Chapter Six
“Make good choices!” Jenna called after Lacey as her sister bailed out of the car and headed into the school.
Jenna took a deep breath and let it out.
She could only hope she was doing the right thing as she pulled her car out of the pick up line and headed for the gym.
She had a couple of hours before her shift, so she might as well get some time in.
She’d intended to start yesterday, but Mason had called her into help with a delivery.
She needed every extra dollar, so she’d take him up on the offer of extra hours.
I’ll never lose the weight if I don’t do the work, she reminded herself. And it wasn’t just so she could make better money.
She’d spent a lot of time thinking about it last night, while she’d helped Lacey with her math.
If Jenna had better muscle tone, then being on her feet, moving as much as she did at work, would be easier. She could finish a shift without wanting to fall across her bed and sleep for two weeks. At least that was her hope.
She’d packed a bag while Lacey had showered this morning, and she was going to start making time at the gym a habit. She pulled up in front of Savage Iron and stared at the huge glass wall that made up the front of the building, or at least the first floor.
What if I do something stupid and embarrass myself?
A montage of images flashed through her head.
She saw herself falling off some kind of climbing machine.
Her arms tangled in the wires from one of the machines with cables and pulleys.
Her body being flung from a treadmill. Every single image came with the sound of men laughing at her.
Jenna pushed the thoughts away and opened the car door. So what if she made a mistake, or ten. She had been telling Lacey that you don’t learn without making mistakes. It was time to practice what she preached.
With a sigh, she opened the car door, fetched her bag from the trunk, and went inside. It was time to see how bad she sucked. If she had her way, she’d at least get a good handle on what she was supposed to be doing before she brought Lacey with her.
Then again, maybe it would do her sister good to see her fall down and get back up and try again, literally.
She’d already been there when Jenna had picked up her life and continued on after Mama’s death.
Though, Jenna could admit, they’d both been so lost in grief, she didn’t know if Lacey had been aware of some of the shit Jenna had been forced to do in order to keep her sister with her.
Parts of her were glad. She wanted Lacey to grow up as normally as she could, but at the same time, they were orphans, or at least as far as either of them knew.
Jenna’s father had left before she had more than the vaguest memories of him and Mama had never shared who Lacey’s father was.
As far as either of them were concerned, they had no one else.
And while it was hard sometimes, they were okay with it.
As long as it was just the two of them, they never had to worry about anyone else letting them down.
“Good morning, Jenna,” Roadkill said as she stepped in the front door. “Let me know when you’re ready to start and I’ll be ready. I’m going to call the prospect up to cover the desk.”
Jenna didn’t say anything, just nodded as she headed to the locker room to change. Her stomach churned, but she did her best to ignore it as she made her way past all the machines that half-way scared her.
After she changed, she put her bag in one of the lockers, then took a deep breath and straightened her shoulders before heading back to the main room.
There, she found Roadkill still at the front desk, going over some software she didn’t recognize with a young man who looked closer to Lacey’s age than hers.
She stepped close but didn’t say anything as she didn’t want to interrupt what he was doing.
“Jenna, why didn’t you say something?” Roadkill asked when he noticed her.
“I didn’t want to interrupt.”
“I’m just showing him how things work. He’ll pick it up in a few days. Jenna, this is Bobby Lee. Bobby Lee, Jenna.”
“Nice to meet you, ma’am,” the kid said with a nod. Jenna blinked. She wasn’t sure she’d ever been ma’amed. She wasn’t entirely sure she liked it.
“Come on. Let’s get started. First thing we’ll do is warm up. Stretches, a little walking, that kind of thing, to warm your muscles up before the real workout. It helps to prevent injuries. And it will give me a chance to ask a few questions so I can tailor your workout to meet your goals.”
She frowned but followed him.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
He led her to a flat area where there were thin mats spread out. She assumed it was where they did things like boxing and MMA type sparing, but she hadn’t asked. Now, he led her there and waved her to join him as he sat flat on his butt on the mat.
Unlike when she’d first come in, what, day before yesterday?
He wasn’t wearing jeans and boots. Today he wore a pair of dark gray sweats, running shoes and a loose t-shirt.
