Even if having someone dare to take charge in bed once in a while appealed to me. “I’ll see you on the mats!” I called out to one of our regulars, Mike, as he made his way for the locker room. He flipped me off, continuing on his way without even glancing back at me.
“Don’t you have work to do or something?” he yelled, and I fought back my rising smile. I could always count on the moody ass to hate mornings as much as I did.
“Anything I should know?” Beth asked as I walked up to the front desk. She flipped her pixie cut blond hair away from her face, leaning tattooed forearms on the counter.
“Nope.” I popped the word with my mouth, ignoring the way she studied me. The damn woman saw way too much for her own good, even if we never talked about our personal lives in depth.
“Are you and Patrick back together?” she asked. I raised a brow at her, curling my lip into a grimace. “I’ll take that as a no. So what was he doing wallowing in the parking lot when I pulled in?”
I groaned, dropping my head to bang it against the counter five times. “Remember how relentless he was about getting me to go out with him?” I asked her, my voice muffled by my proximity to the surface.
I’d disinfected it the night before, so it was clean, at least.
I hoped.
Ugh.
“You mean when I told you he was kind of creepy?” she asked, brushing a stray hair off my face as I turned my head to rest my cheek on the counter.
“Yep. Hard to imagine, but I think he’s worse now that he’s gotten to stick it in me.” She shook her head with a laugh. An expression I’d gotten very familiar with over the years. Sometimes, I considered developing some tact or thinking before I opened my mouth.
But fuck that.
“I don’t understand why you dated him in the first place.” She twisted, logging into the computer system as it booted up.
“My life was suddenly overwhelmed with testosterone by association when Ivory got married. I wanted someone normal. I didn’t realize normal would be so freaking boring.” I grinned, spinning to face some early gym members as they strolled in through the doors and made their way to the locker rooms to get changed.
It was one of the great perks of my job that I worked with muscled, shirtless boxers all day long.
It was also one of the great downsides that none of them were mine to play with.
Ivory had Matteo. Samara had Lino. Calla had Ryker.
I had an ex-boyfriend who couldn’t seem to understand that I didn’t want his wayward dick anymore. I shuddered, trying not to wonder how long he’d been getting action on the side while we’d been having sex.
As far as I was concerned, his dick was contagious and needed a biohazard bag, even if my tests had come back clean.
“Girl, you need the opposite of boring.”
She was right, unfortunately. “I don’t think what I need exists. I’m just going to be content with what’s possible. Not spend my time looking for some fairytale romance. I’m in no hurry to get married, anyway, so it’s all good. I need a fuck buddy to replace my vibrator, but he’s gotta be decent to manage that.”
“Gross,” Mike inserted, stepping out of the locker room with a grimace. “We’ve talked about this, Killer. You do not have a sex life. It doesn’t exist.”
Tapping the counter, I grinned at Beth with a roll of the eyes. “Right, just like you don’t, either. I’m so sure.”
“Of course I do. I’m not like a sister to me.”
“I hope not. I know you’re close to your family, but I think that would require a whole different kind of closeness.”
“Shut up, Runt,” he taunted and laughed, shoving my shoulder as he climbed up into one of the rings in the main space. “Did I hear Beth say Patrick was hanging around this morning?”
“You told me to shut up.” I smirked, turning for the young woman who had stepped in the front doors and looked around, lost.
“And you wonder why I eavesdrop!” he called after me.
The woman glanced at him, her eyes darting back to me as I approached. “Can I help you?” I asked, watching the uncertainty as she swayed her weight from side to side with an excess of nervous energy.
It was something I saw often, and I knew what she would say before she ever opened her mouth.
“My friend Camille said you might help me,” she admitted with a whisper. “There’s this guy—”
“Oh honey, there’s always a guy. Come on. I’ll get you on the mat. The first session is free. After that, I only charge $20 for a private session. But if you can’t afford it, I teach a free class every Sunday night. Sometimes they can get crowded, but my more experienced students come back and help a lot. You’ll learn plenty that way, too.” I led her over to one of the empty mats at the back of the room, and my guys knew enough to ignore us. No woman who found herself in a situation where she lived in fear wanted the attention of a bunch of intimidating men on her.
“How can you do that? You must lose so much money.”
I nodded. “Some things are worth more than money. The ability to defend ourselves is something that should be free. So here, in my gym, it can be.”
She slipped off her shoes as I took off the slippers I wore around the gym. I knew I looked like an idiot, but when I was in and out of rings and mats all day with wraps around my ankles, the last thing I wanted was man filth between my toes.
They were nasty creatures.
The moment my foot touched the mat, it felt like my body relaxed beneath me. It was where I belonged. Where I’d grown up, even
