Page 27 of Breakaway Goal

“I mean, if you don’t mind …” I say tentatively.

“Don’t mind at all.” He flashes his pearly-white smile.

Even though what we’re doing is, surely, as innocent as can be, Rhys still walks to his door to shut it. And there’s still a long beat of heavy silence when he steps back from the door, his hands gripping the hem of his shirt before he pulls it up.

When he does, my eyes go so wide I’m surprised they don’t fall out.

I’ve seen Rhys shirtless before. But never while both of us are alone, behind the closed door of a bedroom.

The context accentuates every detail that I already knew about his physique. The pop of his rounded shoulders, the width of his chest, the incredible definition of his abs, the way his broad, bulky upper muscles taper deliciously down to his trim, sleek waist.

All those features are covered in intricate tattoo designs which do nothing to obscure the razor-sharp peaks and valleys of his musculature.

My gaze crawls down to the sharp V shape carved into his lower ab muscles, pointing sinfully below his beltline. The beltline that his hands are now reaching for …

I’m gawking. Shamelessly gawking. But I couldn’t stop myself if my life depended on it. Not as his jeans fall down the muscular columns of his legs, and he steps out of them.

Rhys Callahan is standing in front of me, wearing nothing except a tiny pair of black boxer briefs that cling to his trim hips, pinning me with his whiskey-hued gaze while I’m on his bed.

How many times have I imagined this exact scenario?

A thought pops into my mind that has an unpleasant sensation spiraling through me and a bitter taste rising to my mouth.

How many girls havebeenin this exact scenario? How many girls have had Rhys step out of not just his jeans, but his boxers, too? Had him crawl on top of them and touch them all over just like I’ve imagined more times than I can count?

Dozens, for sure. Hundreds?

And he has no interest in me ever being one of them.

That’s enough to extinguish the sparks that were dancing over my skin, and to make the heat pulsing in my core dissipate.

He’s just my friend, he’s just helping me out, and I’m stupid to be sitting here letting the sight of him affect me physically as if it were anything else.

“So, how should I pose?” Rhys asks, an amused twinkle still in his eyes and a twitch still on his plush lips. “Like … this?” He adopts the perfect pose of a discus thrower mid-throw, his torso curled, his hips set, and his arms poised.

“Perfect,” I say, trying to shift mental gears back to being an artist, treating the incredible body in front of me the same way I would treat a figure model in the middle of a classroom.

I pick up my sketchpad and get to work. Happiness rises in me as the lines and curves my pencil scratches out on the rough paper finally come together.

As I work on the sketch, I try to force my brain to stay in objective artist mode.

Still, no matter how I try, no matter how I tell myself that this is an utterly platonic gesture from a friend just trying to be helpful, it’s hard to keep a flame from licking at my center when my eyes pass over a particularly defined muscle; it’s hard to keep a muscle of my own from tugging at the peak of my legs when my gaze sweeps over the curve of Rhys’s firm ass.

Eventually, though, I make enough progress that the artistic part of my brain fully takes over. I’m totally focused on the product on my paper, filling in the fine details of Rhys’s musculature.

“How’s it coming along?” Rhys asks.

“Good,” I say, feeling like I’m in the zone with my eyes narrowed and my right hand seeming to attain a mind of its own. “Really good.”

Then, the spell breaks. Thanks to a knock at Rhys’s door.

The muscles in Rhys’s shoulders and neck tense. My stomach drops.

“Hey, Rhys, you in there?”

A mortified feeling stiffens my back. Rhys’s chest visibly hitches on a sharp, silent inhale.

I was just telling myself that this is nothing but an innocent, helpful gesture. But for some reason, it’s suddenly hard to feel that way when my older brother is standing on the other side of the door with his best friend stripped to his underwear in front of me while I’m on his bed.

---