Chapter 2
Chapter
Two
Austin
I wake up early with a dull pain in my right shoulder and an ache in my lower back and grimace.
Fucking injuries.
After over a decade of pro football, I’m still doing better than a lot of guys I started out with who are already retired.
But Austin Adams in retirement?
Fuck no.
Football is who I am.
I’ve still got a few more good years left in me.
The shoulder is getting better, and as long as I stick to the rehabilitation program, I’ll still be able to play in the upcoming season.
I just need someone to rub out these knots in my back, and I’ll be fine.
At least, that’s what I keep telling myself.
Thirty years old and my body is already breaking the fuck down.
Like every player in the NFL, my dream was to win a Super Bowl. Then it was just to get to a Super Bowl.
Now my dream is just to keep playing for as long as possible before my body totally gives up on me.
I make a quick call to the spa and book a massage. I have a choice between a newly qualified masseuse who can see me now, or someone more experienced who can’t see me until ten.
I take the experienced masseuse. I can’t trust this body with just anyone.
I stretch and run through the exercises in my shoulder program and then take a run along the mountain trails.
It’s beautiful here, and as I run through the wilderness, breathing in the warm summer morning air, for just a moment I almost believe that maybe there is life after football. Maybe it’s out here in the mountains.
I take a quick shower, pull on some sweats and a Denver Breakers t-shirt and head down to the spa.
The main part of the grand old colonial hotel is a renovated mansion built by some gold miner who struck it rich here in the gold rush.
The spa and gym are in newer buildings just off the main house, but still as luxurious as the rest of the place.
Everything at the Wildstone Resort and Spa screams wealth and opulence — bellboys dressed in burgundy and gold jackets, the gold chandelier and marble staircase in the foyer, the giant ferns in gold pots outside the spa.
I step in and the place is like an oasis with more ferns, an indoor waterfall, the scent of heavenly essential oils and relaxing flute music playing softly.
The receptionist, a young woman with big eyes and short dark hair, blushes behind a huge marble desk at the sight of me. “Mr. Adams! Welcome to the Wildstone Spa.”
“Austin is fine,” I tell her.
“Oh, of course, Mr. Adams,” she says. “I just… um… Oh!” She’s so flustered, and it might be cute if this didn’t happen every fucking time. “I have you booked with Liv,” she eventually manages to tell me. “She’s our best. Magic hands. That’s what they call her. Magic Hands Liv!”
I just raise an eyebrow. I could seriously use some magic hands today.
“Let me get you comfortable in the treatment room. I’m sure she’ll be here any second.”
A few minutes later, I’m in a dimly lit room, naked on a massage table with my face in a hole, staring at the floor and nothing covering me except a small towel draped over my butt.
I’m used to it. I’ve had so many massages, physiotherapy, and chiropractic treatments over the years. I’ve been prodded and pinched and yanked around by the best.
Minutes pass, and I wonder how long I should lie here before I go check on what’s happening. I’m about to get up and find out when the door opens.
“Fuck, sorry,” says a husky feminine voice. “Oh god. Sorry I said fuck.”
I let out a chuckle.
“I’m so sorry to keep you waiting, Mr. Adams. I’m Liv and I’ll be your masseuse this morning. Are you comfortable enough?”
“I’m fine. And don’t worry about it. I heard you have magic hands, so I’m sure this is worth waiting for.”
“I wish Jody would stop telling people that,” she says with a huff of a laugh.
“Oh, so you don’t have magic hands?”
“I didn’t say that. I just like my clients to find out for themselves.” I enjoy the hint of flirtation in her voice. “I see on your intake form that you have some sports-related injuries.”
“Right shoulder.”
“I’ll go easy there,” she says. “Anywhere you want it harder?”
“Everywhere else,” I say, not even attempting to hide the flirtation in my own voice.
I can’t even see this woman. She could be sixty years old, for all I know.
I mean, she was the more experienced masseuse, but her presence feels warm and kind, and I already know I like her.
