Page 30 of Opening Strain

She’s capable. Caring. Devoted. Sweet. Kind. Sexy.

The type of woman who belongs in a couple. Where I’m the other half.

For the first time, I don’t feel like bolting at this thought. Darren’sDo Not Fucklist doesn’t seem as insurmountable as before.

Jenna’s grey eyes widen. Not trying to pull away from me, she verbalizes the question running through my own mind, “What are you doing?”

I gaze into her expressive eyes. I can use a little distraction from all this hard work. “I can think of some more fun exercises we can do.” For some reason, I channel Tris and bite my lower lip.

She yanks against my hand and frees herself. “No sex. Doctor’s orders.”

Her leap to sex makes my head spin. Is she thinking about me like I’ve been fantasizing about her? My voice lowers, beneath its normal tenor. “There’s plenty of other things we can do.”

“Are you high, Bennett?” She snaps her fingers in front of my face. “Did you take the pain meds?”

“What? No. You think, after Darren?—”

My use of her ex-boyfriend’s name causes her to stumble backward. In a strangled voice, she says, “We’re done here.” She flees the room.

Crap. This situation’s fucked up.

I’mfucked up.

Chapter Ten

Iadjust my regular clothes and stand, walking around the room. When Jenna doesn’t appear after a couple of minutes, I throw my shoulders back and saunter toward the connecting office. Well, saunter would be the accurate term if I didn’t have this big fucking knot on my thigh that refuses to let me walk like normal.

My knuckles rap on her door. A discombobulated voice says, “Come in.” I take note of the undercurrent of resignation, but it doesn’t stop me.

Opening the door, I throw her the smile I use during all our concerts. One that ends up with roadies clearing the stage of bras and panties. Jenna, however, doesn’t appear moved. “Hey, thanks for a good session earlier. I think I made progress this morning.”

Her brow quirks, questioning whether my normal tone now is the real Bennett, or the earlier, flirty one was. I’ll never tell.

“Yeah,” she clears her throat. “Yes, you did well.”

I nod, resting my good hip against a bookcase. “I did learn my lesson from yesterday. I can’t leapfrog ahead in my recovery or else I’ll suffer the consequences.”

“I tried to warnyou.”

“Yes, I know. At least I learned quickly—only one try.”

An unwilling laugh comes out of her mouth, which makes me relax against the bookcase. No lasting harm done. “I thought you were going to do five reps.”

“I’m man enough to admit I would’ve been on the floor.”

She walks around her desk and leans against it, mirroring my posture. “Any plans for your afternoon off?”

“I was thinking of checking out the arcade game store. Want to see if I can beat some of the people on the leaderboard.”

Her eyes turn a lighter shade of grey. “I used to spend hours in that place playing Donkey Kong. My sister knew to pick me up from there before dinner.”

“Sister?” This is the first I’ve heard her mention a sister. I thought she was an only child.

“Yeah. She’s ten years older than me, so she’s more like an aunt. Kara’s married and lives in the City with her husband and two kids. We’re not close.”

I take in this new information. Tit for tat. “I’m an only child. Sounds like you were one as well, more or less.”

“Aside from birthday and big holiday texts, we don’t have much to do with each other. I like her though, even if we don’t have much in common.”

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