Chapter 3: The First Touch

Dr. Carrie Vance

The clinic was silent—the kind of heavy, pressurized quiet that only exists in buildings designed to keep the world out. It was 8:00 PM. The staff had gone home, and my luxurious office space was enveloped in pin drop silence. 

I should have been home. I should have been sipping a glass of chilled white wine in my quiet apartment, celebrating the fact that I finally had the lion in my cage. Instead, I was standing in the dim light of Therapy Room Three, staring at the padded table where Jake Slater would soon be lying.

I hadn't expected him to show up tonight. I’d told him, two weeks. It was a test, a way to see how much of the "Legend" was left under the desperation.

He had lasted exactly six hours.

The elevator chimed down the hall. And in a matter of seconds, I was face to face with Jake Slater again. He was exhausted. Good. An exhausted man was a man who let his guard down. I straightened my white coat, checked my reflection in the polished steel of a cryo-tank, and waited.

He wasn't wearing the suit anymore. He had changed into black athletic shorts and a grey hoodie that stretched tight across his chest. He looked raw. Less like a billionaire CEO and more like the athlete who had once commanded the center of a stadium.

"I told you the fourteenth, Mr. Slater," I said, not looking up from the tablet in my hand.

"The fourteenth is for people who have time to lose, I don’t have that luxury" Jake rasped. He didn't wait for an invitation. He walked to the table and sat on the edge, his breath coming in shallow hitches. "I checked the Vanguard stock prices an hour ago. They’re dumping shares to artificially tank the value before the board meeting. I don't have two weeks. I have tonight."

I finally looked at him. His blue eyes were bloodshot, the skin beneath them bruised with fatigue. The arrogance was still there, but it was brittle now, like glass that had been struck too many times.

"Lie back," I said.

He obeyed, his massive frame taking up nearly the entire surface of the table. He was a mountain of a man, even when broken. I walked to the counter and picked up a bottle of warming oil. I had infused it myself—peppermint for circulation, arnica for the bruising, and a heavy base of sandalwood.

I poured a pool of it into my palms. The scent filled the small room, thick and intoxicating. I rubbed my hands together, the friction creating a heat that I felt in my own marrow.

I stepped up to the table and placed my hands on his right thigh.

Jake’s entire body jerked. His muscles turned to stone under my palms.

"Relax, Jake," I murmured. My voice was low, and professional, but my heart, my heart sand a different tune as it drummed a frantic rhythm against my ribs. "If you fight me, I’m just moving bone against bone. You’ll leave here worse than you arrived."

"Then don't... touch me like that," he growled.

"Like what?" I moved my hands in a long, slow stroke from his hip down to the top of his knee. The oil made the friction effortless, my skin sliding over his in a way that felt dangerously intimate. "This is a medical massage, Mr. Slater. If you're reacting to it, that's your problem, not mine."

I leaned my weight into him, my forearms pressing into the thick muscle of his quad. I could feel the heat radiating off him. He was a furnace. Two years of Europe, two years of training with the best, and I still wasn't prepared for the way his body felt under mine.

I moved to the knee. The scar was white and jagged, a lightning bolt frozen in his skin. I placed my thumbs on either side of the patella and began to rotate the joint.

Jake let out a sharp, choked groan. His hands flew up, grabbing the edges of the table until the metal groaned under his grip.

"It’s trapped," I said, my voice clinical. "The scar tissue has adhered to the ligament. Your surgeon didn't just leave a mess; he left a trap. Every time you walk, you're tearing the fascia all over again."

I leaned closer, my face inches from his thigh. I focused on the movement of the tissue, digging my thumbs deep into the groove of the joint. I felt him tremble. It started in his leg and moved up his torso, a fine, violent shaking.

Suddenly, his phone, sitting on the side table, lit up. It didn't just buzz; it screamed with a high-pitched alert.

Jake let go of the table and grabbed the phone. His face went from flushed to bone-white in a matter of seconds.

"What is it?" I asked, though the sinking feeling in my gut already knew.

He didn't answer me. Instead, he swiped his thumb across the screen and held the phone to his ear.

"Marcus? Tell me you're seeing this," Jake barked into the phone. His voice was a jagged edge. "How the hell did they get photos of me at the clinic? I was in and out in ten minutes!"

He sat up, ignoring the pain that made his jaw lock. He stared at the wall, his eyes wild.

"The Chronicle? It’s already on the front page? 'The Legend’s Last Stand'?" He let out a harsh, bitter laugh that sounded more like a cough. "The Vanguard Group. They had someone following me. They’re using the photos to trigger the board's lack-of-confidence vote. If they prove I’m seeking emergency medical intervention, they can argue I’m physically compromised for leadership."

Jake’s hand was shaking—not from the pain in his leg, but from pure, unadulterated fury. "I don't care what it costs, Marcus. Buy the editors. Kill the story. If that board meeting on Friday happens while those photos are circulating, I'm done. My agency is done."

He listened for a moment, his face sagging. "Just... do it."

He hung up and stared at the phone. For the first time since I’d known him, the "Legend" looked small. The bravado, the million-dollar smirk, the icy confidence—it had all evaporated. He looked like a man standing on the edge of a cliff, watching his entire world crumble into the sea.

His shoulders slumped.  He looked down at his ruined leg, and for a split second, I saw it. The fear. Not just the fear of losing money, but the fear of losing his identity. Without the agency, without the "Legend" title, he was just a man with a limp.

I watched him, my thumbs still slick with oil.

