The last thing I wanted was to involve him with my mess of a personal life, but I needed to warn him again of what might happen.
“I just ran into a friend of my ex.”
“Okayyyy.” He drew out the two-syllable word, his fingers digging into my arms, seemingly involuntary.
“Lance asked me to reorder a few things in front of him, and now Bruno knows I work here. I asked him not to tell Mitch, but he said he can’t hide this from him.” As if reliving the encounter all over again, my palms began to sweat as my breaths continued to be stolen from me. “He’s gonna show up here. I know it. And I don’t want to see him.”
“Then you won’t.”
“You don’t understand. Now that he knows where I work, he’ll be relentless.”
“I’ll handle it.”
“No,” I said resolutely. “There’s no telling what kind of trouble he’ll cause for you if you get involved. It’s my issue. I’ll deal with it.”
“Deal with it how you have been? Because all you’re doing is running away from the issue.”
Stunned he spoke so blatantly about a situation he had no understanding of, I jerked out of his hold and retreated several steps.
“You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t I?” A pensive look danced across his face. “I know all too well about avoidance.”
“Well… well… your issues aren’t mine. Please don’t get involved.”
“You already involved me when you warned me about him.”
I couldn’t call bullshit because he was right. I did warn him, but I never told him I wanted him to insert himself into the situation, if and when it arose.
My mouth fell open once more, ready to tell him again not to worry about my ex and me, but he turned away before I could utter a word.
“I’m going for a run. Care to join me?” He walked toward the back exit, never waiting for me to answer, but I supposed he expected me to follow, which I did.
Anything to get my mind off my encounter with Bruno.
Besides, there wasn’t anything I could do about the issue with my ex except to wait and see what transpired.
22
I laced up my sneakers and took a seat on the top step of the landing, waiting for Sophie to emerge from her apartment. I never ran with anyone. I needed solace, the time to beat myself up for past mistakes. So why I asked her to come along was beyond me. The only thing I could think of was that I didn’t want her to be alone after her encounter with her ex’s buddy. I knew all too well what it was like to live with fear. Not that I’d compare mine with hers, but any level of fear ate you up on the inside. That much I believed to be true.
The creak of her door had me jumping to my feet.
“Ready?” I asked, devouring the sight of her.
She wore black leggings and a red-and-black racerback exercise top. It looked more like a sports bra to me, but what the hell did I know? Maybe it was, but far be it from me to make a comment. My eyes homed in on the zipper, and I envisioned tugging it down, dangerously hungry to get another view of her glorious tits.
“How did you know I run?” She stood a foot from me, adjusting her ponytail.
“Elton told me. He said you asked once if you could use a treadmill, that you usually ran outside, but it was raining that day.”
“Does your team tell you everything?”
I nodded and replied, “Everything.”
“Good to know.”
Once we hit the street, I led her to a detour off the main strip close to a half a mile down the road and onto a path I’d discovered months ago. Not a lot of people knew about this hidden gem, so whenever I did use it, I didn’t have to worry about being bombarded with people wanting a selfie.
