How to Love Read Free Page B

elderly Asian woman with sad eyes and a heavily wrinkled face, a man sitting on a bench near a beach, clearly homeless, head bowed with defeat, a little girl in a ballet tutu sitting on the floor looking up at someone or something with sad longing on her small face.
    Mike paused in front of that one, his chest clenching. Then he shook his head. Obviously she was a talented photographer if one of her images could grab him like that.
    He passed through a wide opening in the wall, into another smaller gallery. Ah. Here were the nudes. Not as many photos as there were in the front part of the gallery, in fact there were very few, some black and white, some color. Some were of very specific body parts only—a round breast with a tightly puckered dark nipple. A seductive curve of a hip and thigh. He blinked as he studied the close-up of a woman’s vulva, naked of any hair and gleaming with oil. He stood there for a long moment, staring at that one, unable to take his eyes off it. Damn.
    His cock stirred in his shorts, which luckily were baggy.
    None of the images showed a face. Even if it was a full body image, the model’s face was usually in shadow or turned away from the camera. He moved on to study some male images. The first one he looked at was a man standing against a dark background. Water poured down on him and crystal drops surrounded him. Barely the outline of his muscled body could be seen, but it was incredibly beautiful.
    Another featured a black and white image of a guy stretched out on a bed, really just the curve of his ass, shot probably from the vicinity of his feet, and what an ass, perfect and smooth, with high contrast lighting. The next was the torso of a man standing, head bowed, hands clearly touching himself, but that was just out of the frame, his muscled abdomen outlined in shadow and light. Something about his pose exuded a desperate need for sexual relief.
    Mike’s cock was getting harder.
    The photographs certainly weren’t porn. They were erotic, but also moving. And there was obviously a lot of technical talent required.
    The next one he stopped to look at was a naked woman outlined against a window, her hand pressed to the glass, clearly conveying a sense of longing and anguish. Other people in the gallery murmured as they studied the images and he heard a couple debating about which one they wanted to purchase. Then he heard a voice speak behind him to the couple. “Have you decided?” He’d know that voice anywhere, after only having spoken to her for a few minutes yesterday, a distinctive low, smoky voice.
    Mike turned to watch Jules, her dark brown hair a messy cloud around her face. She had a strong face—high, sharp cheekbones, thick eyebrows, a narrow nose, full lips—but feminine. Her skin was amazing—smooth and perfect and glowing. But it was her big, thickly lashed lavender-blue eyes that drew him in, made his chest ache, made him think about sex.
    She turned her head then and caught his eye. With a blink of surprise she smiled. Listening to the couple, she subtly held up a finger and he nodded, turned his attention back to the images on the wall. He listened to her quiet conversation with the couple about the images.
    “I love this one,” she said to them. “It was a challenge getting the model to cooperate. I wanted to show some of his personality.”
    “He seems very…dominant,” the woman said hesitantly.
    “Yes,” Jules agreed. “That he is. And he did not like me telling him what to do.” They all laughed a little.
    “I like that one,” the woman said.
    “I sort of wanted a female picture,” the man said.
    After a short pause, Jules said, “Well, if I could make a suggestion…this one here…” She led them toward where Mike was standing. He moved aside, catching her eye and her smile once more. She gestured to one of the framed photos, a black and white of a couple, another one with no faces visible. The man stood behind the woman, his arms around her