Can't Hold Back Read Online Free Page B

through, she was on her feet, pushing her chair back. “Hey, guys? I have to try to convince someone they need PT, okay? I’ll be right back.”
    “Ha!” said Gabi. “You have an even tougher job than I do. I just have to convince guys they want to watch action movies and play flag football.”
    Alia made a face at her and went after Nate.
    He wasn’t in the hallway outside the dining room. She hesitated, then headed for the stairs.
    She’d looked up his room number when he’d failed to show up for his appointment, tracking him there unsuccessfully before she thought to ask the guys on the back porch whether they’d seen him.
    Just before the staircase, she heard a low, short groan of pain—more of a grunt, really. Not quite human. A wounded animal. She turned back. She’d almost missed him.
    He’d ducked into an alcove, the doorway of one of the first-floor meeting rooms. He was pressed into the corner, one arm up above his head as if to brace himself.
    “Nate.”
    “Go away.”
    “Nate, please let me help you.”
    He raised his face and his eyes glittered. “What, witnessing my humiliation once wasn’t enough for you?”
    She reached out a hand, but he flung his arm out and knocked hers away. “Get out of here.”
    “Give me a chance. One chance. If I can’t help, I promise I’ll leave you alone.”
    “No.”
    She couldn’t make him accept her help. He’d made his position more than clear. She turned to go. Then a thought struck her.
    “For Braden,” she said, turning back again. “If you won’t let me help you for
you,
do it for Braden.”
    A long moment passed. The only sound was his breath, hard and ragged. Then he looked up, defeat in his eyes. And nodded.
    —
    Sitting in the reception area, waiting for Alia to call him into her office, he repeated “for Braden” over and over like a mantra, because this
sucked.
He would have been perfectly happy to have never laid eyes on Alia or Becca again as long as he lived, but because the universe had a savage sense of humor, Jake had gone on vacation and left Alia in charge of pain relief.
    She’s the best,
Jake had said.
I hate to say it, but she’s better than me. If there’s any way to make the pain stop, short of numbing yourself to death, she will find it.
    He didn’t believe it. But she’d said the magic words,
For Braden,
and she’d made him a deal he couldn’t resist: If she couldn’t help him, she’d leave him alone.
    Plus, last night he had hurt so ferociously, he’d been ready to beg, borrow, or steal pills. And he didn’t want to even flirt with that thought.
    When she’d said she would help him, he’d briefly thought she’d meant right then. Right there. That she would lay hands on and somehow transform the pain, and him. But of course it made sense that she was just asking him to schedule an appointment, like anyone else. Any physical therapist would have certain professional boundaries, and that probably went double for a woman working among so many alpha men, and triple for working in a setting where the pain never stopped and you were geographically available 24/7.
    “Nate.”
    She always said his name like it was a statement of fact. A conclusion.
    He raised his head from where he’d rested it in his hands and regarded the woman standing before him.
    Not head-turning. Not flamboyantly pretty. But her eyes were warm and her hair shone in the sunlight, and her gray T-shirt hugged her curves, and if the situation hadn’t sucked so bad, if he hadn’t still been pissed at both her and her sister, if he didn’t feel like he’d been run over by a tank, he might have felt a stirring of lust.
    That would have been the final straw, so it was damn good it wasn’t the case.
    He got to his feet, unsteady. A week since the oxy had gone down the toilet, and still not quite clean. He could feel the hunger in his veins, clamoring at him. He felt dirty and corrupted and, God,
dizzy.
He prayed he wouldn’t throw up in her