"Where are you taking me, Dan?"

"Somewhere special."

Cherri laughed and bumped against me as we moved through the shadows cast by trees overhanging the track, the rich scent of pine needles and loam surrounding us. Rain had fallen overnight but the ground beneath the thick tree cover lay dry. I was interested in Cherri's reaction as we turned the corner and she caught her first sight of the barn.

It stood as drunken as ever, dilapidated but for me always magical. I experienced a sudden nervousness. The barn was my place. My special place. The barn called to me in some way I didn't fully understand. I'm a aburbs girl, northern LA, our large house set on Camarosa Drive in Santa Monica, but this dilapidated old place touched a part of my heart that had been waiting all this time to be touched, completing me. Stupid, but that's how I felt.

Cherri stopped and my heart beat fast.

"Is this the place?"

I nodded, then realized she wasn't looking my way.

"What d'you think?"

"It's old... Is it safe?"

"Sure."

"Yeah?"

"Sure. I checked it out. It's safe." I giggled. "Not quite as safe as houses, but..."

Cherri glanced at me. "Leave the jokes to me, Dan. Okay, let's go."

She went on ahead and I held back, watching, I seemed to be always watching Cherri. Shafts of sunlight caught her as she moved through them, illuminating the air around her, making her thin skirt transparent, making her hair glow. My hands trembled and I gripped the Nikon hard trying to still them. I needed to be calm.

"Come on Dan." Cherri turned and called back.

I ran and caught her up, ran past so I could be first to the barn. On my previous trips I'd managed to work the main door loose, making the way in easier. I stopped in the center of the big ground floor and took a quick light reading, turned back and ran off four quick shots as Cherri came in, outlined against the brightness outside, her legs showing through the filmy dress as though it hardly existed.

Cherri smiled and walked across to me, the hard packed dirt floor like concrete. As she came she moved through more sunlight arcing between gaps in the planks. She walked past me, reaching out and brushing my arm with her fingers as she went.

"I like your place, Dan."

"Me too."

"It's got... something. Maybe because it's a secret. Makes it kind of... sexy." She stopped at the foot of the ladder and glanced back at me and I grew worried because she was so beautiful, no longer sure this was such a great notion. My feelings for Cherri starting to get out of hand.

Cherri put one foot on the first rung, sunlight behind and I knelt and took three shots.

"How d'you want to do this? I feel sorta awkward now. Do I just, like, take everything off or what?"

I laughed. "Don't ask me, Cherri. I've never done this before either."

"You must have."

"Why would I be taking pictures of naked girls?"

Cherri smiled on one side. "I would."

"Yeah, but you're perverted."

Cherri stroked a hand up her leg. "You make that sound like a bad thing." Her fingers caught the hem of her skirt and lifted until I caught a glimpse of blue panties matching her bra and my camera captured the moment.

"I know it's hard, but why don't you try to forget I'm here and just... you know, just do what's natural."

"Easier said than done, babe. You know what I wanna do?"

"Tell me." I continued taking pictures. Cherri moved, not posing for me, just Cherri being Cherri, too beautiful to be anything other than enchanting. "Though knowing you it's probably something gross."

"No, not gross. Not gross at all. I've heard you too when you think I'm asleep."

"Oh... that."

"Yeah. I wanna do that. And I'm kinda turned on at the idea of you watching me." She laughed, bending forward as though the idea was the funniest thing in the world. "Shit, Dan, when I'm around you I guess I'm kinda fucked up."

Cherri took another step up the ladder and I moved closer, the Nikon sounding as I captured her. I didn't want to say anything, my entire being now focused through the 85mm lens. Cherri climbed slowly, reached the upper floor and turned to sit, spreading her knees. I stood at the foot of the ladder and Cherri knew damn well she presented a clear view all the way up her skirt but she didn't care, presenting more of her tiny blue panties to the camera.

She touched herself, lightly through her panties, directly between her legs, then rolled backward and I caught the image, a blur of cotton, of skin and hair. When I climbed to join her Cherri stood at the open doors staring down into the water.

"Deep. You want to go swimming later?"

I said nothing, trying to make myself invisible, sticking to the shadows, the sound of the Nikon becoming the sound of the barn. Cherri glanced at me, a quizzical expression on her pretty face, a slight frown. I read her clearly as she made a decision. My heart beat faster when she touched her neck, moving slowly, posing for me, her hand working the top button of her blouse loose.

I wound on and discovered the film was finished, rewound fast and snapped the back off the camera and reloaded. Cherri waited for me, touching the hem of her skirt, raising and releasing it, showing the length of her slim thighs, teasing me with the view. When she heard the camera back close and me winding the next frame through she released another button... another. I moved around her, trying to remain silent, capturing the revealing of her chest and belly, her bra cupped snug around her breasts, nipples showing prominent through the pale blue lace.

