Sylvie
I agonized about what to wear. It wasn't like I had a massive collection of gym wear to choose from—when I did exercise, it was a clumsy attempt to follow an aerobics video I'd found on YouTube, in the privacy of my bedroom with the blinds closed. So all I had was sweatpants and Lycra tops.
The problem, as I was hotly and painfully aware, was that Aedan would be there.
And however much I was focused on the fight, however scared I was for Alec and myself and what awaited us in a month's time, I couldn't stop thinking about him. I knew his reputation. I knew I should be running in the opposite direction. But instead, I kept thinking about the feel of his hand on mine, when he’d briefly held it.
Those blue eyes that seemed to see everything.
The jagged, ugly scars on his neck that only made the rest of him seem more beautiful.
I should be scared of him. I was scared of him.
But at the same time, I was drawn to him. And so I agonized about what to wear.
Eventually, I screamed at my own reflection in the mirror. And I stood there, listening to the silence and, after a few seconds, I realized I'd been waiting for Alec's answering shout from his room, telling me to shut up. That nearly started me crying again.
It had been a long night. I'd slept alone in the apartment plenty of times, of course—Alec had had plenty of one-night stands, usually with curvy blondes, and he preferred to go back to their place because no one wants to have to introduce their sister over breakfast. But I'd always known, those times, that he'd be coming back eventually.
I threw a towel in a bag and headed out before I could think about it anymore.
The gym wasn't what I'd expected. It didn't look much like the gyms I'd seen on TV, all polished wood floors and gleaming machinery and sunlit, airy studios filled with people doing yoga.
This was a boxer's gym.
The walls were whitewashed breezeblocks. There were only two types of equipment: things to lift and things to hit. And the place was full of men lifting and hitting.
That was the other thing that was missing: women. I couldn't see a single woman in the entire place. I stood there feeling completely out of place.
Then an Irish voice from behind me. "You okay?"
For a moment, I thought it was Aedan. I spun around and found myself looking at someone completely new.
He was a little smaller in the shoulders than Aedan and leaner, too, though he was ripped as hell.
And he was topless. A tattoo on his bicep said Ruth.
A fresher-looking one on his other bicep said Karen.
He had blue-gray eyes and similar black hair to Aedan. Almost as good looking, too. What was this? Had I stumbled into some Irish-run gym? Was it a membership requirement that you be blue-eyed and gorgeous? "Umm..."
"Relax," he told me. "You aren't the only woman."
I looked around. "No?"
"Oh, no. Natasha's been here. And Jasmine." He frowned and then gave me a look that managed to be flirty and apologetic at the same time. "To be fair, they only came once, but..."
"Making friends?" Another Irish voice, behind me.
One that sent an unexpected tremor of excitement down my spine.
I spun again to see Aedan. He was in a blue tank top and black sweatpants and he looked.
..amazing. The other guy was ripped and good looking in a filthy sort of a way.
But Aedan was powerful on a different level—raw and primal.
Dangerous. If the other guy was a wolf, Aedan was a lion.
And he was staring at the other guy with a knowing glare and just a hint of. ..something.
"Just saying hi," said the other guy, grinning. He looked between the two of us questioningly.
"I'm training her," said Aedan. And there was something in the way he said it, something that made me frown inside. As if there was an unspoken message alongside it.
"Oh," said the other guy, nodding as if message received. "Okay. No problem. Got it." And he gave Aedan an especially big grin.
Aedan put an arm around my waist and led me away. "Don't mind Connor," he muttered. "The fecker just...flirts."
"Was he? Did he?" For some reason, I was blushing. I was also trying not to react to the feel of Aedan's muscled arm caressing my waist with each step. I was re-running the conversation in my head. Had he just basically told Connor to back off?
Was Aedan jealous?
Aedan must have caught my confused look because he cleared his throat and shrugged. "He's just some wanker," he muttered. "Plays the guitar and thinks women all worship the ground he walks on. Flirts even now that he's attached.”
I nodded to let him know I understood. But my mind was spinning. He was a little jealous. And, at the same time, I was trying to keep a straight face because I’d never heard anyone say wanker before.
He led me over to a thick gym mat and slipped off his sneakers.
It hit me just how big the size difference was between us.
