She crooked her head to look up at him. “Is this a joke? Did Mandy put you up to this?”
“I’m completely serious.”
“I’m not a horse.”
His gaze flicked down for a split second. “In fact, you are not. But the principle’s the same.” He motioned for her to lift her foot.
She ignored the gesture. “I thought you were mad at me.”
“I am.”
“So, why do you want to help?”
“Because you need it.”
“And because Mandy asked you?”
“Mmm-hmm.”
Katrina considered his expression seriously. “Were you ever in love with my sister?”
“No.” He reached down and lifted her ankle, crouching and resting her leg across his denim-covered knee.
She didn’t fight him. “Are you lying to me?”
“No.”
“So, there’s nothing between you and Mandy?”
“She’s marrying my brother. That’s what’s between us.” He tugged at the bow and loosened the laces of Katrina’s sneaker.
“I don’t even know how to interpret that.” Did he mean Caleb had come between him and Mandy?
Reed gently removed Katrina’s shoe and set it on the worn, dusty floor. “There’s nothing to interpret.”
“You’re being deliberately oblique.”
Reed shook his head, slipping off her sock. “What makes you think I had a thing for Mandy?”
“Because you’re doing her a favor. By helping me. What other reason would there-”
His large warm hands wrapped around her ankle, and she jumped at the electric sensation.
“It’s not Mandy.” He rotated her ankle. “Does this hurt?”
Katrina sucked in a breath and tried to tug her foot out of his grasp.
“Hold still.”
“It hurts.”
“Sorry.” His thumb pressed on the inside of her foot below her ankle bone. “This?”
“Yes,” she hissed.
He tried the opposite side of her foot and glanced up.
She shook her head in an answer.
“Point your toe?”
She did.
“Other way.”
She flexed. “Ouch.”
“Yeah,” he commiserated, moving back toward the sorest spot. He made small circles with the pad of his thumb, massaging in a way that hurt, but the pain wasn’t too sharp.
She steeled herself to keep still.
“Relax,” he instructed. His attention moved farther up her calf.
Okay, that didn’t hurt at all. In fact, it felt very nice. Very, very nice. She closed her eyes.
His deep voice was low and soothing as it rumbled in the cavernous space. “I’m going to move you.”
“Hmm?”
“You lean over any farther and you’re going to fall off the bike seat.” His hands left her leg, and suddenly he was scooping her from the bicycle, lifting her, carrying her.
“What-”
“Over here.” He nodded to a small stack of hay bales against a half wall.
He set her down, and the stalks of hay prickled through her tights.
She shifted. “Ouch.”
“Ouch?”
“It prickles.”
Reed shook his head in disgust, coming to his feet, striding away, his boot heels clomping on the floor.
Katrina straightened. But just as she was debating whether to hop her way back to her discarded sock and sneaker or get her bare foot dirty, Reed returned with a dark green horse blanket over one arm.
He spread it across the hay bales, then unceremoniously lifted her to place her on the thick blanket.
“Better?” he asked, tone flat.
“I only have thin tights on,” she protested, gesturing to the contrast of his sturdy jeans. “The hay pokes right through them.”
“Did I say anything?”
“You think I’m a princess,” she huffed.
“You are a princess.” He crouched down in front of her, lifting her foot to his knee again.
“I have delicate skin and thin clothing.”
His strong thumb began to massage again, working its way in circles up the tight muscles of her calf. “Am I hurting you now?”
“No.”
“Good. Lean back. Try to relax. We’ll talk about your clothes later.”
She leaned back against the hay. “They’re nice clothes.”
“For Manhattan.”
“For anywhere.”
“Shut up,” he said gently.
She did. Not because he’d told her to, but because his hands were doing incredible things to her calf. She found herself marveling that such an intense, powerful, no-nonsense man could have such a sensitive touch.
He took his time, releasing the tension from her muscles, gently working his way toward the injured tendon. By the time he got there, the surrounding muscles were so relaxed that it felt merely sore, not the burning pain she’d been experiencing for the past two weeks.
He moved away from her ankle, back up her calf, leaving bliss in his wake. Then, to her surprise, he started on the sole of her foot. She wanted to protest, but it felt too good as his fingers dug into the ball of her foot and the base of her heel. And when he switched to the other foot, she was beyond speech. Her sympathetic nervous system fully engaged, and her brain went to autopilot.
“Katrina?” Reed’s deep voice was suddenly next to her ear.
She blinked against the fuzziness inside her brain, realizing that he’d leaned down on the hay bales beside her. Her eyelids felt heavy, and her mouth couldn’t seem to form any words.
“Do I have to kiss the princess to wake her up?” he joked.
“Am I sleeping?”
“I hope so. You were snoring.”
“I was not.” She brought him into focus and saw that he was grinning. She couldn’t believe she’d fallen asleep during a foot massage. “Do you have magic hands?”
“I do,” he intoned.
The barn was quiet, the light dim all around them. They were alone and his eyes were pewter-dark, molten, watchful. His face was hard-wrought, all planes and angles, beard-shadowed, with that little bump on his nose that seemed to telegraph danger.
She had a sudden urge to smooth away that imperfection, to run her fingertips across his whisker-roughened chin and feel the heat of his skin. He’d said something about kissing her. Was he thinking about it now? Would he do it?
Her gaze shifted to his full lips, imagining their softness against her own.
“Katrina.” His voice was strained.
She wanted him to kiss her, desperately wanted to feel those hot lips come down on hers, his hard body press her back into the hay, his magic hands wrap around her waist, along her back, over her buttocks, down her thighs. She just knew he would take her to paradise.