"I'm getting kinda excited, Dan," she said, touching a fingertip to the raised circle which peaked her bra. Another shot, a perfect shot, filled with both innocence and lust.

Cherri loosened the tie on her skirt, let it rest open on her hips, low down so an expanse of tanned belly showed between her blouse and the top of the skirt. Cherri touched herself, fingertips tracing random patterns, touching her navel, her hip, the under-curve of her breast.

Cherri pulled her skirt back and retied it and I frowned but instead of stopping she reached beneath and tugged at her panties, let them drape at her ankles before stepping from them with a grin.

"Better."

She walked from the opening, passing close to me and I breathed in her scent, Cherri's clean smell and something raw beneath, the smell of sex, hers and possibly mine. I grew aware of how sore my breasts felt inside my bra, sensitive and aroused, of how my pussy throbbed, wetting my panties.

Cherri climbed the piles of straw, kneeling and looking back at me, her blouse hanging loose, ass stuck in the air and I knelt and ran off a dozen shots as she slowly drew her skirt up to reveal her naked ass, perfectly formed, perfectly shaped, and nested at the base of those glorious cheeks a fuzz of reddish hair framing her sweet pink slit. I swallowed hard, told myself to be professional; but it was tough.

Cherri touched herself, once, lightly, hardly a touch at all but as her pupils bloomed I captured the moment. She loosened her skirt again, turned back and knelt on the straw, letting the skirt sag once more, shifting her hips so material caught, slid, caught again, each movement revealing a little more. This wasn't undressing, this was sex, raw and primal, Cherri deliberately displaying herself piece by tiny piece for my lens.

Cherri reached behind and unclipped her bra, worked it loose under her blouse until her breasts came free. They didn't sag at all, small and round with pink nipples pointing upward, half revealed beneath her blouse as she moved one way then the other. Her skirt continued to slip, revealing the flush of pubic hair and then the swell of her mons. I moved to the side, capturing the curve of her back swooping to her delicious ass. The skirt reached her thighs, revealing her sex completely but Cherri turned away as though shy and I almost groaned at the beauty of the sight she presented.

"I'm yours," Cherri said, her voice a whisper, almost too quiet to hear. She lay back on the straw, opening her blouse to reveal the length of her body, lifted one knee to reveal her secret, sacred place, so beautiful I couldn't look anywhere else, my camera stealing her soul.

I changed film again, slipped out of my fishing vest and hung it on a beam, loosened my shirt. It had gotten hot in the barn, a film of sweat glossing Cherri's neck and chest.

"Take everything, Dan," Cherri said, letting the blouse finally slip from her shoulders, laying back on the straw and touching her sex. I moved closer, focusing on that point but Cherri seemed to be in no hurry, enjoying the tension, wanting to stretch the moment as long as possible. She rolled off the bales and walked to the platform, exposed to the world if the world cared to look and I captured her backlit and glowing. She walked back, coming close to me, closer, until she reached out and touched my cheek with her fingers and I smelled the scent of sex on them and wanted to kiss her tainted fingertips, wanted to put them in my mouth and suck the taste of Cherri's pussy from them. She brushed against me, her skin against the cotton of my shirt and pants, so close I could have enfolded her in my arms but didn't. This thing we were doing was one thing, that other thing I wanted to do something else entirely. I trembled deep inside, noticed my hands remained still. Dad would've been proud of me... or maybe not...

Cherri passed by and I relaxed as she climbed back to the bales of straw, climbing high until she could touch the rafters, arching her body, displaying her perfection for my lens. She came back, resumed her position on the makeshift straw sofa and touched herself again.

"D'you need to change film, Dan?"

Her fingertips brushed through her bush, teasing her own thighs.

I glanced at the film counter. "Ten shots."

"Reload now."

I stared at her and nodded and she waited while I changed the spool, ready now for the transparency, wanting to capture her beauty in high definition color.

"Ready?" The first words I spoke in an age.

Cherri nodded. "Oh fuck yeah, am I ever ready."

"Are you sure you want to-"

"Shut up and take the pictures." Cherri pushed two fingers inside herself, withdrew them, glistening with her juices and my camera made love to her as she began to work her own body, touching and teasing, tweaking her nipples, stroking her belly and neck and thighs, all the while those two fingers making a steady, soft noise as they worked in and out. After a time her breathing joined the sound, grew in intensity, masking the sound her fingers made. Cherri lifted her hips, straining, taking her weight on her shoulders and heels, her ass coming off the straw, thighs trembling and I moved closer still, standing over her, capturing the expression on her face, moving to the side and she turned to stare at me, back ahead and she whimpered and shook harder, trying to stop her climax, obvious she couldn't hold out long and as her eyelids fluttered shut I stepped close again, the raw smell of her surrounding me as she cried out and shook, plunging her hand between her legs, clasping her thighs tight and rolling onto her side as she jerked over and over again, curling into herself.

