Free Exhibition by Danielle Zeta Page A

accepted in the city—would anyone lift a figure to help a stranger?
    “Please let me go,” she said. “Please.” She looked up into his face, shocked to see not anger but grief twisting his features.
    Abruptly, he released her and closed his eyes. “I should’ve listened. I’m a fool.”
    “They’re just clothes, Shane,” she whispered, folding her arms over her chest. “I’m the same as I ever was.”
    His eyes popped open. For a long moment, he stared at her. She felt as though he was unwrapping hers soul, layer by layer, until all was left was the sin that disgusted him.
    “That’s what they told me,” he said, shaking his head. “I should’ve listened. I will from now on.” He turned and strode away, head high, shoulders back, every inch of his strong frame declaring his judgment of her.
    She sank onto the bench in the cramped dressing room, feeling as though she’d been condemned by God himself.
    * * *
    As soon as the young woman walked onto the train, Marcus knew he had his playmate for the trip.
    She was blond, a little short, ordinary. Very young, not much older than twenty. The kind of girl nobody would notice, and from the way her shy eyes darted around the car looking for a seat, Marcus could tell she liked her invisibility.
    Marcus smiled, got up from his seat, and slid past the standing commuters to get closer to her.
    Nobody noticed him, either—because he, too, chose to be invisible. He could strip off his black suit and underclothes and walk naked past all fifty-seven people in that subway car, and not one of them would spare him a glance.
    Imagining the reaction if the young woman stripped off her clothes brought another smile to his face. Her naked body—ordinary or not—they would notice. He felt the deeper stirrings of desire, indulging in the fantasy. He could make her do it. Even as people looked and stared, laughed, admired, and shouted, he could make her strip off her clothes and show her body to the world.
    There was a lot he could do.
    When he was almost within his reach, Marcus stopped to study her. Standing between them, a young man in a black polo shirt and baggy jeans, reading his phone, abruptly lurched to the side and his body into a smaller space near the door. Now Marcus had the head-to-toe view of her.
    She had her head bowed over her own phone, one hand gripping a handrail overhead that ran the length of the train above the seats. The posture exaggerated her hourglass figure. The blouse gaped between the buttons, exposing not flesh or lace, but a plain white cotton camisole. Her lower body was encased in a long, dark, shapeless skirt. Her charms—and he could see them, feel them, smell them—were completely disguised.
    He wasn’t disappointed. If he’d wanted confident sexuality, he would’ve chosen the tall, elegant raven-haired beauty with the Japanese vibrator in her shoulder bag who was perched in the priority seats next to the door.
    No, he liked his new playmate in ugly, ill-fitting clothes. What fun it would be to take her out of them.
    What’s your name? he asked silently.  
    Her eyes darted up in alarm. She scanned the faces around her, a crease forming between her eyebrows. Pretty eyebrows, darker than her hair, nicely arched over big, sweet brown eyes. Her nose was smallish, a little off-center, and dusted with freckles. Her lips—
    After a long second, she dropped her gaze back to her phone.  
    He stepped closer. Her lips were perfectly curved, dark pink, glossy. He sent out a curious tendril of consciousness into her thoughts.
    Ashley. Her name was Ashley.
    How about a taste, Ashley?
    She looked up again, mouth parting. He could feel her heart begin to race as she tried to understand where the voice was coming from.  
    The voice only she could hear.
    First her gaze darted to the young man in the jeans, but he was completely preoccupied with the message from his girlfriend.
    Next her eyes focused on a dark man in a charcoal suit sitting across