Page 36 of Dirty Like Dylan

When she looked up at me, I peeled my eyes off her ass and smiled. She smiled back. When Ash wasn’t around, she definitely smiled a lot easier.

“Check this out,” she said.

Already am…

She had her camera set up on a tripod with a short, wide lens, and she clicked the shutter with a remote. The exposure lasted several seconds, then she showed me a series of identical images on the back of the camera, each one darker than the last.

“Multiple exposures,” she explained, looking anywhere but at my bare chest. “I’m gonna do some HDR on some of them. It’s popular with real estate photography, though it can get cheesy if it’s overdone. The images start to look cartoonish and fake. But if you do it right, you get all this detail in the highlights and the shadows, with the various exposures, that you couldn’t otherwise get with just one exposure, and if you merge them properly, it’s gorgeous. Rich, saturated colors and tons of detail.”

“Sounds like you know what you’re doing,” I said, impressed, trying not to stare at her legs again. It was just too tempting. She was still on her knees, right in front of me.

And I so had a thing for legs.

Shapely, slender calves.

Toned thighs.

All of which Amber Malone possessed.

“You, too,” she said, blushing a little. “I heard you playing.”

“Yeah. Shit. Remind me to give you some earplugs.” Really should’ve thought of that before I beat the house down. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay. It really wasn’t that loud, after I shut the door to the basement. You’ve got good soundproofing.” Then her face fell, like she’d realized that might offend me. “I mean, not that I don’t want to hear you play…”

I laughed. “Trust me, I know. No one wants to live with a drummer.”

She smiled a bit, but didn’t say anything.

“I’m going out for a swim,” I told her, “so you might want to avoid the back yard for a while.” I winked at her, but she didn’t giggle like she did last night after all the wine.

“Um. Why?”

“Because I like to swim naked…?” Damn. Did she already forget our flirting last night? Or was she really that drunk on the Prosecco?

Her reaction was priceless as she seemed to strive for neutral professionalism, even as her cheeks flushed beneath her freckles. “Oh. Right. No worries. I’ll be here for a while…” She seemed to be trying, hard, not to appear wound-up by whatever mental image I’d just put in her head.

But I knew when a woman was wound-up over me, and Amber was definitely getting there.

Normally, that would’ve been great. Perfect. But with Ash being such a stubborn dick… I was gonna have to be careful here. Play this one slow. Like really fucking slow.

After all, the idea was to hook her up with him, right? That was what was important here.

I didn’t mind baiting her a little, on his behalf, since he couldn’t get his shit together to make a move. I also didn’t mind if she decided she wanted us both. At all. The more time I spent with her, the more I liked that option best.

But what I wasn’t gonna do was sweep on in and take her for myself.

Sometimes, I seriously regretted being such a generous guy.

“So, uh… catch you later,” I said, and got the hell out of there.

Amber was maybe a little confused by my abrupt departure, but what could I do? If I stood there flirting with her any more, I was gonna poke out her eye with my dick. She was still down on her knees, and I was starting to throb in my sweats, with her pale green eyes gazing up at me like that. In about three more seconds I was gonna be rock hard, and it was gonna be obvious.

Fuck, Ash.

I went out back and stripped down, the way I would if no one was in the house. I took my time, letting the fresh chill of the October air cool me down. I didn’t cover up. I didn’t even worry about shrinkage; fact was, I had a lot to work with.

I checked the pool. It was warm, almost hot, the way I liked it. As I slipped into the water, I couldn’t tell if Amber could see me; if she was just inside any of the windows. Really, she could’ve been anywhere in the house. She could’ve even left, gone back to Ash’s place for a break. But for all I knew, she was in the living room or the kitchen, right now, watching me through the windows.