Secrets Vol. 2(14)

Glancing at Cole, I say with complete certainty, "I want one."

"What?" Cole turns toward me. He blinks and opens his eyes wider like that might disprove what he heard me say.

That was the thought that was trapped inside my mind. As soon as I felt my previous conceptualizations crack, I knew that I'd want to learn everything about this. I'm intrigued and terrified.

My heart thumps when I say it and my palms grow hotter. "I need to know what it feels like on the other end of the lens. I can learn the practical part with models, but this - " I shake my head, "it's not about knowledge, it's about feeling. It captures the client's beauty in a powerful way. The only way for me to know how the client feels is to actually be the woman in the portrait." My gaze locks on his. His sapphire eyes search mine, his brow pinched with shock. "Shoot me, Cole."

He seems shy, like the idea hadn't crossed his mind. He doesn't look away when he says, "I don't think that's a good idea." His lips part like he wants to say more, but he doesn't.

"Cole," I don't know what I'm going to say. I just know that this is important. I can't understand this wholly if I don't. "Please. It's a shoot. We're both grown-ups here. We can manage this." Well, I was hoping we could. I shrug like it's no big deal, "Besides, you said you only do one-nighters and I'm not that kind of girl."

He works his jaw and looks up at me from under his brow. "I never said I only do one-nighters. I offered you a one-nighter."

"And I said no," I reply absently, no longer looking at him. "So there's nothing to worry about."

I'm staring at the paintings. The thought of a shoot like this has butterflies swirling in my stomach. I walk past Cole and pull out more canvases, looking at more of Cole's work. He watches me, silently. The paintings aren't what I thought they'd be. If light could be liquefied and poured into a paint can, that is what Cole made - something sensual, beautiful, and completely sexy.

"I can admit I was wrong," I say turning toward him. "This is art. I see it now. You showed me something I didn't think was possible and there's no way in hell I can shoot this kind of stuff without submerging myself in it.

"There's a reason why Sottero wanted me, Cole. There's a reason why I'm at the top of my class. I don't do things half way. If I see something I want to do, I learn everything about it, and I'm taking you up on your offer. I'll run the Long Island branch of Le Femme. I'll shoot this kind of stuff, but you have to shoot me first. It's nonnegotiable."

He blinks at me and shakes his head, "God, Anna. I - " He runs his hands through his hair and sighs. I know I've won. I know he'll do it.

We stay in his apartment for the night. I sleep rather restlessly in his guest room. The place smells like Cole. I can't stop thinking about him, but I finally pass out not wanting to consider what I offered earlier in the evening. He lets me sleep late and I emerge from the shower around noon. We go into the Manhattan office and work until sunset, editing the remaining images from last week's shoot.

Neither of us says much. When we leave, he holds the door to his Porsche open and I slide in.

I feel his eyes on the side of my face as we drive back to the new studio. Cole is silent. His fingers are wrapped around the steering wheel tightly. It's like nothing happened last night, like he didn't agree to do something completely sexy with me. I lean my head back and stare out the window. I don't turn to look at him.

It's late by the time we hit the open stretch of highway back to the beach house. I wonder about him. I wonder who he really is, what he really sees. He does such a good job of hiding everything that I realize I have no clue. There's a passionate side to Cole, but there's something softer and more vulnerable, too.

"What are you thinking?" he finally asks, glancing between me and the road.

I shrug, like I'm not thinking anything, like I'm not obsessing about him and wondering about his past. "Just wondering about stuff," I mutter the half-truth to cover the lie, then add, "Nothing really."

"You have that far off look in your eyes. I've been around you long enough to figure out what that means, so spill Lamore. What has your brain in a knot?" He smiles softly at me.

I glance over at him wondering if I'm so transparent all the time, or if he just reads me better than others. I sigh and shake my head, "It's none of my business, but I saw something I wasn't supposed to see when I grabbed your bail money." I shrug like it's no big deal, and glance at him out of the corner of my eye. "It was a picture of you in an army uniform and a beat up Tiffany's box. It looked like it'd been run over." He says nothing and stares at the empty road, concentrating as if it were rush hour. I'm looking at my hands, running my thumb over the thumbnail on my other hand.

My voice is soft, "You looked so young and afraid. And the ring, I guess there's a heartbreaking story there?" His shoulders tense. Cole works his jaw and swallows hard as I finish speaking. I think he's angry, but I can't tell. I look at my hands and say, "I didn't mean to look. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said anything."

He doesn't glance at me anymore. His eyes take on a vacant stare like he's remembering something he wants to forget. "It's fine. I'd forgotten it was in there. The rest of those pictures were burned." He doesn't acknowledge the Tiffany ring.