Chapter 4
GRAYSON
The next morning, Gray found himself across the street from Philadelphia Fit in a convenient little Italian deli. The short, older Italian woman behind the counter had flirted with him, and turned a pretty pink when he flirted back. He ordered a large breakfast sandwich on a bagel and two coffees.
When she asked if he was waiting for his girlfriend, he’d acted shocked and asked her if he had a girlfriend, how would he ever get her to marry him?
She laughed, and he took both coffees to a little table by the window.
He was a naturally early riser, which had conflicted on multiple occasions with his nightlife and the Club. Still, he wanted both coffees.
He woke up as the sun rose higher in the sky, and waited for the gym to roll up their garage-style doors.
The doors were the reason he was content to watch from a distance, figuring they would open at some point.
Although the gym opened at six, it was almost eight when the three garage doors were opened by Lexi herself.
He appreciated that she was up and at work early, even after the late night before.
Work ethic was something he took seriously, and it looked like his little sub felt the same. Gray took a moment to frown into his coffee. Not his sub. His… fighter. Maybe. The doors allowed him to see most of the gym, and he watched covertly.
Lexi showed no signs she was tired as she moved from group to group. She joked, corrected forms, and worked out with the classes. He was rewarded with a view of her toned abs -impressive even from a distance- as she shed her t-shirt emblazoned with the gym’s logo.
Another trainer came into view several times; a towering black man with short dreads and shredded arms. Gray wondered if that might be the owner, then reconsidered as it became clear Lexi gave him direction. Another worker bee then, and with that thought Gray dismissed him.
“Don’t tell me you got stood up?” the Italian woman asked.
She came over to clean his table- or chat maybe, he wasn’t sure, but he smiled again.
“I wasn’t meeting anyone.”
She hmm’d, then looked across the street to the gym.
“Looking for someone, then?” she asked, innocently enough as she cleared the remains of his breakfast.
He shifted and rolled his shoulders out, a little stiff from sleeping on the couch and then sitting still for so long.
Gray liked to move. But he knew, as with everything else, patience and forethought were necessary steps to getting what he wanted.
As the last class broke up, he debated leaving, and then Lexi brought a small group of women into a ring in the middle of the gym.
“I’m thinking of joining. I wanted to see some of their classes.”
“Oh, how nice! Well, why don’t you go on over?” she asked, and made a little shooing motion with her hand towards the gym.
“I’m shy,” he said with a smile.
She cackled.
“My Aunt Minnie, you’re shy.”
She swatted at him with her hand, her cheeks rosy again, and made her way back behind the counter. He wondered…
“Do you know anyone over there?”
Her cheeks had been rosy, but now she shone with bright eyes and a huge smile.
“My girl Alexis runs that place,” she declared, and lifted her chin as if it were own accomplishment.
“Your daughter?” he asked.
This was an interesting turn.
“Heavens, no, but I… well,” she hesitated and glanced across the street. “I like to think of all my regulars as mine.”
She nodded once and went back to wiping down the counter, but he thought there was more to it.
Still, the first conversation wasn’t the time to ask.
He could wait. Plus, she might tell Lexi some guy had been asking about her and staring at the gym for…
damn, over two hours, he realized, glancing at his watch.
“But you should join,” she continued. “It’s a good place. Never had trouble with anyone from there, and Lexi’s the best there is.”
The best, huh? He looked back to where the women were paired off, going through close-up sparring drills.
“What about the owners?” he asked and watched her expression shutter down from open and friendly to guardedly polite.
“Couldn’t say,” she said, “never met ‘em.”
Interesting. It was possible the owner was an asshole then, he thought, and Ms. Italian Deli didn’t want to talk badly about anyone. Gray nodded and watched Lexi throw a larger woman over her shoulder. Again. And again.
His brows lowered as the women lined up for Lexi to throw each woman onto the mat. He fished an above-average tip out of his back pocket to place in the tip jar, bid Ms. Deli a nice day, and told her he’d be back.
A sharp breeze hit his face as he stepped outside, and as he walked down the street, he glanced back into the gym one last time. There was Lexi, now being thrown by each woman. He winced as she landed hard. Well, he figured, at least he could say for certain she wasn’t lacking for stamina.