Winning Love

by Abby Niles

  He could pinpoint every single person who had already completed the run. How?

  A layer of dried mud was crusted on their skin.

  The insane woman had brought him to a mud race.

  Shaking his head, he stifled a laugh. Gayle never stopped shocking him. How in the hell would she top this? She couldn’t. There was absolutely nothing she could do or say that would be able to dethrone an obstacle course over a pit of sludge. Nothing.

  But he felt no resentment or anger at being misled. The lightness he’d known she’d bring filled his chest. Yeah. Agreeing to join Gayle had been the right decision.

  After slamming himself into his room yesterday, the only person he’d thought of as he sat alone on the edge of his bed, head cupped in his hands, was Gayle, and how much he really could use one of her quips to shock a smile out of him—knowing somehow she would drive away the isolation. In those moments, he’d accepted he needed her…at least for now. Though his attraction to her terrified him, she helped bring a lightness back that he hadn’t felt in a long time.

  He’d called Gayle right then and there and asked if the offer to join her for the race still stood. There’d been no hesitation, just an instant “Of course it does,” that had eased his lingering doubts and helped him fall into a dreamless sleep. This morning, when she’d shown up at his door wearing a pair of ultra-bright, pink, running boy-shorts, a purple tank top, and matching striped socks she’d pulled to her knees, he should’ve known something was amiss. But this was Gayle. If she’d shown up in a freaking tutu, he might have paused for a minute but then brushed it off. His second clue should’ve been when she suggested he grab a change of clothes. Asking why had only gotten him a smartass, “Do you want to be in sweaty clothes all day?”

  Now he had the real answer. What he had on wasn’t just getting sweaty. The neon green running shorts and the first sponsor shirt he’d earned as a pro fighter would soon be covered in mud. He didn’t give two shits about the shorts. The shirt, well, that was a different matter. Yeah, it was old, but he didn’t want it ruined. Unfortunately, the spare wasn’t one he wanted ruined, either. He glanced around. Many of the guys had bare, mud-covered chests. Guessed he’d be doing the race shirtless, too.

  Gayle peered over her shoulder, one of her pigtails flipping into the air. Those were damn cute on her. They weren’t the low ones she had sported the day they’d met. A tail jutted out on each side of her head and was held in place with pink ribbon bows, matching the getup she had on. A smile tried to emerge every time he looked at her.

  “I have to find Milton,” she said. “He’s the coordinator I told you about. He’ll have all your stuff.”

  “Okay.”

  After five minutes of meandering through the massive crowd of people, a beefy, muscular man with close-cropped black hair, who had to be ten years younger than Mac, came out of nowhere and tossed Gayle over his shoulder, spinning her around.

  Mac tensed, then charged forward, prepared to bash the man’s teeth in, but then he registered Gayle’s delighted laughter. Upside down, she popped the man on the ass, just as she had Mac the other day. Did she smack every guy’s ass?

  “Milton! Put me down.”

  The younger man finally put her back on her feet, tugged one of her pigtails, and slung an arm over her shoulder. “Hey, gorgeous.”

  The radiant smile she sent the man tweaked Mac’s gut oddly, and all he wanted was to get her away from this guy. It was also as if she’d forgotten Mac was even there. What the fuck? He cleared his throat, and Gayle glanced over at him. “Oh! Yes!”

  Damn. She really had forgotten he was there.

  “Milton! I want you to meet Mac Hannon.”

  “What the hell, Gayle! Say it right. This is Mac ‘The Snake’ Hannon.” Milton shoved the hand that wasn’t resting around Gayle’s shoulder at Mac. “Huge fan! What brings you to Kansas?”

  As Mac took the offered hand, he tried to keep from scowling at the masculine fingers dangling a little too closely to a perfect breast, or how the owner of said perfect breast wasn’t trying to move away. “I’m helping a friend train.”

  “Who?”

  “Lance Black.”

  “Never heard of him.”

  “You will.”

  Gayle shifted into Milton’s side, bringing her arm around his waist and tilting her face up to look at him. “Did you get Mac registered?”

