“Well, you know what they say about low-hanging fruit. It isn’t nearly as good or sweet as the fruit up high. You just have to be willing to work to reach it.”
Ian chuckled. “Yeah, I’ve certainly been going for the low-hanging fruit. I haven’t had time to work any harder at a relationship. It’s a shame, though. If I got one thing out of this whole mess with Missy, it was that the idea of starting a family really appealed to me. I just didn’t want to start it with her.”
“I don’t blame you.”
Ian sighed and sat back from his plate. Despite their discussion, he’d managed to demolish everything they’d cooked and still had a hankering for something sweet. He might have to go claim some of his Monopoly winnings before too long.
He looked up and watched Bree as she chewed her food and looked out the window. She was as beautiful as always, but their conversation seemed to have brought her energy down a little. He couldn’t tell if she was overworked, or if the lack of love life was bothering her.
“It sounds like we could both use a vacation,” he noted, trying to perk up the discussion.
The sadness slipped away from her expression, her thoughts returning to the present. Bree smiled and looked around at the cabin. “What would you call all this?”
This might be the closest thing he’d had to a vacation in a very long time, but that didn’t mean it qualified. It just proved to him that it took a blizzard to get him to relax. “I call it captivity. When I say the word vacation, I mean beaches, warm breezes and suntan lotion.” He looked at her with a raised eyebrow. “Bikinis. Frothy drinks. Skinny dipping in a private splash pool at midnight.”
Bree’s eyes grew wider as he spoke until they were like giant blue marbles watching him. Her cheeks were tinged pink, her lips moist and open slightly. He could tell her mind had followed him to a tropical location with the two of them mostly nude. Then, in an instant, she stiffened up and regained her composure. “That sounds like a nice idea. You should go when you find a new lady friend.”
“What if I’ve already found a new lady friend?” he asked boldly.
Bree took a deep breath, her shoulders shrugging slightly. “I think we need to survive this trip before we start worrying about another one.”
* * *
“May I take your picture?”
Ian looked up at Bree with a frown. They’d loaded the dishwasher and cleaned up together, then he’d carried his glass of wine into the living room to relax. Bree had picked her camera up off the coffee table and started tinkering with it. Their dinnertime conversation had sent her brain spinning. A vacation? Together? Yes, they’d had sex, but she knew this wasn’t going to go anywhere. Did he? It didn’t sound like it.
When life got problematic, Bree preferred the buffer of her camera between her and the world. Because there was only so far she could go from the temptation and complication of Ian, the camera was her best bet.
Judging by the look on his face, he wasn’t expecting Bree to spring this on him. Especially after she’d awkwardly rebuffed his offer of a holiday in the Caribbean. “Why would you want to take my picture?”
She shrugged. She couldn’t exactly tell him her initial motivation. At the same time, as big a mess as this weekend was, she wanted the photos to commemorate it. “It’s what I do.” Bree reached for her nearby camera bag and pulled out a different lens filter. She held the camera up to look at him through the lens, snapping a quick photo to test the light in the room.
Looking at the shot, she was reminded how photogenic Ian was. He was a handsome man in person, with penetrating green eyes and a square jaw covered in evening stubble. His features were masculine but refined. His dark hair was thick and wavy, yet kept short enough to stay under control. Photographing him, however, brought out an aura of confidence and power. There was an edgy male energy in his photo. And if she looked closely...signs of long-term exhaustion and stress. She recognized that look from her father. It was the kind of bone-weariness that came from weeks and months of working at an insane pace. Success at all costs.
And that was why she couldn’t go to the beach with him. Once they got out of here, things would be just like they were before and she’d be pushed aside for his work again. If she was going to make time in her own schedule for a relationship, she wanted it to be with someone who was willing to do the same.
“Do you want me just sitting here like I am? Or would you prefer me nude?” he added with a wicked grin.
Bree sighed. Of course he would turn her request into a sexual innuendo. He might be nearly thirty now, but she was coming to learn that most men’s sense of humor stopped developing around fourteen. At least it got her mind off her worries for a while. “Clothes on, please. I haven’t taken nude portraits since my college project on the human form. It’s not really my thing.”
“I mean, I don’t mind,” he continued, ignoring her protests. “I couldn’t help but notice you admiring my stunning male form earlier today. If you want to blow up a photo of me and hang it over your fireplace or something, I totally get it.”
“No nudes. And no huge egos, either. I need to be able to get your whole, inflated head in the frame.” At that, she hesitated. What she would really like was a shot of him with his guitar. In her old scrapbooks, Bree had pages of photographs with Ian playing. At the coffee shops. On a park bench. In his dorm room. Even on stage during one of his only school performances before he’d quit. She’d really loved photographing him while he worked, and adding another picture to the collection seemed appropriate. “I would really like to take your picture while you play, actually.”
At her suggestion, Ian frowned, just as she’d expected him to. “Last night was a one-night limited engagement. I don’t intend to do it again.”
Bree dropped the camera to her lap, a pout threatening to force out her bottom lip. She tried to hold it in. “Please, Ian. You can play whatever you want. Just let me take a few pictures.”
He sighed, then leaned forward to rest his elbows on his knees and look at her. “Bree, I know that you still think of me as the Ian you knew in school. I do the same thing. I see you and think about spotting you in the crowd at the coffee shop or when you helped me study for my algebra finals. But we’re not those people anymore. It’s been a long time and we’ve both grown up. That person you remember—the charming musician with the guitar—is long gone.”
“But last night...”
“Last night,” he interrupted, “was just for old time’s sake. Nothing has changed. I’m not suddenly going to grab that guitar and pick up my music career where I left off nine years ago. Those were just the dreams of a teenaged kid who didn’t know any better.”
And those were the words of a grown man made bitter by having those same dreams crushed. It made her sad to think that one person had the power to make him throw everything away. He’d disengaged himself so much from his music that he wouldn’t even pick up a guitar. Certainly he could at least play for fun without thinking he was going to be a rock star one
day. Bree enjoyed her photography and had moderate success, but she never expected to shoot for Vanity Fair. She did it because she liked to do it. Wasn’t that enough?