Chapter 3
Chapter
Three
Liv
I reluctantly cover his gorgeous, muscular ass with the towel.
“You’re all done, Austin,” I tell him. “I’ll give you some time to get dressed.”
I could stare at the back of this guy’s broad, insanely ripped naked body for the rest of eternity, but I’ve already gone ten minutes over and I’m so fucking thirsty, and I need more painkillers.
I rush out of the treatment room and into the staff room out the back.
I’m slumped on a chair, downing two more painkillers when Delilah, dressed in an expensive cream pantsuit walks in.
“Woah, you look like shit!” she says, pulling a leaf out of my hair.
I chug the rest of the bottle of water. “I overslept, and I didn’t even have time for a shower.”
“Liv, do you think you might need the rest of the day off?”
I shake my head. “I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine. You look like you slept in a bush.”
“A cave.”
“What?”
I’m about to tell her about the cave and the nakedness, but I can’t tell her that. I can’t tell her that I walked a mile down the mountain, barefoot and naked, hiding behind trees to dodge dog walkers and runners this morning. She’ll have me committed! Or at least put in rehab!
“Okay. Take a breath, honey,” she says, sitting down next to me and rubbing my arm.
Oh god. Am I having a panic attack?
One minute I’m downing tequila, the next I’m waking up in a cave, naked, and then I’m rubbing my hands all over the hottest naked guy I’ve ever seen in a very unprofessional way.
God! All I wanted was to scrape my nails down his back, strip off my black button-up, lift my skirt, flip him over and fucking ride him!
I wipe my sweaty forehead with the back of my arm. “Something strange is happening to me,” I say.
“It’s probably the change,” Delilah says. “Just a hot flush.”
But she’s not looking at me like it’s just a hot flush. She’s looking at me like she’s deeply worried that I’m sick or losing it or something.
“Liv, you just need to go home. Take a cold shower. Sleep it off.”
“I’ve got another client at one.”
“Jody can reschedule your client.”
“Nope,” I say, shaking my head. “I’m okay. I can take a quick shower here and I’ll feel much better.”
“Liv.”
“Honestly, Delilah. I’m just hungover. Nothing a shower and a diet Coke can’t cure.”
Even after the cold shower, all day I feel hot and bothered and a little… out of control.
I get through my clients, but I can’t stop thinking about Austin. I know I was wildly inappropriate with him. But he was grunting and groaning in such a sexual way, and there was this thing within me that responded, that wanted him so fucking bad!
Clients grunt and groan all the time. That’s normal.
What’s not normal is how ready I was to risk losing my job and my reputation of being the best masseuse in Wildstone if he had been at all interested in fucking me. I would have fucked him on the table, against a wall, on the goddamn floor. Anything. Anywhere.
When I get home, I grab a glass of iced water, like that’s going to fix me, and then dial up and get on the internet to search for information on hot flushes.
But this doesn’t feel like the symptoms on doctor dot com. This feels like I’m in heat.
I go to bed early, hoping I might be able to sleep it off. Instead, I just lie there, wondering what the fuck is wrong with me and if I need medical attention.
Eventually I sleep, and when I do, I have the wildest dream.
I’m drunk on tequila and tumble out of the taxi outside my house.
The car drives away, and I have a sudden urge to run.
I can’t go inside. I don’t belong inside.
I belong outside and I just have to run.
It’s like I can’t do anything else but run.
I start running up the mountain trail behind my house, throwing off items of clothing as I go — my shoes, my little black dress, my underwear, until I’m totally naked and free!
I’m howling and running, and suddenly, I’m running on all fours. I’m a goddamn mountain lion!
I’m a wild fucking animal! So free of all the bullshit, the ex-husband, the rules and responsibilities, the expectations, the three-inch heels, I’m wild and I’m free!
I run and I run until I can’t run any more.
Then I walk, on all fours — on big cat paws — into a cave where I roll into a ball and fall asleep.
I wake up panting, like I’ve just run all that way. Again.
And something inside me knows.
It wasn’t a dream.
I’m a real life, fucking cougar.