  The tweak pinched his gut a little bit harder this time, and Mac worked his neck, trying to relieve the irritation.

  “Yep, I grabbed both packets when I saw you coming toward the registration tent. Your bibs and drink tokens are inside.” He held out a piece of paper and pen to Mac. “I need you to sign this.”

  Mac snatched them from him and scribbled his signature on the release form, hoping it would get the man to go away. All the lightness he’d felt was now gone, and it hadn’t disappeared until this asshat had shown up and Gayle had started fawning all over the fucker.

  “Your heat will start gathering at the starting line in about twenty minutes,” the man said. “Have fun, and make sure to stick around afterward.”

  “Plan to.” Gayle rose on her tiptoes and kissed him on the cheek. The sight of those inviting lips he’d been fighting not to take for days, now on another man’s skin, had Mac grinding his molars. “Thanks for arranging this, Milton,” Gayle said. “I owe you one.”

  “A favor!” Milton looked at Mac and waggled his eyebrows. Mac swore he felt a tooth crack. “You heard that, right? She owes me one. Woman, I know exactly what I want.”

  If this asshole didn’t get the fuck out of here, Mac was liable to toss him in one of the mud pits. Thankfully, he dropped a peck on the top of Gayle’s head, then sprinted off toward the tents again.

  Gayle turned toward Mac. “You read— What the hell is the matter with you?”

  Since he could actually feel the scowl on his face, God only knew what it looked like. He sure wasn’t going to express the immense aversion he had for Milton on first sight—nor was he going to examine it. “So this is a mud race. You kind of left out that little piece of information.”

  “Did I forget to mention it? Oops.”

  “Since this is one of my favorite shirts, looks like I’ll be running without it.”

  “Trust me, handsome, I won’t mind.”

  Warmth spread across his chest, easing the aggravation. It was the first time she’d used her nickname for him since things had gone awkward yesterday…and she hadn’t called Milton by anything other than his name.

  “I still would’ve come, you know,” he said. “I was thinking about doing the one in Atlanta this year.” Though that race was definitely more serious, since it was one of the most grueling mud races anywhere. Costumes were not encouraged. The one today was just a good-time race, which fit Gayle.

  “You can line dance, and now you’re willing to wallow in mud. You can be such a stick in the mud, I just wasn’t sure how you’d react.” To soften the insult, she stuck out her tongue. “Take pride, handsome. You’ve surprised me. Twice. That doesn’t happen often.”

  She started walking toward the tents and he fell into step beside her. “How often do you do these?”

  “Whenever one is within driving distance. Rick is usually my mud buddy, but he bailed on me.”

  “Rick?” How many men did this woman hang out with?

  “He’s a co-worker.”

  “You’re a meteorologist, right?”

  “Yep.” As she came to a stop at a table under one of the tents, she dropped her backpack off her shoulder and handed it to the person behind the check-in desk. “If you’re taking your shirt off, you’re going to want to do it now.”

  She leaned a hip against the table…waiting expectantly. A rush of heat ran over him. Yeah, he was planning to do this shirtless, but he hadn’t planned on doing a strip show right in front of Gayle.

  “Come on, handsome. Take it off.”

  Groaning, he yanked the shirt over his head, wadd
ed it up, and stuffed it into the backpack that sat by his feet, then straightened.

  “Holy. Shit.”

  He glanced at Gayle, who was making it no secret she was gawking, or that she liked what she saw as her gaze slowly appraised every inch of his exposed torso. A part of him wanted to puff out, let her get a really good view, but he was enjoying having her eyes on him a little too much. Instead, he reached down, lifted his backpack, and turned to check it in. The woman behind the table had apparently been in the process of scribbling down something, because now she was bent over a yellow notepad with a pencil still pressed to the paper, frozen…and was openly staring, as well. He glanced around. A lot of women were. Heat crept up his neck. It’d been a very long time since he’d been the object of such ogling—or at least been aware he was an object of it.

