She tried to look up, to catch his eye. But he shrugged, keeping her cheek pressed firmly against his shoulder. “Tammi,” she said.
He sighed, feeling one of those damn blushes cook his face. “She show you that picture?”
Her cheeks plumped in what had to be a smile. “There might have been a picture.”
The urge for a smoke hit him. Sex and memories made the craving for nicotine hard to wrangle. “A couple of hours before the picture, I had a fight with my dad. Baseball tryouts, I think. I don’t know. He was always so angry. Just another knock-out punch of a day. Justin took the shot, screwing around with my camera. Probably trying to make me forget about it, about him.”
He closed his eyes, focusing on the warmth of her breath against his collarbone, the solid deliciousness of her leg draped over his waist, her body molded to his all the way to his ankles. She traced circles around his nipple, tugged lightly at his chest hair, and he knew he had to have her again before they crept downstairs for breakfast. “I just remember that time…being gray and soulless.” He let out a dry chuckle, more reflex than humor. “Sounds like teenage angst, doesn’t it?”
“What seems a lie is a ramshackle need, waiting to be born.”
He pulled back just enough to let those baby blues of hers tear him apart.
She smiled, ducked her head. “Bradbury.” The finger circling his nipple paused, then reversed direction. His cock stirred beneath the sheet as pleasure—more than just for her body—rushed through him.
“I like to read. I didn’t make it to college, not like you. Two-year tech degree, landscaping. Took some classes in architectural design. That’s where I met my friend Lainey. I told you about her. She’s coming to visit soon. Anyway, with books, I didn’t need a class. I didn’t need anyone. Escape in pages is easy.” She pressed a kiss to the sensitive spot between his neck and shoulder, sending goosebumps racing across his skin. “I’ll show you my collection sometime.”
Hand whisking down her back, he tucked her into him. Another ten minutes, maybe a half hour. Just the two of them against the world. “You are, Fontana Quinn, a constant surprise.”
“No need to be surprised. I told you I wasveryflexible. Yoga works wonders, Atlanta.”
Rolling her to her back, he loomed over her, a smile taking over his face. “Yoga is my new best friend.”
“Let’s take your old truck out, find a quiet spot, and I’ll climb on over to the driver’s side and show you how I can fold up like a map.”
Leaning down, Campbell seized her lips before he could say something meaningful—a sentiment, a prayer, awish—he couldn’t take back. “I've never seen someone so naturally beautiful,” he said when the kiss went deeper than he thought he could handle. And though his words were bigger than any kiss could be, he meant every one. “No artifice. Just you.”
Fontana blinked in that way women did, weighing whether this was truly a compliment or a subtle way of saying she didn’t worry enough about her looks. As if anyone but God could do better. “I take itlittle artificeis not your type?”
He settled back until his chin rested on the curve of her breast, plump and warm against his Adam’s apple. Shewasstunning and tried less than any woman he’d ever known to play it.
He couldn’t help but be fascinated.
Some of the pleasure burned off her gaze, like the sun killing fragile, early-morning mist. “I’ve never asked. I mean, if you’re involved with anyone.”
He rolled to his back, keeping contact with her body. Shoulder, hip, thigh. If she was going to ask probing questions, staring at that crack in the ceiling he really should fix might be a good plan. “There was this woman, on and off last year. Mostly off. Nothing special. She was nice, but”—he let his hand rise and drop to the mattress—“just nice.”
She rose to her elbow, hair shrouding her face. Tossing it back, she locked those stormy, desperately blue eyes on his. “I know what this is. It’s okay if ‘Nothing Special’is still around.”
Anger sparked, lighting a fire in his belly. “Whatisthis, exactly, Fontana? Since you’re so sure, because I’m confused as shit.” He pinned her with a challenging look. “Really. Enlighten me. It’s not like you don’t have good old Henry sniffing around like a dog in heat. ‘Nothing Special’doesn’t want to marry me, and I’ve heard Bowman has looked at rings.”
She blew a fast breath through her nose, like a racehorse about to leave the gate. “Forget Henry. I’m notyourtype. You’re leaving. I know next to nothing about?—”
“Oh, no. Fuck, no.” Campbell caught her wrist as she tried to scoot off the bed. “You know more about me than anyone on this planet. Don’t hang that onthis, whatever it is.”
Jerking from his grasp, she snapped, “Right back ‘atcha, Atlanta.”
“What more—” Then he got a good look at her face, and the lightbulb went off. “Ah, okay. Never gonna give up, are you, Miss Quinn?” With a sigh, he rose, unconcerned if she stared at his ass on the trip to his desk and his dick on the way back.
They were in the bottom drawer, tucked inside a yellowenvelope, one he supposed he kept because the color screamedcaution. He hadn’t looked at them in years, but he carried them everywhere. It didn’t take a shrink, just a self-assessment from a photographer with a BA in Art, to tell him what that meant.
When he reached the bed, he tossed the envelope to her.
Her eyes weren’t committed to anything below his waist, and it hit him again just how interested she was inhim.How this, whatever it was they were doing, wasn’t just physical.
Although physical he could handle—the rest scared the life from him.
She sat cross-legged, the wrinkled sheet covering just enough to keep him sane. The photos, once spread out for review, were dog-eared, their white borders marking them as mid-‘70s throwbacks.
