Slip of the Tongue (Slip of the Tongue 1)

“Ready?” Finn slips my coat off and puts it down. “Lean against the wall.”

He takes the camera back and retreats without watching where he’s going. A couple in matching puffy coats almost mow him down. He doesn’t notice, snapping a picture, studying it, then coming back to me. He motions me off the wall and pulls my hair forward over my shoulders. He runs a few strands through his fingers, lays them against my dress. My scalp tingles, and the feel of him spreads down my neck, leaves my fingertips buzzing. A sensation between my legs makes me suck in a breath.

At that, he looks up. The wrinkles between his brows are deep. For a split second, he looks as though he’s forgotten we’re here to work. He wets his bottom lip. There’s heat in his eyes. I’ve seen it before, this intensity, the almost-pained frown on his face, though I can’t place exactly when he’s looked at me this way.

“Hello again,” I whisper.

His expression eases. “Hi.”

“You said that when we met. Why?”

“I told you,” he says. “I thought you were another neighbor.”

“Someone else in the building looks like me?”

He lifts my chin until the back of my head touches the brick. My throat is exposed. He leaves me there to take a picture that can’t be anywhere near professional. I right myself, and he doesn’t stop me, just studies my face. “Your eyes are mesmerizing right now. It’s like you’re wearing color contacts.”

“How do you know I’m not?”

He tilts his head. “You can smile now.”

During the next ten minutes, he’s all business. He gets close, squats, backs up, stands. He says things like “bend that leg” and “cross your arms” and “let’s try it without lipstick.”

It takes me a good few minutes to remove the grease from my lips.

He watches, laughing. “You look like you made out with a clown.” He asks for my cosmetic bag and dabs liquid foundation around my mouth with a sponge, his touch alone keeping me warm. I have nowhere to look but at him. His lips are bright pink like the tip of his nose. They’re parted, the bottom one begging to be nibbled. I wonder how cold his face and hands must be.

Finn leaves me there and moves to the middle of the street. He wants my coat on, then off, then over my shoulders. He’s visibly perturbed when he has to move for cars and takes it all very seriously. I like watching him work, knowing he’s studying me through his lens.

With a strike of lightning, he lowers his camera. We both look at the sky. A heavy, gray mass has gathered in the distance. “Shit. Let’s go back,” he says finally, packing up his things.

I quickly dress in my coat and scarf before requesting an Uber. Now that the session is over, I shudder a few times in a row, as if my body’s been holding it off. My cheeks ache. I roll my neck.

“You were great,” he says. “We definitely got something.”

I’m not so sure. I worry the pictures are too out there for the workplace. “Maybe we can try a few normal shots to be safe.”

He laughs from where he’s crouched. “You don’t trust me one bit, do you?”

“No, I do. I do,” I say too fast. “I so appreciate you doing this.”

The Uber arrives at the curb. Finn hoists his camera bag over his shoulder and gets the door. “Weather permitting, we can take a few simple photos by the plants near our building,” he says. “Just to ease your doubts about me.”

We slide into the backseat and say hello to the driver.

“It’s not that I doubt—”

“I’m teasing you.” He puts an arm around my shoulders and pulls me in. “Cold?”

I should back away. Once I have it, though, his warmth is impossible to reject and feels as necessary as taking a breath. “A little.”

He squeezes me to him. Moves his hand up and down my bicep. “You’re shivering.”

The driver looks at us in the rearview mirror. “You guys are a cute couple.”

“Thanks,” I say.

Finn arches an eyebrow, pleased—because she thinks we’re together, or because I didn’t correct her? I don’t even want to correct her. I’ve missed the look she’s giving us, the one a woman makes when she’s more envious than jealous. I get it all the time with Nathan. That feeling, coupled with the heater blasting from the front seat, leaves me slightly woozy.

We’re just like actors in a movie, I tell myself. After a few minutes, the urgency to get warm lessens, and the door opens to another less pressing, but still basic need. Because that’s how my arousal feels—essential. The more it’s ignored, the fiercer it grows. I snuggle into his side. All it takes is his hand on my upper thigh to invite an assault of graphic fantasies. Finn shoving me down on the backseat because he can’t control himself anymore. Thrusting his fingers under the hem of my dress to find me ready for him. The lower half of my body aches with sudden demands.

“Some of those photos were for me,” he whispers into my ear. He couldn’t have chosen a worse moment to tease me. My legs are jelly-like. “Does that make you mad?”

I check to see if the driver is paying attention. She must know I’m married. How can something so vital and concrete in my life be hidden? “What if I say yes?” I ask.

“I’ll delete them. If you’re sure it doesn’t . . . turn you on.”

I try not to pant. “Why would it?”

“Imagining me looking at them later.”

I turn my head. Our mouths are a breath apart. One more inch and they’ll touch. Again. Those lips are the color of sunburnt rock but whisper soft. I can’t stop the image of him looking at me, my exposed, white throat on his computer, his dick in a firm fist. It should disgust me. It makes my panties damp instead.

“No response necessary,” he says as the car pulls up to the curb. “I can read it on your face.”

He gets out like nothing’s changed, taking my elbow to help me from the seat. “Let’s try over there,” Finn suggests. A pair of trees in front of our building create a golden-brown canopy.

The chill in the air is electric. He can’t miss the threat of rain, but he gets his camera out anyway. This time, he doesn’t position or touch me. He just takes a few close-ups.

“We didn’t even need to leave the premises,” I joke.

Hiding behind the lens, he says, “Stop trying to destroy my creative vision.”

“Does that help you—you know? When you’re looking at them later, by yourself in the dark—are you thinking, ‘Oh, God, this one is so artistic’?”

He scolds me with a lifted brow. “Are you teasing me?”

The smile on my face is forced for the camera, so he can’t tell by my expression. “I—”

“I’m a grown man, not a teenager in my parents’ basement,” he says. Click. “I don’t get myself off in the dark unless I’m in bed.” More concerned with his work, he doesn’t make eye contact. “And the answer is no. I couldn’t give a fuck about the composition so long as I’m looking at you.”

I flush hot. He’s not being subtle. I’m not exactly discreet, either. Flirting with him feels good, though, like salve on a burn. “Let me at least put on some lipstick, then.”

“No. I like you without it.”

I’m about to say this isn’t about what he likes, lipstick is more professional, but I’m cut off by a rumble of thunder. Without warning, raindrops drum the top of my head. “I think that’s our cue.”

He doesn’t move. “Stay there.”

“My hair—”

“So what?” he asks. “We got what we needed. Don’t smile.”

The rain falls harder, skipping right from drizzling to pouring. One minute it’s on top of me, and the next it’s sideways. He takes more pictures.

“Your camera’s going to get ruined—”

“Try not to react to the rain.” He gets close to my face. Moves some strands of hair that’ve stuck to my cheek. “I know it’s hard. Just let it happen to you.”

I stand very still, my hands awkwardly stuck at my sides. I could never do s

omething like this for a living. Not modeling, and not the photography side of it. I feel ridiculous, but Finn’s snapping away as though he’s struck gold.

“You look—Jesus, Sadie. Fucking gorgeous.” The adoration in his eyes soothes the chill in my bones. I forget that I’m wearing expensive-as-fuck shoes in a mess of wet leaves and that my Chloé handbag is on the ground, getting soaked.

“Really?” I ask.