  “My. My. My, handsome. Those abs”—Gayle finally dragged her eyes away from his chest to meet his eyes— “should never be covered up. You really are doing a disservice to women everywhere by doing so.”

  Despite his embarrassment at the blatant attention, her over-the-top compliment pulled a chuckle out of him. As he handed the backpack to the check-in woman, who had finally stood up straight, a slight caress feathered across his ribcage on his left side. He flinched away.

  “Trust,” she said. “That’s beautiful.”

  His tattoo. Fuck.

  Without a word, he hurried past Gayle and out of the tent into the sun. Hands on his hips, he inhaled deeply, disturbed by the way he could still feel the slight brush of her fingertips across the inked skin.

  Ally had thrown the word trust around like it was a religion. Trust your decisions. Trust your instinct. Trust it will all work out. Trust, trust, trust. Hell, she even had him putting so much faith in that damn sentiment he’d permanently altered his body.

  A load of horseshit was what trust was.

  Trust was no damn different than hope—two worthless emotions the human psyche had come up with to try and banish the bad. All it took was finally seeing the truth. He’d seen it. He’d accepted. Nothing could be trusted. Hope was meaningless. No amount of trust or hope would make a lick of difference.

  Gayle ran past him and slapped something to his chest, knocking him from his morose thoughts. Automatically his arms came up to grab whatever it was as he looked down. His running bib. Lifting his head, he watched her sprint into the group gathering at the starting line. No awkward moment. No explanations. No puzzling stares. Damn, the woman was amazing.

  I’m very familiar with the look you get.

  Her words from yesterday echoed back. Was it possible she had been close to someone who had gone through something traumatic? Was that how she knew when to back off?

  Either way, she knew exactly when not to push, and he appreciated her for it.

  He pinned his bib to his shorts, then jogged to her side. After she attached her number across her stomach, she reached her arms above her head, and arched her back. Mac knew she was stretching, knew for once she wasn’t deliberately trying to get a rise out of him…and still she did. The snug purple spandex hugged her breasts, and his fingers itched to reach out and touch her as lightly as she’d touched him.

  Fuck, this was getting bad. It was easier to ignore the attraction when she was provoking it, but the awareness of her was becoming constant, evoked simply from her standing there…he couldn’t ignore that. And was beginning to think he didn’t want to.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” a masculine voice boomed overhead, startling Mac out of his alarming thoughts. Thank God. “Thirty seconds.”

  Gayle bent her leg behind her and grabbed the top of her foot with both her hands. Stretching. He probably should do that. Anything right now to keep from watching her. He followed her lead.

  “You’re going to love this,” she said as she switched legs.

  “How long is the course?”

  “Four miles and fifteen obstacles.”

  “Three…two…one.” A boom sounded, and runners started to sprint down the roped-off section of the parking lot.

  Mac hopped from foot to foot, warming up his muscles as he waited for the crowd to thin. Since they were toward the back of the line, their progress forward was slow. Once they got past the bottleneck at the starting line, things opened up, and they were able to set an even pace. He set his stride to Gayle’s, making sure to stay beside her. Through the mile jog across a street and into a more tree-thickened area, he found himself anticipating the obstacles, wondering what they would be. Had he known he would be doing this today, he would’ve studied the course, found out what to expect, made sure there weren’t any surprises. Come up with a game plan.

  Gayle had taken that away from him. Made him just be in the moment. And there was a thrill to it he’d forgotten he missed. At one time, he used to be a go-with-it sort of guy. What would it be like to be that guy again? Did he want to be that guy again?

  He sneaked a glance at Gayle. Maybe. At least while he was here.

  They came to an open field with tires spread out on it. He and Gayle each grabbed one and sprinted about fifty yards then tossed them onto a growing pile on the other side.

  “The first few obstacles are just to warm us up,” she warned as they continued down the path.

  “Good, ‘cause that was lame.”

  She gave a winded laugh. “Just wait until the mud comes into play.”

  “That’s when the real fun starts?”

  “Oh, yeah.”

