oblivious as he remained to her presence, she let her fingers slip over the soft strands, then curled her fingers into her palm as she stepped away and quietly headed for Tyler’s room. Since she felt pretty certain Erik would wake up at some point and head for bed himself, she left the tree lights on so he’d be able to see.
It was to that soft light that he awoke a little after midnight, along with a cramp in his neck and an ache in his back that, he realized an hour later, made sleep impossible.
Rory heard the faint tap on the door, blinked into the shadows. It had been raining for a while now. She’d lain there, listening to the steady sound of it, imagining the drops taking all the ice away, before the new additions to her usual anxieties about what she’d taken on ruined the little exercise. Everything always felt so much more overwhelming alone at night. With Erik there, she’d at least been able to manage the more restful thoughts for a while.
Hearing the tap again, she slipped from the trundle by the night-light she’d moved to the only working outlet in the room and opened the door.
Her glance collided with Erik’s solid, shadowed and bare chest. Down the hall, light from her bathroom filtered through her bedroom door, too dim to reveal more than curves and angles and the shadow of his forearm as he gripped his neck.
He stepped back as she stepped out and pulled the door closed behind her.
She hadn’t grabbed her robe. Shivering a little, she crossed her arms over the sleep shirt that barely hit her knees. “Are you just now coming up to bed?”
“I came up a while ago. Do you have anything I can rub on my shoulder?”
He still hurt. Pretty badly, she assumed, to have come seeking help. Feeling guilty that he’d hurt himself helping her, feeling worse because his discomfort was bad enough to keep him from sleep when she knew how tired he must be, she headed for her bedroom door and the bathroom right inside.
The light above the vanity cut a swath across the near edge of the queen-size bed that had once occupied her guest room. If the rumpled purple comforter and sheets were any indication, whatever sleep he had managed had been as fitful as hers tended to be. As she turned into the bathroom, she noticed his nearly dry socks, his long-sleeved undershirt and a pair of gray jersey briefs on the towel rack above the heater vent. With the washer and dryer off circuit, he’d had to improvise.
Realizing what he wasn’t wearing under his jeans, she quickly opened the medicine cabinet, pulled out a tube and turned to hand it to him.
He’d stopped in the doorway beside her.
The light was infinitely better here. There were no shadows to hide the broad expanse of his beautifully formed chest, the flare of dark hair, the impressive six-pack of his abdomen or the fact that while he’d zipped his pants, he hadn’t bothered with the button.
Her glance jerked up. His hand still clasped his shoulder, his fingers kneading the tight muscles there. But it was his cleanly shaven jaw that held her attention. The hard line of it looked tight enough to shatter teeth. The way he arched his back and promptly winced made it evident his shoulder wasn’t the only problem.
His frown of discomfort shifted to the pastel tube he took from her.
“What is this?”
“Herbal cream. I bought it when I pulled a hamstring.”
“When?”
“It wasn’t anything I did here,” she assured him, since she had been known to acquire a bump, bruise or strain herself during her move. “It was in a yoga class. It’ll help,” she insisted, pretty sure he’d had something more industrial strength in mind.
The skepticism carving deep lines in his face remained as he held up the tube and backed into the bedroom to let her pass. A gravelly edge of fatigue roughened his voice. “I appreciate this. Sorry to wake you.”
She didn’t bother telling him that he hadn’t. Or that she was actually grateful for the reprieve from her sleeplessness. All that concerned her now was that he was in pain.
“Where do you need that?”
He’d moved to the foot of her bed, away from the narrow shaft of light spilling across the bedding at the corner. Her bare feet soundless on the carpet, she stopped three feet away.
“By my right shoulder blade.”
He wouldn’t be able to reach there. Not very well, anyway, as stiff as he appeared to be.
“Do you want me to do it?”
He didn’t look as if he thought that a very good idea. “I’ll manage.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yeah. I’ve got it,” he insisted, only to wince again the instant he moved his hand in that direction.
Not allowing herself to overthink the situation, she took back the tube. Twisting off the cap, she squeezed a hefty dab of the white cream onto her fingertips and handed the tube back to him.
“You have no business calling me stubborn, you know that?” With him filling the space in front of her, she added, “Turn around,” and after a second’s hesitation on his part found herself faced with his broad and sculpted back.
In the filtered light, the view of him half naked was no less unnerving, but at least he couldn’t see how hard she swallowed before she reached up and spread the cream between his shoulder blade and the long indentation of his spine. His skin felt as smooth and hard as granite when her fingers slipped upward.
Traces of rosemary and mint mingled with the scents of soap, shampoo and warm, disturbing male.
Silence didn’t seem like a good idea.
“Why is it that when I came literally a split second from wounding you, you said I wasn’t even close? You actually did hurt yourself,” she pointed out, rubbing the cream over a knot the size of an egg, “and your ‘almost’ is two hours.”
He lowered his head, gave a small groan with the movement.
“It had to do with circumstances.”
She was about to tell him he’d have to do better than that when he sucked in a breath.
She went still. “Did I push too hard?” she asked instead.
His breath leaked out, the tightness in his back audible in his voice. “In a good way.”
She’d smoothed her fingers alongside the wide curve of his shoulder blade, the long muscle there as unyielding as the bone beside it. Repeating the motion, keeping the same pressure, she felt his broad back rise as he drew another deep breath, then slowly released it.
What she was doing felt good to him. So she did it again, slower this time. It felt good to her, too, she realized, easing her motions even more. Though she’d tended to fight his efforts, he had been taking care of her in one form or another since the day they’d met. As little as there seemed to be for her to do for him in return, as little as he seemed to want from her beyond what centered on their professional
