Page 52 of Happy Is On Hiatus
“There’s nothing to deal with. We’re getting divorced. We have another meeting with our attorneys next week, and then this will be done. You don’t have to approach him at all.” Rita wasn’t afraid that Benny would do something to physically harm Nate. Her brother had been in more than his share of fights growing up on the streets of Baltimore City, but he’d matured during his time in the marines, and when he’d come home, he’d been a different man. While hearing him talk now was reminiscent of the teenage Benny, she also had faith in his growth in the church as well as in the world, that he wouldn’t resort to such basic measures. Tariq, on the other hand, could be a loose cannon, even at forty-five years old.
“Now I’m gonna tell you to stop it. You can’t tell me not to talk to him because I’m just gonna do it anyway.”
That was the truth. “Well, just make it a quick conversation,” she told him.
He laughed. “You still so bossy. You can’t tell me how to deal with the dude that hurt my sister, Rita. That’s off-limits for you. Now we can talk about my nieces. How are they?”
The conversation took on a normal tone for the next thirty minutes, until she received the text that Vance was on his way. Reluctantly ending the call with Benny, she ran to her closet and pulled off the robe she’d put on after her bath. She slipped on sweatpants and an oversize T-shirt, then added a pair of fluffy gray socks with ridiculous green frogs on them. With a shake of her head as she passed the floor-length mirror in the closet, she shrugged. She had no idea how to dress for a massage.
In fact, she’d been wondering why she’d even requested one. Nate had used one of the rooms in the basement as an exercise room, so there was a treadmill and other gym equipment that she used sporadically. She had no need to go to Vance’s gym or to ask for a massage, and yet there was a pep in her step as she headed downstairs to wait for him to arrive.
By the time she hit the bottom of the steps, she’d told herself there was nothing wrong with asking for a massage. She could book any type of self-care she wanted and didn’t have to answer to anyone—not even her nervous inner thoughts—about it. This was the new Rita, the one who was going to live her life on her own terms. That was what she’d told herself after the run-in with Nate in Ocean City, and it was what she was determined to live by.
When the doorbell rang, she walked calmly to answer it. Vance greeted her with a smile, and she returned the gesture.
“So where would you like to set up? We have a gym down in the basement.”
“Wherever you like, or rather, wherever you have enough room for the table.” He held up said folded table, and she nodded.
“Yeah, let’s go to the basement.” She locked the door and started walking through the foyer. “There’s a bunch of equipment in the exerciseroom, but you could set that up in the front of the basement with no problem.”
“Good.” He followed her down the basement steps and immediately began setting up the table. “I’ve got towels in that bag over there. You can remove your shirt and wrap the towel around you, and we’ll start up top.”
Okay, she hadn’t thought about being topless, or bottomless, for that matter, but she probably should have. It was a massage, after all. She went to his white duffel bag with the black-and-gold VGFitness logo on the side. Grabbing a towel, she took it into the bathroom and removed her shirt and bra. With the towel wrapped securely around her chest, she returned to the room to find him standing near his table, digging out bottles of oil from his bag.
He was wearing joggers now, not the jeans he’d had on earlier today. The joggers fit him nicely, especially in the front, where just the slightest hint of an outline appeared.
“Are you allergic to nuts?”
She quickly averted her gaze to the bottle of oil in his hands. “Excuse me?”
“Nuts. Do you have any nut allergies?”
“Why? Are we having a snack before the massage?”
He grinned and held up one of the bottles of oil. “It’s almond oil. I like it because it allows my hands to glide easily and doesn’t usually irritate the skin. It can stain sheets, though, so I use this yoga mat over the cushions on the table instead of a cloth. But if you’re allergic, then I have other options.”
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “I don’t have any allergies.”
“Okay. Good. Well, whenever you’re ready, we can get started.”
She was as ready as she was ever going to be. Rita walked over to the table and eased onto it.
“On your stomach,” he instructed her.
She did as she was told, and when his hands went to the top of the towel to ease it loose, she struggled with the unfamiliar feeling of another man’s hands on her bare skin. All her doctors had always been women. Besides Nate and the two boys she’d allowed to fondle her breasts during her teenage years, there’d never been another man’s hands on her. Vance didn’t try to cup her breasts like those three had; instead, he eased the towel from around her but left it draped down by her waist.
The moment his hands were on her, Rita forgot everything else. There was no Nate, no other teenage boys, and most of all, no worries. With every stroke of his hands, her mind emptied of more of the distractions that had been running through it rampantly for the past few months. She’d even mastered her doctor’s deep-breathing technique with the sound of Vance’s extremely soothing voice in the background.
“You could be reciting an X-rated fairy tale, and I don’t think I’d mind one bit,” she murmured when his hands moved from her shoulders to work down her spine.
He chuckled. “That’s part of the training. I can also yell like a ferocious lion, as my son puts it.”
“You have a son?” She didn’t know why she hadn’t considered he might be married with children. Perhaps because there’d been no ring on his finger.
“Yeah. Sons. One’s twenty-five, and the youngest is twenty-three.”
She nodded. “Oh.”
