I like my body. I’m strong. I’m fast. I’m capable.
And I will never be the kind of woman who should set foot in any dress shop except my normal boutique back home in Minnesota, where Mrs. Gerardi understands my body shape and has helped me with every dress I’ve ever bought.
Or I should acknowledge that I’ll once again wear the same dress I’ve worn for every other formal event since I arrived in this city just east of the Blue Ridge Mountains in southern Virginia.
Yes, it’s fabulous, but I wanted something new for the auction.
Something different.
A girl deserves more than one dress that makes her feel like a queen, doesn’t she?
“Does that hurt?” the dude asks, still gruff. “This looks like it hurts.”
“I’m…fine.”
I heave one last time with a massive shimmy, pulling one arm free, but also pulling something in my upper arm that makes me yelp.
Fuck.
Fuck.
Not again.
I drop to my knees, barely registering that I’m gasping for breath, free of the dress, as pain radiates through my shoulder.
This is not a good day.
This is not a good day at all.
And that’s before the guy squats in front of me, his grim face coming into focus through the dots in my vision. “Thought that sounded like you.”
Fuck.
Me.
Fuck me upside down and sideways and over a barrel and inside a fish tank.
No.
No no no nono.
I hope he’s strong.
Of course he’s strong.
He’s Duncan Lavoie. The curly-brown-haired, bright-green-eyed, smiling-at-everyone-but-me goddamncaptain of Copper Valley’s hockey team.
It feels like three lifetimes ago that our friends-with-benefits situation went sour. But with him squatting in front of me, grim-faced, while I suck air into my lungs and cradle my left arm, the slash to my heart feels brand new.
“Thank you for your assistance,” I say as I realize I’m flashing him.
My boobs are hanging out.
My boobs and my white granny panties.
“Shoulder dislocated again?” His voice has a dead feel to it, like he doesn’t want to be using it but he has to because he’s Duncan fucking Lavoie. If there’s a problem in a five-mile radius, he thinks it’s his to solve, no matter how competent the people with the problem might be at solving it themselves.
“No,” I lie.
