Silk Scarves and Seduction (4 page)

Before long, they were looking at her pictures, which she had kept tucked into a plain school folder, a purple one, according to Tess.

They had paid her ten thousand dollars, outright, for ten of them, and told her she needed to stop treating her art so badly. Then they’d given her the name of a gallery owner in New York and said she needed to go see the lady.

Tess had told the story, laughingly, a hundred times. And Blush still had a foolish look on her face every time she overheard Tess repeating it.

No, not the standard wedding photographer. He scowled and recalled how much he had paid for a few of the framed and matted portraits he had in his house. Of course, they were originals, and nobody else would ever have another like them.

But that didn’t make the paying for them any less painful.

Blush still took jobs when she felt like it, but more often than not when he heard her talking to Tessa, it was a job working with younger kids, people she knew and liked.

Flipping the light off, Marc headed out of the office and eyed the door leading to the darkroom.

She guarded that space like a demon.

With a passion.

Well, he thought with a grin, she wasn’t here now.

He tried it, and it opened under his hand. Flicking on the light, he jogged down the steps, eyeing the prints scattered around in what looked to be reckless abandon to him. He was sure, for her, there was some kind of order, but it resembled a tornado’s wake. He walked alongside one table, seeing a child playing in the park, and he could almost hear her laughter. Then an old man sitting on a bench, and there was the whisper of a sigh of regret on the air, the bittersweet taste of memories.

Marc felt his throat tighten just staring at it.

Damn, she is good.

But she always had been. College had only refined that raw skill, and a year or two in Europe had added a depth of emotion that was enough to bring the sting of tears to one’s eyes, or the bubble of laughter to one’s lips.

Tessa, Blush and Marc had known each other since elementary school. And Caleb…mustn’t forget the silent, ever watchful Caleb. The dark-haired, quiet boy had moved in a few years later, a little after the bond had been formed between the other three, and he had slid into their small group like a shadow. Watching. Always watching.

And it had been Tessa he had watched, with those dark, impenetrable eyes. But the three of them, Caleb, Tessa and Blush had grown closer, and Marc had watched as he was cut adrift. He had been older, and damned if he hadn’t been jealous of how close they had gotten, leaving him feeling just a little on the outside.

Blush had been in fifth grade when her father had given her a camera, after she had begged and begged. Marc could still remember how she had been chasing after the boys, all right, but she had been chasing after them to shoot pictures of them on the court, not to flirt.

Damn, all of fourteen, he had been fourteen when he felt the punch of love when she had come running up to show the pictures she had gotten of the babies she had been watching for her next door neighbor. They had been decent pictures, he guessed. But, watching her sparkling eyes, his breath had caught in his throat and he had felt the heady rush of a boy’s first real crush.

For a kid—a twelve-year-old kid. It didn’t matter that she didn’t look like a kid. That never mattered. What mattered was he couldn’t possibly let his friends know he had it bad for a seventh grader, when he was in the hallowed halls of high school.

But then, she got her first boyfriend. That made it a whole new ballgame.

Especially once he found out Danny Winston was playing around with a cheerleader in Marc’s homeroom. Now, what friend would let that go?

But Blush hadn’t taken it lightly, being made a fool of. And unfortunately, she had blamed both him and Danny. It didn’t matter that wasn’t what Marc had set out to do. He hadn’t intended on seeing tears fill her pretty brown eyes, or seeing a hot red flush of humiliation stain her cheeks. That had given him some very bad moments, and that alone had made him take the pranks she had dished out over the years. Her pride had taken a beating at Danny’s hands, and Blush had always held a grudge. Why, exactly, she had decided to blame Marc, instead of Danny, he’d never known.

But he hadn’t counted on the tears. Marc had expected temper, he supposed. Not shame, not embarrassment. Maybe, if he had known how it was going to hurt her, he would have dealt with it a little differently, instead of pushing her gently into the room so she could see her darling boyfriend’s tonsil hockey for herself.

After seeing him getting all hot and heavy with Samantha Moriarty, she had just blackened Danny’s eye and called it quits. But she had looked at Marc with her brokenhearted eyes and whispered furiously, “I’ll never forget this, you …you…you jerk!”

When he had found pictures of him making out with his girlfriend posted throughout the neighborhood a week later, he had damn well known who to blame. It had taken all of her allowance to bribe somebody from the high school photography club to develop them for her, although Marc suspected they would have done it for free if they had known what was on the roll of film.

Marc had been forced to endure a week of humiliation for that one.

Sighing, Marc reached up and rubbed at his neck, surrounded by all the portraits, lost in memories. As he turned around, his eyes passed over a studio-style framed, black matted portrait hanging on the wall. He didn’t really see it as he started to turn around and head upstairs.

He had already taken the first step when he froze.

Turning back, he stared at the picture that erased all doubt that Blush had indeed been the model for the pictures he had received. Not that he had ever had much doubt.

She was standing before the camera, her face turned to the side, those glorious golden curls piled on top of her head, the lacy red scarf draped so that it hid one breast and trailed across her belly to cover the other hip.

Oh, hell.

Like the others, the portrait was black and white, the only color in the scarf, deep shocking red. It was so fucking erotic that his cock was aching just from staring at it. And it was so unbelievably beautiful that it would do any museum in the world justice.

And he knew, just from knowing her style, that she had taken it herself.

The sound of a powerful truck engine alerted him and he thanked God she had the windows down here blacked out. Hitting the lights, he tore up the stairs and hid himself in the shadows of the living room. Tucking one hand into the pocket of his jean jacket, he caressed the silky red scarf as he waited.

Valery couldn’t stop snickering as she tossed her keys onto the table.

