She throws her head back and laughs while I grab my workout bag. “Oh, you don’t want to know that.” Cori looks at me. “The changing room is to the right behind the white veil.” I nod and walk to the side, moving the fabric aside. I look inside, and this is more like it.
All the walls are squared cement blocks with five brown bathroom stalls and three white sinks stuck on the wall. I’m about to kick off my shoes when I feel wind beside me and see Brian walk by with his bag in his hand as he heads to one of the stalls. Walking to the biggest stall at the end, I change into my workout clothes. Folding my clothes, I walk out of the stall and see that he is already gone. When I walk into the room, I see him in his workout gear. He’s wearing black shorts, and a black short-sleeved shirt molds his whole torso.
“Ready?” he asks, slapping his hands together, and I nod. We walk out together and find the gym. The trainer meets me and looks at us as we walk in. “I’ll be on the treadmill,” he tells me, walking to the five treadmills that are side by side. I don’t have time to watch him because the trainer introduces herself, and for the next hour, I block him out of my mind and push my body.
Chapter Twelve
Brian
Looking in the mirror while I raise the dumbbells at my sides, I watch her ass run on the treadmill. This is much better than when the fucking trainers made her do squats with her ass to the mirror. It was at that time I knew I was close to the edge.
“So this is where all the cool people hang?” a woman wearing a sports bra and tight booty shorts says as she walks in. I recognize her as one of the backup dancers. She is wearing a baseball cap on her head with her hair in a ponytail at her nape. Kellie looks over at her and smiles, then grabs a water bottle and drinks it. Her chest is heaving, sweat pouring down the sides of her face.
“I don’t know about cool people,” she huffs out, smiling.
“Stacey and I were doing the routine over and over for the past two hours. That was my exercise for the day.”
“Have you met Brian?” she asks, pointing at me, and I set the dumbbells down for the introduction. The woman gives me a once-over. “Brian, this is Jennifer, one of my backup dancers.”
She walks over to me with a swing in her hips, holding out her hand. “So he’s the one everyone’s been whispering about.” Wiping my hands on my shorts, I shake her hand. She grabs it tightly and shakes it up and down while she continues to talk. “I can see it now.” She smirks, not letting me go no matter how much I try to slowly move my hand from her tight grip.
“I’ll make sure to introduce him tonight at dinner,” Kellie says, and I’m finally able to slip my hand out of her grip, but she makes sure her finger lingers in the middle of my hand, and she swirls it in a circle. Pulling my hand away, I smile at her tightly.
“Are you ready to go?” I look over at Kellie, and she nods at me, so we get ready to walk out of the room.
“We will see everyone later,” Kellie announces.
Jennifer says under her breath, “I hope to get to see a lot of that later.” The words almost make me shrivel up. We walk out, and Kellie walks with her head down, her body tense next to me.
“What’s wrong?” I ask her right before we walk into her room.
“I’d appreciate it if you didn’t flirt on the job.” She doesn’t look at me as she turns and walks into the room, leaving me by myself. I don’t take the time to get my temper under control before I storm in and see her grabbing her bag. “I’ll shower at the hotel room.” She looks at Cori, who gives me a questionable look.
“Excuse me,” I say to her, and she still doesn’t look up. “Kellie,” I snap, and she finally looks up. “I was not flirting. In case you missed what went on in there,” I say, pointing back to the hallway, “she wouldn’t release my hand. It was almost like the grip of death.” I walk to my bag, then grab it, and sling it over my shoulder. “If anything, she was flirting with me, and I was being polite.”
“Whatever.” She rolls her eyes. “Is the car here?” She ignores me, turning to Cori, who just nods. We don’t say anything to each other the whole time we walk out of the venue and get in the car. She doesn’t sit next to me in the golf cart either. Instead, she sits in the back with Cori, who ignores everything by being on her phone. Cori is the first one out of the cart and up her stairs before I turn off the cart.