Page 56 of Strut

He scrolled through a few. “I was going to show you later, but I guess this is as good a time as any. Have a seat.”

I slid into the chair and Hunter leaned over my shoulder to open a folder.

I gasped.

There were hundreds of images, all of me.

Some incredible photos from Blast Off, quite a few for the magazine, of course, but the majority focused on me and not the clothes. On my emotions and the persona I wrapped myself in when I walked. Hunter caught every detail.

But the most telling photos were the tons of candid shots he’d taken during our time together. Beautiful, funny, absurd, thoughtful, radiant photos that captured me in all kinds of moods.Me.Not clothes. Not fashion. Noton. Not how I looked. Butme. Theinsideme. The sometimes clumsy, sometimes awkward, sometimes silly, plain, ordinary Alec Williamson. Themethat few had taken the time to even look for, let alone know well enough to capture in a split-second snapshot.

I’d been aware of his penchant for taking random photos of me ever since he’d asked if he could that evening at the pier. Hunter’s camera was an extension of who he was. He rarely went anywhere without one, and if he did, he wasn’t averse to using his phone. Along the way, I think I’d just stopped noticing. I must have because I didn’t remember half of these.

Pulling a face when I’d lost our race to the train the day before. Grinning with chocolate gelato all over my lips and chin after a midnight dessert run. Curled up on the couch engrossed in a scary movie, my eyes huge as saucers. Chopsticks up my nose, for fuck’s sake. That one was going in the bin. There were photos of me sound asleep, cleaning my damn teeth, reading, making coffee, and a lot taken on our various walks. How had I missed all of these?

“Too creepy?” he asked, sounding more than a little nervous.

I reached for his hand and squeezed it. “Not at all. I absolutely love them.” And I did. They were personal, emotional, and rip-your-heart-out fucking glorious.

“What’s in this one?” I pointed to a second folder with my name on it and Hunter went still.

“I, um,” he hesitated, his expression uncertain, like he was debating the pros and cons of showing me. Then he sighed and opened the folder, and I swore his hands shook.

A photo appeared that I absolutelydidremember him taking and I froze in my seat.

Holy shit.I reached out and ran my fingers down the screen. It was an image of me laid out across our bed, just after I’d come undone at Hunter’s hands and every bone in my body quivered like jelly. Just remembering it, flummoxed me.

I stared at the photo, reliving the moments that had come before it. Shaken at the unexpected emotion roaring through my body, I’d been hiding silent tears, lying face down in the pillow with Hunter curled into my side, his arm resting over my back. He’d been playing with my hair, as he so often did, humming something nonsensical against my bare shoulder while I’d been scrambling for a mental foothold in a rising tide of feelings I couldn’t hold back.

It wasn’t just sex with Hunter. It had never been just sex, and it wouldneverbe. From that first fumbling disaster outside the club, Hunter had taken something from me that I’d willingly given, and if I’d thought I could just walk away if things didn’t turn out the way I wanted between us, I was an utter fool. That had a world of pain written all over it. I was too far gone.

I wanted Hunter, wanted him in every way it was possible to want a man. His touch, his laugh, his tender places, his angry edges, his infuriating stubbornness, his gentle knowing. I wanted him more than I knew I should and far more than was sensible. And as he’d kissed his way down my back, I’d bit into the pillow to muffle another cry and wondered if I dared hope for more. Hunter had laid open my heart and burrowed inside and that had to mean something, right? Ithadto.

Then, before I’d been able to summon an answer, Hunter had leaped from the bed and snagged his camera, instructing me to turn onto my back so he could grab a couple of shots. I’d dragged my face across the pillow to dry my damp cheeks and managed a laugh as I rolled to my back, well used to the call of the man’s fickle muse. He’d seemed not to notice my turmoil, too busy getting me posed just as he wanted, all of which provided the additional distraction I needed to settle that roller coaster of emotions in my heart.

Except as I studied the photo, it was patently clear that I’d failed miserably, because nothing,nothinghad prepared me for what I saw in my eyes in that photo. Warmth and hope, longing and hunger, and something that looked a whole lot like… love, or at the least a glimpse of it. I swallowed hard, and there it was again, that warm hope rising in my chest just like it had before that damn photo. It would either ignite me or bury me, but it was too late to turn away.

“Hunter, this is...” I spun to face him. “I... don’t know what to say.” I returned to the image again, my heart beating a tattoo against my ribs as tears welled in my eyes.

Hunter crouched beside me. “Hey.” He took my hand and held it between his. “Are you okay? If you don’t like it—”

I planted my lips on his and kissed him soundly. “I love it. Do you hear me? I love it.”

“Thank God. Because I do too.” His shoulders relaxed and he kissed me back, long and slow. “Thank you for giving me the chance to get to know you. I didn’t deserve it, but thank you. You’re beautiful, Alec, inside and out, and that’s what this image says to me. Somehow, it’s stripped bare in every way.” He brushed our noses together. “I wanted you to see yourself like I see you.”

I didn’t know what to say because he was right. It’s just that I wasn’t sure if he was seeing exactly what I was because I barely recognised myself in that photo. A man so happy, so content, fucked senseless and so damn... in love. Yep.Fucking hell.Hook, line, and sinker. When in the hell had that happened? Because everything I’d been feeling and hiding when he took that damn photo was written all over my face, plain as day for all time, for all to see.

I might’ve been pretending that I wasn’t falling hard and fast, but the camera didn’t lie. I was in way over my head and there was no going back. Then again, I think I’d been a little bit in love with Hunter Donovan since the first moment I saw him.

I cradled his face and pulled him close enough to feel our lashes brush. Then I kissed him softly. “Take me to bed, baby. Do to my body what your camera does. Open me up and make me come alive.”

He said nothing, just smiled and kissed me softly. Then he led me to our bed, gently peeled me from my clothes, and laid me down like I was something fragile and precious. We warmed our bodies in each other’s arms, and it was slow and easy, full of smiles and teasing and soft laughter. He slid into me with a soft sigh like he was coming home and rocked us lazily until I spilled into his hand, and he shuddered in my tight heat. Then I fell asleep with his arms around me, the big spoon to my little one, and loving every terrifying second of it.

CHAPTERTHIRTEEN

Alec

I rockedwith the jolting movement of the train and tuned out the noisy argument over baby names happening two seats back. Hunter had insisted I catch a cab to Darcy’s studio and left money on the table for me to do just that, but I’d ignored it. Riding the train gave me time and a distraction to settle my nerves. Hunter was meeting me after the shoot and I figured I’d let him buy me a drink instead.

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