“I guess we’re both discovering what our limits are.”

Brando points his dark-brown eyes at me in a way I haven’t seen yet. I stand a few feet in front of him, feeling the salt air fill my lungs, enjoying his devoted attention, wondering how bad news can feel like good news when you’ve got the simple things right.

“So it’s just you and me now? We’re going it alone?” I say, having to look at him through my wind-blown hair.

“In case you hadn’t noticed, it’s been that way from the start.”

I smile shyly and put a hand on my beach skirt as it blows against my skin. I didn’t feel like my regulation jeans and dark t-shirt today. It was a snap decision to wear this light-blue, almost see-through skirt, and a tight white tank top with a denim jacket over it. The kind of decision a girl makes much more easily when she’s getting some.

“What’s the next step then?”

“We still need a video,” Brando says, still studying me like I’m the Sistine chapel. His look makes me feel naked, but the stranger thing is that I don’t mind.

I squinch up my face. “How? You said it yourself, we have no budget. Nothing. Maybe we can borrow some equipment, but don’t we need a director? Lighting guys? A studio? I don’t know, videos seem like—”

“You look so beautiful right now,” Brando says, his voice cutting through mine like a soft punch.

I look down at my feet, wondering if it’s normal for an adult woman to blush this much.

“The way your hair falls over your face,” he continues, as if in a trance, “the way your eyes catch the light and hold it. You always look amazing, but right now, right here, out in the light, I can see the magic around you.”

I look around to see if anyone else is nearby, embarrassed but smiling like I’m guilty of getting away with something.

“Anyway…we were talking about the video?” I say, looking back at Brando. He’s holding his phone out in front of him. Filming me. “Oh no! No no no!”

“Yeah,” Brando says, standing up, his face expressing pure, mischievous glee. “About that video…”

I hide my face behind my hands, turning away and taking a few steps back down the pier. Brando follows, his hand still holding the phone steady.

“Brando! Put the phone away!” I say, but I’m laughing as I say it, and the way his eyes narrow as they flick between the screen and mine lets me know how much he’s enjoying this.

“If you look one tenth as good on film as you do in real life, this is gonna be amazing.”

“Come on!” I say, pleading as I twirl around to face him, walking backwards away from the camera, before turning back around to walk down the pier.

Brando steps in front of me, so now he’s walking backwards, and I’m walking towards the camera. He winks, and I try not to smile, try not to laugh. Try not to let Brando make me feel so playful and happy, as if this could actually happen.

“How about a little dance?” Brando says from behind the lens. I stop and give him a look that says ‘no,’ before covering my face with my hands again, hiding behind my hair. “Or act shy,” he says. “That works too.”

I continue to walk, Brando still filming me head-on as he steps backwards carefully.

“Okay,” I say, talking to the camera lens, “you win. We’ll do the video like this.” I get just close enough, and then snatch the phone away from him. He freezes on the spot, his hands still out in front of him, holding a phone that isn’t there anymore. “On one condition,” I say, raising the phone and pointing the lens at him, “you’re gonna be in it too.”

I watch him on the phone screen as he drops his hands to his side, and gives me a picture-perfect, cover-shoot sexy, incredibly photogenic smile.

“Deal.”

The rest of the evening is a heady blur of laughter and randomness. We go to a sushi place and we film each other acting goofy with our chopsticks. Brando gets sake on his shirt and we go to a clothes store to buy a new one. I force him to change in the middle of the store, on camera, making sure I catch the looks of the female onlookers, eyes wide as they bite their lips. Brando gets someone to film him surprising me by picking me up on his shoulders and running down the boardwalk. I do cartwheels on the beach, Brando takes off his clothes and emerges from the water, we film ourselves kissing against the changing colors of the sky as the sun sets.

“This…could actually turn out pretty awesome!” I say, checking the footage as we enter Brando’s apartment. “It’s no blockbuster, but it’s real. It kinda makes sense. Intimate, kinda silly, genuine. It’s perfect for the song.”

Brando walks up to me and pulls the phone from my hand. “I agree.”

“Do you think we got enough?” I say, looking up at him. “For the whole song?”

“No."

Brando’s face is sultry as he raises the camera and points it at me.

I look sideways at him, confused, but still playfully curious. “What are you doing?”

“Filming you.”

“I can see that,” I say, laughing gently. “But is this for the song? Or for yourself?”

“That depends,” he says, voice thick and full, “on how hot it gets.”

“Hot?” I say, the wetness of my lips audible in my voice. “You mean, like this?”

I ease off my denim jacket, body sideways, looking over my shoulder at the camera – at Brando. I drop the jacket to the floor and press myself back up against the wall. “Like this?” I say, arching my back, breasts pushing out against the white tank, skirt swishing from the curve my ass. Brando stalks around me with the camera like an animal, moving the lens the way his eye would across my body, lips parted like he can already taste me.

I spin around and walk away from the camera toward the couch. “What about this?” I move the skirt slowly down over my ass before letting it drop. I look back over my shoulder and see Brando on his knees, camera in one hand, pulling his shirt off with another, breathing so heavy it’s as if it doesn’t fit, the lens and his eyes worshipping my ass.

Facing the window, Brando behind me, I take my tank top off, slowly teasing it up over my belly and over my head before tossing it aside. Then I do the same with my bra, folding my arms, hands over my breasts, before turning around. Brando’s shirt is off, and though he’s still holding the camera up to face me, he’s not looking at the screen anymore. “This?” I say, lips pouting.

Brando steps toward me slowly, shoulders rolling like a jungle cat. My heart beats faster with every inch of space that disappears between us. I drop my hands from my breasts and push my palms against the phone screen. He’s close enough that I can see the tension in his neck muscles, taste the testosterone on his skin. He stretches his arm out, camera pointing back at both of us.

“This,” he says like a low, dangerous hiss, before forcing his lips on mine.

I grab the back of his neck, fingers digging into his unyielding, taut skin, urging his delicious tongue into me. I let another hand venture around the ripples of his torso, exploring the irresistible curve of his muscles.

He continues to film as we fuck each other’s mouths harder and faster with our ferocious tongues. His other hand presses against the small of my back on its way down to my ass, where it grabs and smacks me harder against him. I gasp at the delicious sting and wrap my arms around his neck, legs around his waist, and he lifts me up as easily as another part of his body.

I close my eyes, feeling light-headed from his smell, from the rhythm of his heartbeat; so hard against my chest it makes my tits move, pressed up against his pecs. I struggle for breath, his tongue probing me hungrily, but I can’t let him go, won’t let him go.

He gives my ass another firm slap and I moan, tilting my head back. “Brando.”

He carries me to the bedroom, while I concentrate on tasting his shoulder. He throws me back onto the soft sheets of his bed, his giant frame towering above me. He tosses the phone aside.