Beyond The Music (The Rock Gods Book 7) (13 page)

Aaron had Lincoln in the pool after lunch going through a variety of aerobic exercises using large rubber balls and other floating devices all meant to help him with balance and strength. By the time Lincoln pulled himself out of the pool, he was exhausted. Aaron set up his massage table out by the pool and gave Lincoln another long massage that relaxed him to the point this time he actually did fall asleep.

When Aaron finished, he helped Lincoln sit up on the edge of the table. “After you change we’ll work on your guitar some more.”

“How about I take a nap instead?” Lincoln suggested. He growled when Aaron shook his head.

“We only have so many days to get you ready for practice,” Aaron reminded Lincoln. “Besides, I don’t want to lose the momentum we’ve got going right now.”

“Me resting for a few hours isn’t going to jeopardize my progress, Aaron.”

“Guitar work first, then you can rest,” Aaron said.

Lincoln rolled his eyes and hopped off the table. He made no effort to keep the sheet wrapped around his waist as he walked toward the house.

“You forgot your shorts,” Aaron called out to him.

“If you don’t want to see my naked ass then look the other way,” Lincoln barked. “Because I’m not putting those wet shorts back on.” Lincoln ignored the laughter he heard coming from Aaron behind him and walked into the house.

Lincoln was finally able to ditch Aaron after dinner. He hobbled to his bedroom, took a hot shower, and then relaxed naked on top of his bed with his acoustic guitar draped across his lap. Physically he was exhausted. Muscles he wasn’t aware he had were sore now, but it was a good kind of hurt, wasn’t it? His emotions were another story altogether. He still had not fully grasped the reality that lay before him with this disease and what kind of life he’d have because of it. But Aaron was giving him a new perspective on living and Lincoln could slowly feel himself emerging from the fog he’d been wandering around in for the last two years.

Aaron was making him feel whole again. Alive. That in itself was part of what was bothering Lincoln. Along with those feelings came others that Lincoln wasn’t sure how to process. And it was becoming increasingly obvious that Lincoln was feeling more than he should for Aaron, something beyond the normal nurse-patient relationship. There were also times when Lincoln was sensing Aaron felt the same damn way about him.
Unless he treats all his patients like this?

Talk about a major slap to the face. Lincoln had finally found someone he’d like to explore something physical with and he has a disease that has robbed him of the ability to function as a normal man would. Not to mention, Aaron was technically employed by Lincoln and Lincoln wasn’t sure how that all worked with licensing and such. It was kind of ironic Lincoln would be in this position of wanting someone he was unable to have. First time in his life and it sucked.

Lincoln worked for a few hours on his guitar, perfecting the melody that had been running through his head for a few days. Lyrics were joining the music and Lincoln was writing them down as fast as they came to him. It was sounding like a bluesy ballad, which worked perfectly with Lincoln’s deep baritone voice. Goosebumps rose up on his skin after the first time he played and sung the song through from start to finish.

Jesus.
He liked the sound of the music and the soulful quality of the words when threaded together. For the first time in a year, he was truly excited about something he’d created. He reached for his recorder to catch the song when he sung it a second time.

  ~ Unburden Me ~

Exposed my heart and soul to you.

Stripped bare and torn in two.

Lift the weights

That hold me down.

And I’ll fly free

If you unburden me.

In the damp stillness of the dawn

I shared my bed with pain.

I walked into the river of sin for you

To try and wash away my shame.

I let the current take me.

It swirled around my face.

I didn’t have the will to fight.

There’d be no more saving grace.

Take this pain and give me wings.

I want to touch the sky.

No more darkness; only light,

And no more tears to cry.

A weightless force, I would be.

No truer source of pure divinity.

Set me free to fly

And unburden me.

Lincoln hit the stop button on the recorder and let his head fall back against the pillows at the headboard of his bed. He was well beyond fatigued right now, but he couldn’t remember feeling better. He wasn’t even sure how long he’d been working. The time had flown by without notice and Lincoln felt . . . accomplished.

He swung his legs over the edge of the bed and attempted to stand. The wobble in his legs was subtle at first, then grew more severe as he tried to walk the short distance to his bathroom. Three slow steps and he was crippled with pain in his feet and legs so intense he fell to the floor in a fetal position.

