Chapter 20: The Photographer's Demand
The blinking red light on the camera was the only movement in the room. Aidan felt its stare on his skin, a cool, digital eye witnessing the slow slide of Jenny’s body off his, the damp sound of separation. She curled against the leather, spent, her breathing gradually slowing. Aidan’s own muscles felt liquefied, but his mind was a torrent of static—a bizarre cocktail of satiation, shame, and a dark, uncharted thrill.
The door opened again. Catriona stepped back in, but she was different. The silk robe was gone, replaced by tight black jeans and a simple grey t-shirt. Her hair was pulled back severely. In her hands were two small, brand-new memory cards.
“The originals are safe,” she said, her voice clinical. She didn’t look at them as she approached the camera, ejected the card inside, and slid in a fresh one. The action was efficient, practiced. “I’ve made backups. Now we have a clean slate on here.”
Jenny sat up, pulling her knees to her chest. “A clean slate for what?”
Catriona finally looked at her, and then at Aidan. The hunger from moments before was now sheathed in a frightening calm. “For version two. The lighting’s changed. It’s softer. More intimate.” She peered through the viewfinder, adjusting a dial. “Aidan, get another whiskey. You look like you need it.”
He didn’t argue. He stood, his legs unsteady, and walked to the decanter on the sideboard. The amber liquid splashed into the glass, the sound abnormally loud. He drank half of it in one go, the burn a welcome anchor in his throat.
“Jenny, on the chaise again. But on your knees this time. Face the windows, back to me.” Catriona’s directions were clear, devoid of the earlier purr. This was a director blocking a scene.
Jenny, with a curious shrug that seemed to accept any new rule of this game, complied. She got on her knees on the leather, her back a graceful curve, the perfect arcs of her backside highlighted by the dusky pink light now streaming in.
“Aidan. Behind her. Don’t enter her yet. Just… be there. Let the camera see the comparison.”
He set the glass down. The whiskey warmth spread through his core, muting the panic, amplifying the latent heat. He moved behind Jenny, his body aligning with hers. He was already hard again, a reaction he felt divorced from, something autonomic and undeniable. The broad head of him pressed against the cleft of her, not pushing, just resting. A promise.
Catriona’s shutter clicked. She moved sideways, capturing the profile. The contrast of his weathered hands on Jenny’s youthful hips, the sheer difference in scale.
“Now,” Catriona murmured, voice barely above a whisper but cutting through the room. “Slowly. I want to watch it disappear.”
Aidan’s hands tightened. He guided himself, pushing forward into that impossible, welcoming tightness. Jenny gasped, her back arching deeper, a low moan escaping her as he filled her. The camera whirred, zooming in mercilessly.
“God, look at that,” Catriona breathed, not to them, but to the image in her viewfinder. “It’s like she was made for it. Stop there, Aidan. Don’t move.”
He froze, buried to the hilt, trembling with the effort of stillness. Jenny clenched around him, a helpless, pulsing reaction.
“Perfect. The stretch is… anatomical. Beautiful.” The clicking was incessant. “Now, Jenny, you move. Take him. Just with your hips. Slow. Make me believe you can’t get enough of it.”
Jenny began to rock, a gentle, rolling motion that drew a ragged breath from Aidan. Her eyes were closed, her brow furrowed in concentration, a medical student understanding a profound new function of her own body. Catriona circled them, a shark in the dim light, capturing every nuance: the sweat beading on Aidan’s spine, the flutter of Jenny’s lashes, the slick, rhythmic connection.
It built again, that terrifying wave. Aidan tried to hold it back, but Jenny’s rhythm became more urgent, needful. Her quiet, pleading sounds undid him.
“I’m going to—” he gritted out, a warning.
“Not inside,” Catriona commanded, stepping closer, the lens now just feet away. “Out. On her. I want to see it all.”
The order was a violation of their unspoken rule, the final, sacred taboo of their arrangement. For a second, Aidan resisted, the instinct to spill into that warmth overpowering. But Catriona’s will, channeled through the unblinking eye of the camera, was stronger.
He pulled out, the sudden emptiness a shock. He fisted himself, and with a choked groan, his release erupted onto the small of Jenny’s back, stripes of white stark against her olive skin.
The camera clicked one final, definitive time.
Silence descended, broken only by their panting. Catriona lowered the camera. She stared at the result of her direction, a vivid, glistening painting on Jenny’s skin. Without a word, she set the camera aside on the desk.
She walked over to the chaise. Kneeling on the rug, she didn’t look at Aidan’s shocked face or Jenny’s half-turned, questioning one. She simply extended her index finger and swiped it through the warm, pearlescent pool on Jenny’s spine.
She brought her finger to her lips, her eyes locking with Aidan’s as she slowly, deliberately, tasted it.
Her eyelids fluttered. A complex wave of emotion—triumph, revulsion, profound arousal—passed over her features. She swallowed.
“Salty,” she whispered, her voice raw. Then she stood, wiping her hand on her jeans, the gesture oddly casual. “The clarity was better that time. The external shot… the texture is incredible.” She picked up the camera, ejecting the second memory card, holding the two tiny plastic squares in her palm like precious stones.
“We’ll do this every Wednesday,” she stated, her tone returning to that unsettling normalcy. “The light is best on Wednesdays. It’s a good… routine to establish.”
She turned and left, closing the door softly behind her, leaving them in the wreckage of the chaise, the scent of sex and whiskey and her new, absolute control hanging heavier in the air than any shadow.