LEXI
She flailed for her water bottle next to her and groaned as she knocked it over and sent it rolling away. Too exhausted to go get it, she stayed still.
In the darkness behind her closed eyes, her traitorous mind flashed a certain someone’s smile again. Mr. Intensity. With an enormous yawn, she fought the image off and her eyes watered.
With her eyes still closed, she smelled Eddie’s body spray and felt the softer mat next to her give a little as he sat.
“You sure you don’t wanna charge dem for beating you up?” he asked, and placed her water bottle next to her.
Lexi shook her head with her eyes still closed. She flung her hand out towards it, but her arm landed on Eddie’s thigh. Not caring, she left it.
“You know I won’t charge for the women’s self-defense class. And I’m not beat up.”
At his silence, she opened her eyes to find him staring at her with his most skeptical look. She had to smile.
“I’m a little beat, islander. Not beat up. There’s a difference.”
“Maybe there is, but somet’ing’s bothering my girl. Somet’ing wrong, love?” he asked.
His Jamaican accent changed throughout the day. Sometimes it was soft and lilting, like it was now, or he could get rid of it on purpose and speak like someone born and raised in Philly.
“You ‘ere pretty hard on yourself dis morning.”
Lexi looked up at him.
“Did Randy or Tasia tell you anything about last night?”
Since Eddie was her just-in-case contact, she’d texted him the night before.
He knew she’d gone to the LifeStyle Club after the awkward dinner date.
He shook his head and frowned. She wasn’t sure if he frowned because his boyfriend Randy hadn’t told him something, or just at the mention of the club.
Eddie didn’t get club life - the overnights that Randy worked, or the ‘type of people’ that would go to what he considered a club for perverts. Since Eddie was bi, she thought of all people, he would be more open-minded to alternative lifestyle choices.
Even after three years of Randy working there, he was against the LifeS Club.
Even so, at the gym, it was just the two of them, and they’d created a solid friendship on top of a working relationship.
They had a handful of part-timers, and fitness instructors who were freelance, but at the heart of the gym it was just her and Eddie.
He was her closest friend, and she blew out a sigh as she sat up, hoping they weren’t about to get into his judgments again.
She thought of Tasia, their mutual friend and avid fitness fanatic, who had originally set Lexi up on the date with that asshole. Lexi didn’t hold it against her; there was no way Tasia could have known the guy would be a scumbag on a power trip.
“The date Tasia set me up on went shitty.” Lexi paused and looked him in the eye. “Like real shitty.”
“‘’ow bad?”
“Ahh… he-wound-up-unconscious-with-a-black-eye-shitty.”
She said it in a rush and it came out sounding like one word. Eddie had little response. His normally expressive face was blank as he looked out the garage doors.
“Did you get hurt?” was all he asked.
Lexi shook her head and grabbed the water bottle he’d brought back to her.
“No, he barely touched me.”
Eddie smiled then.
“Dat’s my girl.”
“And-” she started, then looked around the gym, making sure no one was within earshot.
“Dere’s more?” Eddie said, shaking his head. “Such an exciting life you ‘ave.”
The little slap she landed on his thigh made him smile.
“I met someone.”
Eddie only tilted his head at her and looked deep into her eyes.
“You mean you met someone else on your blind date that went sideways resulting in an unconscious man?”
Lexi shrugged.
“Not interesting like that. But he’s… it’s interesting.”
“Interesting. Right,” Eddie spat, dry as dust. “Girl, I don’t know why you bother with these power-hungry assholes, eh? You could date any guy you wanted, and it’s not like you to look up at someone else and let them in charge, eh? You need a good man.”
Lexi stood up.
“Right now I’m fine with no man, thanks.”
She offered a hand and pulled Eddie to stand next to her. Except he kept her hand in his.
“I worry about you,” he said, the concern evident in his eyes.
“Nothing to worry about,” she said, purposely light.
With a wiggle of her fingers, she broke his hold on her hand and stepped back. Serious emotions weren’t really her thing.
Between Mr. Intensity last night and Eddie this morning, she needed a break. And maybe a little caffeine pick-up, since between the adrenaline rush last night that refused to wear off and her nightmares, she’s tossed and turned all night. Maybe she’d gotten three hours of sleep.
“I need caffeine,” she said, with a jerk of her head across the street. “You want anything?”
“I’m good girl, but you tell Mama Troisi Eddie says hi.”
When she stepped into the deli, Mama Troisi already had her order waiting for her on the counter, extra large and steaming hot. She took off the to-go lid and inhaled the fragrant vanilla red-eye, knowing it would scald for at least the next ten minutes.
