pictures before I change my mind.”
Directing Abby toward his photographic equipment, Matt got her settled on a stool. He wasn’t sure if he wanted the sculpture’s vague facial features to be in sharper detail, but it seemed like a good place to start.
He kept up a steady patter of questions and comments as he calculated his shots, capturing Abby’s face in a range of emotions once she realized that he didn’t expect her to remain motionless. Making her laugh netted Matt shots of the length of her neck and the sharp line of her jaw, while stories of a youth split between his surfer father in Santa Cruz and his banker mother in Philadelphia drew expressions of concentration and soft affection. The parallels between his parents’ story and his own were disturbing, so he moved on quickly, choosing instead to dwell on the fluttering of the pulse in her neck and what it felt like against his lips.
Pulling a low stool in front of the backdrop, he had her rest one set of toes upon it to mimic the sculpture’s stepping motion. He took several shots of the way her body naturally shaped itself in that position, noting small adjustments that would need to be made to his clay. He asked if she would raise her jeans legs to her knees so he could get clear shots of her calves.
“Wouldn’t it be easier if I just took them off?” Her cheeks pinked, but she carried on in a steady voice. “You need full leg shots, right?” Without waiting for his answer, Abby lowered her foot to the floor and unbuttoned the worn denim, sliding it over her hips. Matt allowed her a measure of privacy and a minute to reconsider by checking his camera and dumping the pictures he’d already taken onto his computer. He kept his mind on his task, trying not to think of what was underneath her jeans.
When he turned back, she had already returned to her previous position, this time clothed in just her tank and underwear. She kept her eyes trained at the floor ahead of her raised foot. “Sorry. I wasn’t expecting…” She giggled. “Well, at least I didn’t expect there to be cameras involved.”
Matt laughed as well. “No, not what I was imagining either. Ready?” Abby nodded, and he started moving around her, framing his shots to highlight areas he hadn’t been able to closely observe previously. The gentle curve of calf muscle as it diminished into delicate anklebones. A sweep of long thigh as it curved inward. The secret darkness in the bend of a knee. Matt resolutely banished thoughts of strength and softness in her legs, trying to keep the same objectivity that he maintained with any other model even as the white lace that stretched across Abby’s hips tantalized him with both what it revealed and what it covered.
Conversation died as the tension between them rose.
Crouching to get a close-up of her shin and the top of her foot, Matt glanced up to find Abby’s gaze trained on his hands before it roamed up his arms and over his shoulders. Her intensity stopped him short, and he lowered his camera to stare at her face, frozen by the desire written there. Abby’s eyes locked with his, and she whispered, “Am I doing this right?” Matt nodded once. “Then finish.” Abby grasped the hem of her shirt in both hands and pulled it over her head. Dropping it to the floor, she unclasped her bra, and it joined the small pile of cloth near her feet. With shaking hands, she gathered her hair into an untidy pile on the top of her head, assuming the position of her sculpture.
“Abby…” Matt murmured, standing before her with his camera hanging at his side.
“Take the pictures,” Abby said. Her mouth curved into a slight smile. “This might be your only chance, because I can’t believe I’m doing this.” She tilted her head to look at him as he raised the camera. “Your statue is beautiful, and it needs to be right.” Her head returned to the correct position.
Matt moved around her, clicking the shutter or correcting positioning with a gentle touch on arm or leg. After just a few shots, he realized that he wasn’t feeling the familiar itch to shape clay with tools or fingers, but an ache to caress the skin of the woman in front of him.
He began to pack away his camera.
“Are we done? Did you get all the shots you want?” Abby lowered her foot to the floor. She released her hair, and it tumbled down to caress her shoulders.
Matt turned his attention to the photographic lights. “I’m done. And not even close.” He chuckled and shook his head. “I got the pictures I’ll need. Want is a whole other thing. It’s time to quit when I can’t look at you as a professional anymore.” With the last light extinguished, Matt was across the space in two swift steps, one hand clasped around Abby’s hip to crush her against him and the other cradling her head as he kissed her with hungry intensity. The frustrated passion of the night before combined with the tension between them made his kisses rough and desperate.
Abby met his strength with softness, cradling Matt’s face with gentle hands before trailing them over his neck and shoulders, stroking his chest and stomach and drawing a low, needy moan from deep in his throat. Rather than clash against his hard form, her body molded to his, offering softness where he had angles.
His restless hands skimmed her back before cupping the comparative roughness of the lace that covered her behind. Stumbling toward a low table, he set Abby onto her bottom and yanked his shirt over his head, tossing it to the side before leaning over her and caressing the gentle swell of her breast with his palm. His brain stalled, caught in the biological imperative to have, and to take, and to enter. Only Abby’s softness and warmth mattered, and the aching need within his own body.