It wasn’t just his height—it was the width of his muscled shoulders and the presence of him.
He looked like a statue made out of granite.
I felt as if I was made out of matchsticks.
This is ridiculous. I can’t learn how to fight. Look at me!
But it was the only chance I had.
I knelt to untie my sneakers. I'd settled, in the end, for gray sweatpants and a black Lycra top over a sports bra. As I knelt there, I became aware of something. A sort of hot, tingling wave lashing across the tops of my breasts. A feeling that soaked down into me and finished between my thighs.
I didn't have to look up to know he was staring down at me. It only lasted a second. When I glanced up, he was looking off towards the far end of the gym. Maybe I imagined it. Maybe I was just transferring all my feelings onto him.
I couldn't take my eyes off his shoulders.
Under the hooded top, they'd looked big.
Now, though, exposed by the tank top, they were huge—powerful and solid, and the way his arms narrowed and then flared again into thick biceps and sculpted forearms..
.wow. I'd been expecting him, somehow, to be covered in tattoos—a lot of fighters were.
But I couldn't see one anywhere. The only mark on him was that jagged, twisting maze of scars down one side of his neck.
I could see it better, in the daylight, and the viciousness of it made my chest ache.
Someone had not just stabbed him but twisted and gouged and—Jesus.
What would drive someone to do that to him?
It didn’t make him ugly—not in my eyes. It made me want to kiss him, there, press my lips along every hardened scar. If my kisses couldn’t heal him, they could at least show him that it didn’t matter.
That isn’t going to happen. Going by his gruff manner, this was going to be all business, even if he had been a little jealous when he saw Connor talking to me.
That knowledge didn’t stop me looking, though. It couldn’t—his body was too damn addictive, harder and more solidly real than any guy I’d seen. His strong chest narrowed to a trim waist, giving him that gorgeous X shape between shoulder and thigh. Big thighs, too. Powerful. And between them—
I jerked my eyes upward and found myself looking right into his. He'd been staring down at me again, just as my eyes had strayed towards his cock. I didn't know which of us was more embarrassed.
I slipped off my sneakers and stood up. "Okay," I said. "Where do we start?"
He nodded, all business again. I was getting all kinds of mixed signals from this guy.
Did he like me or not? And it didn’t help that, up close to him like this, he was freaking intimidating.
That darkness, rolling off him in waves.
The sense that, without even thinking about it, he could just crush your head or pound you into the ground.
Pound me into the ground. The phrase echoed around my head a few times and then seeped mockingly down into my body, liquid-hot. I forced myself to focus, my face growing hot, and looked expectantly up at him.
"Hit me," he said. That strong accent again, each short word like an impact of stone on metal. Harsh and uncompromising. And sexy as hell. Hit him?!
I blinked at him a couple of times. "Really?"
"Really."
I hesitantly made a fist and lifted it, then put it back down. "Just...hit you?"
"Just hit me."
I punched him lightly in the stomach, like I was miming it. My knuckles brushed his abs and I could feel the ridged hardness there, warm through the fabric.
"No...actually hit me. I have to see what you've got. Hit me like you mean it."
I swallowed and hit him as hard as I could, in the same spot. I expected him to do some lightning-fast block or maybe dodge out of the way. But he just stood there and my fist connected. I hit a wall of solid, warm muscle, like punching rubber. He rocked back maybe half an inch.
"Oh shit!" I said. "I'm so sorry!" I instinctively put my hand on his stomach where I'd hit him. "Are you okay?"
He looked down at my hand, then into my eyes. "Aye," he said softly.
I removed the hand.
He checked there was space behind him. "Come at me again," he said. "Try and hit me."
"Where?" I asked hopelessly.
"Anywhere."
He started to move backward in an easy, fast-footed shuffle. I swung at him and, this time, he moved. I missed completely. I tried again and he dodged the other way. He seemed to know where I was going to go before I did it. How was that possible?
He stopped suddenly and I pulled up short to avoid crashing into him. Then he lunged forward.
I yelped and staggered back, tripped over my own feet and went down.
I landed with a whump on the mat, arms and legs everywhere.
I instinctively glanced around the gym. Everyone else there looked like they belonged.
Even Connor was slugging a punchbag. No one was actually laughing at me, but I could feel it in their looks. What's she doing here?