“I haven’t.”
“Good.” She picked up her notebook and sat on one of the benches. She was irritated but more at herself than at Garrett. She was being overly sensitive, and she knew it, and it wasn’t his fault. Well, indirectly it was, because he’d placed her in this position by singling her out and putting her in charge of his recovery.
“Why me?”
He frowned. “Huh?”
“Why did you choose me? You had to know I don’t have half the experience of some other members of the team.”
“I told you why. Because you didn’t take any of my shit and you told me exactly how you’d handle me.”
“I see.”
“So . . .” He looked down at his shoulder then back at her. “Handle me.”
She really wished she hadn’t picked up the sexual innuendo in what he said. Which was probably all in her mind and not at all in his words. She wished he was ugly or unpleasant to deal with.
Even when he was whiny and complaining, there was still an underlying charm about him. He might be a pain in some areas of his recovery that made him cranky, but that she could handle. He was also friendly, and oh, dear God, was he gorgeous and sexy, and he had a body she wanted to get her hands on in much more than a therapeutic way.
But this was her golden opportunity, so she was going to have to separate her . . . urges from her job.
“So . . . are we done here?” he asked.
“Nice try. Our time together isn’t up yet.”
“My shoulder feels like a limp noodle.”
“And you’re not the therapist, so suck it up and sit there until I tell you you’re done.”
She walked away to get the stretch bands and the ball, mainly to create distance. The less she chatted with him, the less she’d think about him on a personal level. When she brought him the bands, he gave her a dubious look.
“We should be beyond this.”
“And you like to cut corners. That’s why your therapy isn’t progressing. Let’s do this.”
He blew out a loud, frustrated sigh but did the routine she laid out. She turned some relaxing music on.
“I’d prefer something harder.”
She tried not to wince. For some reason, everything he said conjured up sex in her head. She’d like something harder, too, but it wasn’t music she was thinking about. And she needed to stop acting like a lust-filled teenager for the love of God.
“This is relaxing. I want your muscles liquid, not tensed up.”
“You could always give me a massage after.”
“You want a massage therapist, I’ll bring one in. That’s not what the team is paying me to do.”
“Oh, so you will bring in a masseuse for me?”
She stood beside him, watching and making notes while he pulled at the bands. “If I think one is warranted.”
“Yeah? And how will you know?”
“After I finish you off, I’ll see how your muscles feel.”
“How come you won’t do the massage yourself? My other trainers did.”
“Good for them.”
“But you don’t want to climb on me and massage me. It’s too personal for you.”
Now that was innuendo. Plain and clear. She slanted him a glare. “Well, now I know what kind of massages you get.”
“Huh?”
“Climb on?”
He laughed. “Okay, I was exaggerating. But I know you all give massages. Except you, obviously.”
She met his gaze and couldn’t tell if he was teasing her, challenging her, or plain trying to annoy her. She chalked his attitude up to sore muscles and decided to give him a break. “I didn’t say that.”
“I know you all are trained in massage because one of the guys told me.”
“Yes, we are. But that’s not our primary focus as therapists. I tend to frown on doing it because I don’t want my patients to look on me as a glorified masseuse.”
“You mean because you’re a woman.”
“No, because I worked my ass off to become a therapist. And not a massage therapist.”
“Again . . . touchy.”
“I’m not touchy. And you’re finished here. Let’s move on.”
She put him through a routine of circuit training with various upper body machines, with the objective of strengthening his shoulder.
“You gave me heavier weights when we started,” he said as he dragged the pulley forward.
“I know.”
He frowned as she had him do another set with only twenty pounds of weight. When he bent to adjust the pin to a heavier weight, she stopped him.
“These are too light. I’m not getting any benefit.”
She tilted her head to look at him. “Last time I looked, you weren’t in charge. Do another set with this weight.”
He gave her a look through his narrowed gaze that led her to believe they were about to argue the point, but then he straightened and did the set.
“Your form is good, so let’s up the weight.”
“Finally.”
She bit back a retort. He was frustrated, and she knew that. She had a plan. She increased the weight in ten-pound increments after each set until she saw him struggle.
Impressive. And encouraging. His shoulder could bear a lot of weight, at least on the pulley.
“Now, let’s pull from the side. This will be harder.”
“I know.”
Once again, she started with lighter weights and gradually increased. He couldn’t handle as much weight, but she monitored him for signs of pain. When she saw the wince, she ended the session and marked it in her notes.
“I could do more. Now that we’re into it, I can see the benefit. It’s not hurting as much, and my shoulder can handle it.”
“That’s enough for our first go-round.”
“I need to push myself,” he said as he followed her to the next circuit. “You said so yourself.”
She turned to face him. “And if you reinjure the shoulder, you’ll be back pulling ten pounds again, and you’ll miss the season. Is that what you want?”
“No.”
“All right, then.” She took him through the rest of the circuit, arguing with him the whole way about how much weight he could handle. She remained firm, refusing to allow him to press or lift any more weight than what was in her therapy plan, much to his irritation.
“We’re done,” she finally said after an hour.
“That’s it?”
“A little while ago you wanted to be done.”
He paused. “Well, that was earlier. I’ve got a second wind, and I can go longer.”
“We’re finished. Now, I’ll stretch you. Go lie down.”
“That’s not enough. We need to do more.”
“It’s enough for now. I’ll give you a good stretch, and you’ll be begging me to leave you alone for the rest of the day.”
“We’ll see.”
Alicia gave him a sly smile.
