An excited giggle was starting to make her lips tremble, so she clamped them down. Everything was going the way she’d imagined. She almost couldn’t believe how exactly. And she’d mapped out the disrobing process in her head in advance, had choreographed it, basically. The order in which she’d remove clothing items, how she’d avoid awkwardness when it came to unhooking her bra (she’d purposely worn a black lacy push-up that lifted and separated, not a horrible sports bra that flattened her breasts, turned them into a single fleshy pancake).

As she reached for the zipper on the side of her skirt, though, Jude stopped her, placing the frame of his racquet on the back of her hand. “No, not your clothes. I want you to take off your Band-Aid.”

“My Band-Aid?” she repeated.

“Yeah. I want you to show me what’s underneath.”

“You’ve seen what’s underneath.”

“And it’s not a mosquito bite. I want to see again.”

“Why?” The word came out a whisper.

Before he could respond to the question, she shook her head, rescinding it. She’d set the rules. Now she had to obey them. After all, he’d already exposed himself to her tonight, even if without knowing. She owed it to him to return the favor, to make herself vulnerable. Besides, she’d been prepared to get completely naked. What he was asking for should be a piece of cake in comparison. She grasped the edge of the Band-Aid with her pinched-together thumb and index finger. One fast motion, she told herself. As she started to pull, though, a jolt of fear ran along her spine, an electrical charge that made her fingers withdraw, curl self-protectively into her palm. She tried, but she couldn’t uncurl them. A silence developed, grew so deep she could hear the wet, clammy thud of her heart in it.

And then Jude said softly, “I’ll do it.”

He laid his racquet on the ground and put his arms around her almost in an embrace, but looser. His hand slipped under the back of her shirt, his fingers locating the spot just above the waistband of her skirt. He removed the adhesive slowly, his eyes on hers the whole time. She winced, but not at the pain. In fact, the air felt good on the always-covered patch of skin. So did his fingers, moving lightly over it, then clinging to it, applying different pressures, changing angles, deftly, skillfully, tenderly. He didn’t even seem to want to look at it, which should have relieved her, since it was the thought of the tattoo being viewed, and by him in particular, not touched, that made her stomach twist, the back of her neck start to sweat.