“Jesus Christ,” I groaned when my ribs gave a strong throb as we stopped right by the hood of my car.
The big man dropped both of our bags on the ground, and I couldn’t help but notice the big vein in his neck pulsing. His fingers were curled at his sides. “Let me see.”
“I’m all right,” I insisted, debating whether or not to bend over and grab my bag.
“You are the worst liar I have ever met,” he said. “Pull up your shirt or I’ll do it for you.”
“Uh…”
He wasn’t exaggerating.
When I didn’t immediately pull up my T-shirt, he did it for me. One hand fisted the worn cotton material at the hem, and the next thing I knew, he was jerking it up. Way up. My shirt went high over my breasts, my black sports bra and all.
I tried to smack his hand away. “What the hell are you doing?”
It was useless. He had a death grip on the material, and his eyes were laser-focused on the middle section of my body.
Maybe I should have been self-conscious, but I wasn’t. Not really at least. I ate well, I exercised a lot, and frankly, I just didn’t give a crap if he found me lacking or thought I was too much. Because I was in pain. The skin covering my abs was inflamed and red; right down the middle, tiny beads of blood dotted my poor stomach. Luckily, my ribs weren’t swollen or blue.
But tomorrow…. I cringed.
As I shuddered at the thought of how much I’d be hurting tomorrow, Kulti yanked down on the elastic hem of my royal blue running shorts two inches. It was low enough for the elastic band of my pastel blue cotton panties to make an appearance.
“All right,” I muttered and pulled them back up, out of his grip.
Kulti flicked his gaze up, chin still down, my shirt still bunched in his other hand. “I didn’t take you to be shy.”
“I’m not.” Unless it was in front of a camera, that was more along the lines of a complete and total meltdown.
“You’re acting like it.”
A small part of me was well aware he was just egging me on, challenging me so I’d do what he wanted. I wasn’t shy. I was used to people—okay, physical therapists, chiropractors, and masseuses—putting their hands all over me when I was half-dressed. Practicing in sports bras when it got too hot or when I wanted to work on my tan wasn’t out of the usual either. I didn’t have any real issues with my body, except for a few stretch marks in key places along my glutes and quadriceps. At some point, I’d gotten over the idea that beautiful faces and traditional feminine bodies, whether they were slender or curvy, were the only standard of beauty in the world. The fact that I wasn’t built slim or voluptuous and would never be anything close to any kind of bombshell was fine with me now. My body and build were a hard fact.
My arms, stomach, and legs were a sign of the craft I’d been working on my entire life. It was my machine: short torso, wide-ish shoulders, and muscular thighs. They were mine, and I wasn’tembarrassed of it. I was happy with myself. Sure, I’d had people tell me my quads were too big, or that I needed to stop lifting weights before I looked too manly, whatever the fuck that meant. My arms couldn’t be scrawny, and I needed my legs to take me to the end of the universe and back, and they did. On the other hand, I’d also had teammates and coaches tell me I should put more muscle on. I could have been more, and I could have been less, but I was just me. At some point, you just had to decide to be the best version of yourself, the one you could live with and look at in the mirror day after day.
Eventually, I’d found that person. Not a model and not a physique competitor in a bodybuilding competition. Just me.
Plus, I’d seen Kulti’s ex-wife and his ex-girlfriends. He liked them tall-ish, long-haired with small breasts, just between the line of slim and fit.
Which was not my small C-cups that didn’t shrink no matter how much bench pressing I did, or my hamstrings and butt that only fit into the most stretchy of jeans after ten minutes of wiggling, jumping, and tucking. I didn’t even think about my face because that was a whole different matter. It had scars and freckles that I couldn’t and wouldn’t do anything about.
“Fine.” Dropping my hands, I held them up before pulling my shirt over my head. Screw it. What were boobs and some freckles when he’d seen me without makeup nearly every day for the past two months?
His lids dropped low over his hazel-ish eyes, but he didn’t say a word. Instead he watched me with that heavy gaze as his hands wrapped over my sides just below the smallest part of my ribs. They were cool and firm. I couldn’t help but notice his hands were big. I only just barely managed not to make a sound at his touch. I mean, Marc touched me all the time. It was no big deal.
His hands slid up, his palms so wide and fingers so long, he could almost reach all the way around.
Then he squeezed, and I let out a really unfeminine grunt.
The German didn’t break eye contact with me once, even as his thumbs pressed into the hollow between my ribs, the pads restingon the scraped-up skin above the flat muscle of my abs. My nostrils flared as he squeezed a second time, my heart racing, racing, racing under cover. The hair on my arms prickled in response to him.
Did he need to look at me while he did this? “I’m fine. If anything, they’re just a little bruised,” I said in a controlled voice that didn’t even hint at the fact the big organ right in the center of my chest thought it was heading into NASCAR.
One thumb absently stroked a line upward to the elastic band of my bra, which I couldn’t help but remember was literally just a centimeter from the bottom swell of my breast. “You’ll be fine,” he stated confidently like he had X-ray powers that told him everything was all right.
His hands dropped from my stomach.
I swallowed, trying to get myself together. “My, uh, keys are in the side zipper of my bag. Can you grab them for me or pass me the bag so I can get them?”
