“Ian, what’s up, man? Long time no see,” said Bruce, a guy who had spotted me on the heavy weights more than once.
“I know. I’ve been out of it lately.”
Bruce’s face scrunched up in concern. “Everything all right?”
I opened my mouth to answer him with something simple and impersonal, but then I spotted Lauren walking through the door and I lost all train of thought.
“Um, did you hear me, bro? I asked if everything was all right,” Bruce asked again.
I nodded and swallowed hard. “Yeah, I’m fine. My dad on the other hand, not so much. I mean he’s better now, he just…um.” Lauren was walking to the front desk and talking with Tonya the receptionist. She smiled and flipped her hair over her shoulder. My eyes trailed over her, taking in the shorts and T-shirt she wore—both of them snug in all the right places—and I wondered what she was doing here. “He had a, a, um, heart attack a few weeks ago.”
“Holy shit, man. Is he all right now?” Bruce’s worried tone jerked me back to the conversation with him. “How are you holding up?”
I amped up the pace on the treadmill, hoping he would see I was going too fast to hold a real conversation and leave it at that. “I’m fine. My dad’s doing well. He pulled through, and now we’re all trying to get back into the swing of things,” I huffed out.
“Good. I’m glad to hear it,” Bruce said. What else was he supposed to say, though? Sorry? God, I was glad he hadn’t said he was sorry. I was so sick of people telling me they were sorry about my dad’s health, as though it was their fault. “If you need anything, let me know. Catch ya later.”
“Later.” I nodded.
As soon as Bruce walked away, I shifted my gaze to the front desk again in search of Lauren. She was still standing there, laughing and cutting up with Tonya. There was a clipboard in her hands. A jolt of excitement surged through me at the thought of her working out here, with me, getting all sweaty and toned. Hot damn, I bet she had some sexy little sports bras and yoga pants. Pushing the button on the machine to pick up the pace a notch, I pushed those thoughts down. The last thing I needed was to pop a boner in the middle of the gym. I would be labeled as a perv forever, and probably would have to get a membership elsewhere.
Focusing straight ahead, I saw from the corner of my eye when Lauren set the clipboard down on the desk and followed Tonya around for the tour. My heart rate increased, but not because of my running—because I was suddenly nervous about whether she would notice me.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
LAUREN
Cardio Strong was decent. It wasn’t anything like the gym at the university, but it still was better than attempting to find the motivation to work out with a blowup ball on my living room floor. There were a few things I needed while working out. One, visual motivation. I eyed Tonya’s sleekly toned physique with envy, thinking I could check that one off the list. And two, eye candy. My eyes scanned the place for the latter. There were a few guys who fit the bill, but then I spotted one that made me stop dead in my tracks.
Ian.
He was running on a treadmill along the far wall in all of his shirtless, sweaty glory. A pair of black basketball shorts hung low on his hips, revealing those sexy V lines pointing straight to an area of wonder. A white tank top draped over his left shoulder had become his sweat rag for the moment.
“These are the elliptical machines, and here are the stationary bikes.” Tonya continued to ramble about the equipment. “But I can see there might be another deciding factor coming into play at the moment—the amount of eye candy available. I must say, there is quite a bit.”
My cheeks warmed, and I dropped my eyes to the carpeted flooring. When I brought them back up, Ian was staring at me. His lips formed into the hint of a smile, and he waved. I waved back.
“I take it the two of you already know each other?” Tonya asked.
“Yeah, we do.” A wide grin built on my face when Ian stepped off the treadmill and headed in my direction.
“Lauren, hey. You thinking about joining?” he asked as he wiped his brow with the edge of the white tank top haphazardly tossed across his solid shoulder. “It’s a great place.”
I forced my eyes to glance around before bringing them back to his. “I can see that.”
“I think you have a great tour guide right here, so I’m just gonna mosey back to the front desk,” Tonya excused herself.
“I don’t think I’m much of a tour guide,” Ian insisted. A tiny smile touched the corners of his lips as he raked his eyes over me. “Is there anything she left out that you’d like to see?”
My mind filled with dirty thoughts. I wanted to see a few things, but they would be inappropriate to be flashed in public.
I shook my head. “No, I think I’m already sold.”
His grin deepened. “All right. Well, I’m almost done here, and then I’m gonna shower. Afterward, you wanna do something together?”
“Sure.” I had nothing better to do.
“Cool.” He shuffled his feet. “I’m gonna lift some weights. You can watch if you want or go talk with Tonya some more.”
“I’ll watch.” I could feel the devilish smile twist my lips as soon as the words left my mouth. There was no way to hide the rush of excitement that crept through me at the thought. A guy with muscles was sexy as hell, and damn, Ian fit the bill in that department. “If you don’t mind.” I winked.
He cocked his head to the side, his boyish grin still clinging to his face. “I wouldn’t have asked if I minded.”
