Chapter 23: The Real Photos

Leah's POV

On the third Saturday in May, I stood in front of a white paper backdrop in a cream silk robe.

I was thirty-nine weeks along, and my feet were bare.

I had asked for this, and my hands were damp.

Rowan had spent two hours moving lamps.

"Chin down a little," he said, from behind the camera. "Not that much. There."

"You've said that to forty brides."

"I've never said it to anyone I wanted to kiss between frames."

Fran, who was working the silver reflector, coughed loudly.

"Some of us are trying to hold a light," she said.

Brooke sat on the studio sofa with Gravy asleep on her chest, five months old, drooling on a cardigan.

She had a part-time job now, in the accounts office of a dental supply company.

It had never heard of Marianne Kessling.

She still slept in Fran's sewing room, and Fran had told her, twice, to stop saying thank you.

"You look amazing," Brooke whispered. "Don't tell him I said so."

"I heard that," said Rowan.

"Then you know it's true."

He took the first few frames at a distance, with the paper and the lamp and nothing but my silhouette.

Then he came closer.

I'd known he would, and I'd dreaded it for weeks.

"Leah." He lowered the camera. "There's a pose I won't suggest. You know the one."

"I know the one."

"I don't want to take it. I took it once for someone else, in this room, and it's the worst thing I ever shot."

"You didn't take it for yourself. You took it for Marianne's check." I stepped off the paper and put my hand on the camera. "Rowan, look at me."