by Gail, Stacy
Again, pretty hair. And again, wrong color.
Maybe he was wrong. God knew it wouldn’t be the first time.
The kickboxing instructor and the woman headed toward the heavy double doors that led back to the brightly lit main reception area, the hub of the sprawling fitness center. In unhurried movements he did the same, slinging his bag over his shoulder as he went.
“...never forget, you don’t have to worry about that.”
“Then what was the first lesson I taught you, girl?” The older man’s voice, rough from screaming like a bloodthirsty maniac for the past hour, was now calm enough for Nate to pick up on a faint accent. Something foreign, exotic. “Always be aware of your surroundings. Be an animal. They have better instincts than humans. This is what you must be.”
“I know that.” The woman’s voice came as a surprise—cold and hard as steel. Of all the things that didn’t quite mesh with the woman he was looking for, that deadly tone was the one thing that fit like a glove. “Stupid me, I allowed myself to feel safe in your class.”
“You are safe when I’m around,” came the automatic response. “Naturally, you will be safe here. But this lapse...”
“It’s unacceptable. I agree.” Then she stiffened before she shot a deliberate glance over her shoulder, pinning him to the spot—proof that she was more aware of her surroundings than her companion. “Ah... Sorry. Are we blocking your way from getting out of here?”
Translation—stop lurking behind us, creeper. “Actually, I was hoping I could speak with you. I assume that as a personal trainer, you take on private clients?”
It was an impulse. But asking while in front of the older man, someone she clearly trusted, seemed like a decent idea so he rolled with it. When she paused and looked him over as if he were a side of beef that may or may not be rancid, Nate cursed his foundering instincts. God, he hated flying blind like this. Six months since he’d lost his inner compass and he still hadn’t gotten used to running on normal human instincts.
Maybe he was wrong about her.
“My schedule is pretty packed and I only train on-property. If you’re looking for concierge service, you’ll need to talk to another trainer.”
He allowed himself a small sigh of relief. At least it wasn’t a no. “I don’t even know what concierge service is.”
“Jacob here offers in-home personal training sessions, as well as dietary and lifestyle guidance. If that’s what you’re looking for...”
“In-house is good.” It was a cautious way of doing things, with no chance of putting herself in a position where she’d be alone and at the mercy of another. A smart move for any woman, but he liked how this wary trait fit his profile. If only he could see her back, he’d know for certain that she was the one.
She gave him another head-to-toe sweep, and for no reason at all his skin began to heat. “Do you have a particular area you want to target?”
“My focus is to beef up my training for the Chicago marathon. My endurance sucks.” Did Chicago even have a marathon? He was almost sure it did, though he couldn’t imagine anyone voluntarily running in a place that seemed as frozen over as Santa’s backyard. “I’ve been working out on my own but I’ve hit a plateau. When you told me what your specialty is, it seemed like a sign from above.”
Her friend, Jacob, grunted a sound that could have meant anything before he took his leave through the heavy doors. Nate watched the older man go with a surge of two-toned relief. Not only did his absence signal that Nate had been deemed harmless, but now that he had her all to himself he had a sudden urge to take her off to someplace one hell of a lot more private than a gym doorway.
She watched Jacob’s retreat as well before she turned her attention back to him. “The marathon is in October, so...seven months from now. Plenty of time to get your stamina up to the level you need, as long as you’re serious about this.”
“Trust me, I’m serious about everything I do.”
“I don’t trust without a very good reason.”
He searched her face, trying to superimpose the memory of a shattered woman, pale from blood loss and near death, over the woman who stood before him now. There were many differences, but...yeah. She could be the one. “I’m guessing I’ll have to work hard to earn that trust.”
“And maybe not even then.” She dug through her packed duffle bag, a bulky nondescript thing as understated as the rest of her outfit. To his eyes, everything about her whispered at trying to be invisible. “Here’s my card with my email and the number for The Body Electric—just leave a message for Ella. If you’re really serious about this, give me a call or drop me an email that includes your contact info so we can figure out a schedule that works for both of us. Though I should warn you—as packed as my schedule is, it’s entirely possible I can’t accommodate the times you’ll be free to train.”
“I’ll make sure our schedules will mesh...” He looked down at the card. “Ms. Little.”
“Ella, please. And you are...?”
“Nate da Luca. Call me Nate.”
“Call me when you’re ready.” And before he could offer a hand she was through the doors, while his hand inexplicably tingled at the lost opportunity to touch hers.
Chapter Two
“Could somebody please tell me why Mother Nature is being such a bitch?”
Ella glanced up from her weekly worksheet as Phoebe Deene, the forty-something manager of The Body Electric, stomped up to the horseshoe-shaped reception desk. Ella had never met anyone quite like Phoebe, a former bodybuilder who looked like she bench-pressed forklifts, and possessed a business savvy that could teach barracudas how to be cold-blooded. Aside from Jacob, there wasn’t a person Ella admired more.
She grimaced at the snow dusting Phoebe’s coat and neon-blue spiked hair. “Looks like March is going out like a lion, which seems strange to me. As I recall, it didn’t do this last year.”
