Even just to strip me down for a massage, she’s got this certain care for my body. It makes her touch worshipful, like she’s handling something important, something that means the moon and the stars to her.
I almost can’t stand the silence between us.
The prickling tension.
Or how damn bad I want to put my hands on her body like I own it and just feel her warmth soaking into my fingertips.
She holds my eyes as I flop back against the sofa. Then she settles again, bracing one knee against the cushion, her hands falling to rest on my stomach just above the waist of my jeans.
I can’t help sucking in a breath through my teeth, shuddering, her touch so hot, my skin so crazy for this mad, sexy woman.
“You okay?” she asks softly. “This might hurt, getting your jeans off.”
Real cute. I don’t think she guesses the real pain I’m in.
Wanting her so bad I can hardly feel the hissing agony in my thigh. Not when the need burning in my gut cuts twice as deep.
So I nod, licking my lips, bracing myself. “Rip the Band-Aid off, darlin’.”
“I’ll try to be more careful than that.” She smiles gently.
So she says.
But she’s fucking me up hardcore as those nimble fingers flick the button of my jeans open and draw the zipper down.
I try one more time to tell myself this is nothing to her.
It’s a job, ain’t it? She undresses clients all the time. She’s seen human bodies in every state imaginable.
But it’s hard to be objective when she’s dragging the denim down my hips, and it’s pulling my boxer-briefs so tight against me, the fabric rubbing hard, teasing at a reckless hard-on that’s pure torture.
Yeah, I’m boned.
Peace can’t be blind.
She can’t miss what’s going on, tugging my jeans around my thighs and leaving me with nothing but my underwear guarding my growing cock, an unmistakable bulge against the cotton.
Her gaze darts downward.
Her cheeks blush that gorgeous shade of sunset, cherries and ocean sky and dawn and every pretty redness in between.
Fuck.
Her lower lip catches between her teeth, and she averts her eyes.
But I think she’s breathing a little harder as my jeans come down the rest of the way.
Then the heel of her palm knocks my scar.
Pain explodes over me like a nuclear bomb.
I snarl, rolling forward, clutching at my thigh with a blistering litany of curses. Suddenly, I’m not thinking with my cock anymore.
I’m thinking with every bit of agony in me. Peace makes a distressed sound, tossing my jeans aside.
“Crap,” she gasps. “I’m sorry, I—hold on. I’ll fix it.”
I just squeeze my eyes shut, gritting my teeth, while she darts away from the room.
She’s not gone long.
Through the roar in my ears I hear her rattling around upstairs, digging, before she comes clattering back down with the case she uses for her massage oils.
She careens back to the sofa, dropping down next to me. The case hits the coffee table and snaps open. If I wasn’t hurting so damn bad, I might almost laugh. She makes me think of an Army medic with a go bag diving in to save a soldier down.
Hell, I feel like a man down right now.
“Let’s see...” she whispers.
She rifles through her bottles and comes up with one that has a faint reddish-gold tint to the oil inside. Soon she’s got a palmful, rubbing her hands together to warm it with swift friction.
The scent is explosive. Something with a pungent bite like cinnamon, maybe leather. I don’t know. But just the scent alone is soothing.
It gets me breathing again, ready for her hands, her heat.
“Ahhh, baby,” I growl. It falls out spontaneously. “You’re so the shit.”
She laughs, giving me a heavenly stroke. I love how fast this stuff numbs me up.
Pure soothing heat drenches me, melts into my flesh, and I groan, shuddering.
The pain relief isn’t instant, not by a mile, but it’s better than a legion of needles ripping at my flesh.
“What is that stuff?” I ask, focusing on how she kneads my flesh.
“My own custom blend, sort of,” she says. Her voice has that steady, soft warmth that she settles into when she’s working, like she can heal with the hypnotic rhythm of her words as much as the rhythm of her touch. “Have you ever heard of BPAL?”
I shake my head, leaning back a bit, making myself lie down and letting her work.
I gotta trust her.
Let her do her thing.
And I try to relax as she works her fingers in knowing circles over the scar. Each pulse of pain is a little less terrible, a little less raw.
“Never heard of it,” I say.
“Black Phoenix Alchemy Labs.” She laughs. “When I was a kid, it was this big thing online. They make these oil-based scents, instead of alcohol-based or water-based colognes. It only takes a dab to last all day, but they’re unique because they respond to your body chemistry and mix with your skin pH to make your own scent. Which means what smells really good on one person can smell rank on another.”
I snort. “You ask me, most normal cologne smells rank anyway, so this already sounds like an improvement.”
“Maybe.” Her voice softens and so does her touch.
She switches to using the heel of her palm, kneading my pain like dough to make it more pliant, more malleable. I’m almost starting to enjoy how it hurts as that heady scent drifts over me.
“Keep talkin’,” I tell her. “Your voice helps me along.”
“Well, it used to be this status thing around the online message boards I’d hang out on. You’d get samplers to try out and talk about all the different scents you could throw together. I was into it because it was this cool thing, but I honestly thought half the people were bullshitting.” Her voice hitches up, taking on a snooty accent that makes me grin. “I get heart notes of cardamom, with a secondary hint of jasmine and a delicate underpinning of laurel, lavender, and jock straps.”
Can’t help myself.
I burst out laughing, the feeling helping to loosen more tension knifing through me. “Jock straps, huh?”
“Yep. I bet not one of them could tell the smell of jock straps from cardamom,” she says, laughing wickedly. “I don’t know what cardamom smells like.”
“Got one up on me, darlin’. I don’t even know what cardamom is.”
“Because you’re a dude,” she teases, warm and sweet, and it aches to hear that fondness in her voice for me. “But they had this one line of scents called Dragon’s Hide. It was this leathery smell mixed with something else I couldn’t identify. It always made me think of Dad. This leather jacket he always wore, all the time, and I just...”
“You tried to make your own?” I ask softly. “So you’d have a scent that reminded you of him.”
She nods and swallows thickly.
I open my eyes and watch her in her glory.
The sweet little smile playing around her lips, the way she touches me with tenderness. This woman might just be an angel come to earth.
“But I made it my way, and it kept me working until I figured out the oil I’m using on you right now. Cinnamon. A little fiery, just like me.” She shakes her head with a soft, self-deprecating laugh, and her unbound hair shimmers like the spark she is. “The heat helps, don’t you think? It’s a good topical remedy for pain. Penetrates deep to loosen up the tension and warm the muscles.”