14 - Jess
Jess
Choosing between Brock and Hunter was like trying to decide whether to get hit by a freight train or an avalanche. Both options promised total structural devastation, but the intricacies of the delivery system differed wildly.
Sabrina Carpenter’s Please, please, please blasted through the tinny speakers of my Civic, while the air conditioning did its best to fight the mid-morning swamp heat of District line traffic.
I stared at the dashboard, my fingers drumming against the worn plastic of the wheel as I tried to calculate the social fallout of David’s proposed field test. If I brought Brock to the mixer, his shoulders alone would cause a minor legislative gridlock in the lobby.
If I brought Hunter, he would probably spend the evening dissecting the subtext of the managing partner’s passive-aggressive small talk.
Both scenarios were terrifying. Both scenarios were infinitely better than showing up to Amberleigh’s wedding looking like a tragic historical artifact.
I turned the corner into the Capitol Fitness lot, my eyes locked onto a glorious, empty space three slots down from the main entrance.
It was shaded by a scraggly oak tree, clean, and completely devoid of broken glass.
I flicked my blinker on, a tiny surge of victory warming my chest, and cut the wheel.
“What the—?”
A Ford Bronco screeched around the corner from the opposite lane. The tires howled against the hot asphalt, a plume of grey exhaust belching from the tailpipe as the gigantic square hood swung into my trajectory.
I slammed my foot on the brake, the seatbelt locking violently across my collarbone as the Civic bounced to a halt. My bumper stopped exactly three inches from the Bronco as it whizzed past me.
“Motherfucker!”
The truck slid into my beautiful shaded spot with sickeningly smooth precision, the engine rumbling a few times before dying with a heavy thud.
For two seconds, I just sat there, my heart thumping in my throat while Sabrina begged someone not to bring her to tears. My hands shook with the effort to fight back tears of my own, the heat of homicidal fury prickling up the back of my neck.
The driver's side door of the Bronco swung open, and Dane descended from the cab.
He wore an olive-green compression shirt that left nothing to the imagination, and a pair of faded gym shorts.
The asshole went about his way, totally oblivious to me.
He reached into the back seat, hoisted a canvas duffel over one shoulder, and turned to walk toward the glass doors of the gym.
But my assumption that he’d been ignoring me was debunked when he flipped me off over his shoulder without looking back or breaking his stride.
"You have got to be kidding me.”
I kicked the driver’s door open, leaving my car idling in the middle of the driving lane, the keys still in the ignition and Sabrina still rocking the chassis. My sneakers hit the hot pavement with a loud slap as I stormed after him.
"Hey! G.I. Joe!" My voice cracked slightly under the weight of the humidity. "Are you blind, or have the steroids finally reached your optic nerve?"
Dane turned around slowly, the heavy duffel shifting slightly against his back. He looked down at me from his ridiculous height, his face a mask of bored, asshole indifference.
"Oh. It’s you," he said, his voice coming out dry and flat. He knew it was me. He’d known all along. "I didn't recognize the car. I thought someone had left a motorized lawnmower out here. Was just about to report it to management."
"I had my blinker on!" I shouted, pointing a finger back toward the Civic, which was currently blocking three cars that had just entered the lot. "I was halfway into the turn. That was my spot and you know it."
“Is your name on it?" And he craned his neck to check the asphalt for good measure.
Dick.
“You’re a dick,” I said out loud. In keeping with the good measure theme.
A wry smile lifted the corner of his mouth. “What is it with you and my dick?”
“Shut up. I want my spot back.” Heat rose up the back of my neck, and got worse when he shook his head slowly.
"The rules of gridiron apply,” he said simply. “First come, first served. You hesitate, you lose the yardage."
"I didn't hesitate! I was avoiding vehicular homicide. You ran a stop sign to get in here and steal the spot from me."
"It was a yield sign," he corrected, shifting his weight. "And I yielded. Not my problem if you’re too slow.”
"You’re a child," I said, stepping closer until I was right up to the logo on his chest. "A giant, over-muscled, tactical-vest-wearing infant. Move the truck, Dane. Move it before I find out if my library card can scratch a vintage paint job."
A deeply obnoxious smirk crept onto his face. Not that the first one ever disappeared. He was just having fun with this now. It made me want to test the structural integrity of his jaw with my elbow.
"I'm not moving, princess. But I suggest you get out of the driving lane before someone lodges a formal complaint." He tapped his watch with an index finger. "Clock's ticking. Have a great workout."
