But his reluctance to have a massage had shifted her thinking. Maybe O’Doul didn’t like to be touched at all. She’d tested this theory the other night at the bar, laying a hand on his broad shoulder in passing. He actually flinched a little.
Weird.
The training team was worried about a strain to his right hip flexors, so they’d asked for her help. And now here she sat watching both the door and the clock. If O’Doul didn’t show this time, she’d have to tell Henry—the head trainer—that she might not be the right therapist for O’Doul’s needs. If the man was sensitive to being touched, it might work better if he chose his own therapist.
This possibility made her jumpy as hell, though. It shouldn’t be the end of the world if one player snubbed the staff massage therapist. But job security was always at the back of her mind, and she really wanted to do well for this team. She wanted to do well, period.
Every hockey team had a staff therapist, but the role was usually held by a man. Ari was proud of her position on the Bruisers, and lately, the job was the best thing in her life. Since the breakup with her boyfriend of eight years, her job was the one steady thing in her life.
Luckily, this train of thought was interrupted when the door to her therapy room flew open to admit O’Doul. Right away she was struck by how absurdly handsome he was. It ought to be against the law to have a jaw that rugged and eyes the color of a tropical sea. As a massage therapist, Ari believed that all bodies were beautiful and miraculous. However, some were more miraculous than others.
But when she checked his expression, her confidence faltered. O’Doul was the only player who walked into her treatment room wearing the same expression that another man might wear to have a tooth extracted.
“Good afternoon,” she said, hopping down as he took off his coat.
He turned to face her the way a guy might face the firing squad. “Afternoon.”
“I’ll step out while you change,” Ari said, placing a sheet on the table. “If you’d feel more comfortable you can leave your undergarments on. When you’re ready, lie down on the table, using the sheet as a cover.”
“Got it,” he said, pulling his team sweatshirt over his head.
Ari stepped out of the room for a moment. She tied up her hair and fetched a bottle of massage oil off the warmer where she’d left it. Then she took a minute to close her eyes and visualize how she wanted the hour to go.
The team often snickered when she led them through visualization exercises, but Ari knew their power. It was hard to achieve something if you couldn’t imagine it working. With her back to the door, she first formed his name in her mind. Patrick. When meditating on her clients’ needs, she always used first names because they seemed more personal. When you put your hands on someone’s body, it was personal whether you wanted it to be or not.
Today I’m healing Patrick.
In her mind’s eye, he relaxed on the table. With firm but gentle hands, she’d probe his trouble spots. She pictured his hip flexor muscles, overlapping one another, the nerves stretching toward his groin in one direction and around to his lumbar spine in the other. She visualized her hands bringing him comfort, easing the strain, recruiting the deeper hip flexors. She’d try to ease any pressure he’d been shifting to his lower back. At the end of the hour, he’d be looser and more flexible. He’d feel more confident whenever he moved.
Ari opened her eyes. She could help Patrick if he’d let her. She knocked twice before re-entering the room.
“C’mon in,” came the gruff response.
She let herself in, then stopped for a moment at the stereo she kept on the countertop. She cued up a playlist and then washed her hands. “Daughter” had begun to emerge from the little set of speakers she kept on the counter.
“Pearl Jam?” he asked from the table.
“You don’t like it?” she asked. She would have figured him for a grunge rock guy. He was thirty-two years old with a macho streak a mile wide.
“No, I love it.” He chuckled. “Once I tried to get a massage at a hotel, and they were playing harp music. My ears were bleeding.”
“Okay, no harps. Got it.” Ari approached the table and looked her client over. Bodies were an everyday sight for a massage therapist. But this was a particularly stunning example. All athletes were muscular but O’Doul was cut. Even lying flat on a table he looked like a tightly coiled spring, ready for sudden physical exertion. The sheet had been casually draped across his waist, but everywhere else rippling muscle was visible, from his stacked shoulders to his thick calves.
He tucked his hands behind his head and stared up at the ceiling. “How long does this take?”
Ari laughed in spite of herself. “Sixty minutes, usually. And I haven’t killed anyone yet. I swear.”
“Okay. Sorry.” His mouth formed a tight line.
Right. Ari rubbed her hands together to warm them. She was oddly self-conscious for someone who gave six or more massages a day. “I’m going to ease toward your hip flexor strain, okay? I’ll want to relax the surrounding muscles, so they don’t contribute to your pain. You’ll let me know if anything hurts, and if you don’t approve of the pressure.” She folded the sheet back to reveal his thigh. She patted his knee to announce her presence, then used her left hand to palm his lower quad, and her right to slowly manipulate the muscle just above his kneecap.
The goal was to relax the athlete before working on the trouble spots. Though O’Doul seemed poised to make his escape at any moment. So she’d better not dawdle.
Slowly she worked her way up the outside of his hip. So far, so good. “Just checking in, here. How’s the pressure?”
“Okay,” he said tightly.
Hmm. Not exactly a rave review. She worked on, and eventually he closed his eyes and sighed, which was always a good sign. If there were no risk of being caught acting silly, she would have given herself a victorious fist pump.
Taking her time, she loosened up all the ancillary muscles, the ones connected to his trouble spot. Her beat-up old iPod played a Red Hot Chili Peppers song and then transitioned back to Pearl Jam again.
All was right with the world until Ari moved her hands closer to Patrick’s inner hip. One by one, all his muscles tightened up until his entire body had the consistency of a concrete block.
“Patrick,” she said quietly, and his eyes flew open. “Are you in pain? Massage doesn’t have to hurt to do you good.”
“No pain,” he said quickly.
Liar. “You’re fighting me, though. Why is that?”
“Uh.” He sat up. “That’s the . . . trouble spot, right? Why would I want someone touching it?” The expression on his face was cautious for once.