He’s scared.

The thought hit me with the force of a physical blow. I had spent two years imagining this moment—seeing him broken, seeing him desperate. I thought it would taste like victory. But looking at him now, huddled on the edge of the table, his ego stripped away by a single tabloid leak, I felt a strange, uncomfortable tug in my chest.

I almost felt sorry for him.

"I need to leave," Jake said, his voice hollow. He reached for his hoodie, his movements clumsy. "I have to get to the office. I have to find a way to stop this."

"Sit down, Jake," I said. My voice was firmer than I intended.

"You don't understand—"

"I understand that if you walk out that door now, with your hip flexors in a spasm and your knee misaligned, you won't make it to the office," I countered. I stepped in front of him, blocking his path. "You’ll collapse in the lobby. And then the Chronicle will have a photo of you being carried out on a stretcher. Is that the headline you want?"

He looked at me, his eyes searching mine. The "Shark" was gone, replaced by a man who was drowning. "I can't just sit here."

"Yes, you can. Lie back down. We’re finishing the session. If you want to save your company, you need to be able to walk into that board meeting on your own two feet. Right now, you can barely stand."

He stared at me for a long beat, his chest heaving. Finally, he gave a slow, defeated nod and lay back down.

I worked in silence for the next forty minutes. I didn't hold back. I pushed his body to its limit, breaking down the adhesions, forcing the muscles to release their grip on the bone. He didn't complain. He didn't groan. He just stared at the ceiling, his jaw set, enduring the pain like it was penance for all his shortcomings spanning his illustrious career.

By the time I finished, the clock on the wall read 9:15 PM.

"We're done for tonight," I said, wiping my hands on a towel. "I'll walk you out."

Jake sat up slowly. He looked dazed, the intensity of the treatment leaving him drained. He pulled on his hoodie and grabbed his cane, testing his weight. He was moving better, the hitch in his stride less pronounced, but he was still fragile.

We walked through the silent clinic together. The only sound was the rhythmic thump-click of his cane and the soft sound of my heels. When we reached the elevators, the doors opened with a quiet ding, and we descended to the parking garage in total silence.

The garage was a vast, echoing cavern of concrete and fluorescent light. Jake’s matte-black SUV was parked near the exit, its headlights cutting through the gloom.

As we stepped out of the elevator lobby and onto the concrete, Jake turned to me.

"Thank you, Carrie," he said. His voice was quiet, lacking the edge of his usual arrogance. "I know I wasn't... an easy patient today."

"Something tells me that’s not going to change," I replied, a small, involuntary smile touching my lips.

He looked at me then—really looked at me. For a second, the two years of distance, the red carpet interview, and the Diamond Club kiss all seemed to vanish. There was just a man and a woman standing in a quiet garage, the air heavy with things left unsaid.

Jake turned toward his car, but as he took a step, his cane slipped on a patch of oil on the concrete.

"Jake!"

I moved before I could think. I lunged forward, my arms wrapping around his waist as his body tilted precariously. He was heavy, a solid weight of muscle and bone, but I braced my feet and held him.

He slammed into me, his chest pressing against mine, his hands instinctively grabbing my shoulders to steady himself.

We froze.

Our faces were inches apart. I could feel the heat of his skin, the scent of the sandalwood oil still clinging to him. His blue eyes were wide, locked on mine. In the harsh, overhead light of the garage, I could see the gold flecks in his iris. I could feel the heavy, thudding beat of his heart against my own.

It was a moment frozen in time. A moment where the hatred I felt for him and the attraction I couldn't deny crashed into each other like a high-speed collision. I didn't want to let go. And for a second, I didn't think he did either.

Click.

The sound was sharp, like a gunshot in the quiet garage.

We both whirled toward the sound.

Tucked behind a concrete pillar twenty feet away was a man in a dark hoodie. He was holding a camera with a massive lens, the red light of the digital display glowing like a predator's eye.

"Hey!" Jake roared, his ego returning in a violent rush.

The paparazzo didn't hesitate. He turned and bolted toward the exit.

"You bastard!" Jake shouted. He lunged after the man, forgetting his injury, forgetting the cane. He took two staggering steps before his knee buckled.

"Jake, stop!" I screamed, grabbing his arm. "You're going to tear it! Stay down!"

He ignored me, his face contorted with rage. He tried to push past me, his eyes fixed on the retreating figure of the photographer. "That son of a bitch just caught us! Do you have any idea what he’s going to do with that photo?"

"I don't care about the photo, I care about your leg!" I shoved my shoulder into his chest, forcing him back against the side of his SUV. "If you run on that knee, you're finished! Do you hear me? Finished!"

Jake stopped, his breath coming in ragged gasps. He looked toward the exit just in time to see a beat-up silver sedan screech out of the garage, the tires squealing against the concrete.

The garage fell silent again, the echo of the car's engine fading into the night.

Jake leaned against the SUV, his head falling back against the glass. He looked defeated. Completely and utterly defeated.

"This is bad, Carrie," he whispered, his voice trembling with a mix of exhaustion and fear. "This is very, well... bad."

I looked at the empty exit, the cold L.A. air swirling around us. My heart was still racing, the phantom sensation of his hands on my shoulders still burning my skin.

I had wanted to destroy him. I had wanted to watch his world burn. But as I looked at the man leaning against his car, broken and exposed, I realized that the fire was spreading. And I was standing right in the middle of it.

"Get in the car, Jake," I said, my voice as hard as flint. "I'm driving you home."