Kelsey Hampton had just reaped what she had sowed her entire life. The guy she was marrying was a philandering perv who just wanted her family’s money, and the beauty of it …the jackass couldn’t have kids, according to Kelsey. So he could make Kelsey miserable, as Kelsey had made people miserable for years, and no child would suffer for it.

There was nothing worse than seeing a child suffer for the parents’ mistakes, Valery suspected. She had been blessed with a great childhood, but she had far too many friends who hadn’t.

Ahh, yes. This was justice for Kelsey.

It was perfect. A wonderful last shoot right before she left for the biggest job of her career. So far.

In a week, she’d be in Scotland, shooting for a calendar. Haunted castles of Europe. Oh, it may seem trite, but it was pretty big exposure.

She had pieces hanging in museums in New York, Milan, and France.

But this could help launch her name even more.

She may never become as famous as Ansel Adams, but…she was making a name for herself.

Sighing, she released the clip that held her curls in the tight chignon, arching her neck with relief as the weight of her hair tumbled free. She rolled her shoulders, feeling the tension dissolve slowly as she smiled, picturing Kelsey as she discovered what a fine mess she had landed in.

It had taken Valery no time to peg J.D.

J.D. Morgan had flirted shamelessly with her the entire time, and his bride had known it, too.

In turn, Kelsey had turned and started flirting relentlessly with the best man, who looked to be happily married.

Happily married…something she had started to believe was a fairy tale. At least for people her age. Not that she didn’t believe in love. Her parents had been madly in love, until the car crash that had killed them. But until she had seen Tessa and Caleb, she just hadn’t really seen it hit anybody, well, like that. So hard. So powerfully.

So necessary.

And returned.

Hell, she had been in love for half of her life with one man. Even when she had given her virginity to a fellow photographer in Kilkenny, Ireland the summer she had toured there before starting college, she had been dreaming of him.

Marc Ford…always, Marc.

Those dreamy blue eyes, and that wicked smile. And his hands—damn it, thinking about his hands was enough to make her want to whimper. She had a fixation about his hands, and it wasn’t an artistic one, either. Not that she hadn’t thought about asking him to let her shoot some pictures of him before.

But her problem was personal.

Valery wanted to feel those hands on her. And his mouth. A fine tremor racked her body and she whispered, “Get a grip, Val. This is so not going to happen.”

Too bad he couldn’t stand her. His face tightened up and his back went ramrod straight whenever he saw her, like somebody had shoved a poker up that fine ass of his. Hell, he seemed to think causing her pain was an amusing pastime. That humiliating her was fun.

Well, to be honest, he hadn’t done anything like that in years…but still…and maybe, well, maybe…he hadn’t exactly set out to embarrass her when he’d showed her that there was more going on in the band room than music lessons.

Maybe he had been trying to help. It wasn’t like he had stood there and laughed at her or anything.

And if somebody else had done it, maybe she wouldn’t have felt that punch of shame quite so bad. She could still remember it, that greasy, hot humiliation that had crawled over her when he had gently shoved her into the high school band room and she had seen Danny in there, making out with Samantha.

But that was only the start of it.

Staunchly, she refused to remember how many times she had spurred things on, like the pictures of his parents. Or how she had done the “sewing” on his date’s dress for the Anchor Club. She had done a damn fine job of hemming it. She had a knack for it, always had. Wasn’t anything she liked, but she didn’t hate it. And the take-up job on the hem couldn’t be faulted.

However…she had loosened the seams on the bodice. And Grace had gone without a bra.

Of course, Val hadn’t been expecting that. If she had known Grace wasn’t going to wear a bra, she probably wouldn’t have done it. But her mind wasn’t exactly moving on the level of a sixteen-year-old girl who was ready to “do it”, which had been Grace’s plan.

Valery didn’t think Marc had been prepared for what Grace was going to do to Valery either. It’s possible he wouldn’t have agreed to drive her there if he had known Grace was going to punch Valery in the nose.

Valery’s nose was still slightly crooked from that.

Frowning thoughtfully, she mused about the fact that they had broken up that weekend. Nobody but Grace and Marc really knew why—Valery had been too steamed over her broken nose to think of it. And the fact that her parents had taken her camera equipment away for a month.

That still stung.

With a sigh, Valery slid out of the tuxedo-styled jacket she had worn to the wedding and tossed it on the back of the couch, never once glancing in that direction. The jacket landed on somebody’s hand as she moved into the kitchen to pour herself a glass of wine. She didn’t see it lifted to a shadowed face or hear the softly inhaled breath as somebody breathed in her scent, before her watcher folded it and draped it gently over the back of the couch.

In the kitchen, Valery toed her high-heeled sandals off, the rhinestones on the straps glinting in the bright lights of the pure white kitchen. She wriggled her candy-apple red toenails as she kicked away each shoe in turn, getting them out of the way so she didn’t trip over them later. More rhinestones glittered on the buttons of her shirt, giving the mannish suit a feminine flair.

But the sparkling drops at her ears weren’t rhinestones. Neither was the half inch thick bangle-style bracelet at her wrist. There was a long gold chain at her neck—twenty inches—with a wand-shaped diamond of more than a carat, and nearly an inch long. It hung between her breasts and it was very real. The anklet on her left ankle was diamonds as well.

The tomboy had come to like flash, and she liked the real stuff.

She undid the snap at her waist and stepped out of her trousers, giving them a half-hearted fold and flopping them over the kitchen island, rolling first one ankle and then the other as she lifted the glass of wine and sipped. The cold, crisp wine rolled over her tongue like liquid gold, so much better than the mediocre vintage that had been offered at the wedding. Kelsey had offered it with a proud smile and said, “Daddy bought this in Italy…”