“Holy fuckkkkkk!” Lincoln cried out in agony. “Shitttt!” He rolled on to his back and then to his other side, but the pain only increased. Before he could scream again, Aaron was inside his room on his knees beside Lincoln on the floor.

“What’s going on?” Aaron asked, as he quickly began to assess the issue.

“My legs . . . fuckkkk! It hurts so much,” Lincoln grunted through clenched teeth.

Aaron shifted Lincoln on to his back, paying no attention to the fact Lincoln was naked. His hands worked the length of Lincoln’s left leg and Lincoln did his best to try and breathe through the pain.

“Oh, my god!” Lincoln grit out. “I can’t take this! Make it stop! Please, make it stop!”

“It’s a leg cramp,” Aaron blurted. He turned Lincoln to his side and moved himself closer to Lincoln’s body in order to manipulate the tensed muscles in Lincoln’s calf and hamstrings.

Lincoln’s palms slammed against the floor as he yelled out in anguish. He’d never felt pain like this before that literally took away his breath. Tears began to build in his eyes and a thin mist of sweat popped up on Lincoln’s skin. Christ, he was going to cry like a little girl if the pain didn’t diminish soon. Or pass out. Shit! Soon as he thought it, his head began to swim and his sight faded, and then his body went lax.

Aaron flipped him quickly onto his back and straddled his hips. He leaned over Lincoln and gently slapped at his face to try and rouse him. “Hey! Stay with me,” Aaron directed. “Do you hear me?”

Lincoln’s eyes lifted slightly to slits and focused on Aaron above him. He wasn’t sure if he realized the position Aaron was in wearing only a pair of tight, white boxer briefs, or if it was Aaron who suddenly noticed he was sitting on top of Lincoln’s naked groin. Either way, the realization had Aaron scrambling off to Lincoln’s side.

“Jesus, I’m sorry about sitting on you like that,” Aaron apologized in a breathy voice. He latched on to Lincoln’s tight calf muscle, then continued to massage until he felt Lincoln’s body finally begin to loosen.

“You dry humping my cock is the least of my worries right now,” Lincoln tried to chuckle but his body was still spasming in pain.

Aaron’s eyebrows lifted in shock. “I wasn’t exactly . . .”

“Justify it however you need to,” Lincoln said. “All I care about is you making this pain stop.”

It took nearly thirty minutes for Aaron to get Lincoln’s leg muscles to relax to the point where the pain subsided enough for Lincoln to get back into bed. Aaron made him comfortable beneath the sheets before he returned to his own bedroom. An hour later, Lincoln was screaming out in pain all over again. Pain relievers taken with a sports drink, a hot bath, and a heating pad is what finally gave Lincoln the relief he needed for him to sleep. After this second time, Aaron remained in Lincoln’s bedroom and stretched out in a reclining chair sitting in the corner of the room in case Lincoln needed him a third time.

By the time the sun began to rise and seep between the window drapes in Lincoln’s bedroom, they were both exhausted. It was Lincoln’s soft moan that woke Aaron in the chair. Instinct drove him to hop from the chair and over to the bed to sit on the edge of the mattress beside Lincoln. He used his fingers to push the long hair off Lincoln’s forehead and touched his fingers to Lincoln’s face to feel for a temperature.

“What’s wrong?” Lincoln’s sleep gravely voice asked.

“Did I wake you?” Aaron asked in surprise.

“Yeah, I guess you did,” Lincoln answered.

“You groaned, so I thought you woke up in pain again,” Aaron explained.

Lincoln moved beneath the sheets and his eyes lifted to Aaron. “I’m a little sore, but nothing like last night.”

“The leg cramps are part of the MS,” Aaron said. “I’ll have to do a better job keeping you hydrated during the day and your muscles loose.”

“Will that happen to me every night?” Lincoln asked and pushed himself up to a sitting position with the headboard at his back. The sheets and comforter slid down Lincoln’s chest and pooled in his lap as he lifted himself in the bed. Aaron tracked the movement with his eyes and Lincoln felt the heat of that gaze all the way to his bones.

Aaron cleared his throat before he spoke. “That shouldn’t happen every night,” he said. “And you should also know it can happen during the day. It’s not just a nighttime thing.”