"You got too many clothes on, Dan," Cherri said.

I'd expected to feel awkward in the minutes after Cherri climaxed, but she sighed deeply and rolled onto her back, lifting herself up to lean on the bales and grinning at me.

"Uh-huhano way are you getting me naked."

"Did you get all that?" she asked.

I nodded. Cherriaapart from wearing no clothesaseemed to have returned to her usual self. Made me wonder whether she did this kind of thing often. She'd appeared so comfortable with herself, with her sexuality, jilling herself in front of me hadn't fazed her in the least. Hadn't bothered her maybe, but doing all kinds of wild and weird things to my head.

Cherri laughed, as though she could read my mind. "Lighten up, Dan, it's only fuckin' sex." She stretched like a cat, her body as soft as a cat's, lacking bone, lissome and loose. "I've been thinking of doing that all the way here." She gave me a Cherri look. "What about you, Dan?"

I shook my head. "Not that."

"Thinking about me, dork," she said, grinning. "I bet you have."

She could read my mind. I straightened up. "I was being a professional."

Cherri broke up, laughing so hard she almost fell off the bale.

We ate the lunch we'd packed that way, Cherri comfortably naked and me with tension in my shoulders that only slowly eased. Afterward we lay in the sun that fell through onto the platform, Cherri tanning and me, eventually, taking off my shirt to lie in my bra. Cherri went to sleep and I took the opportunity to watch her lying on her front beside me, her slim body open to the sun, hair lifting and drifting in the breeze and tried to persuade myself I wasn't falling in love. Trying to persuade myself I didn't like Cherri that way, wondering if I let Jack do what he wanted would I be able to stop thinking about this girl. Eventually the heat and lull of insects flying in and out the barn got to me and I drifted into a doze. When I woke it was because a shadow fell across my eyes; Cherri, dressed again, standing over me.

"Time to go, Dan."

I nodded, dry washing hands over my face. I'd been a long way under, the late afternoon unreal for a moment. I pulled my shirt back on.

Cherri watched me openly. She smiled sweetly, not her usual manic grin. "You got such nice boobs, Dan. I wish I had tits like yours.

"You're perfect," I said, a bit too fast because Cherri's smile lifted at one corner.

"They're not bad, sure, but yours are..." She shook her head. "Yeah, yours are something else."

"They're too big."

"Uh-huh, baby, no way."

I buttoned my shirt, hiding the evidence from Cherri's open gaze. "But remember, when I'm forty they'll be hanging round my ankles. And when you're forty yours'll still be perfect."

Cherri laughed. "That would be a hell of a sight, Dan, that surely would. I'll have to come see that, when you're forty."

I laughed back. "No way!"

"Way!" she crowed. "Way way way! I'll ring you up on your fortieth birthdayawhen is your birthday anyway? No, never mind, tell me when we get back, I'll never rememberaI'll call you up and come round your house and you've got to show me your boobies so I can tell if they've dropped at all."

"Of yeah, sure. I'm gonna do that."

"Yeah? That's okay then." Cherri ignored my sarcasm and slipped her arm through mine as we walked along the track from the barn.

Chapter 16.

I followed Cherri down the trail through the woods, the way back from the barn familiar now. Cherri led us along a higher path but I barely noticed, trying not to think too hard about the wild emotions churning inside me.

When I finally became aware of where we were I called to Cherri, "We need to be lower down."

"This is the right way. You up for seeing something gross, Dan?" The sun had been setting as we left the barn, but light remained in the sky to the west, the moon riding above the far ridge and Cherri's hair glowed in its light.

"What kind of gross?" I followed a few paces behind, concentrating on keeping my footing on the unfamiliar path.

"I found a place we can spy on Jeff and Chrissy from."

"What d'you mean, spy?"

"Spy," Cherri said. "As in spy. There's this spot where you can see straight into their bedroom. I've been a couple'a times already and seen Chrissy in her undies and Jeff naked. Nice bod by the way. Maybe tonight we'll get lucky and catch aem doing the dirty thing."

"I dunno." Uneasy at the thought of spying on someone. At the same time I felt unbelievably horny after our photography session and my critical faculties had lodged somewhere south of my navel. "Is it safe?"

"I don't think anyone else knows about this place. And I'm damn sure they don't or they'd put blinds on the windows."

"You can see right in?"