Garrett dragged his fingers through his hair and laid on his back on the padded table.
Logically, Garrett knew how therapy worked. It was a slow, methodical process, and nothing changed dramatically the first day. But goddamn it, he expected miracles.
He’d need a miracle in order to start pitching again. He was investing a lot in his decision to go with Alicia as his therapist. He hadn’t been blinded by her beauty or great body. He’d depended entirely on gut instinct and the way she’d talked to him.
Now, as she loomed over him, he sucked in a breath and hoped for the best.
“You ready for this?” she asked.
He shrugged. “Sure.”
She lifted his arm over his head, doing the basic stretches he was used to. Nothing hurt, but it always felt good to get stretched out after a therapy session. He closed his eyes and imagined himself on the mound, throwing a curveball to a batter, followed by the umpire signaling a strike.
Yeah, that’s where he needed to put his focus, and if he had to ride Alicia hard to get her to push him, that’s where he’d—
“Jesus Christ!” His eyes shot open when she bent his arm back, then to the side. Hot, stinging pain made his eyes water. “That f**king hurts.”
“Take deep breaths,” she said, her voice soothing, as she did the same damn thing with his arm.
He wasn’t a wimp, and he had a pretty high pain tolerance, but that shit was painful as hell. “What are you doing?”
“Breaking up scar tissue. Pushing you to your limits. That’s what you want, isn’t it?”
“Yeah. But I thought—”
“Shhh,” she said, taking his arm back in a pitcher’s rotation position. “Just breathe and try to relax through this.”
“How long are you going to stretch me?”
“About thirty minutes.”
He could be dead in thirty minutes if she kept this up. He gritted his teeth and sucked it up like a man, trying not to moan when she kneeled beside him and, he was certain, pulled his shoulder right out of its socket.
Okay, maybe he exaggerated, but it sure felt like she was twisting his shoulder into unnatural positions. And he didn’t like it.
The room was getting hot, the pain more intense. Having something to bite down on wouldn’t hurt, either, because Alicia was relentless. And she wouldn’t stop. He needed just a one-fucking-minute break, so he could take a goddamn breath, but she went on and on and on until he was panting like he was about to give birth.
“Tell me about the best game you ever pitched,” she asked as she worked on his arm.
Momentarily distracted from the pain, he lifted his gaze to hers. “What?”
“What was your best game?”
He thought about it for a second. “Against Chicago. Tied in the ninth. I had pitched the whole game. Grueling back and forth. Coach wanted to pull me several times, thought I was getting tired, but he relented and let me stay in.” He winced when she drew his arm back for a long stretch.
“Just take deep breaths,” she said, her voice soft and comforting. “You’re tied in the ninth. Home game?”
He breathed in and out, and she released the tension on his arm. “Yeah. So I face the first batter, who swung at a curve and hit a grounder to first. Second batter popped up to center. The third one was tougher, throwing off fouls on my fastballs, but I figured I could get him because his timing was off. Either that or he was gonna wallop a big one off me. But I dug in and nailed one right past him. He struck out swinging.”
She stopped and looked down at him. “Hard to have that kind of juice on your ball that late in the game.”
He smiled up at her. “Yeah. Our guys scored a run in the next inning, and we won the game.”
“Good game, then.”
“Yup.”
She held out her hand. “And good session. We’re done here.”
Relieved as hell, he sat up. “Thanks.”
She leaned him against the wall then put an ice pack on his shoulder.
“Ten minutes with the ice pack, then you’re all done.”
She’d distracted him during the toughest part of the stretch by making him talk to her.
He watched her while she typed into her notebook, part of him hating her for the wicked-hard stretch, the other part of him just not able to figure her out yet.
She looked up and met his gaze. “You’re giving me strange looks. Was it too hard for you?”
“It was fine.” His shoulder was still throbbing.
“Your jaw is clenched. You should try to relax.” She took the ice pack away and sat across from him. “It’s only going to get harder from here on out. Think you can handle it?”
For a split second, he pondered going back to the other trainers. He was used to their brand of therapy. This had been . . . different. It had been hard. But there was something about Alicia that clicked for him. And he’d asked for this, so he was going to take it. “You’re sure this is going to work.”
“Positive.”
“Then I can take whatever you dish out.”
“Good. If you’re sore later, I’ll rub you down.”
Later? He was sore now. “I thought you didn’t give massages.”
She gave him a look over her shoulder as she left the room. “I’ll make an exception for you since you look like you’re about to cry. But I warned you that working with me wasn’t going to be a vacation, didn’t I? I’m not going to go easy on you, Garrett. If you don’t want to work with me, say so now, and we’ll make adjustments.”
She waited, the challenge in her eyes really damn clear. He liked that about her, and no way in hell was he going to cave.
“If you can dish it out, I can take it. Let’s do this.”
FOUR
IT HAD BEEN A WEEK AND A HALF. TEN HORRIBLE DAYS of therapy that Alicia thought might kill her.
Physically, Garrett was doing all right. He was taking a toll on her emotional state, though, because his constant griping was a pain in her butt.
She either worked him too hard or not hard enough. Nothing she did was right. No wonder the team coddled him. They obviously did whatever he asked to shut him the hell up. He might be pretty on the outside, but she had thoughts of running for the duct tape to slap over his mouth whenever he showed up for therapy.
Even worse, everyone else had left at the beginning of the week for spring training in Florida, which left her alone with Garrett. The first few days she’d had the other therapists to talk to when things had gotten rough. And they’d commiserated, because they’d all worked with him.