maintain a professional relationship with all my clients,” she said as she directed me into the room. I rolled my eyes as I stepped in. I’d heard that from a lot of women before, it didn’t tend to mean much in the long run.
Inside, I was surprised to see a few massage chairs, and I raised my eyebrows. “Huh, and here you were just starting to make me think physiotherapy was just going to be a lot of punishment.”
Now it was her turn to roll her eyes at me, and she looked over her chart as she made her way to the chair. “Knock it off. Now, I’ll need you to lay down here, face-up. I’m going to start by working on some of your upper arm muscles, and we’ll work down from there.”
“Sure,” I said, disinterested. For all I cared, this was just a chance to check out mentally for the next few minutes and enjoy myself. “Figure I can use a day off.”
“This isn’t a day off, Mr. Montoya,” she corrected me curtly as I sat down on the massage table and swung my legs over to lay back, looking up at the ceiling. “This is just as much of a vital part of the healing process as those exercises you seem to hate so much.”
“Sure, sure,” I said, yawning. “So what do you want me to do?”
“Stretch out your arm like so,” she said, demonstrating, and I mimicked her movements. To my surprise, she smiled at my response, and I arched an eyebrow.
“What’s so funny?”
“See how easy that was?” she said with a nod to my arm. “Two sessions ago, that would have had you wincing. You’re already starting to see some progress. I’m guessing getting up and going in the morning the past few days has been surprisingly easy.” I could see the words ‘you’re welcome’ in her eyes as she smiled at me, so I just scoffed in return to her remark.
“My body is a few notches above what you were probably used to at whatever university you graduated from,” I remarked lazily. “You were probably treating volunteers from what, the tennis team?” There was some playfulness in my tone, but she didn’t seem to take it that way, her smile dropping into a frown as she set her clipboard aside to move around to my arm.
“Well, having a highly fit body does count for something, but as they say, the bigger they are, the harder they tend to fall,” she commented, and I watched her hands go to my muscles, starting to feel around at some of the more tense areas. “You may have more muscles than a tennis player, but you can all have the same recalcitrant tendons.”
As she said that and her fingers started to manipulate my arm and shoulder, I felt a slight wince of pain as she touched a sensitive spot. It was a light touch, but it was a spot she knew damn well was a sore one for me, and I could tell it was a warning. But I wasn’t about to let her off so easily.
Despite her icy disposition, Gemma’s touch was surprisingly warm. The next few moments passed quietly as she explored my muscles. While her attention was on my arm, I had nothing else to look at, so my eyes almost unconsciously fell on her as she worked.
I had to admit, she was hot. Gorgeous, even. The past few sessions, I really hadn’t been in a mood to see past her clipboard and instructions, but up close like this, I noticed the smattering of freckles on her cheeks, accentuating her blue eyes. And her eyes were wide and luminous, at that, the room’s lights playing in their intensity as she kept her gaze focused on her work.
I turned my eyes back up at the ceiling, dispelling the thoughts in my head. But as her