Following Ian through Cardio Strong, I got an up close and personal view of his solid, tanned back. A slight sense of disappointment crashed through me at the realization it was tattoo free. There were three or four moles right in the center, but that was it. There was nothing else. I frowned. Nothing went better together than muscles and tattoos. Nothing. Now that I could see his entire upper body was free of even the tiniest tattoo, I was sure the rest would be virgin skin as well. At least I hoped. If he had some funky tattoo covering part of his ass, there had better be some seriously funny drunk story behind it. Ian didn’t seem like the type to have drunken moments like that though. He was too put together and serious.
“You don’t have any tattoos, do you?” I stopped in front of the weight bench he was setting himself up on.
“You sound disappointed about that.”
“Slightly.” I twisted my hair together and tossed it over my shoulder. “I think you could be ten times sexier if you had at least one good-sized one someplace.”
“Is that so?” There was a coyness to his voice, and demeanor that I’d only bore witness to on our last date together. This was another reminder that Ian Mason wasn’t as straight-laced and country sweetheart as I’d first thought. “Do you have one?”
Flashing him my sexiest smile, I placed a hand on my hip. “Guess you’ll have to get me naked at some point and find out.”
I’d said it to get a reaction out of him, and I damn sure did. His eyes nearly popped out of his head at my words, and I was one hundred percent positive if he had been chewing gum, he would have swallowed it. Even though I wasn’t looking for anything serious, it didn’t mean I couldn’t flirt. This was part of how things would pan out naturally between us. Being a flirt was part of who I was, and there was no harm in flirting.
“Is that a challenge I hear?” Ian spun a weight on the other side of the bar he planned to use.
His words shocked me, but I did my best to hide it. Country boy was hiding more badness in there. This shouldn’t come as a surprise I guess, not with the way his best friend was.
“Maybe.” I shouldn’t have added more fuel to the fire, because I was holding strong to my new way of things, but I wasn’t about to back down either, even if I was leading him on.
“Sounds promising.” Ian spun his final weight into place and stood up straight. His eyes locked with mine for a moment as he surveyed me with a pleased expression.
“We shall see
. Why don’t you lift some weights, big boy? I’m gonna go finish filling out the papers for my membership,” I said.
The heat in his eyes was doing things to me that would be difficult to tame if I didn’t walk away now. They were killing my resolve, and forcing me to doubt my decision not to jump in bed with him right away.
* * * *
After Ian finished his workout regimen and showered, I climbed into my car and had him follow me to my place. Once there, I cleaned up a little and slipped into a pair of sandals. Ian was sitting on my couch with his feet propped up on my coffee table when I came back down the hall.
“So what should we do?” I asked.
He uncrossed his ankles and stood. “I know it’s only our third date, but I was thinking maybe we could do dinner at my place? I’ve got to head home and let my dog out anyway.”
My heart kick-started in my chest. Dinner at his place sounded a little too personal and intimate, but I was determined nothing between us would happen, at least for tonight. I was still taking that sabbatical, regardless of what Eva and I had talked about over the weekend.
“Okay, that sounds fine.” I swiped my purse from the table beside the front door and switched off lights. “What kind of dog do you have?”
“A pit bull,” he said, closing the front door behind us. I moved around him to lock it. “She’s a little over a year old.”
“Oh.” A tiny pinprick of fear stabbed at me. Weren’t pit bulls mean?
“I know what you’re thinking. Pit bulls get a bad rep because of their owners, or lack thereof, not because of the breed. Any dog can turn on its owner when it’s treated like shit.”
I was shocked he’d so easily known exactly what I’d been thinking while at the same time feeling completely in awe at the passion in his words.
“You must hear that a lot when you mention the type of dog you have, huh?” I wondered.
“Yeah. It’s a common misconception. One that can easily be debunked if people were open-minded enough.”
I stared at him. This man was exactly the type I should be with, if I were looking. He was kind-hearted and passionate about the simple things, unlike the other guys I always seemed to date. They didn’t give a rat’s ass about a single thing besides themselves. The world needed more guys like Ian Mason.
He started to walk around to the passenger side of his truck, and then paused. “Sorry, I forgot you aren’t that type of girl.”
The warmth I’d felt inside died a little, because in that moment, I wanted to be that type of girl, the type who didn’t think it was awkward or strange for a guy to hold a car door open for her.
But I wasn’t.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
IAN
Lauren was quiet, something that I’d come to realize as unusual for her. We’d hardly spoken on the ride from her apartment to Coldcreek. Thank goodness my radio worked, or else we would have been stuck in silence the entire time. I pulled into Harrison’s parking lot while making a mental list of the things I would need to cook dinner.
“The grocery store?” She chuckled. “We’re on our third date, and you take me to the grocery store?”
I laughed. “When you put it that way, it does sound crazy, but I need to pick up something to cook. My fridge is more than a little bare at the moment.”
I’d been so busy running Mason’s Electric and helping at my parents’ place that I hadn’t made it to the grocery store in a while.
“I’m just razzing you.” She unbuckled once I pulled into a parking spot and cut the engine on my truck. “It’s fine, really.”
Climbing out, I let out a puff of air. “What do you like to eat?”
I figured this was the best way to start. There was no point in buying the ingredients to cook something she wasn’t going to enjoy.
“Food.”
I glared at her from the corner of my eye. “Nice one.”
