Leveled: A Novella. Jay Crownover

at school so I could get out and go to work, and put all my energy into helping others. I still dated here and there, but no one had that same effect on me that Remy Archer did. No one immediately touched my heart, and I was too busy and too focused on my career and making a difference in my clients’ lives to notice the loss.

      That’s why my reaction to Dom was equally shocking and thrilling. When I first saw Remy and started to fall in love, it was like being surrounded by a fluffy blanket of good feelings and endless comfort. It was something I sunk into and never wanted to be without. It felt easy and as natural as breathing. The instant I laid eyes on the big, brooding cop it was like a full body assault. There was nothing easy or comfortable about it. My ears started ringing like I had been knocked upside the head. My vision narrowed so that all I could see was him, and what I saw made my blood heat up and my heart thump loudly. My chest hurt and it was hard to breathe because all I could smell was the earthy, musky scent that was far too alluring and oh so masculine, that emanated from him. My knees went slightly weak, which made me glad I was standing behind my desk, and it took me a solid three minutes before I could get my voice to work.

      He was rougher-looking, more aggressive and assertive than the men I typically found attractive. He looked like he could easily take care of himself out on the streets and like he would have no trouble taking care of whoever he was with in the bedroom. Everything about him was dark and serious, from his short black hair to his intent olive-colored gaze that clearly showed his frustration and fear. His voice was deep and gravelly and the way it made my skin ripple in response had me needing to sit down and take a minute to pull myself together. I wasn’t prepared for him. My reactions were completely visceral and primitive. All the responses Dominic Voss drew from me felt like they came from someplace elemental and animalistic. It was my reaction to him that scared the holy hell out of me.

      As he pushed himself to complete the test, his muscles bulged and flexed. His broad chest expanded and contracted rapidly, making the white scars that crisscrossed his shoulder and side stand out in stark relief against the rest of his tawny skin. There was more evidence of his obviously risky line of work in the jagged scar that shot over his ear and along the side of his skull and contrasted with his short, dark hair. Everything about the man seemed dangerous and brutal, which wasn’t something I should find appealing.

      But I so did.

      When the hour ended and the treadmill cranked down to a barely moving pace so he could cool down, he pulled the respiratory mask off and huffed out, “Not bad, right?”

      He was still breathing heavily, but there was obvious pride hidden beneath his exertion.

      I frowned a little bit and marked some things off on the chart I was using to track his vitals.

      “How does your leg feel?”

      He lifted a dark eyebrow at me and I watched as his hand went to his thigh. The corners of his mouth turned down in a scowl. “It’s fine.”

      I made a noise in my throat and met his dark look with one of my own. I was stupidly attracted to the man, fascinated that after so long I had a genuine response to someone, but I had a job to do and his long term recovery was my priority, not getting him into bed.

      “I think ‘fine’ is an exaggeration. I think you are pushing yourself too hard and your body is fighting back.”

      He continued to rub his thigh while lines of discomfort furrowed across his forehead. I took the opportunity to watch the enticing flex of muscle and sinew that was everywhere as he moved.

      “Haven’t you ever heard of playing through the pain? Yeah, it fucking hurts, everything fucking hurts, but I can’t live my life waiting for it not to hurt before I start existing again.”

      I inhaled sharply and shifted my gaze back to the clipboard. I’d done my fair share of waiting for things to stop hurting before getting my life back on track and the reminder, even though he didn’t know anything about me, stung, and the fear of living and losing what mattered most nipped at all of my senses.

      “If you work the muscles so hard that they never get the chance to fully repair themselves, you’ll never get your natural stride back. If you push yourself too hard, you’ll never recover from your injuries, and where you are now is the best that you’ll ever be.”

      He grunted and stepped off the treadmill. “Then tell me what to do and I’ll do it.”

      I had to bite my tongue—hard—from spitting out the really inappropriate things I wanted to ask him to do.

      Things like step closer.

      Things like let me touch him all over.

      Things like let me kiss everything that hurts so I could make it better.

      I closed my hand around the pen I was using to make notes so tightly the plastic casing snapped.

      My assistant and my new patient both looked at me curiously as I cleared my throat and awkwardly took a step away from the heat I could feel coming off of Dom’s half-naked body.

      “I can give you the tools to make your body work better, but you have to listen to what it’s telling you. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t push past the pain in order to get results, but you need to be able to tell the difference between something simply hurting and something being irrevocably damaged.”

      That was what condition I thought my heart was going to be in after I lost Remy, but now the twinges it was having, the twitches it was displaying at the nearness of this man made me wonder if it, like Dom, had been injured and pushed too hard to heal before it was ready.

      Dom’s dark head bent down so that he was looking at the tips of his tennis shoes. He put his hands on his lean hips and I saw his wide shoulders hunch forward. He looked like he was suddenly being weighed down with the truth of how serious his situation was and that his natural-born fight may have been doing more harm than good.

      “I just want to get back to how I was.”

      I reached out a hand before I could stop myself and put it on his shoulder. His skin was warm, vital and throbbing with so much life under my fingertips. His head jerked up at the contact and our eyes locked. It felt like the most meaningful conversation I had ever had was happening even though no words were exchanged as we looked at each other.

      “There is no going back but there is accepting your new normal.” That was one of the hardest lessons I had had to learn along the way.

      Those massive shoulders went back, his army-green eyes gleamed at me, and I almost passed out when the full impact of the sexy grin he unleashed hit me.

      “I’ll accept that there might not be any going back, but there is going forward and from where I’m standing what’s in front of me is anything but normal.”

      He might be a bruiser and far more blunt in his manner and with his words than I was used to, but as we continued to watch each other I had to admit it was a nice change of pace to see the intensity of the things I was feeling reflected right back at me.

      There was nothing subtle or hidden about Dominic Voss and that forthrightness was irresistible and a balm to the hidden parts of me that were just as broken as his body was.

       Chapter 3 Dominic

      I hurt all over.

      It was a different hurt than the searing and relentless pain that had taken up residence in my shoulder and leg since the accident, this was more of a constant ache, a heavy throb that lived deep in all of my muscles and reminded me every waking moment that there was still work to do. I always considered myself to be in excellent shape and worked hard to make sure that I could not only keep up with the bad guys but with all the other guys on the force. After spending a week getting my ass handed to me by Lando I understood that just being able to bench-press my own weight didn’t mean shit about being fit.

      He had me doing all kinds of things to build my strength back up and all kinds of things I had never done