Theo
CHIROPRACTIC CARE
Tuesday
The morning was busy. So busy, I didn’t have time to think. My coffee was cold before ten, and my hands had cracked four spines already. The two chiropractors I hired were already run off their feet, and my only half-hour break was taken up by an emergency appointment.
I followed my latest client out to the reception desk and picked up the file Mario prepared for me. My break-snatching client should have been here any second, and I needed to read up on their history.
But as my eyes barely glanced over the name, a familiar British voice ground out, “Oh, you’ve got to be bloody kidding me.”
My neck snapped toward the door, and there she was, scowling at me.
I was stunned.
Heat prickled the back of my neck as my eyes raked over the short, gauzy dress hanging from her shoulders, flowing just past her thighs.
Her porcelain skin was bare, her hair hung lose around her shoulders, mussed and ruffled like she’d just woken up, and the flimsy sandals she wore showed off her dainty, manicured toes.
Mia’s filmy dress reminded me of the one she wore in the amphitheater, and my mind went as wild now as it did back then. With her looking the way she did, all I could think of was how easy it’d be to slip my hand under that dress, graze her soft, smooth skin, and finally feel her for myself.
“How are you here?” she grumbled at me. “You’re a carpenter, aren’t you?”
Mario looked from her to me, confused. “Uh, Mia Walker. You’re already in our record base.”
She turned her whole body to look at Mario, and I could immediately tell where her inflammation was. She hurt her upper middle back and couldn’t move her neck.
“I was here in May and saw Gary. Is he still here?”
“No. He sold his practice to Mr Hudson that month, actually.”
“You’re bloody joking.”
“Uh, no, sorry, ma’am, I’m not.”
“Mia,” I interrupted. “I can tell you’re in pain. Come in and let me take a look.”
She shifted on her feet and stared at my chest. “Can’t I see someone else? I’ll wait.”
“Everyone else is fully booked right now,” Mario interrupted. “Sorry.”
I bent to meet her eyes. “It’s me or nothing.”
“Then I’ll take nothing, won’t I?”
Her dark glare was enough to heat my blood.
“Look, I can’t force you into my office, but that inflammation isn’t going away on its own. Let me help.”
She ground out a short, “You think touching me is a good idea?”
I huffed out a laugh, surprised. “It’s my job, and I’m pretty good at it.”
She said, “I don’t care how good you are, I want someone else,” and I couldn’t blame her. We didn’t have the smoothest history.
I bent to her ear and lowered my voice, “I won’t do anything you don’t want me to do, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
Her breathy gasp was so small that no one else could’ve heard it, but the sound went straight to my cock. I squeezed my eyes shut and straightened. That wasn’t supposed to sound the way it did.
“Oh, really. You think you can keep this G-rated?”
Sarcasm. At least we were in familiar territory.
“This is my business,” I told her. “I can’t afford any other ratings.”
“Not even PG?”
“Not even that. You’re safe.”
As her arms dropped back by her sides, I could pinpoint the exact moment she surrendered.
“Well… all right, fine.”
I gestured to my office and let her walk ahead of me, taking note of how she held herself as she carefully stepped inside.
Her voice was quiet, but I managed to catch a muttered, “Fucking universe.”
She sat on my drop table, squeezing her thighs together as she tugged at the hem of her dress. I opened her file and read her facts out loud, taking a look at the circled areas on her last x-ray.
“You have severe scoliosis and used to see Gary every two weeks until he managed to get you to a stable state.”
“I hurt myself in November last year, and he put me on a program to make sure it wouldn’t happen as much.”
“Right. Stretches, biweekly visits, and you were advised to start a strength training program.”
She was quiet.
“I haven’t seen you here before, so you weren’t keeping up with your visits.”
“We had a fundraiser to deal with.”
I folded my arms across my chest as she stared at the wall in front of her. “What about after that?”
“The placement program started, and Gem needed my help with the play. I got busy, and I felt fine.”
“Have you been keeping up with your stretches?”
She swung her stare to me, and I almost laughed at how defensive she was. “Obviously not. That’s why I’m here.” She braced her hands against the table and mumbled, “I can’t believe this.”
I motioned for her to let me help her onto her stomach. She toyed with her dress as I gripped her elbow and eased her into place.
“What can’t you believe?”
“That you’re the one working on my back. You were meant to be a carpenter.”
I ran my fingers along her spine and listened to her sharp intake of breath.
“I didn’t say I was a carpenter.”
“You didn’t say anything, Theo; that’s the point. This is the most we’ve ever spoken, except for all the times you’ve yelled at me.”
I brushed over the inflammation by her right shoulder blade. “I know.”
“So here’s where you clam back up again or tell me I’m a bad teacher.”
I folded my fingers over her graceful, slender neck and kneaded her pressure points. “I wasn’t going to do either of those things.”
“What were you going to do then?”
