Photographer

Lukas Sawyer

"And you just . . . left?" I paced the floor in my big sister's living room as she sat on the couch.

"What the hell was I supposed to do?" She placed the sheaf of papers she'd been studying on the coffee table and gave me her full attention.

"You're what? Most dangerous , Confident girl, why don't you fight?" I folded my arms over my chest and let my back thump against the wall.

"Come on, Lucy."

"I'm serious. If he was as harsh as you say, then why didn't you set him straight?" Why hadn't I?

"I don't know. Something about him. . . twists me up inside." Lucia propped her elbows on her knees as she rested her chin on her graceful hands.

"Okay, let me make sure I've got the facts right. This guy insults you in the middle of Central Park and invites you to his place for a photo session, where he insults you again before tossing you out. And you just let him do it to you." I bowed my head, kept my gaze locked on my feet.

"That about sums it up."

"He must be really, really hot."Despite my burned ego, I burst into laughter.

"He is. But it's more than that. Lukas's got something. . ."

"Lukas?"

"That's his name. Lukas Sawyer." I sensed the burst of motion on the other side of the room and lifted my head to see my sister staring at me, wide-eyed.

"Lukas Sawyer. You met Lukas Sawyer in Central Park?" Not sure what to make of her reaction, I nodded. Her lips parted.

"Oh . . . my . . . God."

"I think I'm missing something."

"Janie! He's bigger than Sebastião Salgado, he's bigger than Emmet Gowin, he's bigger than Ansel Adams!" I struggled to keep up.

"Who's Ansel Adams?"Lucy squeaked and pointed to a picture hanging on the wall behind her.I walked over to it, really looked at it for the first time. It was a stunning black-and-white landscape: a deep, rocky valley with a white moon suspended above.

"Lukas takes pictures like this?"

"No, not exactly. He's got his own style, and—" She made a sound close enough to a growl to make me glance at her in alarm. "Oh, no use trying to explaining it. Hold on a second." She ran into the next room. I took a seat on the couch, listening as she rummaged around. I was almost afraid to see what she wanted to show me. Lucy returned, holding a huge scrapbook close to her breasts. Slowly, almost reverently, she placed it in front of me on the coffee table. I just stared at Lukas's name, stenciled across the front in black ink.

"Go ahead. Take a look." It wasn't going to bite me, I reasoned, so I opened it to the first page. A thick, lush rainforest. A silhouette all but hidden among the leaves. The colors leapt from the photo—every shade of green imaginable. The canopy blocked most of the sun, and yet the scene itself was clear, as if I could reach inside and pull out one of those emerald leaves.

"Holy shit. It looks like a picture out of National Geographic or something."I could hear the smile in her voice.

"Keep going."I turned the page, and there was a similar scene, on the cover of National Geographic. My voice dropped to a whisper.

"Wow."

"It gets better."She wasn't kidding. There were covers to News week, Time, The Rolling Stone. There were prints of people, prints of landscapes, newspaper clippings. Each one so different from the next, bu tevery photo had that same clarity, that same realism. I looked at one of Lukas's pictures and knew the subject. Intimately. Gratefully. I'd been right in the park. He could see you. He just couldn't see me.

"Damn," I said, looking at another photo. Lucy clapped her hands.

"I know! Isn't he amazing? I've been collecting his stuff since college. And you met him! You—" She stopped short, and her voice dropped sympathetic. "Oh, sorry. Forgot that it wasn't a good meeting. Either time."I scrubbed my face with my hand.

"You don't understand, sis. I bragged about being on the cover of Shape magazine. I called him a hack photographer."

"Ouch. No wonder he was so hard on you." His gentle expression flashed through my mind.

"It's not that. I don't think anything I said pissed him off. He was just annoyed because I was boring." She fisted her hand against her heart.

"Oh, Janie. You're not boring." I closed the scrapbook.

"I am compared to him. He's a superstar in his field."

"So? You're a superstar in yours." Surprise made me glance up. She was right. How had I forgotten that?"You don't give yourself enough credit, Janie."Knowing this speech by heart, I leaned back against the couch.

"Doesn't matter, anyway. I blew it with Lukas." A sly grin shaped her mouth, one that had meant trouble since we were kids.

"Maybe not."

"I don't want to hear it." Lucy had a way of walking away from her schemes scot-free, while I caught the full brunt of the blame for whatever we'd done. She went on as if she hadn't heard me.

"John is at a law conference this week," she said, fingering her wedding ring. "And it just so happens that I have two tickets to an art show on Friday. Lukas Sawyer's art show. His first in years." I bolted upright.

"You're kidding." She shook her head.

"Nah. Want to come?" Common sense told me to say no, but I found myself a man obsessed.

"I look pretty good in jeans, right?"

"Ew. I don't know. You're my sister."I smiled for the first time in almost a week. I shouldn't have asked. Even Lukas said I had a great body. And all my clothes were tailored to fit me to perfection.A third chance to see Mason. Maybe, this time, I could manage to be charming.

*******★†★*******