The Winners Circle Read Free Page B

the foresight.
    “ We can take the elevator closest to the front door.”
    He felt lame. He was strong enough to walk. He wanted to use the steps and sneak out the back door. “You don’t have to do this.”
    “ Relax.” Gina stopped pushing. She placed her hands on his shoulders and worked her thumbs into his skin.
    “ What’s this?”
    “ What do you think? You’re so tense.”
    He noticed the kinks in his muscles. Her fingers detailed every knot. He let her hands work their magic, sensing his troubles melt away. Since the moment he’d awoken from the snakebite, he’d been in a haze, as if his body didn’t belong to him, as if his thoughts came from someone else. “This is good.”
    “ You have enough to deal with. You shouldn’t do this to yourself.”
    Her fingers crawled along the base of his neck. Goosebumps rose on his arms. Chelsea was a physical therapist. She was able to do this, but he hesitated to ask.
    Gina kneaded the long muscles over his shoulder blades, as if folding and flattening dough. “Good boy.”
    He felt weird about the basement massage. She was ten years younger, yet handling him like a child.
    “ Good boy.” She returned to his neck, fingering his spine. “It’s really been only Chelsea?”
    “ Yes.” His skin felt warm, no more rash yet hot in a good way.
    “ Don’t you regret it?”
    “ Regret what?” He wondered if they were really talking about him? Their conversations were always about her.
    Gina slid over the arm of the chair and onto his lap. Her nose parked inches from his own. She acted natural, continuing her massage, but her uniform blouse was unbuttoned, offering a glimpse of her full chest. Jerry blushed, his face and ears bright with blood. He knew they were crimson red.
    “ Don’t you want to sample more of the world?” she asked.
    “ Like what?”
    “ I bet there’s a lot you haven’t seen.”
    He shifted his legs, hiding his erection. He was ashamed to be aroused so suddenly. He never generated this affect on women. He wasn’t supposed to be desirable. He was married.
    “ I can be a blonde,” she said. “Is that what you like?”
    His tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth, unable to form reasonable words. He tried not to breathe. Her warm breath bathed his face.
    “ I’m younger than her,” she said. “Think of me in ten years. I know how to take care of myself.”
    She slid his hand inside her shirt, forcing it against her chest. Her bra was unsnapped in the front. “I can be better in other ways. Someone in your position ... deserves the best.”
    He posed like a department store mannequin, staring into her eyes. Her supple breast filled his palm, like a spanking-new car headrest just out of the bag.
    She rubbed his chest. “Think of all the things we can do.”
    “ I don’t know.” His mind gridlocked over the possibilities. Over recent weeks, he’d read about exotic travel, fancy cars, and houses with more staff than family members. Rich men were expected to consume the world and all the women in it. Kings and Presidents swore by it, but he’d loved Chelsea since fifth grade, when they’d stumbled into a beehive and ran screaming across the corn rows of Chesterfield. His love for her was deep enough to swim in. It felt silly to think that way, yet as he watched his friends’ marriages dissolve, some more than once, he believed that they never experienced real love. With Chelsea, he’d already won the grand prize.
    “ I can change the world for you.” She kissed him, drawing his bottom lip between her own. “See, my mouth is flawless.”
    He dropped his lingering hand. He wanted to demean her, erase his pitiful moment of weakness. “What more of the world is there?”
    “ A whole lot.” Gina’s eyebrows arched upward, undeterred. She jammed her business card into his shirt pocket and hopped off his lap. She winked like the first time she’d laid eyes on him. “See you around.”
    She began pushing the wheelchair