The very man I’d wanted to get away from—or out of my head at least.
“Fuck it,” I muttered.
He was grunting with each hard hit of knuckles and bare feet. His skin shone with sweat and damp strands of hair clung to the nape of his neck like thick commas.
For a moment I paused, watching him. He could be a goddamn advert on TV for physical fitness, cologne or some other overpriced product which hoped to sell a lifestyle.
He must have sensed me watching him for he suddenly stopped and turned. He frowned and swiped the back of his hand over his brow. “Freya.” He was breathless. “What you doing here?”
“Couldn’t sleep.” I strode up to a second bag and toed off my sneakers and socks. “Too much crap going on in my mind.”
“Yeah, I know the feeling.” He resumed punching hell out of his bag.
I decided to also forego gloves and started on my usual routine of double punching, double kicking. Working on the accuracy of my aim and hitting each spot I located a fraction before impact.
Soon I was sweating, my ears ringing with the sound of flesh whacking onto leather. The tops of my feet stung and turned pink, my knuckles began to ache.
It was then I noticed he’d stopped.
He was staring straight at me.
“What?” I said, slamming my hands onto my hips and dragging in oxygen.
“Nothing.”
No way is it nothing.
“Tell me.”
He shrugged.
I strutted over to him, wiping my face on my towel as I went. “Spit it out.”
“What club did you go to with Jonathan?”
“None of your business.”
“You two an item?”
I hesitated, then, “Why’d you think that?”
“I saw him touch your leg in the van, on the way to the hit. It was intimate, man and woman, not colleagues.”
I couldn’t deny that Jonathan had slipped up there. “We fuck from time to time.”
He raised his eyebrows. “Did you fuck him last night after you went to the club?”
“None of your business.”
He held up his palms. “No, it’s not.” Pause. “Is it Ricardo’s business?”
I paced past him and slipped between the cool ropes into the empty ring. “You need to remember who you’re speaking to.”
“How could I forget.” He was watching me with his head tipped. “When you’re the woman who might get permission from the chief to smack some sense into me.”
“I don’t need permission.” I flexed and unflexed my fingers. “If it needs doing, I’ll do it.”
He came closer, his abdominal muscles tense and his thick arms stiff at his sides. His blue shorts were silky and didn’t hide the bulge of flesh they covered.