She vaguely wished he’d stop saying her name, or stop talking altogether. It was getting harder and harder for her to get through massaging her ex-lover, whose sexy body now belonged to the woman he’d left her for. She tried focusing on the music, working down his back to massage his ribs and sides. She felt him loosen, seemingly satisfied with her tactile answer.
“I’m glad you found someone better than me,” he murmured. “I bet your husband’s the opposite of me, funny and carefree. I bet he makes you laugh, you always loved to laugh.”
“Derrick was funny,” she admitted with a smile.
“He’s run out of jokes already?” JT teased, and her hands stilled momentarily. She hated this part.
“He, uh, he passed away a few years ago.”
JT propped himself up again to crane back at her, the look of panicked guilt she had expected on his face.
“What? Jesus, Mags, I’m so sorry. I’m like rambling on and… God,” he swore, his hand coming to his chin again. Her heart gave a painful squeeze at the nickname no one had ever used but him.
“It’s okay,” she waved his apology away, knowing it wouldn’t work. It never did.
“Fuck, I’m genuinely ruining your whole day. I should go.”
“Whatever. Do what you want.” Maggie was surprised at the sudden vehemence of her tone. She had felt her frustration flaring, but she was downright icy. Could this day get any fucking worse? Get him off her table and give her half an hour’s respite before the slew of clients she had today. How would she use the time, she wondered faintly. Would she cry out of loneliness? Or would she rub herself raw to the memory of JT’s hard body under her hands? It was a coin toss. Perhaps a bit of both.
JT was staring at her dumbfounded, his expression concerned. The light music played on and Maggie turned away, going back to the side table and fiddling with her things. Just get dressed, she swore to him in her head. Just get out.
But a long moment passed and she heard nothing, not the squeaking of her massage table or the rustling of fabric. She felt her heart beat faster, shifting her weight restlessly. What was he waiting for?
“Come back, Mags,” she heard his soft voice beckon to her, and she shivered.
Then she did hear shifting, and turned to look over his shoulder. He had laid back down.
Tentatively she returned to him, realizing she still held a bottle of self-warming oil in her hand. Absently she poured a little on his back and used her knuckles to work on his vertebrae.
“It feels nice,” he crooned, and Maggie’s heart gave another strange lurch.
She continued her work, venturing down the length of his spine, finding the tension she had expected in his lower, center back.
“I was surprised when you just vanished,” she said, almost to herself, hearing the words and feeling surprised she had even spoken aloud. “Makes sense though, that you went off to do the right thing.”
JT sighed heavily. “I tried to make it work with Courtney, I really did. Aspen was just so sweet and innocent, we both wanted her to have a real family, and we tried. But Courtney and I have always been like two pieces of a puzzle that just don’t quite fit right. You can jam it and jam it all you want but it never really goes. We’d fight all the time at night when Aspen went down, and it eventually got to be too much. We tried living in separate parts of the house and co-parenting but I couldn’t do it. So we got divorced, and we share custody. I moved back to town where at least I could work at a place bigger than the local bank, get back into investing.”