“Sorry cupcake, but whatever the weather did last year doesn’t mean shit around here. Real Chicagoans have seen it sleet in May and they don’t give it a thought. They’ll cuss it, but that’s about it.” She leaned over to see what Ella was working on and tapped a stubby finger at a column. “You forgot to put yourself down for that hour-long consult you did last Saturday.”
“I didn’t work last Saturday.”
“In my book you did. Remember the whiny princess who wanted to know what all the machinery was for, how it was used, and why was it so difficult to operate, and should she actually be sweating?”
Ella couldn’t stop the eye roll if her life depended on it. “Oh, her. That didn’t take an hour, it only felt like it. And it wasn’t an official consult, I just chatted with her for a spell.”
“You got her to sign up for a yearly membership, so that’s working as far as I’m concerned. And Ella, nobody north of Nebraska uses the term spell, unless they’re having a discussion about who’s stronger, Harry or You-Know-Who.” Phoebe waggled a finger at her. “Remember, kid—it’s not just the accent you want to focus on changing, it’s the colloquialisms. I hear about you chatting for a spell, and suddenly my head’s filled with banjo music.”
Yikes. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry, just be smart. You’re a Chicagoan now, so don’t forget it. And speaking of which, did you see the Cubbies’ final game of the preseason last night? Do you think they’re ready to kick some serious ass this season?”
Ella winced. Two boo-boos in one conversation was not the way to start the day. “Um, Phoebe? Does it matter that I don’t particularly like baseball?”
“The old you didn’t like baseball. The new you does. Things like that make all the difference in the world.” With a stern look, Phoebe headed toward her office hidden behind the mirrored wall that faced the lobby. “You have twenty-four hours to tell me what happened in the game last night
.”
“Can I get away with saying the Cubs either won or lost and leave it at that?”
“Nope. I want a moment-by-moment account of the last play of the game, and if it’s done right—and you can prove you understand it all—I’ll give you an afternoon off.”
Great. Homework. “I’m on it.”
While surfing the web for results of the Cubs game, Ella found her attention slipping again and again to the clock in the monitor’s lower right-hand corner. Almost eight. Any minute now her newest client, Nate da Luca, would be walking through the front doors, and she was as nervous as a girl going on her first date.
Which was, of course, completely ridiculous.
What was even more ridiculous was her sleepless night. Hour after hour had been lost to thoughts—she flat-out refused to call them fantasies—about how best to train a man who was obviously in great shape and would need very little instruction from her. For crying out loud, he was built like a frigging fertility god from the Pantheon of the Overly Muscular. He had shoulders so broad she suspected she could sit on one of them comfortably, and arms that looked like he wrestled rabid bears for a living. The last thing she would have expected was that someone carrying that much muscle was shooting to be a long-distance runner. Just to look at him made her think it could never happen, but it also didn’t come as a surprise that he was the type to set his sights on impossible challenges. There was something about him that made her think there was nothing he wouldn’t tackle.
Just as long as he didn’t try to tackle her, everything would be peachy.
She shook her head, and had to stifle a disgusted huff at the self-centered thought. Had it been so long since she’d interacted with an attractive man that her hormone-infused brain pounced on the notion that he would even want to get physical with her? And if that wasn’t crazy enough, she couldn’t help but be stunned that thoughts of some rough hanky-panky with a stranger didn’t leave her cold. First came her awareness of him, and now ideas about tackling. The not-threatening but definitely full-body contact sort that wound up with kisses and tickling...
Oh, boy. Tackling and tickling? She was losing it.
It was Nate’s fault, really. The cork on her dormant feminine hormones popped the moment he started gushing out all that macho charisma the same way Niagara Falls gushed water. It was understandable her unguarded thoughts might wander down the path of sensual curiosity even if she wasn’t mentally ready for it. How could she be ready for such a thing? For a couple of years now she’d begun to suspect any attraction to the male gender was part of her dead and buried past. And she hadn’t missed it in the least.
Hadn’t missed it. But she was sure feeling an empty loneliness now.
A wry smile curled the corner of her mouth as she stared at her worksheet without seeing it. And there it was. She had the hots for her new client. That had to be a good thing; it was proof she’d come a long way in her mental and emotional healing process. Fantasizing about delicious-looking men was both healthy and normal, and she was a big fan of normal. What’s more, she felt safe. There was no risk in enjoying a quick daydream about a man with depthless, smoldering eyes, the kind of eyes that made a woman think that not only could he see through her clothes, he heartily approved of what he saw beneath them. Or how his thick, waving hair would feel slipping through her fingers as she pulled his face close. Or how that wealth of bronzed skin he’d displayed with unabashed confidence would taste against her tongue as she set about exploring him bit by bit—from the muscle-padded curve of his shoulder to the elegantly defined line of his collarbone, to the hair-shadowed chest that was as solidly built as a cinderblock wall. She’d be willing to bet he tasted subtly different from region to region. She’d have to sample every delicious location to see which flavor was her favorite...
Ah, damn. There she went again.
