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Abruptly, he dropped his hand. Lifting a sardonic eyebrow, he looked at the photo. “He looks like a trussed duck,” he observed.
“She’s dragging him behind her like a baby blanket.”
“You’re wrong,” I said automatically, then looked more carefully. Hmm. Now that Edward had pointed it out, Jason did look rather like an accessory, rather than a man, as Madison clutched his hand, dragging him behind her.
“And that white toothy smile of his,” Edward continued, rolling his eyes. “How much did he pay for those?”
“His smile is lovely!” I protested.
“The white hurts my eyes.” He briefly covered them. “I’ve never seen anything so fake.”
“Shut up!”
“Right. I forgot he’s your dream man.” Leaning back in the chair, Edward took a gulp of his black tea as he rolled his eyes. “See where love gets you.”
For about the hundredth time, I wondered about the woman who had broken his heart in Spain. The one who’d made him care so much that he’d actually tried to kidnap her. What had been so special about her? I looked back down at the photo of my stepsister and Jason, beaming at the camera.
See where love gets you...
I set down my fork. “Let’s get back to work.” I tilted my head and said challengingly, “Unless you need a longer break...”
Edward’s cup fell with a clatter against the saucer. His eyes were gleaming with the joy of the fight. “I’ve been ready for ten minutes. I was waiting for you.”
An hour later, back at the cottage, he was walking on the treadmill at the slow speed he hated.
“This is boring,” he grumbled.
“It’s fine,” I insisted.
“No.” He turned up the treadmill speed.
“Don’t!” I said sharply.
He turned it up even more.
“You’re going to kill yourself!” Then my eyes went wide as I drew back, watching him—this man who at the beginning of November had walked with a cane—now jogging forcefully on the treadmill. Edward had improved more rapidly than any client I’d ever seen.
“It’s almost superhuman,” I breathed. I jumped when I realized I’d said it out loud. Praise wasn’t part of our deal. I blushed. “I, um, mean...”
“No. I heard you perfectly.” Still jogging, Edward turned his head to give me a triumphant grin. “I amaze you with my strength and power. You’re in awe. You’re wishing right now you could give me a big fat kiss....”
“Am not!” I said indignantly, my cheeks on fire.
“I can see it in your face.” His grin widened. “Oh Edward,” he said mockingly in falsetto, “You’re incredible. You’re my own personal hero—”
His sentence ended when his ankle abruptly twisted beneath him. He slammed down hard, cracking his shoulder and head against the treadmill. In a second, I was on my knees beside him.
“Are you all right?” Luckily he’d been wearing the safety, which made the treadmill’s engine stop, or the skin of his cheek would have been ripped raw. “Careful. Don’t sit up so fast—”
Ignoring me, he ripped his arm away with a scowl. “I’m fine.”
“It was my fault—”
“It wasn’t,” he said shortly.
“I distracted you.”
Edward looked even more ticked off than ever. “Stop trying to take the blame. You didn’t do anything.”
“Your head’s bleeding. We might need to take you to a hospital—” But as I started to run my hands along his head, he yanked away.
“Stop bothering. I said I’m fine.” He put his hand to his scalp and his skin was covered in blood as he pulled it away.
Rushing across the cottage, I grabbed a clean white towel. Turning on the hot water in the sink, I got it wet and soapy then brought it back to him. Taking it without comment, he wiped his head. I put my hands over my mouth, almost ill with guilt.
“I shouldn’t have let you push yourself so hard. It’s my job to control you....”
“As if you could,” he gibed. He snorted, and one corner of his lips lifted as he looked at me. “Seriously. Think about it.”
Our eyes met. My shoulders relaxed slightly.
“That’s true. I can’t tell you anything, can I?”
He shook his head. “Not a thing.”
Seeing the blood dripping down his forehead, my smile fell. “But you can’t be strong all the time, Edward.” My voice faltered. “Even you have moments of weakness....”
His smile changed to a glare. “Weakness?”
I recoiled from the blast of cold anger. “From your injury.”
“Ah. Well. That’s what I’m paying you for, isn’t it?” He bared his teeth into a smile. “To wipe every trace of weakness from my body, to make me twice the man I was before she—”
He looked away, his jaw tight.
“Do you miss her?” I said softly.
“No,” he bit out. He pulled the towel from his head. “She was a good reminder of the lesson I learned as a child. Never depend on anyone.”
What had happened when he was a child? I wondered. “You depend on me.”
“To fix me? Yes. To keep my secrets? Yes.”
“That’s something, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” he said slowly, looking at me. “That’s something.” He abruptly turned away. Grabbing the handrail of the treadmill, he pulled himself to his feet. “The bleeding’s stopped. Back to work.”
“You’re going to run more?” I stared at him in shock.
“Why not, are you tired?” he said challengingly.
I held up my hands. “Don’t even! You’re going to hurt yourself!”
“I know what I can handle.” But as he stepped back on the treadmill, I saw the white of his knuckles as he gripped the handrails.
Edward was used to commanding everything and everyone. He was nearly killing himself to prove his strength. And forget the time a few thousand pounds of steel had crushed him like a blade of grass.
“A body needs time to heal.” I put my hand over his. “Even a body like yours.”
He tilted his head with a mocking smile. “Looking, were you?”
