10. CODY
I felt genuine sympathy for Danielle—more than I’d expected.
In the short time I’d known her, I’d never seen her this vulnerable.
The pain from being in the car for so long was written all over her face, and I felt nearly useless beside her.
I could help with the rehab exercises, sure, but there was nothing I could do to take away the pain itself.
All I could do was help her through it, step by step.
There were no walking bars here, nothing more than what we had in the room, so I handed her the cane and wrapped her other arm around my neck.
“Just go slow,” I told her. “Do what you can. I’m in no rush.”
She nodded, but couldn’t stop the tears she didn’t want me to see from coming out.
I had this sudden urge to take the pain away or tell her she could quit for today, but that wouldn’t help her get better.
She needed, for lack of a better word, tough love now.
Actually, that was a really shitty term to use, given the amount of “tough” love she’d already had.
Regardless, she needed to push through. For about five minutes, she shuffled back and forth across the hotel room—honestly, more than I expected.
By the time we finished, she’d stopped crying.
“Does it feel any better?” I asked, helping her lie back down on the bed.
“It’s not as stiff.” She groaned as she pressed her palm to her thigh, massaging the skin just shy of the scar. “How long did I walk?”
“Five minutes. Not bad. Better than yesterday.” She didn’t share my pride in her progress. I couldn’t imagine how it must feel to be relearning something as basic as walking. I could see how frustrated she was.
“It looks like you’re starting to get some muscle mass back,” I said, hoping to encourage her.
“Yeah, I guess.” Danielle glanced down, scanning the muscle lines, the shape, the symmetry—she was sizing up her progress.
“So, you know what comes next, right?” I asked.
“Yeah, and I said I could do it myself.” She didn’t even let me respond before she started trying to work the muscles in her leg by herself.
I wanted to tell her it was going to hurt, and that she wouldn’t just be able to hurt herself enough to do it right, but I also knew how fucking stubborn she was. Not to mention how much she hated me.
I watched her try for about two minutes, wincing every time she dug her fingers into the new muscle in her leg.
From the other bed, I could tell she was going easy on herself.
The doctor told her it should hurt, and I already knew her well enough to know she was faking how much pain she was actually in, hoping it’d convince me she was getting in there like she should be.
“You know you’re not doing it right.” I laughed, trying to coax her into letting me do it. “You’re gonna be recovering longer if you don’t really get in there.”
She slammed her hands down on the bed beside her and shot daggers at me before she let out a dramatic sigh. “Just get it over with, Casanova.”
I settled beside her, careful not to jostle the bed. With both hands, I arranged the pillows and lifted her leg, propping it up on the stack of pillows.
Suddenly, I was nervous, more than I wanted to admit.
I hadn’t touched a woman like this since Riley.
This wasn’t supposed to be intimate—it was just part of her rehab—but I couldn’t stop thinking that I was crossing a line.
I don’t know if I thought I was crossing hers, or Alex’s, or the invisible line that I had made for Riley, but something about it felt wrong.
But God, her skin was smooth. The warmth of it under my fingertips was almost too much.
Why did she have to break something that required me to touch her thigh?
A forearm wouldn’t be doing this to me. But this, this was going to drive me mad, and I hadn’t even massaged anything yet.
She lay there scrolling on her phone, not even giving me a second thought.
Meanwhile, I was trying to keep the feel of her silky skin from undoing me completely.
No, on second thought, I was, without a shadow of a doubt, crossing Alex’s line.
“How long am I supposed to do this for?” I asked.
“I don’t know. Fifteen minutes, maybe?” she replied, not bothering to look away from the phone. Whatever she was doing had her full attention, leaving me as more of a background presence.
My fingers hovered for a moment before inching the fabric of her shorts upward, just enough to make space.
I let my hands settle around her thigh, careful not to rush it.
Almost immediately, a sensation went through me that I wasn’t expecting, and I tried my best to hide as I started massaging around her healing leg with gentle pressure.
Her skin was smooth except for a long, jagged scar running down the front.
As my fingers followed the raised line, I could feel the thick and uneven scar tissue underneath.