Maybe it was because she said fuck twice in the first five seconds.
I hear the familiar sound of oil being rubbed on hands. “Talk to me. Tell me what you like, what feels good. Let me know if anything hurts.”
“Honestly, I’m happy with you taking charge. Just watch the?—”
“Right shoulder. Got it.”
Suddenly soft, warm, oily hands are sliding down my back, and I can’t help the little groan that escapes.
She doesn’t comment on it. She’s a professional. This isn’t sexual. This is just a sports massage.
“What brings you to Wildstone, Mr. Adams?”
“Austin, please.”
“Okay, Austin.”
I really like the way she says my name, as if she’s savoring it.
I don’t know why I immediately feel like I can tell this woman anything, but I still decide not to tell her that the real reason I’m here is that I’m just a broken man who can’t sleep in his own bed.
“Just taking some time out,” I tell her. “It’s beautiful here. Especially out on the mountain trails.”
“Howling Ridge has some great trails too. It’s just the next town over. I can give you directions to my favorite one if you’re interested.”
“Oh. I’m definitely interested.”
“Hmmmm. What’s going on here?” She gently presses her fingers into a knot in my lower back.
“Old injury,” I tell her.
“What’s it from?” she asks, rubbing firmly on the knot in a way that makes it very fucking clear she does indeed have magic hands.
“Football tackle,” I say through another heavy groan, which she ignores.
“You play football?” she asks, getting deeper into the knot.
I chuckle at that. “Yeah. A bit. Do you have a team?”
“No. I’ve never been that into sports, and my ex followed soccer.”
Relief floods through me at the mention of an ex, not a boyfriend or a husband, and knowing that she has no interest in football makes me relax deeper onto the table beneath me.
“What’s your current boyfriend into?” I ask.
Her hands pause for a second, and then she digs into the knot even harder, and it feels so fucking bad and so damn good.
“Currently, I don’t have one,” she says.
She moves her fingers away from the knot, and suddenly the ache disappears.
“Does that feel any better?”
“Fuck, yeah,” I practically grunt.
She gets to work on my upper back, and while I know this is just a massage, a professional service, the more her fingers, palms and knuckles slide over the knots and aches in my back, the harder my dick gets.
I swear to god, this has never happened before.
She works my shoulders, more gently on the right side. She firmly slides her slick hands down my arms and when she runs her fingers through mine, all I want to do is grip those hands and press them down onto a bed or into a wall.
Okay, what the fuck is happening?
She moves to my legs, rubbing and palming my calves and thighs, and I know I’m moaning way too fucking much, and then she slides the towel off my ass.
My mind races as I try to think of other massages I’ve had. Sure, they work your butt muscles, but this doesn’t feel like that. This feels like something else.
This feels so damn sexually charged.
And I’m fucking loving every second of it.
When her fingers dig into the flesh of my ass, I’m fucking gone.
I’ve been groaning and grunting like a sex maniac this whole time, but now I can’t stop myself from crying out, “Oh fuuuuck,” as she palms my ass.
She lets out the tiniest gasp, and holy shit, she’s into this too.
Magic hands.
Maybe she does it like this with all her customers. Maybe that’s why she’s usually booked out.
“Would you like to turn over, Mr. Adams? I mean, Austin.”
“Uhhh?”
“It’s not a full body massage if I only do your back.”
Ohhh fuck.
“Um. I kind of can’t right now.”
The last thing I can do is turn over with a massive fucking hard-on tenting under the towel! Where the fuck even is the towel?!
“That’s okay,” she says. “I can just spend a little more time on your back. Is there anywhere you’d like some extra attention?”
Yeah, there fucking is. I’d like some attention on my cock!
I can’t say that though, so I go with, “maybe a little more on the side, where my knot was.”
She digs in again and fuck! Magic hands don’t even come close to how this woman is making me feel.
I don’t even know what she looks like. But I don’t have to.
I’m already so fucking gone for this woman.