his personality. There was a single, large, framed black and white photograph on a blank chimneybreast opposite her, a classically posed portrait of a beautiful anonymous woman draped in nothing but a half dropped silk kimono. The girl was in silhouette, and whilst the clinging silk rendered it beautifully erotic there was no explicitness to spoil the artfulness of the image.
On the coffee table in front of her were a couple of large hardback books on photography, and in the corner a large and expensive looking Nikon camera sat on its tripod, the dark eye of its lens facing into the room, all fairly obvious props for a photographer’s home. Next to the coffee table, to China’s left, was a long sofa of completely different material to the chair she was sitting on, indicating that the flat had been economically furnished for letting by someone with little eye for harmonious detail. She suspected that Tony had worked his unique interior design talents here.
The floor was a tired, polished wood, uneven and knotted, upon which there was a single red plain and rather threadbare rug which roughly marked the centre of the room. Strangely, there was no television, or hi-fi. It was difficult to glean any useful information about the inhabitant of such blandly furnished accommodation. The photography accessories were the only objects that spoke of Mark in any way.
When Mark returned he was carrying a small pack of frozen peas wrapped in a red-checked tea towel. He knelt in front of her and said, “You might want to remove those tights.”
She was shocked at the thought of removing any clothes in front of him but realized the obvious common sense in the statement. Very self-consciously she leant forwards and started to tug the tights off, shuffling her bottom and keeping her legs as close together as possible. All the while she was acutely aware that Mark was staring fixedly into her face, watching her squirm with awkwardness. “A gentleman would look away.”
“Then I’ll stay just where I am,” he grinned.
He carried on looking at her for a couple more moments then sighed and turned his head away, allowing her the opportunity for a less elegant but more efficient removal of her tights. She crumpled them up and pressed them into her Louis Vuitton bag, hoping they wouldn’t catch on anything inside. On the sharp corner of the little business card, for example.
“There you go, you can look now,” she said.
He turned back to her and then gently grasped her calf with one hand. China shuddered inwardly as a fresh charge of electric sensation emanated from the point where his hand was in contact with her bare leg. His eyes never left hers as he slowly lifted the leg and softly placed the shockingly cold parcel onto her swollen ankle. She gasped at the sudden cold but maintained eye contact. What could she read in those big green eyes? They were as intense as ever, and he studied her eyes for any sort of response. Then they flared, a slight and momentary widening of the eyelids and pupils, accompanied by the briefest of almost feral grins. She felt herself melt and knew, but didn’t care, that her own flaring pupils were probably giving away far too much detail about how she was feeling. She couldn’t help it, the corners of her own mouth twitched into a smile, and her eyes flicked down to his mouth, noticing the width, the redness of his generous lips. It was a big mouth, made for devouring, she thought and had a sudden flashed image of herself as Red Riding Hood sitting before a wolf in human clothes.
“All the better to eat you with,” he rumbled, and then shook his head as if surprised at what he had just said. Although she was shocked that he appeared to have directly read her very thoughts, she laughed.
“You did just say that out loud you know?”
“Very inappropriate, and unlike me,” he said. Though she doubted that very much. Somehow she thought he would be very inappropriate whenever he felt like it. He
On the coffee table in front of her were a couple of large hardback books on photography, and in the corner a large and expensive looking Nikon camera sat on its tripod, the dark eye of its lens facing into the room, all fairly obvious props for a photographer’s home. Next to the coffee table, to China’s left, was a long sofa of completely different material to the chair she was sitting on, indicating that the flat had been economically furnished for letting by someone with little eye for harmonious detail. She suspected that Tony had worked his unique interior design talents here.
The floor was a tired, polished wood, uneven and knotted, upon which there was a single red plain and rather threadbare rug which roughly marked the centre of the room. Strangely, there was no television, or hi-fi. It was difficult to glean any useful information about the inhabitant of such blandly furnished accommodation. The photography accessories were the only objects that spoke of Mark in any way.
When Mark returned he was carrying a small pack of frozen peas wrapped in a red-checked tea towel. He knelt in front of her and said, “You might want to remove those tights.”
She was shocked at the thought of removing any clothes in front of him but realized the obvious common sense in the statement. Very self-consciously she leant forwards and started to tug the tights off, shuffling her bottom and keeping her legs as close together as possible. All the while she was acutely aware that Mark was staring fixedly into her face, watching her squirm with awkwardness. “A gentleman would look away.”
“Then I’ll stay just where I am,” he grinned.
He carried on looking at her for a couple more moments then sighed and turned his head away, allowing her the opportunity for a less elegant but more efficient removal of her tights. She crumpled them up and pressed them into her Louis Vuitton bag, hoping they wouldn’t catch on anything inside. On the sharp corner of the little business card, for example.
“There you go, you can look now,” she said.
He turned back to her and then gently grasped her calf with one hand. China shuddered inwardly as a fresh charge of electric sensation emanated from the point where his hand was in contact with her bare leg. His eyes never left hers as he slowly lifted the leg and softly placed the shockingly cold parcel onto her swollen ankle. She gasped at the sudden cold but maintained eye contact. What could she read in those big green eyes? They were as intense as ever, and he studied her eyes for any sort of response. Then they flared, a slight and momentary widening of the eyelids and pupils, accompanied by the briefest of almost feral grins. She felt herself melt and knew, but didn’t care, that her own flaring pupils were probably giving away far too much detail about how she was feeling. She couldn’t help it, the corners of her own mouth twitched into a smile, and her eyes flicked down to his mouth, noticing the width, the redness of his generous lips. It was a big mouth, made for devouring, she thought and had a sudden flashed image of herself as Red Riding Hood sitting before a wolf in human clothes.
“All the better to eat you with,” he rumbled, and then shook his head as if surprised at what he had just said. Although she was shocked that he appeared to have directly read her very thoughts, she laughed.
“You did just say that out loud you know?”
“Very inappropriate, and unlike me,” he said. Though she doubted that very much. Somehow she thought he would be very inappropriate whenever he felt like it. He
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