Out of Bounds (The Summer Games #2)(21)

He didn’t ask before he took my ankle in his palm. His hand was massive and I knew if he closed his fist, his fingers would touch around my ankle. He unwound the pre-wrap I’d just taken my time securing in place and tossed it aside to start fresh. He ran his finger along the back of my Achilles, forcing me to flex my foot to ensure the wrap was in the right spot.

“I usually like to—”

His eyes sliced up to me, warning me to stop while I was ahead. I sighed and leaned back on the vault, letting him do as he pleased.

“Right. Just keep doing what you’re doing, then.”

He chuckled, smooth and low. “Was planning on it.”

I shook my head. “You know, if you weren’t my coach, I’d say you were kind of an *.”

He paused and glanced up from beneath his dark lashes. “But since I am your coach…”

His blue eyes seared into me and my stomach dipped. From a distance, his eyes looked like a simple, solid blue, but up close I could see that wasn’t the case; there was a dark blue ring around the iris, darkening the cerulean blue to something more intriguing. His eyes were so gravitational, I had to resist the urge to bend closer and get an ever better look at them.

Instead, I turned away. “I’ll just think it then.”

He laughed and tossed the pre-wrap aside. I handed him my role of athletic tape and his fingers brushed mine. The proximity was unsettling. I’d been this close to dozens of coaches over the years and I’ve never thought anything of it. Yet sitting there, letting Erik wrap my ankle felt charged and intimate, and the more I thought about it, the worse it became. My cheeks flushed as his hand cradled my calf. He wound the tape around and around and I prayed he would finish soon.

“Well if it helps you train, you can think whatever you’d like,” he countered. “I only care about results.”

I nodded, unsure of my next move.

“What were you listening to?” he asked, as if sensing my awkwardness.

“Oh,” I said, reaching for my forgotten MP3 player. “A little bit of everything. It’s my pre-workout playlist.”

“A little bit of everything, huh? What was playing before I got here?”

I pulled up the playlist and hit play on the first song. He angled his ear to me and I reached forward to slip the earbud in for him. For a few seconds, I sat and watched him listening to the song, hoping he’d like it.

A slow-spreading smile overtook lips. “The Lumineers.”

I grinned. “Bingo.”

He handed me back the earbud. “I saw them at ACL a few years back.”

“Really? I wish I could have been there.”

He smiled. “It was a good show.”

I nodded in agreement. “Seattle to Austin is pretty far to travel for good music though.”

He shrugged and tossed the tape aside, finished. “I was down visiting my mom.”

I nodded. Of course. I’d forgotten he had a connection to the city.

He stepped back and assessed my ankle. I took a deep breath, aware for the first time that the air had been spiked with his body wash; when he’d stepped away, he’d taken the scent with him.

“Come to me from now on when you want it wrapped. It’s too close to Rio to risk f*cking it up.”

I liked the way he said that word: no apologies, no remorse.

I hopped off the vault and tested out the tape. It felt ten times better than when I did it myself, but I would never admit that to him.

“Not bad,” I smiled.

He hid his smirk as he turned and walked away.

I joined the other girls at the bars. They were ahead of me, standing around the chalk bucket and fixing their grips—well, everyone but June. She was on the other side of the mat, chalking her grips at a separate bucket.

“How’s the ankle?” Lexi asked with a knowing smile.

I rolled my eyes. “Fine.”

“You know, I had to wrap my ankle this morning as well and Coach Winter didn’t bother helping me.”

I kept my focus on my grips. “You should ask him to help next time, maybe he thinks you’re better at it than I am.”

Molly snorted. “You’re delusional.”

She and Rosie walked off to take the bars first and I hung back with Lexi. She nudged my shoulder and tilted her head to where Erik was working with June at another set of bars. He held her arms above her head and swept them down, showing her what form to take her for dismount. “You know he used to compete.”

I nodded. “Most coaches were gymnasts at one point.”

She shook her head. “He didn’t just compete, he made it all the way to the Olympics and quit just after trials.”

“Really?” I watched him step back from the mat and wave June onto the bars. He was focused on her, his eyes narrowed, his coaching face in place. “Was he injured or something?”

She shrugged. “No one knows for sure. He never did an interview about it or anything. He’s pretty much stayed out of the spotlight ever since.”

Weird.

“After he quit, he disappeared for a while and then popped up in Seattle to open this gym. He was only nineteen at the time. Crazy, right?”

I nodded, mesmerized by the missing parts of Lexi’s story. Why would he quit right before the Olympics? How could a nineteen-year-old afford to start his own business?