Page 33 of Treat

Brynn disconnected the call and tossed the phone aside, then thumbed the remote to turn up the volume on the television. It was the bottom of the third inning, and the Tigers had two men on with no outs.

“Forget it,” she told Tilly, gathering the popcorn bowl closer, and putting everything else aside, prepared to enjoy the game.

6

“Four more,” Mac barked, and Jude swallowed a groan and obeyed.

“Good, good,” Mac said over the clank of the weights coming to rest. “Nice extension on those.”

Jude grunted. “Fuck, my arms feel dead.”

“They should. I upped the weight.”

“Bastard.”

Mac started shifting weights from the bar to the rack. “That’s my job.”

“Goddammit, Mac,” Jude said, scowling. “How the hell am I supposed to hold a stick in two hours with arms like noodles?”

“Careful,” Mac cautioned with a jerk of his chin. “Your girl will hear you whining.”

“She’s not my girl,” Jude muttered, his scowl deepening, and deliberately didn’t look at the corner of the weight room where Brynn had set up her camera.

She’d kept her distance during the workout, as promised, but he’d known she was there. Every squat, every lunge, every curl and press and pull, he’d felt her eyes on him. And every time he’d seen her looking at him, it hadn’t felt like she was evaluating how she could use the moment for social media.

It had felt like she was fucking him with her eyes.

It wasn’t the first time he’d had to work out with half a chub, and it was just as uncomfortable as he’d remembered. Mac hadn’t helped, his knowing gaze laughing at him the whole time and taking every opportunity to chat with Brynn, making her laugh, and if there was a man who could concentrate on deadlifts while listening to that laugh, well, it wasn’t Jude Bessonette.

“No?” Mac paused, turning to eye Brynn with a gleam in his eye that had the hair on the back of Jude’s neck standing up. “Why not?”

“Because she’s my assistant,” Jude said and chugged water to keep from snarling like a dog guarding his bone.

“Don’t see what that has to do with anything,” Mac mused, weights clattering as he went back to moving them. “She’s cute. Nice smile. Great ass. You saying you don’t want to hit that?”

Jude turned his head far enough to scowl at his trainer. “Watch it.”

Mac’s beetle brows rose. “It’s just an observation.”

“Observe something else,” Jude said and stalked over to the mats to stretch.

Brynn sippedfrom her water bottle and checked the view on her phone’s camera to make sure she was sufficiently zoomed in. Jude had moved away from the weights and was stretching, and if she’d thought the weights were bad, the stretching was ten times worse.

He was on his belly on the floor, a foam roller under one hip, and was rolling back and forth in what she assumed was some kind of stretch designed to aid in hip or quad flexibility. She’d ask him—or maybe just Google it, because there was no way she’d be able to ask without blushing hard enough to set her hair on fire.

Because it looked like he was fucking the foam roller, and dear God, she wished it was her.

Her phone’s camera was high quality, the image crisp and clear. She could see the sweat beading on his skin, the definition in his leg muscles as he rolled back and forth, back and forth. His T-shirt was red—team colors—and had ridden up a little, baring the small of his back. Sweat pooled there, shining in the bright overhead lights, and she was so deep in a let-me-wash-your-sweaty-back shower fantasy that when she came out of it, he wasn’t on the mat anymore.

A quick, panicked look around revealed he’d moved to a treadmill on the other side of the room—and by the deep V of sweat soaking the front, had been there for a while. Mentally kicking her own ass, she repositioned the tripod and went to refill her water bottle.

By the timeJude was lacing up his skates in the locker room, he was a mess. His muscles were like gelatin and his dick was like granite, an uncomfortable state in which to play hockey, even if it was just an informal scrimmage. He was trying to think of some way to get out of it when someone sat on the bench beside him.

“You look like your dog died,” Tommy said, bumping his shoulder into Jude’s. “What’s up?”

“Nothing,” Jude muttered.

“Come on, tell Uncle Tommy what’s wrong.”

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