Page 35 of Seizing Mack
Mack made a quick getaway before she said or did something she would regret, like kick Dee’s smug, arrogant ass across the mats.
She grabbed her stuff and headed home, but first she stopped at the front desk and inactivated Dee’s card. The moment Delilah walked out those doors, her brief employment atSeizewas officially terminated.
Jay watched as she moved the small watering can over the layered planters that took up a good third of the spacious kitchen. Fashioned like a spiral staircase, a bounty of fresh herbs and spices rose from the tiled terra cotta floor all the way up to the open dark wood beams. Mack often found comfort in tending to her multitude of gardens inside and out, and Jay knew this.
“So,” he said, grabbing a handful of dried apple slices from the dehydrator as he followed her. “I saw you talking to the new guy again today.”
“Yeah? So?” she shrugged before catching the gleam in his eye. “He works out atSeize. We’re bound to cross paths occasionally.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Wipe that smirk off your face. It’s not like he’s seeking me out, Jay.”
“Of course not.”
She exhaled. “Look, tonight I bumped into him after sparring with Volker. Before that, I saw him in the weight room a couple times. No big deal.”
He narrowed his eyes. “What were you doing in the weight room?”
“Duh. Lifting weights.”
Jay looked at her sternly. “We talked about this, Mack.”
“No,youtalked about this. I pretended to listen and then completely disregarded your appreciated but totally misguided advice. Lots of women lift weights. It builds lean muscle and helps prevent osteoporosis later in life.”
“They lift little pink weights in LuLaRoe to bad techno pop, not deadlift in camo to heavy metal.”
Mack smirked; he knew her so well.
“Seriously, Mack. You’re completely repressing your feminine side. Do some sexy pole dancing in between the power squats once in a while, you know?”
She shook her head. She didn’t mind doing that kind of stuff in private classes, but not in public. “No. That’s not me.”
“Why not? You have a V-card, don’t you? You didn’t exchange it for a P while you were over in Europe?”
Mack straightened from her crouch and threw a weed at his head. “Fucktard. Can you imagine this —” she waved her hands up and down her body “— shaking it with a bunch of spandex-clad Pluto booties?”
“Pluto booties?”
“Yeah. Girls with butts so small they’re practically nonexistent.” The ones that made Mack feel like a linebacker just because she had some meat on her bones.
Jay gaped at her. “Are you seriously saying you have a fat ass?”
“No. But this baby’s got back.Youtake twenty-mile mountain hikes carrying fifty pounds of gear and see what kind of glutes you get.”
“Turn around,” he commanded, spinning an apple slice in the air. She did. Jay brought his fingers to his chin and looked at her critically.
“Yeah, I see what you mean. Nice ass, Mack.”
“I know, right?”
“No, baby girl, the problem is, youdon’tknow. You have no idea how guys look at you. If you gave them even one iota of encouragement they’d be swarming out of the woodwork, but you keep them at a distance. I am the only one you allow close enough to see past that intense ‘don’t mess with me’ attitude and into your Texas-size heart. It’s frustrating.”
That was, quite possibly, one of the nicest things anyone had ever said to her. Mack blinked rapidly several times, but kept her expression neutral. “Thanks, Jay. I appreciate the effort. But you know as well as I do that your opinion as my housemate and BFF isn’t realistic. Beyond trying to cheer me up, it’s completely biased.”
“Just promise me you’ll think about letting your inner diva out once in a while. You already do private classes. Do a public class, Mack. Just one. Look at it this way: at the very least, it’s great cardio and you might actually have fun.”
She snorted at that. “Public humiliation is not fun.” Ask her to navigate an obstacle course? Run ten miles? Drop and pound out fifty pushups? Yeah, she was all over that. Attempt a body roll in front of a wall full of mirrors and twenty snickering females? Not so much.
