Falling For Mr. December. Kate Hardy

shot numbers in here.’ She wrote them down. ‘Would you like to check that you agree with the numbers before you sign?’

      He smiled. ‘You sound like a lawyer.’

      ‘I sound like a professional photographer who likes to get things right,’ she corrected.

      He checked the numbers on the form against the numbers on her laptop, then signed the form. ‘I’m impressed with what you did. Can I see any of the other calendar shots?’

      Sammy shook her head. ‘Sorry. Only the Chair of the Friends and the committee members she chooses to work with her on the project can see them until the proofs are printed,’ she said.

      ‘Fair enough. I was just curious.’

      ‘About the other models?’ she asked.

      ‘About your work,’ he said, ‘given the way you reacted to that picture of the British Museum’s roof.’

      ‘Ah. If you want to see my portfolio, that’s a different matter entirely.’ She pulled up a different file for him. ‘Knock yourself out.’

      He looked through them. ‘You’ve got a real mixture here—lots of people and a few landscapes.’

      ‘They tend to go with profiles of people in magazines and Sunday supplements,’ she said. ‘That’s my bread-and-butter work. So if the profile is of someone who’s set up an English vineyard, I’d take a portrait of that person and then whatever else is needed to illustrate the interview or article. Say, the vineyard itself, or a close-up of a bunch of grapes, or the area where the wine’s produced or bottled.’

      ‘What about the photographs you take for you?’

      ‘What makes you think I don’t take these ones for me?’ she parried.

      ‘Apart from the fact that you admitted that they were work, it was the look on your face when you saw the house—as if you were dying to grab your camera and focus in on little details. Particularly the fanlight window.’

      ‘Busted,’ she said with a rueful smile. ‘Architecture’s my big love—I never wanted to be an architect and create the buildings myself, but what I like is to make people focus in on a feature and see the building in a different light instead of just taking it for granted or ignoring it entirely.’ And, although she’d never normally show her private shots to someone she barely knew, something about the way Nick looked at her made her want to open up. She went into another file. ‘Like these ones.’

      ‘They’re stunning,’ Nick said as he scrolled through them. ‘And I mean it—I’m not just being polite. I’d be more than happy to have any of these blown up, framed and hung on my walls.’

      She could see in his face that he meant it. And it made her feel warm inside. Some of her exes had scoffed at her private photography, calling her nerdy and not understanding at all what she loved about the architecture. And others had wanted her to give it all up so they could look after her—because a cancer survivor shouldn’t be pushing herself to take photographs from difficult positions. Hanging off a balcony to get a better angle for her shot really wasn’t the sort of thing a delicate little flower should do.

      She’d wanted a relationship, not a straightjacket. And being protected in such a smothering way had made her feel stifled and miserable, even more than when the men she’d dated had backed off at the very first mention of the word ‘cancer’.

      ‘So when do you take this kind of shot?’ Nick asked.

      ‘When I get a day off, I walk round London and find interesting things. And sometimes I go to the coast—I love seascapes. Especially if a lighthouse or a pier’s involved.’

      ‘And you put your pictures on the internet?’

      ‘I have a blog for my favourite shots,’ she admitted.

      ‘So did you always know you wanted to be a photographer?’ he asked.

      ‘Like most kids, I didn’t have a clue what I wanted to do when I grew up,’ Sammy said. ‘Then, one summer, my uncle—who was a press photographer before he retired—taught me how to use a proper SLR camera.’ Nick didn’t need to know that it was because she’d been cooped up in one place, the summer when she’d had treatment for osteosarcoma; she’d been bored and miserable, unable to go out with her friends because she had been forced to wait for the surgical wounds to heal and to do her physiotherapy. Uncle Julian had shown her how she could get a different perspective on her surroundings and encouraged her to experiment with shots from her chair. ‘I loved every second of it. And I ended up doing my degree in photography and following in his footsteps.’

      ‘A press photographer? So you started out working for a magazine?’

      ‘For the first couple of years after I graduated, I did; and then the publication I worked for was restructured and quite a few of the staff were made redundant, including me. That’s when I decided to take the leap and go freelance,’ she explained. ‘Though that also means I don’t tend to turn work down. You never know when you’re going to have a dry spell, and I like to have at least three months’ money sitting in the bank so I can always pay my rent.’

      ‘And you do weddings as well?’ He pointed to one of the other photographs.

      ‘Only for people close to me. That one’s Ashleigh, one of my best friends, on Capri last year.’

      ‘It’s a beautiful setting.’

      ‘Really romantic,’ she agreed. ‘The bridesmaid is my other best friend, Claire. She and I went to the Blue Grotto, the next day. It was for a commission, I admit, but I would’ve gone anyway because the place is so gorgeous. You had to lie down in the boat to get through the entrance, but it was worth the effort. The light was really something else.’ She flicked into another file and showed him some of the photographs. ‘Look.’

      ‘I like that—it’s another of the sort of scenes I’d like to have on my wall,’ he said.

      She nodded. ‘Like that misty seascape in your living room. That’s the kind of thing I like to shoot at dawn or dusk. If you do it with a long exposure, the waves swirl about and look like mist.’

      ‘That’s clever,’ he said.

      She smiled. ‘No. That’s technique. Anyone can do it when they know how.’

      When their food arrived, Sammy put her laptop away while Nick brought out plates and cutlery.

      ‘Would you like a glass of wine?’ he asked.

      She shook her head. ‘Thanks for the offer, but I’m driving so I’d rather not. A glass of water’s fine, thanks.’

      He poured them both a glass of water from a jug in the fridge—filtered water, she thought. Nick Kennedy clearly dotted all his I’s and crossed every T.

      ‘Help yourself,’ he said, gesturing to the various dishes in the centre of the table.

      ‘Thank you.’ She noticed that he eyed her plate when she’d finished heaping it. ‘What?’

      ‘It’s refreshing, eating with someone who actually enjoys food.’

      ‘That sounds as if you’ve been eating dinner with the wrong kind of person,’ she said dryly. ‘Most people I know enjoy food.’

      ‘Hmm.’

      She finished stuffing one of the pancakes with shredded duck and cucumber, added some hoi sin sauce and took a taste. ‘And this is seriously good. I haven’t had crispy duck this excellent before. Nice choice, Mr Kennedy.’ She paused. ‘As we’re going halves on this, how much do I owe you?’

      ‘My house, my hospitality, my bill,’ he said. ‘No arguments.’

      ‘Thank you.’ Though there was more than one way to win an argument. Maybe she could print one of her seascapes for him, the one he’d really liked, to say thank you for the