The glass door opened with a flurry of snowflakes. Without warning her heart leaped into her throat when the object of her heated fantasies pushed into the lobby. Nate looked almost too big to be indoors, wrapped in a long duster-style coat that emphasized the impressive breadth of his shoulders. Right on his heels was Jacob, looking dour in his ancient aviator earflap hat and watching Nate as if he expected the other man might pull out an AK47. Not sure what Jacob was doing there since he wasn’t scheduled for anything until mid-morning, Ella offered him a nod of bewildered greeting before her focus swung inexorably back to Nate.
It was almost unfair, how perfectly nature had constructed him. Diamond-faceted snowflakes dusted his shoulders and hair, and the hands she kept idle on the desk itched to brush them away. He looked disgruntled, as if he disapproved of the snow, Jacob, the gym’s bright reception area and mornings in general, and ideas of how she could wash that irritation away with a smile flooded her brain before she could dam them up.
It was insane, how much she wanted to make him smile.
He shook his head to get the snow out of his hair and found himself face-to-face with her before he seemed to be prepared for it. He froze, the line between his brows vanishing as if it had never been, and for a full heartbeat they did nothing more than simply stare at each other. Then Jacob cleared his throat so noisily it yanked her gaze away from Nate’s, and her cheeks heated as if she’d been caught ogling hardcore porn in public.
“Good morning.” Ella gave Nate her best professional smile while Jacob swept the hat off his bristly head and stomped back to Phoebe’s office. And all the while she prayed her new client hadn’t noticed her overheated gaping. “Considering the frown on your face, I take it you’re not a fan of early mornings?”
“Early mornings don’t bother me. Early mornings accompanied with snow, howling arctic winds and temperatures below thirty degrees... Now that’s something to frown about.”
“You’re not a native of Chicago?”
“Nope. Born and bred in Atlanta, though I’ve done enough traveling in my life to give me a pretty boring monotone.”
“You’re from the South?” Twin spires of wistfulness and unease coiled through her as he came to lean on the reception desk opposite her. With his soulful dark eyes drinking in the sight of her as if her face was the only thing he wanted to see, wistfulness won out. “Do you miss anything about your old home?”
“Right now I’m missing warmer temperatures.”
She laughed, and even she could hear the fluttery quality of it. “It’s not that bad if you stay indoors.”
“What about you? I thought I detected a hint of Dixie in your accent.”
“Like you, I’m pretty much from all over, but I think of Chicago as my home.” A spurt of alarm had her gaze dropping away from his while she did her best to cover her rattled state with a form of the truth. But damn, that sucker-punch observation of his left her scrambling. “The cold shouldn’t affect you in the gym, unless you have any medical issues I should know about. Do you have any arthritic problems that might need special attention?”
“My body is in excellent working order.”
I’ll just bet. The words trembled on her lips even as his statement hung in the air, begging for the feminine attention it deserved. Shocked at how much she wanted to give it, Ella instead backed away from the counter with another polite smile. “That’s nice.”
That’s nice? Wow, stunning repartee, Ella. Great job.
Giving that excellently working body one last look, Ella led the way out of the reception area. Her destination was the main workout room, lined with mirrors and filled with treadmills and ellipticals, hydraulic weight machines and racks of free weights. And with every step she castigated her inner naughty girl until she cowered in submission. She had to get a hold of herself. While it was okay to notice a hot guy—scratch that, a spontaneously combusting, over-the-top scorcher of a man who was every woman’s secret fantasy come to life—it was another kettle of fish to blithely act on it. For one thing, h
e was a client and this was a professional setting. For another, she didn’t know anything about Nate da Luca. For all she knew, he had a loving wife and a dozen kids waiting for him at home. And lastly, she wasn’t in the market for a one-night stand, a fling, or a relationship. Considering her baggage, it was amazing she’d given him a second look.
And a third. And maybe even a fourth.
“All right.” After they’d spent fifteen minutes on a series of stretches and warm-up exercises in the gym’s open-floor area, Ella gestured toward a small bank of treadmills reserved specifically for the trainers’ use. As she was the only trainer on duty at the moment, they had the area all to themselves. “The first thing I need to do is measure your level of endurance, which will be about as much fun as it sounds. Are you sure you’re ready for this?”
“I was born ready.” As if to prove it, Nate stripped off his sweatpants and hoodie to show baggy black and red basketball shorts with the Georgia Bulldogs logo on the side and a black racer-back tank underneath. Clearly he was no longer fussy about being cold. “Let’s get this torture session started.”
“I’ll try to be gentle, but keep in mind that my main mission is to get you sweaty.” The words were out before she could check them at the professionalism weigh station, and like a cowardly idiot she busied herself with setting the machine’s workout program to avoid meeting his gaze. Maybe it hadn’t sounded as provocative as she thought. Maybe he wasn’t thinking about how his massive frame and her much smaller body could still find a way to fit together and get sweaty in much more erotic ways than on a treadmill. Maybe he would let the flirtatious words just sit there, without responding...
And maybe she should give a second thought to indulging in a one-night stand.
A soft laugh escaped him as he stepped up onto the machine and put a hand on the treadmill’s handrail only an inch from where hers rested. “The one thing I enjoy most of all is getting sweaty, one way or another.”