She smiled wide and I followed suit. “Seriously though, I’m not a picky eater.”
“Okay, how about spaghetti?”
“As long as you make a salad to go with it, I’m good.”
“Of course.”
We stepped through the automatic doors and inside Harrison’s. I grabbed a basket to hold the groceries in, and tried not to smile like an idiot as I thought of how nice it was to be doing such a mundane task again with someone who wasn’t my little sister. Hilary and I had always gone grocery shopping together on the weekends. I missed the little things about having a companion most now that I was single again.
“Pasta, do you have a preference?” I asked as we rounded into the pasta aisle.
“Whole wheat?” I loved how she’d said it as a question. Her nose crinkled up, and she looked completely confused.
“That’s what I normally get. My sister—the one you met, Cassie—she prefers gluten free.” I grabbed the cheapest whole-wheat spaghetti noodles I could find and tossed them into the basket.
“Ground turkey or beef?” Lauren asked as we started down the aisle toward the meat section.
“Either. Meat is meat to me,” I answered.
“That’s what she said,” Lauren muttered under her breath.
I eyed her and laughed. “Oh no, are you one of those? The type who hunt for sexual innuendos to toss in here and there?”
She shrugged. “Not usually, but I couldn’t resist with that one.”
“So, beef or turkey?” I asked. We’d stopped in front of the meat section.
“Beef.”
I scooped up a package of ground chuck—the leanest kind I could find—and placed it in the basket. After gathering all the staples for a well-rounded salad and choosing a sauce, we started toward the checkout lanes.
“Oh, wait!” Lauren shouted.
Her words startled me to a halt. “What?”
“We forgot the two most important things.”
I cocked an eyebrow at her. “Which are?”
“Wine and cheese,” she insisted. “I mean, this is a dinner date after all.”
I smiled, liking the way her mind seemed to be working. Alcohol sounded nice, but wine and cheese, that was not my thing.
“Lead the way,” I insisted.
Lauren stepped in front of me, her hips shaking more than they had been while walking through the store earlier, and I knew it was all for my benefit. This made my smile widen.
She turned toward the back of the store, where the wine aisle was located. This wasn’t the section of alcoholic beverages I was used to. Normally, I continued walking a few feet, until I hit the beer along the back wall.
“What do you like?” Lauren asked as she gazed at the shelves of bottles in front of us with a keen eye.
My eyebrows rose to my hairline. “Um, whatever you want is fine.”
She glanced at me over her shoulder. “Are you even going to drink it?”
I inhaled and then let out the breath slowly from my lungs. “Honestly, I’ve only ever tasted wine once. I wasn’t a big fan of it then so…” I trailed off, hoping she would get where I was going with this.
She nodded, but there was this look of pure amusement flicking across her face. “And what kind did you try?”
“It was sweet. Arbor Mist or something like that, I think. I know it was fruity.”
She wrinkled her nose. “That’s not a real wine. That’s a bottle of a fruity malt beverage.”
I shrugged. “Okay.”
I knew nothing about wine, or malt beverages for that matter.
“It is a wine technically, but I think it tastes too much like a malt beverage.”
“So what do you recommend, then?”
She placed a hand on her hip. “Are you going to drink it with me?”
“I’ll taste it.” I smiled. “But I can’t promise that I’ll like it.”
“That’s what she said.” Lauren winked. I chuckled, and she turned back around to glance at the selection. I was glad she was getting that normal Lauren-vibe going again, the one where she was bold and wi
tty. “I think we should go with a red wine. Maybe something a little on the sweet side since you’re practically a newbie.”
“Sounds good,” I insisted. “You pick that out, and I’ll head over here to get something for just in case I don’t care for it.”
Stepping a few feet away toward the beer, I picked up a six-pack of my usual—Bud Light.
Lauren walked over with a bottle of red wine and slipped it into the basket I was carrying. It said Sweet Red on the label.
“All right, now let’s get that cheese and get out of here. I’m starved,” she said.
We headed to the Amish section for a block of the baby Swiss I’d pointed out to her the last time we were in the store together. After checking out, I lugged all the grocery bags to the truck, and we climbed in.
Lauren cranked up the stereo as a song I didn’t think counted as rock played on the local rock station. She sang and nodded her head to the music the entire ride to my house. I tapped my fingers against the steering wheel as I drove, nervous about how the night would pan out. I wasn’t looking for any action, but I wouldn’t turn it down either.
Mojito stared at us from the living-room window as I pulled into the driveway. It had been a while since I’d brought home anyone new, and I wondered how she would react. Grabbing all the bags from the back, I led Lauren up the steps to the door.
“I hope she doesn’t jump up on you,” I said as I fumbled with the lock. “If she does, tell her to get down.”
“All right.”
When we stepped through the door, Mojito excitedly pranced straight to me and sat, waiting on me to give her attention like always. The second she spotted Lauren, however, her ears perked up and she became extremely hyper. She didn’t jump up, though; this was a good thing. It meant I’d finally broken her of that annoying habit.
“She’s gorgeous,” Lauren said. She reached out her hand and allowed Mojito to sniff across her palm.
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