“Shit,” Lincoln exhaled. “What if it happens while I’m performing?”

Aaron shook his head and his hand reached to touch Lincoln’s thigh. “I’ll show you some exercises to loosen up before you go on stage,” Aaron said. “Drinking plenty of fluids helps, too.”

Lincoln rubbed at the exhaustion in his face. It suddenly occurred to him why his doctor had suggested he bring a nurse with him on tour, because nights like last night would be ten times worse if he were alone. Dealing with this disease in general was no longer something he wanted to do all by himself. He’d also discovered handling his illness with Aaron beside him had exposed the raw emotions involved. Lincoln no longer wanted to fight this battle without someone to lean on. He needed help, but asking for it had never come easy for Lincoln.

“I’m sorry I kept you up all night screaming like a little bitch,” Lincoln mumbled. “I mean, I know you’re getting paid to do this, but I’m really grateful you were here.”

“You’re right, it is my job, but I think you’ve seen how invested I become with my clients,” Aaron admitted. “It is far more than a job for me and I really do care about the wellbeing of everyone in my care.”

Lincoln nodded. “It shows,” was all he said then his eyes dropped to Aaron’s bare chest. The soft lighting in the room highlighted the toned planes of muscle on Aaron’s torso, which Lincoln hadn’t been able to appreciate the previous night when Aaron was straddling his hips and he was writhing in agony on the floor wedged between Aaron’s strong thighs. Now everything seemed to be more in focus. It wasn’t just the physical beauty of the man sitting on the edge of his bed, with the lightly tanned skin and the swirls of dark brown hair on his chest that fed into a thin treasure trail that drew Lincoln’s eye directly to Aaron’s groin. It was also the fact Lincoln could fully see the attachment he was developing for Aaron.

Lincoln’s head began to spin. He’d never felt an attachment for anyone before in his life, so why now with Aaron? Was it simply because Aaron was helping him through a difficult time in his life or was it deeper. God, he didn’t want this to turn into something emotional on his part. Partly because Aaron was his nurse and Lincoln didn’t need the complication of falling for his fucking nurse. The other aspect he needed to remind himself of was that Aaron cared about all of his clients the same way as he did Lincoln and when Aaron moved on to his next client, Lincoln would be nothing more than a memory or a line entry on his resume.

Lincoln’s eyes settled on the Celtic symbol tattooed above the waistband of Aaron’s boxer briefs. “What’s it mean?” Lincoln asked in a hushed voice.

“Balance,” Aaron answered and lowered the waistband another inch in that spot to expose the entire inked design. “It’s the Celtic version of the Chinese yin and yang symbol.” Aaron grabbed his bicep. “This barbed wire tattoo was my first. It has no real meaning for me. I just thought it looked cool at the time.”

Lincoln’s fingers were itching to touch the designs on Aaron’s skin. Instead, he balled the sheets up in his hands to prevent himself from reaching out. “Any others?” Lincoln asked.

“I have the yin and yang symbol on the back of my shoulder,” Aaron offered.

Lincoln tried a weak grin, but only managed to lift one side of his mouth. “That’s a lot of balance.”

Aaron shrugged. “Balance is also equality. Two opposing but complimentary forces together equal each other out and create a universal oneness or perfect harmony. It’s important we maintain that in our lives to keep ourselves centered. It’s also what I try to impart on my clients.”

“That’s really deep, Aaron,” Lincoln remarked. He left out the eye roll from his comment, but he was certain Aaron felt it nonetheless.

“Scoff all you want at the message,” Aaron said, “but when you find that balance in your life, you’ll find true peace.”

“If you start singing campfire songs I’m gonna have to slap my own message into you,” Lincoln laughed.

“Speaking of songs,” Aaron added. “I heard parts of what you were singing last night and it was really good. It is also intense.”

“It’s not done, but it’s getting there,” Lincoln replied.

Aaron nodded and stood up from the bed. “I’ll go throw on some clothes and come back to help you.”

Lincoln started to respond but the sight of Aaron walking away with all that gorgeous skin on display eliminated every thought inside his head. All he could do was silently watch the fluid beauty of Aaron’s stride as he moved across the room and down the hall.