“Dad,” I said spinning back to face him, a smile pasted to my lips. “I was going to chat to you about Daniel but I can tell you’re busy. We can catch up later.”
“Daniel you say” — he studied me intently — “sounds interesting, why don’t we catch up over dinner tonight?”
“Dinner ... lovely,” I fumbled over my response, cursing the elevated pitch to my voice and the heat creeping into my cheeks.
“He really does seem to have made an impression.”
Relief swept through me as he misinterpreted the cause of my peculiar state. “Uh-huh.”
“Well, I look forward to the details tonight — see you at eight, Abi.”
I nodded and spun on my heel, heading for the staircase once more, anxious to get away from him and desperate for some time to myself to make sense of my confused thoughts. There was so much I needed to find out, starting with the full extent of what my stepfather had kept from me and why. He had always been a stranger to me, but now he was someone else, something else. I feared him, but more than that was a growing sense of hatred toward him. Recounting all that I knew him guilty of made me sick to the stomach. How could he have given me such a false impression of my own mother and kept my inheritance from me? How could he send me to a shrink just to keep tabs on me? How could he treat his women like he did? Was that how he had been with my mother? What if her death...?
I rammed my fist against my mouth, a sudden surge of nausea hitting me hard as I tried to push the thought from my mind. My eyes flicked back toward the study and I watched as he locked the door and headed to the back of the house. He was no doubt on his way to the gymnasium where Emma would be waiting.
Poor girl. What was she doing with a man like him? She couldn’t possibly love him and yet, was she that callous to be with him for the money? From the time I had spent with her, I couldn’t believe it to be true. I just didn’t understand it. And I wanted to understand it. I wanted to understand her. And suddenly I wanted to see her ... badly. Her motives were suspicious at best, but I didn’t care right now, I just wanted the pain of all this information taken away and replaced with the passion she inspired in me.
I knew I had a couple of hours to kill before I could seek her out so I continued to my room, my mind racing with unanswered questions and half-baked plans of what I could do next.
An hour and a half later, with no clear answers or strategy in place, I headed for the gym, unable to wait any longer. I had changed into a baby pink crop top and low-slung training pants under the pretense of heading for a session myself.
I found Emma still mid-workout. Dad had really meant it when he said she would be worked harder. She sat at the weights machine, doing a pec fly. Her muscles hard through exertion, a sheen of perspiration covering her exposed skin. Did Dad choose her clothing too? Her skimpy hot pants clung to her like a second skin. Her exercise bra, despite the lack of material, was doing an adequate job of keeping her ample breasts in check but her nipples protruded through the soft fabric, begging to be gawped at. Each time she pulled back, it stretched captivatingly tight against her.
“Quite a sight, isn’t she?”
I spun on my heel toward the voice. It was Mick, the personal trainer, and he had caught me blatantly ogling.
Heat crept into my cheeks as I struggled to say something.
“Don’t worry, I won’t give you away,” he said playfully. “Why don’t you come and join us? Emma’s coming to the end of her regime anyway.”
At the word “regime” and the reminder of what it had meant for my stepfather, the color deepened in my cheeks, but I stood my ground.
“That would be great,” I said. “So long as I’m not in the way, I hadn’t realized Emma would still be here.”
He didn’t believe me for a second. “I’m sure she won’t mind, she’s probably bored of having to work with just me and this score card, perhaps a bit of competition will help boost things a little.”
“Competition?” I said tentatively as I followed him into the room.
Spotting our approach, Emma halted her repetitions and sent me a dazzling smile. I fought hard to keep my eyes on her face but they were constantly drawn to her chest and those two taut peaks...
“Abi wants to put some time in, so I thought we could have a bit of a wager between the two of you, spice things up a little?”
Emma took up her towel and started to rub away the perspiration, all the while her eyes flicking back to mine, catching me looking where I shouldn’t.
She let out a small giggle. “A wager, you say?”
“Aye, how about the one who can push the most weight with the same repetitions can treat the other to something of their choosing?” He winked at me as he said it and I wondered what he was implying, my mind following a path of possibilities that really wasn’t helping me stay focused in the moment.
“Sure,” she said, throwing her towel down and looking to me. “You should get warmed up first though, don’t want you getting yourself an injury.”
And that was all the encouragement I needed. I never tackled weights until after my run and I decided not to change the habit. I wanted to impress her with what I was capable of. She was clearly happy enough to wait for me and Mick was enjoying the banter.
A short run, a stint on the rowing machine and I was warmed up and ready for her ... or rather our wager. Every time I had glanced in her direction, her eyes had been on me, watching me, her thoughts unreadable but the smile that touched her lips was more than just friendly. I was sure of it.
“Right then, ladies, I figure we’ll go for the best of seven moves that test you top to bottom starting with the upper body...”
Obediently, we did as instructed. Each taking our turn while the other watched. Some moves more torturous than others, notto carry out but to observe. Watching her work out was like foreplay without the contact. Her body captivated me. And as things heated up, it became more and more obvious that she found me just as appealing.