Abby’s squeak as cool wood met heated flesh jerked Matt back to awareness of his surroundings. He rested his head against her shoulder, breathing heavily, listening to the clamor of his heart. “I’m sorry,” he said. He turned his head so his ear rested on her chest, gratified to find that her heart was slamming along at a pace to match his.
“I’m not sorry
. That was hot.” She laughed, and Matt joined in.
He nibbled at the curve of her breast with his lips. “If you think that was good, you should see what I can do with a comfortable space and a little time.”
“Show me.”
“I plan on it.” Pushing himself to his feet, he helped her upright. He cupped her face in his palms, lowering his head to hers in a slow, soft kiss. As much as he wanted her, and as difficult as it was to still hands that itched to stroke her body, Matt felt that he had to give her another chance to back out. “Are you sure about this? No pressure, remember.”
Abby closed the gap that he had created between them, running her hands over his chest and shoulders and twining her fingers in his hair. “I’m very sure. I don’t want to waste any more time.” Matt felt her hands against his stomach as they worked at his waistband.
“Right,” he said, and then his mouth was on Abby’s as he backed her into the hallway. He pushed at the soft lace that covered her hips, tearing one side in his haste to feel all of her heat and softness, and when that slight barrier was gone, he cupped her behind and lifted, backing her against the wall as her calves twined around his thighs. Taking a hot, hard nipple between his teeth, Matt bit down. The sound of Abby’s low moan called an answering sound from his own chest and made him not entirely sure that they were going to make it the few short feet into his bedroom.
Only the need to hold her up and his corresponding inability to rid himself of his jeans brought him back to hazy comprehension. He lowered Abby, relishing the feeling of her skin sliding against his, until her feet touched the floor. They were both breathing heavily, and Matt no longer tried to still his hands. He stroked Abby’s shoulder and arm with one hand, cupping her breast as he braced his other arm against the wall next to her head. Abby’s hands moved against him as well, fingering through the hair that lightly covered his chest.
“Damn, Abby,” he joked breathlessly, “what are you doing to me? All my smooth moves went right out the window there.” He glanced down at the scrap of lace at his feet. “Sorry about your panties.”
Abby laughed, her breath stirring his chest hair. “Stop apologizing. I haven’t had this much fun in years. Though I’m generally a comfort girl.”
Matt pushed away from the wall and took her hands in his, raising them to brush his lips against her sensitive wrists. “Then it’s about time this ended,” he said.
“You can’t seriously mean quit now. That’s just cruel.”
Matt grinned. “By ‘this,’ I meant wall sex, woman.” He started backing her toward his room, dropping kisses wherever he could reach. “While that has its time and place, I want to take my time and enjoy, and that requires a bed.” The backs of Abby’s legs hit the edge of his bed, and she sat abruptly. “Like this one. Are you good with that?”
Abby scooted back until she could stretch out on the mattress, her arms above her head. She watched Matt shed the last of his clothes. “Very good with that,” she said. “What’s your plan?”
He paused for a minute, enjoying the view before him and wishing for an instant that he could take a picture of Pretty just like that, lying on his bed with her hair in a wild halo around her face. Instead, he used his artist’s eye to impress every line deep within his brain. When he was sure it was indelibly set, he slid onto the bed. “Abby,” he said, drawing his tongue along the tendon at the side of her neck and swirling it in the hollow under her ear as she arched against him. “My plan is to touch every inch of your body to begin with.” His hand caressed her breast, traced the gentle curve of her waist as it flared into slim hips, and ended up between her legs.
“I plan to pay special attention here,” he murmured.
“Smooth moves, huh?” she asked breathlessly, whimpering as he sucked her nipple into his mouth.
“Mmm hmm…” he hummed, smiling as the vibration against her hardened flesh drew another gasp. “I have years of practice to draw on.”
“I love the sound of that,” Abby said, fisting her hand in his hair and drawing his head up to kiss him fiercely.
Matt lost himself in her then, his senses overwhelmed by her tastes and smell and sounds, by the feeling of the curves and planes that he’d been thinking about for weeks. He rolled onto his back and eased Abby on top of him, freeing his hands to caress her even as his mouth explored. Her body responded to his touch like it had been made to do so.
Abby’s hands against him were sure; she seemed to know where to touch him and when to move on, keeping him at the knife’s edge of pleasure without sending him over the edge. Every kiss and lick and touch he gave her was returned with interest, their exploration aided by the knowledge of when and where to guide each other. Moving together slowly at first, kissing and touching hair-roughened skin and velvet softness, they learned each other’s bodies.
