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“Give me your foot.”
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me.” He curled his fingers in a come-on motion. “Unless you’re chicken?”
Her eye narrowed, but she complied, sticking out one foot.
The moment he touched her warm skin, a current sizzled between them. He forgot about the jet, about the turbulence, and the fact that if they weren’t fucking, they were fighting. Instead, he focused on her cinnamon perfume as it invaded his personal space, teasing him with memories of the night when he’d kissed his way down her neck. His reward that night had been her soft moans as she rubbed herself against his hard cock. But today wasn’t about that. It was about making her feel safe. Even if she wouldn’t admit she needed anyone’s protection, he needed to give her that.
The jet bounced in midair. Ryder’s muffled groan as she sank further into her seat settled him firmly back into the present.
“I promise, this will help.” He popped his knuckles and flexed his fingers.
Trying his best to ignore the feel of her smooth skin under his finger or the firmness of her calf where she’d rested her leg on top of his, he unhooked the black ankle strap of her Calvin Klein sandals. The brand suited her. Unfussy. Confident. Straightforward.
Dylan’s Department Store had carried the sandals two springs ago. The shoe stuck out because the buyer had over purchased and the extras had to be shipped out to other stores under the corporate umbrella that offered past year styles at a discount. The whole process had been a logistical nightmare.
“What are you doing?” Her skin tone remained less than healthy, but her voice had regained some of her signature Waterberg toughness.
“Giving you a foot massage.” He slipped off the sandal and laid her bare foot on his thigh, which warmed upon contact with her skin.
“Forget it.” She squirmed against his grip.
He pressed his thumbs beneath the ball of her foot, making sure to deliver just enough pressure to signal to her nerves that he meant business. “Just give it a chance.” Circling his thumbs in small half-moons, he worked his way back and forth across the bottom of her foot. “It’s the least I can do to help.”
Her shoulders drooped and the lines around her mouth relaxed. “Oh, my God, where did you learn that? It’s magic.” Her eyes fluttered closed.
The reaction puffed him up on a primal level, like a caveman who’d just killed a saber-toothed tiger and had guaranteed his family’s survival for another day. “Benefits of an ex-girlfriend who was a massage therapist.”
Ryder cracked her eyelids open. “Ex?”
“Uh-huh. She was less than pleased when I returned to my WASP-y roots, as she put it.” Another bit of turbulence jostled her foot out of his hand, but before she could react, he reclaimed it, rotating her ankle and smoothing his palm across the top of her foot. “We got our first tattoos together. I got a dragon. She got Che Guevara’s face on her…uh…breast. I should have known then that it wasn’t going to work out.”
“Yeah, I don’t see the hipster and Mister Corporate lasting.” She laughed.
“Not by a long shot.” He slid his thumbs to opposite sides of her sole, then pushed them together again before repeating the motion vertically.
Ryder sighed and all the worry in her face melted away. “I could marry you right now.”
“Is that a proposal from the woman who wouldn’t return my calls?”
She flinched and every muscle in her foot tensed.
He stopped rubbing her arch. “Just a joke. I didn’t mean it the way it came out.” Shit. Nice one, Harris.
“You’re not my type. Not anymore. Anyway, I just can’t do relationships right now. I’m in the middle of a year of no commitments.”
The news annoyed him, and he renewed his massage with more vigor. “You’re sure about that?”
She winced. “Whoa, go easy.”
“Sorry.” He paused at her smooth heel and interlaced his fingers, resting them on top of her foot. It was the first time he’d really looked at her feet. Her toenails were a bright cherry red. Seeing the single dash of color was like getting a glimpse of his first girlfriend’s bra in eighth grade.
“Did you kill the nail technician after your pedicure?”
“What do you mean?”
“Your girly toenails.”
