“It still hurts?”

I nod, but still can only really think about his large, dry hand. Touching my knee. “I’ve been running without a brace, and I know I shouldn’t yet. I just don’t think I’ve ever really recovered.”

“How long ago was this?”

“Six years ago.” I hesitate, then add, “And two…the second time it happened.”

“Ahh, a double injury. So it’s sensitive?”

“Very.” I shrug. “I guess I’m glad that by my second, I’d already started my masters for rehab. Otherwise I don’t know what I would have done.”

“It hurts not to compete anymore?”

He looks at me with complete openness and interest, and I don’t know why I’m even answering. I haven’t talked about this openly with anyone. It hurts in every part of me. My heart, my pride, my very soul. “Yes. It does. You’d understand, right?” I ask, quietly, as he lowers my leg back down.

He holds my gaze as his thumb lightly strokes across my knee, then we both glance at his touch, as though equally stunned to realize how easy it was for him to leave it there while we had an entire conversation—and for me to allow it. He lets go and we say nothing.

I put back my Velcro but underneath the brace, I feel like he’s just doused my skin with gasoline, and it will burst up in flames any second he touches me again.

Shit.

This is so not good, I don’t even know what to do myself. My relationships with my clients have always been informal. They call me by my name, and I call them by theirs. We do a lot of work and have a lot of contact, but they never touch me. Only I do.

“Do this one.”

He puts his farthest hand out to me in a fist as he speaks, and I’m kind of grateful for the opportunity to get seriously accustomed to touching this man for work purposes.

Shifting to my side, I take his hand in both of mine and spread it open with my fingers. He leans back on the seat and stretches his free arm, the one closest to me, all along the seat behind me. Hyperawareness of that outstretched arm sizzles through me even if he isn’t touching me, and once again, I’m awed and strangely compelled by his palm, how rough, firm, and callused it is.

I don’t know why he seats himself in a bench instead of a single seat, but suddenly his thigh is too close, his knees folded, his legs spread wide, taking up two seats and leaving me with one, and I can feel and smell every inch of him.

Our other four flight companions laugh up front and his eyes flick up there, then back to me. I’m entirely aware of his gaze as I press into his palm with my thumbs, pushing hard into the tissue until I feel the little knot I found fade away. I keep probing and searching for more but can’t find any, so I move to his wrist.

He has the broadest, sturdiest wrist I’ve ever seen, and his forearm is powerfully built and corded with thick veins that run up his arm. I hold his hand as I twirl his wrist , and I’m lost in the movement of his joint, perfectly mobile. I probe into his forearm then his bicep, which hardens and clenches for me. I close my eyes and work deep within the muscle. All of a sudden, the arm behind me folds, and his hand curls around the nape of my neck. He leans in and whispers, “Look at me.”

I open my eyes to see his eyes are sparkling, and he looks perfectly amused. I think he knows I’m getting a little worked up. I want to drop his arm and squirm, but I don’t want it to be too obvious, so I lower it carefully and smile back. “What?”

“Nothing,” he replies, revealing his dimples. “I’m very impressed. You’re very thorough, Brooke.”

“I am. And wait until I get to your shoulders and back. I might have to stand on you.”

He cocks one dark eyebrow and looks supremely entertained. “How much can you possibly weigh?”

I wink. “I look slim, but I’m still a little muscular.”

He scoffs then tilts his head curiously as he reaches out to my arm and grasps my small bicep between two fingers. Thankfully, it stays firm when he clenches. “Hmm,” he says, his eyes dancing with mirth.

“What? What does ‘hmm’ mean?” I prod.

He brazenly grabs my hand and wraps my fingers around his gut-wrenchingly sexy bicep muscle. He doesn’t even flex, but his smooth, taut skin and total firmness under my fingers leave me breathless. He’s such a … boy. Showing me his bicep. I notice he’s watching me, and his blue eyes shine with playful intensity. I bite my lower lip in response.

Since my job requires I touch him, a lot, it would feel a little odd for me to withdraw my hand. So instead, I give a little squeeze with my fingers. It’s like palpating an enormous rock with absolutely no give to it. At all.

“Hmm,” I say with my best poker face, trying to mask the emotions inside. I’m undone. Completely undone. Every sexual organ in me is awake and aching. My genetically induced mating instincts are at full attention, roaring inside me.

He laughs and runs his hand up the length of my bare arm again. He dips his fingertips under the sleeve of my button shirt and slides them right over my triceps muscle at the back of my arm. His eyes glint devilishly because he knows he’s totally got me. This is one of the worst parts for a woman, a place where body fat can be measured with a mere pinch.

There’s not a single place on his body I could get even a pinch of fat from. He probably consumes twelve thousand calories a day to maintain his lean muscle mass, which is around what famous Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps consumes when actively training. His caloric intake is easily over five times what I eat to maintain my weight, but I can’t really do the math right now. His fingers are still there, under my sleeve, touching my skin. He’s got this playful smile on his face, his eyes dancing in mischief, and yet the atmosphere has shifted until I feel like not only we are incredibly aware of our bodies, but the other people on the plane are, as well.

