I swing down to the floor. “Would you like for me to grab you a belt and show you how to use the auto belay?” I ask him, feeling a tad guilty for goading him into doing something he’s never done before. I don’t want him to get hurt.
“Nope. I’m good. Are you getting cold feet already?”
I scoff, then laugh. “Be prepared to eat my chalk dust.”
We approach the expert wall. Lining up in front of it, we’re almost shoulder to bicep. The man is several inches taller than I am.
I flex my fingers and roll my ankles. This should be quick and easy.
“Are you ready?”
JD nods, looking up the forty-three-foot wall.
“Get set.”
“Wait,” he says.
I decide I’ll let it slide if he wants to back out. I’m not that mean. But apparently, JD is, and he’s playing dirty. He reaches behind his head and pulls his shirt off, throwing it to the side.
Holy hell. JD was muscular and built back in high school, but his younger self has nothing on what he looks like now. I’m so hypnotized by his bare chest and back that I don’t hear him say, “Go.”
By the time I come to my senses because I’m switching from staring at how the muscles in his back and shoulders bulge and elongate to staring at his ass, JD is already a quarter of the way up the wall.
Son of a—
I scramble up as quickly as I can. I’m good, but not that fast. It takes me a minute to catch up but he’s still about an arm’s length ahead of me.
“You said you’d never done this before.”
He smiles when he looks down at me. “Never said that. What I said was that it looked like you were having fun and asked if you’d like to show me.”
I should have known he was playing me. Memories of the time JD scaled up the side of the house to my bedroom balcony make their presence known and I feel like an absolute fool for forgetting.
My hand misses a hold and I growl when he gets another foot farther up. “You’re a sneaky bastard, Jackson Hallstead.”
“And you owe me a dinner date,” he says triumphantly when he reaches the top.
His smile is so wide and child-like, I can’t help but laugh. The way he’s looking at me with such happiness and joy squeezes my heart until it hurts. How many times did I cry myself to sleep every night missing his gorgeous face and his beautiful smile, wondering what I had done to make him walk away? Was I not good enough? My love for him not deep enough? Was I not pretty enough? Sophisticated enough? Did I not satisfy him enough in bed?
My smile freefalls into oblivion and my eyes become blurry with unshed tears. I look away, but not quickly enough that he doesn’t notice.
As deftly as I climbed up, I make my way back down the wall in short order. I pick up my chalk bag and bottled water and start walking toward the side gymnasium door that leads to the women’s locker room.
“Aurora, wait.” I hear him coming up behind me. “Please. Stop.”
His one-word command has me jolting to a standstill.
“Look at me.” Another command.
“I need to take a shower and get dressed before the center opens. And you have your rec staff meeting at nine.” I look anywhere but at him while making excuses.
JD hasn’t put his shirt back on and his body heat burns my back when I turn around and he walks up behind me.
“How can I fix what’s broken if you don’t talk to me,” he says in a low hush.
My skin breaks out in tingles when his hand brushes over my neck and across my shoulder.
“I see that your body still remembers me.”