  The next obstacle was a wood wall. Easy enough to get over, since it was like climbing a ladder. Afterward, they awkwardly made their way across a thin rope bridge over a shallow gully, then crept across a rather rickety-looking balance beam. As they approached an arched monkey-bar contraption, Mac noted the large mud pit underneath. Shit was about to get interesting.

  “You first,” he said. “I’ll start when you’re a few bars ahead of me.”

  With his upper body strength, he’d be able to swing across this thing without any issues. But he’d didn’t want to just zip past Gayle.

  “All right.”

  She slowly—very slowly—swung from one bar to the next. Come on, woman. As she hung from the fifth and sixth bar, he paced along the edge of the pit. She wasn’t going to make it.

  Monkey bars were hard enough when they were straight across. Put in an arch, and more muscle, strength, and endurance were needed to complete the task. Gayle was using all hers up just dangling as she worked up the momentum to make it to the next bar.

  Mac rubbed his mouth, struggling not to start clapping and yelling at her to pick up the pace. Gayle wasn’t one of his training buddies. He wasn’t at the gym. But the competitive edge ate at him now. Drove him.

  When she finally made it to the middle, he wrapped his hands around the first and second bars and quickly monkeyed across. Within seconds, he was beside her. By the way her eyes widened and she gasped, his sudden appearance had startled her. One second she was there, the next she was gone. Right in the sludge below. Fuck, that was his fault.

  He glanced down. The sludge came above her knees, and as she struggled to walk, she slipped, landing on all fours. Immediately, Mac let go of the bar. Warm, slimy mud enveloped the bottom part of his leg.

  As he mucked his way toward her, worried she was going to be pissed he’d messed up her focus, he said, “Damn it, Gayle, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you lose your concentration.”

  A snicker greeted his words. She lifted her head, and the twinkle in her eyes made something in his chest expand. Holy hell. She didn’t give a rat’s ass that he’d fucked up her progress. Someone jarring his focus would’ve set him off.

  But Gayle was enjoying every single second of this. No frustration. No fierce competition. Just pure joy. He really could learn a thing or two from her.

  As he came to stand beside her, he put his hands on his hips. “And here I jumped in ready to save the damsel in distress. But you look happier than a pig in mud.”

  She tried to
push up and slipped, the mud coming up to coat her neck. A laugh burst from her as she held up her hand. “As much as I love to get down and dirty, this damsel could still use your help.”

  Grinning, he latched his hand around her mud-coated one and yanked her up. After they pretty much had to crawl out of the pit onto flat land, they stood up. Mac surveyed the man-made mud hill in front of them—which had become slicker by the many other racers who had gone over it before them. And the ones slipping over it now.

  “This should prove interesting,” he said.

  “I can tell you from experience, there is no use trying to run up the hill. Slow and steady, handsome.” She winked, then started to bear-crawl up the hill by digging her fingers and the toes of her shoes into the mud. When she got far enough that he had room to begin, he followed the path she’d made. Concentrating on the indentions she’d left in the mud, he reached for one of the deep imprints made by her foot. One second his fingers had slipped into the slimy surface, the next, a squealing mass slammed into him and he was sliding down the hill on his back. As he drew to a halt at the bottom, the mass landed across his chest, knocking an oomph out of him.

  Her muddied pigtail slapped him across the cheek. Breathless laughter warmed his neck as she tried to control the giggles that had overtaken her. One feminine mud-coated hand rested on the naked skin of his chest—a place that hadn’t been touched by a woman in many years. The grime didn’t hinder the way this accidental touch scorched his flesh, consumed him. Unable not to, he cupped her elbow in his palm, just needing to return the connection.

  She lifted her head and gazed down at him, hazel eyes so full of life, happiness in her grin, a streak of mud across her cheek. Everything in him stilled for a brief moment then roared back with a vengeance. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d wanted to kiss a woman more.

  Ally. Her lifeless face swam before his eyes.

  A rough breath stuttered out of him as he struggled to shut down the painful memory that threatened to explode before his eyes, and he released Gayle’s elbow.