“Hmm,” he says, softly, and finally gives a little pinch. We both laugh.

I clear my throat and straighten, unable to stand anymore touching. I feel dangerously giddy and am definitely not happy about it. So I extract my iPod and headphones from a small travel bag I’m carrying and set them on my lap. He stares down at them, then he snatches my iPod and connects his headphones and starts going through my music, handing me over his. I search through his selection, and absolutely loathe all his songs. He’s into PURE rock, and I drop my headphones and grab my iPod back.

“Who can relax to that?”

“Who wants to relax?”

“I do.”

“Here.” He hands me his iPod back. “I’ve got to have some easy listening for you. Listen to one of mine and I will listen to one of yours.”

He’s selecting a song for me from his own apparatus, so I look for one I like in mine, and I settle on a girl power song called “Love Song,” by Sara Bareilles, which is basically this girl telling the guy that he’s not getting one. I play it for him.

My love for girl power songs is almost legendary. Old and new. It’s all my friends and I hear. Even Kyle sings them.

So then I put on my headphones to see which one he selected for me, and something happens to my body when I hear the first words of the song, And I’d give up forever to touch you … from the Goo Goo Dolls “Iris” song.

And I’d give up forever to touch you …

Cause I know that you feel me somehow…

You’re the closest to heaven that I’ve ever been and I don’t want to go home right now…

I duck my head to keep him from noticing that I’m blushing and almost have to force myself not to pause it because it feels unbearably intimate.

To listen to this song.

That he strangely selected for me to listen to.

But I don’t dare pause it. Even when he leans forward to catch my expression. His knee brushes mine, and the point of contact blazes through me as the song keeps spilling into my ear. And I don’t want the world to see me, it says, but I want you to know who I am…

I think I’m not even breathing, I don’t even know if I can.

He’s also listening to my song, and his eyes are so close to mine when I peer up at him, I can count each one of his spiky dark lashes. I swear his irises are bluer than the Caribbean Sea.

His lips twitch with humor, and he shakes his head with what I think is a chuckle. A chuckle I obviously can’t hear because I’m listening to the end of “Iris,” which I first heard in the movie City of Angels and which also made me cry, like, for days. A guy gives up, literally, forever to be with the girl he falls in love with, and then something tragic happens—like in a Nicolas Sparks’ movie.

When silence follows the end, I slowly take my headphones off and return his iPod. “I didn’t even know you had slow songs in there,” I murmur, fully engaged in a new conversation with my own iPod, as he returns it.

His voice is low and intimate. “I have twenty thousand songs, everything is here.”

“No!” I say in automatic disbelief as I turn and verify, and it’s true. Mel thinks she’s the shit because she has ten thousand, and I’m going to have to tell her she is certainly not.

And now, what I just can’t get over is that, from twenty thousand songs, he played that one to me?

“Did you like it?” His eyes pierce me, and I know he can see my blush, I can’t help that.

I nod.

My iPod feels warmer than usual as I nervously start to play with it, and I refuse to think it’s from his hand. But it’s from his big, scarred, tanned, beautiful manly hand. Cheeks flaring even hotter, I try to sink into my own musical world.

Occasionally, during the flight, he passes me his headphones and iPod, and makes me listen to a song, and I look for one for him. I don’t know what’s up with me, but when he smiles at me with that lazy smile that shows both dimples, listening to all the girl power songs I hand him over, like “I Will Survive” from Gloria Gaynor, I want to melt, especially when at the same time, the devil grins in mischief and seems to decide to pick on me as he plays “Love Bites” by Def Leppard for me.

I die as the powerful sound of his Dr. Dre beats spill into my ears, pushing the low, masculine vocals so deep inside my body, every sexy word seems to pulse shamelessly in my sex. The words are so raw and carnal, they make me think about him, and me, touching and kissing and loving….and I hate that for a fraction of an instant, I even believe that’s exactly what he wanted me to think.

I’m rooming with Diane in Atlanta, and I love that she keeps her toothbrush toothpaste, and all her girly necessities as neatly tucked away as I do. She’s a great roommate, sunny and positive every moment of the day, and I love that we get to talk about healthy cooking during the evenings, when we each hit our own queen-sized bed.

I’ve learned that she shops for the best local, freshest ingredients every morning, and she feeds Remington only top organic food, every single day, on schedule every three to four hours—which is why his workouts seem to be spaced in sections of either 3-2-3, or 4-4 with heavier meals in the case of the latter. The man eats for three fully grown, hungry lions. A lot of protein. A lot of vegetables. And in the half-hour window after his workouts, so many carbs that even I get carb-high just thinking about those delicious sweet potatoes and pastas he wolfs down.