When her gaze floated up to discover the smirk tilting my lips, her face went blank. Like what you see, don’t you? I wordlessly asked. She scowled and dropped her attention to the control panel of the treadmill.
At least it was good to know I wasn’t the only one battling the attraction between us.
We managed to successfully ignore each other for a while after that. She finished her short run, climbed off the treadmill, and went to the weight machine in the center of the room. It was a large tower with a weight stack, pulleys, and an inclined seat. There were different bar configurations and rope pulls stored on the side that could be clipped on in various places to work different sets of muscles.
She peered at it like the thing was intimidating, and she wasn’t exactly wrong. No matter how good the design was, there was a learning curve. Even I’d had to watch a YouTube video my first day in here, just to make sure I was doing everything right.
She adjusted the pin on the weight stack, sat down on the seat, and tucked her ankles under the leg extension bar. Except she hadn’t changed the cable over, so it wasn’t set to pull weight. When she pushed her feet forward to straighten her legs, there was no tension, and the bar went up easily.
Because I disliked her, I should have been happy to watch her struggle, especially when it was something I could easily solve. She got up off the seat, put her hands on her hips, and examined the machine, before deciding to reset the pin in the weights—clueless that it wasn’t the issue.
I should have enjoyed it, but instead it bothered me.
Keep your mouth shut. You don’t owe her anything, and if the roles were reversed, she’d do the same to you.
The second time she sat and attempted to use the leg extension part of the machine, she got exactly the same results. Her face contorted with frustration.
So, I ignored the voice protesting in my head, put down my weights, and strode to the machine. Her suspicious gaze was laser focused on my reflection in the mirror as I approached, and she watched how I turned the knob to activate the pulley for the leg developer. I stood back, crossed my arms over my chest, and lifted an eyebrow.
There, my expression told her.
She swallowed a breath, pushed her feet forward, and this time it was what she wanted—it was a challenge to move the bar.
The word from her was quiet and begrudging. “Thanks.”
I didn’t acknowledge it, but not because I was being a dick. It was because I’d been the last one to use the machine and I was taller than she was, so she had the bar set too low. It had to be uncomfortable. She was putting all the strain on the tops of her feet, rather than the base of her shins.
Fuck it.
I’d already helped her. What difference did it make if I did some more? Plus, if she hurt herself, it might take her out of rotation as a scene partner . . . and I couldn’t have that. I didn’t like her, but the two hottest sexual experiences of my life had included her. I was more than a little curious to see if I could get that streak to continue.
She jolted to a stop, making the weights clank loudly when I leaned down in front of her and pulled out the adjustment handle, shortening the length of the center bar two notches. The handle locked back into place, and I straightened beside her, waiting for her to try the machine again and make sure it was right.
It was.
“Thanks,” she muttered under her breath.
I didn’t know what to say. I was uncomfortable with her in every way possible. She made me twitchy and feel things I didn’t want to, so the word stumbled from my lips, making me sound like an asshole. “Whatever.”
She sucked in a sharp breath at my shitty response, and inside I winced, but on the outside, I pretended not to care. I trudged back to the weights I’d abandoned and focused on finishing my set, trying to block her out.
It was so fucking hard not to think about Madison when she was right there. It’d been hot in this place before she’d shown up, and now it was an oven, slowly baking me to death.
I snatched up my water bottle and drank, but no amount of water seemed to quench my thirst.
“Do you know if this machine does any other leg exercises?” Her voice was careful, like she was sure she was going to regret asking me.
I lowered my bottle and considered how to answer. My workout was done. I could shrug, walk away, and leave her to figure it out. But she’d asked the question, even as she expected me to be a dick about it, so I wanted to prove her wrong.