Eventually the tight coil of need deep within Matt became too much, and he moved to the nightstand, plucking out a foil pouch. He watched Abby as she watched him roll the condom over his length. He took in her heavy-lidded eyes and swollen lips as she moved restlessly against the sheets, and he had to push down an urge to plunge into her right then. “How do you want me, Abby?” A flush covered her body, and her quick breaths raised and lowered her chest.
“I want to feel you all over me,” she whispered, spreading her legs so he could rest between them. “I need you…”
Her tiny gasp turned into a moan as he held her hip and slid into her in one stroke, dropping his head to cover her mouth with his. Pulling her leg high, Matt felt her tighten around him. Her soft sighs and whimpers increased in volume and sharpness as the tension inside him built and he moved harder and faster. The feeling of Abby’s body against his, the pleasure in her response, stilled Matt’s mind, and he was want and need and fill; Abby’s answering want and give and open made her his perfect match, and words gave way to sighs and groans and the sound of flesh against flesh.
When he could think again, Matt found himself curved around Abby, his head lying against her chest as he gasped for air. Gentle fingers smoothed through his hair as Abby’s own rapid breaths began to slow. Matt stroked her stomach with a shaking hand, tracing the curve of her hipbone with a fingertip before settling it on her still-trembling thigh. “Abby, that was…” he began in a husky voice, and then trailed off.
“I know,” she answered, a smile in her voice.
His eyes drifted closed. He settled his head more firmly against her chest and wrapped his arm around her hips. “Do you mind?”
Abby’s soft laugh was cut off by her own yawn. “Not at all. You need your rest for later.” She stroked his back with a languid hand before dropping a kiss on his head. “And there will be a later. I promise you that. I’m sure you still have a few smooth moves to demonstrate.”
He chuckled. “More than a few,” he mumbled as he drifted off.
Chapter Twelve
JUGGLING A GLASS OF ICED TEA, a book, her iPod, and a blanket, Abby hooked the French door with her toes and pulled, closing it behind her. After a late night and a morning of fishing Play-Doh out of little mouths, she was ready for some solar therapy. Picking her way down the beach, she dropped her armload on a chair before shaking out the blanket and lying down in the shade of the umbrella. A smile crept across her face when she stretched and all the delicious aches from the night before settled into her limbs.
“Don’t do that! Don’t you do that!”
Abby tipped her head back and watched Sarah tiptoe across the hot sand with her own armload of goodies. “Do what?”
Dropping her things, Sarah plopped down onto the sunny side of the blanket and shook her finger in Abby’s face. “That! That! You’ve been grinning and giggling all morning, and it’s driving me crazy. Where’s your stupid phone, Abby? Did Matt have to surgically remove it from your hand last night?”
Abby shot her the finger but realized that she hadn’t thought of the museum in days. Sarah shoved a Styrofoam container forward. “Here—eat your lunch.”
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Balancing the container on her stomach, Abby propped herself up on one elbow and opened the box. She lifted out a piece of sushi, and after taking a bite, she closed her eyes and hummed in pleasure. “Good stuff.”
“Yeah, well, it better be,” Sarah said around a mouthful of rice and ahi. She chewed quickly and swallowed, grabbing Abby’s iced tea to wash it all down. “I had to hide from Tyler and his band of flying freaks twice before I got back to the car. That guy in the surf shop thought I was insane when I ducked behind the sailboards. That’s the second time this week. At least I didn’t knock them over this time.”
Abby laughed at the image, drawing another glare.
“Don’t laugh! That kid’s persistent as hell. Too bad I don’t date tadpoles.”
“Well, maybe not date…”
“I hate you. I really hate you,” Sarah whined. “I didn’t do that, either—thank you very much, by the way—unlike some people I could mention.”
“Jealous?” Abby popped another piece of sushi into her mouth.
“Hell, yeah!” Sarah picked a piece of rice off her stomach. “Oh yeah…and I ran into Surfer Dude II—you know, the blond? He was picking up sushi too. He wanted me to pass a message.”
Abby closed her empty container and reached for her glass of tea. “Chris? What did he have to say?”
Sarah nabbed the glass first and took a swig before passing it to Abby. “He said to tell you he’s really sorry about this morning, and he should learn to keep his mouth shut, and he wasn’t hinting at all, and…” She thought for a minute. “That’s about all.” She settled her sunglasses over her eyes and stretched out in the sun, adjusting her bikini. “He turned bright red—did he see your boobies?”
“Not even. I was fully dressed when I ran into his drunk butt outside the bathroom at about three o’clock this morning.” Abby adjusted her own suit but stayed in the shade. “Secondhand tequila is a smelly thing.”
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