“Feel that?” I asked her as I pressed down on it.
“Fuck. Yeah.” She made a face that made me well aware I was hurting her, so I backed off, lessening the pressure.
“That’s what you gotta be massaging out.
I know it hurts, but you don’t want it there permanently.
If you want to do it on your own, you’re gonna have to put pressure on it like this.
” I squeezed a little harder, putting more pressure on the scar as she clenched the bed sheets in both fists, trying to hide her pain.
“Yeah, maybe…maybe you should just be the one to do it.” She was finally leaning into the idea of more help, and I was desperately wanting to lean out of it.
From where I sat, her perfume drifted toward me—enticing, distracting, and entirely too inviting.
My nerves tensed. I reminded myself that this was just part of her recovery, nothing more.
She was my best friend’s sister for fuck’s sake, and I wasn’t someone she needed.
But what I needed was something to pull my focus away, or the next fifteen minutes would feel like a lifetime.
She had shifted her attention to the TV, so I decided to do the same.
“So, what are you watching?” I asked.
“A show called Forged in Fire. It’s a blacksmithing competition,” she replied, still without looking at me.
I was baffled by this girl. “You’re not normal.”
That got her to look at me. Unfortunately, not the way I wanted her to. I looked back down at her leg.
“Excuse me? How so?”
“I didn’t mean anything bad by it. It’s just that most girls like you don’t sit around watching the History Channel all day.”
“Girls like me?” Now I had done it; she was annoyed. She was staring me down and I could see the creases on her brow and nose form as she contemplated what I had said, half confused and half pissed off.
“I didn’t mean it in a bad way. I just meant girls that are…”
She cut me off. “Pretty?”
“Beautiful.” The word slipped out before I could stop it.
Fuck.
My eyes widened, and I felt my face turn hot with embarrassment.
I shouldn’t have said that. If Alex had heard, he probably would’ve killed me right then and there, my arms still wrapped around his sister’s thigh.
Judging by the look Danielle gave me, she might beat him to it.
I braced myself for her reaction, but she stayed silent, her eyes unreadable.
“Danielle, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.” I stammered, struggling to recover.
“God, no wonder you’re here.” Now her frustration was visible, and who could blame her?
In her mind, I was looking at her like a piece of meat.
I mean, I can’t say that I necessarily wasn’t, but I was in no way acting on it.
And besides, I wasn’t that type of guy. Not that she knew that, but I guess it was time to come clean.
“That’s not why I offered to help,”
“Then why did you?” Her voice was laced with suspicion; she didn’t sound convinced in the slightest.
“Do you want the truth?” I asked.
She nodded, her focus finally turning away from the TV and settling on me, with a little too scowl for my nerves, but I was in no position to complain.
I took a breath.
“I offered because I felt like I didn’t have any real meaning in my life anymore.
My parents died when I was really young.
I barely remember them. I grew up in foster care, just drifting from one place to another.
When I was sixteen, I met my first girlfriend, Riley.
She was the first person who made any effort to care about me.
She believed I could be more than what I thought I was.
That’s why I joined the military. I wanted to give her a better life. ”
By now, I was rambling, afraid I was losing her attention, but Danielle had shifted her body away from the TV.
She was watching me with intent eyes, but her expression was softer now.
Maybe it was working; maybe she understood me better now.
I realized I’d left my story hanging, and Danielle gave me a look like she was pushing for me to go on.
“With the money I was supposed to make on my first deployment, I planned to buy her an engagement ring and get us a house. Three weeks after I shipped out, I got a letter from Riley’s mom.
Riley had started working as a bartender to save some money, just until I came back.
One night, driving home from work, she was hit by a drunk driver.
She died instantly. The only person I ever cared about was gone, and it was all because I was out there trying to give her the life she deserved.
If it hadn’t been for Alex, I never would have survived it.
So, when I saw him almost lose the only person he cared about, I promised I would do whatever it took to keep that from happening.
I guess in some weird way, I just wanted to feel my stars align again.
I don’t even know if that makes sense, but… ”