Sinful Love (Sinful Nights #4)(48)
A tear slid down her cheek.
She swallowed it quickly. Judging from the way he grunted and shoved deep in her, he didn’t notice. A storm of emotions swelled, gripping her chest, squeezing her heart like an invisible hand trying to choke up the mess brewing inside—guilt, joy, sadness, elation.
She inhaled sharply, willing the air to spread through her lungs, to free her from this specter of remorse. She didn’t want to feel it. There was nothing wrong with having sex. Nothing at all.
Yet her heart was fracturing at the same time as it was stitched back together. Sex with Michael was both wondrous and bittersweet.
And she understood precisely why she felt so f*cking good, and so f*cking awful at the same time.
“It’s so good with you, Annalise,” he said a minute later.
“I know. It is. It’s so good.”
It was unlike anything she’d ever felt. It was better. It was the best.
That was the problem.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
The beautiful blonde stretched on her belly on the white duvet—heels kicking in the air, lips red and pouty, as seductive as she was real. Even when she was posing, there was nothing forced about her client’s beauty.
Casey Sullivan had one of the best smiles Annalise had ever photographed. Fresh-faced and all-American, she possessed a gorgeous grin. The woman also knew how to give “come f*ck me” eyes to the camera.
She was thinking of her husband, Casey had said, so it was easy to gaze at the lens that way—like she loved him and wanted him at the same damn time. Now they were in the last series of shots at the boudoir studio space. Casey wore an emerald-green satin push-up bra and matching lace panties. “Nate always likes me in this shade of green,” she said.
“I suspect your husband likes you in anything, everything, and nothing,” Annalise said as she finished shooting.
Casey laughed. “Yes, that does describe him perfectly.”
“Then he is going to be one very happy man when he sees these photos. He won’t know what to do with himself. His jaw will drop. Guaranteed,” Annalise said, as she showed her some of the pictures on the back of the camera.
Casey shrugged into a robe and peered at the images, and she squealed with delight as they flipped through the frames. “These are amazing,” she said, then ran her hand over the outline of her belly. “You can’t even really tell I had a baby six months ago.”
Annalise shook her head. “You look radiant, happy, and beautiful.”
Casey blushed and waved a hand in the air. “Stop, you flatter me.”
“No. I don’t have to. The camera loves you because you’re so happy and so in love.”
Casey met her eyes. “You can really tell from how I look at the camera?”
“Of course. It’s in your eyes. Everything is.”
Casey narrowed hers, and studied Annalise. “Hmm. What’s in yours, then?” she asked playfully.
A red flush crept across her cheeks.
Sex, hot sex, more sex. Dinners, days, sleepless nights. Idle chats, deep conversations, sweet nothings, and so much coming together. The last three days and nights in Manhattan had passed in a blissful blur. She’d cancelled her hotel room and stayed with Michael. During the days she’d finished her shoot for Veronica’s while Michael had worked with clients, and in the evenings they’d gone to dinner, or to a club, and sometimes they hadn’t left the room at all.
New York with Michael was a great escape from the past and the present.
The only trouble was she couldn’t rid that nagging guilt that gnawed at her for having such an immeasurably lovely time. As if she shouldn’t be allowed to enjoy herself—at least, not this deeply, this quickly, this intensely. Most of the time she turned the volume down on that voice, but still it spoke up, worming its way around her heart like an insidious creature.
“You’re happy, too.” The declaration came from Casey. Annalise’s heart skittered. The woman was so straightforward and so direct.
“Of course I’m happy,” she said, in her best cheery tone, keeping things businesslike. “I love what I do.”
“But something is holding you back?” Casey pressed on, undeterred.
Annalise knit her brow together. “Hmm?”
“From truly being happy,” Casey elaborated. “I can see a sadness in your eyes, too. Barely there, but it comes into focus now and then.”
Annalise swallowed and fiddled with her camera. The woman was too astute, too observant. She didn’t answer.
“If something holds you back from your happiness, you should try to move through it,” Casey said softly.
Annalise looked up, her client’s gentle words threading into her. “Spoken from experience?”
“Sort of. I had to get through my fear that my husband and I would lose our friendship if we became long-term lovers.”
“And you didn’t, clearly.”
“We didn’t but we had to walk through that fear. Live in it. Roll around in it for a while.”
“And you think I need to roll around in something?”
“I think whatever is making you sad, you should face it.”
On the cab ride back to the hotel, Annalise lingered on her client’s advice. Rubbing her thumb against the outline of the lens in her camera bag, she wondered if Casey was right. She had to face this thing, this voice, this knot in her stomach that stood in the way.