Page 67 of Mommy

The little yelp she lets out is confirmation enough that she knows that there’ll be cardio waiting for us at home.

I just need to make it home first. And in order for that to happen I need to let her down.

Or do I…

“Let go of the bar and hold onto me.” I grunt out

She stares at me through her blonde lashes, unsure. But when I roll my eyes I can feel her fingers on my neck. Her short nails scratch over my shoulder, leaving a delicious trail of pain behind that helps me focus.

I wait until she has both hands wrapped around my neck and clings to me in a koala bear hug, before I ask:

“Ready?”

Ivy makes some noise of reassurance, and I let go.

It’s only a few feet to the floor, but the gap is enough to make her tighten her grip. Once we’re down, and I have my hands free, I plant them both on her ass.

The initial thought was to help her carry the weight but I’ll have to admit that it does feel nice to have her in my hands.

“Next time,” I murmur into her unbound hair. “we’ll train legs.”

“Yeah, right,” she snorts out, while carefully untangling her limbs from mine. “After what you made me do today, I’ll never set foot in this place again.”

Laughing, I set her down on the floor. My eyes follow her movements as she picks my shirt up and slips it over her head like it’s her armor against a cruel world.

“You look beautiful.” I say the words before my brain has processed them. All the blood is still trapped somewhere in my crotch, and my mind has become a ghost town. Ivory’s eyes snap up to meet mine.

The pretty pale blue is filled with suspicion, a soft sky littered in puffy white clouds.

Shit.

That wasn’t as casual as it should’ve been.

For a second I think, she’ll just take the compliment, her mouth starts to pull into a small smile, but she shakes it off before it blooms.

“Your ass could be better though.” I add, and the tension in the air vanishes.

Just like a cord cut in half, there’s nothing between us anymore. No pull and no tug. Safe grounds.

Ivory’s laugh is a mirror to my own unbothered wink when she whacks at me.

It’s better like this. Safe.

But I want more.

I silence the small voice in the back of my head. That idiot doesn’t know what’s good for him. He might like the pull now, but he’ll hate once it starts to drag him under. I know that, and I’ll keep us both above the surface, breathing fresh air.

“We should head home.” Ivory says, her eyes wandering out one of the large windows. “Posie has been alone for almost two hours.”

Sighing, I nod. If we would have things my way, this workout would have included at least 3 more exercises, but I know that I can’t fight Ivory on this. If I make her stay longer today, I won’t be able to persuade her to tag along tomorrow when we are—in fact— training legs.

“Alright, I’ll see you outside?”

Instead of giving me an answer, Ivory squeezes past me and skips in the direction of the locker rooms.

I stare past her, sucking in air through my mouth like an idiot to keep my instinct to run after her and tackle her to the ground at bay. My erection is a raging problem, and I’ve never been this glad to have taken her to an early morning workout. There’s not many people here, and those that are, focus on themselves. The picture taking crowd of wanna be body builders that focus on everyone but themselves comes later in the day.

I’m about to breathe out my relief when I hear the locker room door open and close shortly after I’ve entered and taken off my shirt. Risking a glance to the side I see Ezekiel come in, and I suppress a groan.