I blushed. “No. That is, yes, of course I was, but—”
“I like it when you blush.” Turning away, he reached for the power button of the treadmill. He really was determined to kill himself.
“No more running for today,” I said desperately. What could I possibly do to stop him? “Um—take off your clothes and lie down.”
He gave a low laugh. “You really don’t want me to run. Very well,” he said gravely. “If you’re determined to lure me away with sex, I accept.”
“Take your clothes off for a massage. I don’t want you to stiffen up....” The corners of his lips quirked, and I scowled. “Shut up!”
“I didn’t say anything,” he said meekly.
I pointed at the massage table. “You know what I want.”
“Yes, as a matter of fact I do.” Stepping off the treadmill, Edward looked down at me with a gleam of light in his eyes. “I’m just surprised it’s taking you so long to admit it.”
He was so close. And looking at me so intensely. My heart was pounding. All he had to do was reach out and take me in his arms.
“Admit what?” I breathed, trying to ignore the bead of sweat between my breasts as heat flashed through me. “Admit you’re a colossal pain?”
“Have it your way.” With a grin, he stepped back and reached up to pull his T-shirt off his body. “So you want me naked, huh? I knew sooner or later you’d be begging me to—” He flinched, and exhaled, dropping his arms. Gritting his teeth, he started to try again.
“Stop. Is it your shoulder?”
“It’s fine,” he ground out, an obvious lie. He must have hit his shoulder harder than I’d thought.
Coming to him, I ran my hands over his shoulder anxiously, then exhaled. “It’s not dislocated.”
“I told you.” He started to reach up to pull off his shirt.
“Stop. Let me do it.”
He tilted his head, his eyes gleaming. “Be my guest.”
My hands shook as I lifted his faded cotton T-shirt upward, trying to ignore the warmth and steel of his tautly muscled chest and shoulders beneath my fingertips. I yanked it over his head, tousling his dark hair that my fingers longed to touch, to see if it was as silky as it looked.
He straightened. “Thanks.”
“No problem.” I couldn’t stop my eyes from lingering over his hard-muscled form laced with dark hair. I licked my lips.
Then our eyes met.
Our bodies were still so close together. The upper half of his body was now naked.
And Edward suddenly smiled.
Not a friendly smile. A dangerous one, full of masculine power that threatened all kinds of things. Things I would like. Things that would pleasure my body. Things that would break my heart.
But I’d already had my heart broken once. And if Jason Black had broken it, Edward St. Cyr would crush it, smash it, light it on fire and then laugh, as he watched the ashy remains float softly to the ground.
“Are you going to take off the rest of my clothes, or shall I?” His dark sapphire eyes gleamed. “It might assist in your massage to take off your own clothes as well.”
A selfish man may try to tempt the unwary virgin into sensual pleasures beyond her imagining, Mrs. Warreldy-Gribbley had warned. There is only one means of resistance. The weapon of icy courtesy.
Coldly, I lifted my chin. “This isn’t a date. Your muscles need to be massaged after all your exercise today, and the fall. Otherwise you’ll hurt.” Grabbing a large white towel, I flung it at him. “Don’t lift your shoulder again today. Let me know when it’s safe to turn around.”
Folding my arms, I turned the opposite direction. Furious at myself.
Why did I let him have this effect on me? No other client, and there had been some good-looking ones, had remotely made me feel like this. Even Jason had never made me feel like this. The times he’d kissed me had been pleasant. But he’d never made me feel so confused, off-kilter, and well, burning hot....
“You can turn around.”
I did so. And wished I hadn’t.
Edward was stretched naked, facedown across the massage table, as I’d ordered, covered only by a white towel across his backside, between his powerful back, his slender hips and thickly muscled thighs. Leaning his elbow against the leather cushion of the table, he propped up his head and looked at me darkly.
“Isn’t this what you wanted?” he said huskily. “Me naked and at your mercy?”
I opened my mouth for a witty comeback, but only a squeak came out. I coughed to cover, then nervously went to the table. It’s no big deal, I told myself fiercely. I’d massaged him many times over the past few weeks.
But something felt different. Something had changed. My skittish sexual awareness of him had managed to penetrate the gym. Why? How?
Edward lifted a dark eyebrow. “Be gentle with me,” he said mockingly. Closing his eyes, he propped his chin on his folded arms and waited for me to touch him.
Touch him.
I looked down at my hands, which felt suddenly tingly. I knew how to give a professional massage. Why were my hands shaking? I didn’t feel like a competent physical therapist. I felt like what he’d once called me—a frightened virgin.
Edward St. Cyr, my boss who’d inspired me and irritated me in equal measure, who was way out of my league and didn’t see me as anything more than someone he could casually flirt with, and perhaps casually sleep with, and casually forget, was naked beneath my hands. And I feared if I showed a moment of weakness, he might roll over and devour me. I pictured a lion devouring a gazelle in a documentary, the flashing jaws digging into the meat and sinew.
If he felt my hands shaking... All he had to do was turn around on the table and pull me down hard against him in a savage kiss.
Don’t think about it, I told myself fiercely. Flexing my fingers, I poured oil in one palm then rubbed my hands together to warm them. Slowly, I lowered them to his back.
Edward’s skin was warm, like satin. I heard the soft whir of the nearby space heater as I ran my hands down the length of his spine, feeling the smoothness of his skin over hard muscle.
I wondered what his naked body would feel like, pressed against my own.