Rumor in the neighborhood had it, the Italian espresso machine Mama Troisi kept had been tinkered with by Mama herself to get as hot as machine-ly possible. As she was succumbing to the seductive aroma of coffee, Mama stepped out from behind the curtain separating the kitchen from the front.
“Girl, you got a man watching you?” was the first thing out of her mouth, and Lexi looked up, surprised.
Her first thought was Byron.
“Didn’t think so. What did he look like?”
Mama pursed her lips and opened her phone to show her a picture of Mr. Intensity himself, sitting out the picture window, staring across the street. To the gym. Her gym.
Mama must have taken it without him knowing from behind the counter. Why the hell would he have staked out the gym? She handed the phone back and walked over to where he’d been sitting. He’d had a perfect view into the gym, once the doors rolled up - and of her, leading her classes.
“Thanks Mama. I know him. I’ll take care of it. Did he bother you?”
“Not at all. He paid cash, tipped plenty and he’s a flirt.”
Mama tilted her chin down to peer at Lexi over the rim of her glasses and Lexi thought it was a shame she didn’t have a camera on her.
“You like him?” Mama asked.
“I don’t know him,” Lexi said, staring hard into her coffee.
She thought about the little buzz she’d felt when he’d sat at her table last night. His penetrating gaze and gorgeous smile that kept popping into her mind’s eye.
“Well, I like him,” Mama declared, pushing her glasses back up on her nose.
“As long as he don’t give you any trouble, I like him just fine. But you be careful.”
Her eyes nailed Lexi to the spot.
“A man who looks like that sometimes makes too much trouble. Asks too much of a woman. But you tell him he can come in for my espresso anytime.”
Smiling, Mama walked back into the kitchen. With a little eye roll, Lexi fished a five out of her gym leggings and left it under the edge of the register.
The rest of the morning passed quickly, assisted, she was sure, by her caffeine buzz.
Soon enough it was lunchtime, and she took a long, hot shower.
It helped to ease some aches, her tension, and her lingering headache from the lack of sleep.
Her outfit to go meet Mr. Intensity had been chosen with more care than she gave most clothes.
She wasn’t sure what he wanted from her, so how could she know what image she wanted to give?
She went with thick leggings, her standard heavy black boots, a white tank with a thin, burnt orange, open-necked sweater overtop.
All of her tops were wide-shouldered or off one shoulder, leaving her room to breathe.
Since it was still beautiful out, Lexi walked.
It was the time of year where the only crisp-cold moments were still overnight and into the early mornings.
Afternoons, so long as they were sunny, could still reach the seventies.
Today wasn’t quite that warm, and she enjoyed the sun warming her face and forearms once she pushed up her sleeves.
As she walked, she thought about Mr. Intensity.
He said he was working on a project… What kind of project could need her input?
Wait, maybe he’d seen her talk with the fighter from the night before?
Could he want help with the fighters? She put it away as a possibility as her phone vibrated in her pocket.
Blind Date Guy
You really think
you can treat me
that way?
Oh shit. She forgot to block him. With two clicks, Lord Byron was officially no longer her problem.
By the time she reached LifeStyle, she took her overshirt off to wrap around her waist. Only one guy had tried talking to her on her walk over; the wife-beater and liquor bottle almost concealed in a brown paper bag were enough to make her ignore him.
The back door was enormous, grey, and metal, shaped like a square instead of a standard door. She pressed the big black buzzer in and heard a resounding (annoying) buzz from inside.
She’d wondered if she might have overestimated the intensity of his stare, or the breadth of his shoulders. It was always dark in the club and… a minute later, there he was. Nope. They stared at one another for a moment before he opened the door wider.
“I’m glad you came.”
“Thanks.”
Lexi didn’t respond beyond that, but moved past him in the doorway.
As she did, she caught a scent; woodsy? It smelled fresh, and like she’d even have it in her own shower.
Except it smelled expensive. The interior lights were almost all off, and she followed him in the quiet.
They walked down a hall, which passed an open kitchen and a couple of closed doors.
“How was work?” he asked.
Small talk, she thought, resigned. It would be better…
“Don’t you know?”
He paused before they would come out to one of the small lounges in between entertainment rooms. His only response was to raise his left eyebrow.
“You were there half the morning,” she said with a little grin.
With a small shrug, Lexi walked past him and into the lounge to take a seat. Instead of sitting straight up, she curled one leg up under her and swung the other over the side of the chair, swinging it as she stared up at him.