I could tell she was still trying to come across as upset, but it was hard for her to keep it up. She melted into my touch.
“Apologize. I was out of line.”
She was quiet as I worked my way from her neck to her spine, well aware of the fact that my hands were inches from her ass.
“You’re apologizing?”
“Yes.”
“To me?”
“There’s no one else here.”
“But, shouldn’t I apologize? I didn’t know about Kira’s mother, but if I knew–I should’ve been nicer.”
I tried to ignore the pang in my chest. I didn’t know if I’d ever stop missing Tash.
“I wouldn’t have wanted you to be. After the way I treated you, I deserved what I got.”
That sat with her for about a minute as I shifted around her, bracing my hands on the middle of her back. She made a noise like she was afraid of the pain she was about to feel.
“I’ll be gentle.”
“Is that what you always say before you push it in?”
I smirked. “You’re trouble.”
“Apparently.”
I put her through a gentle version of the routine, releasing tension without aggravating her inflammation.
Mia had definitely been in this situation before.
She knew what to expect and didn’t fight me on any of the positions I led her into.
It was almost disorienting. I expected her to push back, or at least stiffen in my hands.
Instead, she was pliable, soft, and willing, and fuck me if it didn’t make me think of how willing she was in that closet.
I shook my head and laid her on my table, on her back this time, as I sat behind her and worked her neck again.
“So you bought this place before the fundraiser started. This was the work you said you had to do.”
“When Kira and I moved, I had to close my practice back home.”
“And you moved here right after the funeral.”
“Kira needed it.”
“Why New York, though?”
I shifted her head to the left, testing it, watching her face. She winced, and I moved her back to the center. She looked up at me, waiting.
“Her mom wanted it. When Kira got her acceptance letter, Tash made me promise that I’d get her through the program. That, and my sister lives here. She’s the only other family we have.”
I felt her eyes trace my neck. “Was the band just a distraction then?”
I had to give it to her; she knew how to get a smile out of me. That fundraiser was a shit-show, but it was the last time Kira laughed before school started.
“Oh, look at that. The grump can smile.”
“I can laugh too. Almost like a real human.”
She pretended to gape at me. “Was that a joke?”
“Maybe.”
“So…” She lifted her hand and twirled it, prompting me to keep talking.
“So I’ve played music and worked wood since I was a kid. My parents sent my sister and me to almost every available extracurricular class in town.”
“Every class? So you had triangle lessons? Singing lessons?”
“Yep. I still can’t sing for shit, but that didn’t stop my parents from trying.”
She laughed, and I was surprised at how good it felt to pull that sound from her. Like I’d done something right and could call it a day.
“But you can play guitar.”
“And piano. I played for Kira all the time, and when she saw the flyer for the band, she thought it’d be good for me.”
“And was it?”
I could feel a snort coming on but managed to squash it. “It was interesting. Definitely distracting. Kira had a great time giving me a faux-hawk and ripping the sleeves off of my shirt.”
Mia’s laugh tapered off as I moved around the table and lifted her foot. She groaned as I kneaded into her arch and flexed her toes. The hem of her dress slipped along her thigh, and I tore my eyes away.
Mia was a client, and touching her like this shouldn’t have gotten anything out of me, but fuck, I was as hard as a rock. The minute she sat back up again, she’d notice.
“So you don’t play with Brent anymore?”
I gently placed her foot down and reached for the other. “No. That was a temporary thing. I’m not a real musician; I just know how to play.”
From the other side of the table, I could see her pretty lips quirk upward. She was about to tease me; I could tell.
“Those tattoos aren’t because you were secretly hoping to be a rock god one day?”
“No. They’re, uh, tributes, I guess.” My cheeks heated. “To some of my favorite things.”
“Oh well, you have to tell me what those things are now. What could you have loved so much that you had to get a tattoo?”
I cleared my throat and circled my palm across her heel. “Kira’s on my arm with angel wings.”
“Because she’s your little angel.”
“Yeah.”
“Damn it, Theo. Don’t you dare make my heart melt. I don’t think I could take that and a foot rub.”
I coughed out an awkward noise, and she snickered. Smartass. I wanted to pinch her baby toe just to tease her back, but I set her foot down instead.
“Stand for me?”
She did as I asked, and when I noticed her careful hold on the edge of the table, I gripped her elbow and helped her up.
Immediately, her eyes went to the bulge in my trousers, widened, then darted away.
“Mia, I can’t help it.”
“You could at least wear tighter boxers. I shouldn’t be able to see it, should I?”
“I’ve always been… bigger–”
“Now you’re just bragging.”
“–And I don’t usually have this kind of problem around my patients.”
She looked up at me, and her confusion seemed genuine as she asked, “Why me then? You don’t even like me.”
“I liked you enough to want to fuck you in a closet.”
She blushed, and something told me that didn’t happen to her often.