Behind me, an SUV honked its horn, a long, angry blare that cut through the fading notes of the song still leaking from my open door. I glared at Dane’s retreating back, my teeth grinding so hard I could taste the metal of my fillings.
The SUV honked again, and snapped me out of it. I dove back into the driver’s seat, whipped the wheel toward a distant, gravel-strewn corner of the lot next to the dumpster, and killed the ignition.
Inside the building, the air conditioning hit me square in the face but did nothing to cool the furnace currently blazing behind my ribs.
I rounded the corner by the juice bar and stopped dead.
Dane and Hunter were deep in conversation, laughing about some shared amusement. My blood boiled. Hunter was amazing, but just seeing him being all friendly with Dane made him the enemy by association in this moment.
"Hunter.” My voice cut through the overhead pop music like a cleaver. "As a representative of this establishment’s administrative and therapeutic framework, you need to intervene. We have an active hazard on the property. A problematic client who’s making the environment hostile for everyone else."
He blinked, his easy smile faltering as he took in my posture. His eyes did a quick, concerned sweep of my face. "Uh, I’m not sure what—"
“It’s Dane,” I cut him off. “He’s an ass.”
Dane rolled his eyes, letting out a theatrical sigh. "Are you seriously ratting me out to teacher? What’s next, a note to my mother?"
"Dane, knock it off," Hunter said, then looked at me with an expression that was entirely too intense for a Saturday. "And I'm not a hall monitor. If there's an issue, you two need to unpack—"
"I don't need to unpack anything," I snapped, gesturing wildly toward the glass doors. "I need Lurch over here to learn how a parking lot works, and to stop acting like a prepubescent."
"The spot was vacant, and my entry was clean," Dane said, looking down at me. "You’re just mad because your little lawnmower engine couldn't keep up."
"That lawnmower has excellent fuel economy, you giant primate."
"It’s a rolling traffic obstruction," Dane fired back.
Hunter raised his hands, looking back and forth between us like a man caught in the middle of a tennis match where the ball was a ticking bomb. "Okay, let’s take a breath. The hostility here is clearly masking a deeper—"
"Stay out of it, Hunter," we both said in unison, not even looking at him.
Hunter took a step back, and gave a silent salute of surrender. There was no point in mediating something that couldn’t be salvaged. He knew it as well as I did.
I glared at Dane, my heart rate already racing along despite not having started any cardio. "Just stay out of my way. I mean it."
"You stay out of mine," he countered, his posture straightening into nothing short of a brick wall.
We stood there, locked in a rigid stare-off. The space between us was tight with a ridiculous, stubborn energy. Neither of us blinked. Neither of us yielded an inch of territory.
Then, with no verbal cue whatsoever, we both broke.
It was an instantaneous, simultaneous sprint toward the double doors leading into the Sweat Sanctuary.
We hit the threshold at the exact same moment, our shoulders colliding with a dull, fleshy impact.
Dane used his bulk to try and wedge me against the doorframe, but I dropped my center of gravity and threw a vicious elbow into his ribs, forcing just enough space to squeeze through.
"Just don't break anything!" Hunter’s voice echoed behind us, but he was the last thing I was bothered about.
I scrambled past the rack of medicine balls, my eyes locked on the prize at the far end of the turf—the single, pristine leg press machine that wasn't leaking hydraulic fluid. I was going to get my workout, my way, even if I had to tackle a man twice my size to do it.
My sneakers skidded on the black rubber flooring as I flung my body onto the padded seat of the leg press, locking down the territory as triumphantly as a flag planted on the moon.
"Yes," I wheezed, death-stare dialed up to maximum.
Dane pulled up short, his gym bag swinging forward with enough momentum to clip my knee. He stared down at me, his chest heaving beneath that compression shirt. "You run like a chicken."
"Yeah, well, this chicken just beat your ass in a sprint, so eat me."
His one eyebrow shot up at my choice of words, but I was too high on adrenaline to dissect it. It’d be a cold day in hell before he got close enough to sniff me, let alone t—
“You wish, princess.”
“Screw you.”
I reached blindly behind my head for the lever to adjust the seat. My fingers hit metal, pulled a pin, and the backrest collapsed with a violent clatter, leaving me lying completely flat, staring up at the ceiling lights.
Dane hollered with laughter that was way more emphatic than it needed to be. Just to rub it in.