He looked far more ready to workout than the first day.
Then she would have sworn he looked ready to throw someone over his shoulder and haul them out than to join them on the floor.
He showed her how to do a couple of stretches.
“Tell me about why you want to do this?” he said while she was bent forward, trying, and failing to touch her toes.
Jenna frowned. That was an awfully invasive question.
“I want to get into better shape.”
“I get that, but we all have a motivation. We all have something that pushes us to get up in the morning, to brave the cold, or the heat and get here in time to finish our workout before we tackle everything else on our plate. What’s yours?”
She didn’t answer right away. She was trying to come up with something better than she needed to make more in tips, and this was the only way she could figure to do it.
Well, other than trading her job waiting tables at the Driftwood Lounge to work the stage down at the Broken Spur.
And she couldn’t do that. She had custody of Lacey, but this was the bible belt.
If word got out that she was putting food on the table and a roof over their heads by taking off her clothes for strangers, they very well could step in and take her away.
Then she’d end up in the foster system and that was the last thing Jenna wanted.
That would be failing Mama, and Lacey, in the worst way. She looked at him through her lashes, keeping her head lowered so he wouldn’t know she was watching him. Should she say it? How much should she say?
“I need to be in better shape to make more money.” She kept her voice soft, so it wouldn’t carry across the huge space and no one else would hear her humiliation.
Jenna didn’t know what she’d expected to happen after her confession, but it wasn’t for the big, burly biker to stop and stare at her.
Another glance through her lashes told her he was scowling too.
“I’m sorry. You’re going to have to run that by me again, slower this time. I’m not sure how working out and losing weight will help you make more money.”
She sighed.
“I wait tables down at the Driftwood. I know I could make more with a better place, or with better hours, but I need to be home in the evenings with Lacey. She’s older now and she needs to know she’s not alone.
Mason, he’s my manager says I would make better tips if I was in better shape.
” What she didn’t say was that every time he said it, he also added a cruel sneer that round was not an attractive shape.
“That fucking prick. Mason? What’s his last name?”
Jenna watched, forgetting to hide that she was looking at him, as his jaw clenched and he fisted his hands.
Why did he seem so upset? It wasn’t like she hadn’t heard that, or something like it, at least a million times.
It wasn’t the words that cut from Mason, but the hateful, cutting tone he used every single time.
“His name, Jenna. Give it to me.”
She shook her head. It wasn’t worth it. Mason wasn’t worth the trouble Roadkill would likely get in for whatever he had in mind.
“It doesn’t matter.” She bent back over her leg, reaching for her toes, then switching to the other leg and leaning into that one.
“You need a better job.”
“I know. But what can I find here in Wilmer that will let me work during school hours, call out when I need to without losing the whole gig and lets me keep on all my clothes?” Jenna knew she sounded whiney and pathetic.
She really wasn’t making a good impression here.
But did that matter? Did he have to like her in order to help her learn to use the gym?
“I can tell you’re not comfortable with this. But I have one more question before we move on.”
She stared at him, then nodded. She might as well get over it with.
“Did this Mason start out hitting on you, then turned to getting mean when you either said no, or it didn’t work out?”
Jenna froze. She thought back over the last three and a half years she’d worked at the Driftwood Lounge. Had Mason ever asked her out?
Something sparked in the back of her mind.
It took a moment of digging, but eventually she remembered Mason suggesting she meet him for dinner, more than once.
She’d been so absorbed in dealing with the courts and foster system in order to keep her sister out of the system she hadn’t even registered that he was flirting.
Was that why he was so nasty to her? Because he felt like she snubbed him?
She didn’t have time to worry about that now. She went back to stretching.
“How long do we do this before you show me what’s next?
” She had shit to do and worrying about the motives of her petty, hateful boss wasn’t on the list. The way she saw it, in better shape she might be able to land a better job.
Or at least move a little faster to make more tips, that would be helpful too.
“Ten to fifteen minutes, both before and after, you need to figure that in when you’re planning a workout. You don’t want to skip it, that’s how people get hurt.”
She nodded. She would do as he said, she didn’t have time for injuries.