Page 31 of The Knockout Rule

* * *

Isla spread gel on Eric’s Achilles and switched the ultrasound machine on. She liked finishing their sessions with ultrasound. Mobilization and strength building to begin, localized treatment promoting local healing and blood flow to end.

Eric lay on his stomach, eyes closed. He inhaled deeply and exhaled a long breath as he relaxed. She’d treated him for six days now. At the end of every session, he’d grunt out the same slow breath. Like he was on his first vacation in ten years. Whit, always nearby, sighed in tandem.

“You did great today,” she told Eric. “But your calves are crazy tight.”

“The running and skipping are murder on me. Seems worse lately.”

“Because your training’s too intense. All you do is workout, eat an insane amount of calories, and walk your dog, which is also exercise, by the way.”

The dog in question gave a snort.

He laughed. “I sleep, too.”

Maybe, but there were dark circles under his eyes. His rotator cuff was paining him more than usual. She wanted to prod, ask if he planned to beat his body down until he was as sick as her father, but those were landmine topics.

“Do you exercise this much in your home gym?” she asked.

“Home gym?” He made a scoffing sound. “My house is barely big enough for Eliza and Asher’s toys.”

Isla blinked at Eric’s back. She knew he lived with his family, had assumed they lived in an extravagant mansion, not a house too small for a home gym.

She didn’t prod and ask if he hadn’t made as much money as she’d assumed. Not exactly polite conversation. She focused on her work instead, moved the ultrasound’s probe around his ankle in slow circles. Unfortunately, her gaze also moved, roaming over the expanse of his muscled back and shoulders, emphasized in his sparse workout clothes. The man was criminally attractive.

He angled his head to catch her eye. “How’s the dating app going?”

Her movements jerked slightly. Had he sensed her heated perusal? Unlikely. That hadn’t been the first time she’d taken an eyeful of his body, but she was always quick to school her features, lead them to neutral conversation.

“It’s going slow,” she said. A noncommittal reply.

More like it wasn’t going at all. She’d been busier than expected while away, communicating with the contractor who was finishing her office space, putting out fires when they’d painted the bathroom the wrong color, taking an accounting course to brush up on her bookkeeping. Dating had once again taken a back seat.

Eric shifted his hips. A small move, but heat moved through her. She suddenly envied that treatment table, wished she was the one under him feeling the hard press of his body.

Jesus. She really needed to deal with her extended dry spell.

He stilled, but his dating inquisition persisted. “With all that chiming, I figured you’d have met someone by now. I mean, unless…” The tips of his ears pinked. “Forget it.”

She gripped the probe harder. “Unless what?”

Was he insinuating she was too picky? Picky with food. Picky with men. A high-maintenance woman who was too difficult to date?

He turned his head face down on the pillow. “Nothing,” he mumbled.

“If it was nothing, you’d tell me what you meant.”

He didn’t reply.

She moved the ultrasound in faster circles. “You’re seriously going to say something like that and leave me hanging?”

Whit whined from the floor.

“See?” Isla said. “Even your best friend thinks you’re being rude.”

Eric laughed, a muffled sound that shook his body. He lifted onto his elbows and rotated enough to look at her. “Unless you’re only after a hookup. I assumed you wanted a relationship, but then realized in this day and age most people use those sites for other things.”

“Oh.”