It’s fucking lame.
I clear my throat and blurt out what I’ve been trying to figure out since she mentioned the cream. “I don’t think I can lift my arm to put the cream on my shoulder.”
She freezes, skirt swishing against her knees. On a heavy sigh, she turns back to me with an expression I can’t quite place on her face. Some cross between annoyance and sadness. And then she’s kicking her boots off and padding across the room in socked feet, swiping both creams off the desk, and then crawling up on the bed until she’s kneeling behind me.
“Which shoulder?” Her voice is tight as her breath dances across my bare back.
“The right one.”
“Where?”
“Everywhere.”
“Jesus, Rhett,” she breathes.
“Getting hung up tonight didn’t help.” Nothing worse either because you can see the disaster coming in slow motion. This sense of panic settles into your gut that your hand is really fucking stuck in there.
“Okay, before tonight, where did it hurt?”
“Under the shoulder blade.”
The tips of her fingers land gently right where the plate of my shoulder blade rests over my ribs, and I shiver. “Here?”
“Jesus, why are your hands so cold?”
“Because it’s freezing outside, and I walked to get you all this, dumbass.” Her fingers prod along the line of the blade, and I wince.
“Careful. Your dad told me to keep my hands off you.”
“Yeah, well, he didn’t tell me to keep my hands off you.”
A quiet, strangled noise lodges in my throat as her hands flutter over my skin. Somehow, that one sentence from her lips has all my blood rushing in a singular direction. And suddenly, things feel awkward. Altogether too quiet. Too personal.
“Thank you,” I mutter, it’s so much easier to say without looking her in the eye.
She rests her hand flat against my back for a few beats and quietly replies with, “You’re welcome.”
I can hear her squeeze the cream out into her palm next, the sound of her hands rubbing together as she warms the ointment between them. And then she’s slathering it over my shoulder, hands gliding against my skin with such tenderness that it doesn’t even hurt. She massages gently, and I let my eyes fall shut, my shoulders drooping when I didn’t even realize I had them tensed up.
Her fingers press and slide down every line of muscle, down into my mid-back, toward my spine and over the top of my shoulder.
“These muscles are hard as rocks,” she mutters with a thread of annoyance in her voice.
Yeah, and so is something else.
When her fingertips push up the line from the top of my shoulder into my neck, I groan.
“Is your neck sore too?”
“I told you everything is sore.”
She sighs and reaches for the other tube. I can smell the minty medicated scent the minute she squeezes it out. “Your neck is sore because all the muscles beneath it are so fucked.”
“Is that the medical diagnosis? Fucked muscles?” I ask as she brushes my hair aside.
Her responding laugh is quiet, but then her hands are on my neck, digits digging in at the base of my skull and pulling down, thumbs working hard. And when I groan this time, it’s in pleasure, not pain. I lean into her touch like a dog getting a scratch behind the ear.
I hate seeing the tour doctor on the best of days, but after The Summer Treatment, I will definitely dread his thick, rough hands when I could have her careful, soft ones instead.
My cock throbs between my legs, and I’m momentarily grateful for my loose sweatpants.
At least she’ll never know.
She spreads the muscle balm over my shoulders, covering areas she’s already soothed. And for a moment, I let myself imagine that she really likes this. Doting on me. Caring for me. Putting her hands on me. That it’s not just a job. That she isn’t just trying to prove herself in what I’m assuming is a brutally cutthroat industry.
When she pulls away, I bite my tongue to stop myself from asking her to keep going.
She swallows audibly before she crawls off the bed and straightens herself beside me. “Just make sure you cover that cream up with a shirt, so it gets nice and hot.”
“Okay. Yeah.” My eyes shift over to my luggage, wondering if I’ll be able to lift my arms comfortably enough to pull a shirt on.
Summer must catch the look on my face because she sighs deeply and moves over to my open bag while shaking her head. “Is this t-shirt okay?” She turns, holding up a well-worn gray shirt.
“Yeah.” I scrub at my beard, feeling a little embarrassed by her involvement here, but also relieved. Because I’m tired. Tired of hurting. Tired of knowing my body isn’t keeping up but pretending it’s fine. It’s nice not having to pretend in front of someone.
She saunters back toward me, gathering the body of the shirt up and holding the right side arm hole out to me first as she comes to stand between my knees. I silently put my arm through, lifting it as little as possible, and inhale her scent. She even smells like cherries. Once both arms are through, she steps even closer, legs brushing against my inner thigh as she lifts the neck hole over my head and pulls it down.
All I can hear is the brush of fabric over my ears and the sound of us breathing the same air.
The t-shirt falls over my body, and she gives me a forced closed-lip smile. She brushes my shoulder, as though there’s something there, and then quickly turns away. Almost like she can’t get away from me fast enough.
And who could blame her? I’m sure dressing a grown-ass man wasn’t what she imagined for herself when she went through law school.
“Thank you, Summer.” My voice comes out gravelly in my dry throat.
“Of course. Just doing my job,” she replies, pulling her boots up over toned calves. “You were incredible tonight. You should be very proud of yourself.”
She says it as she walks out, not looking me in the eye. Which is fine, because she’d see how much it bothers me that she’s just doing her job.
Because it does bother me, and I can’t put my finger on why.
The worst part is, it doesn’t bother me enough to stop me from limping over to the bathroom and fucking my hand while thinking about her cherry lips the minute she shuts the door.
12
Rhett
Beau: How’s Summer?
Rhett: Seriously?
Beau: Yeah. Are you being nice to her?
Rhett: Why is everyone so worried about Summer?
Beau: Because you’re a dick and she’s really nice.
Rhett: Oh, yeah. I’m sure it’s her personality you’re after.
Beau: It doesn’t hurt that she seems really smart too.
Rhett: You done here?
Beau: I also really enjoy looking at her, so there’s that. She’s like the total package, ya know?
Rhett: Can you fuck off now?
Beau: Sadly, no. You’re stuck with me forever. Don’t die out there tonight!
Rhett: What if that was the last thing you ever said to me?
Beau: Then I’d think to myself: if only Rhett had listened to my good advice.
I’m sitting on the edge of my bed, scrubbing at my stubbled face with my hands, when I hear a soft knock at the door.
As I march toward the door, I realize that while I’m still tired, I’m not as sore as I was. Though the pain did wake me up at one point in the night, and I got up to take more pills—which Summer had laid out in a row for me.
Seeing them sitting out like that made my chest pinch in a completely new way.
In the same way it does when I swing the door open and see her petite frame standing in the hallway, bundled in a puffy down jacket holding a paper cup of what I’m assuming is coffee in her hand.
“Good morning,” she says flatly, holding one cup out to me. She seems a little tired now that I get a closer look at her.
“You okay?” I ask, holding the door open wide for her to come in.
Summer sighs when she steps across the line and brushes past me toward the desk where her medicinal treatments are laid out. “I’m fine,” she says, counting the pills that she left there. “How are you feeling this morning? You woke up to take a pill? Or have you just had one this morning? You need to take the twelve hour one.”
“Yes, Boss.” I swagger over, having an internal laugh at her fussing over me like this. I one hundred percent get off on it.
After grabbing the pills and the stale glass of water—the one that still tastes a smidge like bourbon—I toss back the medicine while noting the dark smudges beneath her eyes and the way her lashes flutter shut while she takes a deep swig of her coffee like she needs it to survive.
“You look tired.”
She tilts her head and hits me with her most unimpressed look. All wide eyes and pursed lips. “Thank you. How charming. Now lose the shirt and get on your bed.”
I blink slowly as I put together the real meaning behind what she’s saying. “That’s very forward, Summer.”