The ground began to slope upward even further, silencing even the new queen of fitness as we struggled to make it up one of San Francisco’s most notorious hills. I tried to distract myself by taking stock of the ways our exercise outfits were helping and hindering—our sports bras in particular seemed to be doing jack shit to keep our boobs from jouncing around like we were in an inflatable bouncy castle.
Normally I liked to keep my exercise routine to a strict regime of banging hot guys and lifting heavy mystery novels, but apparently other people underwent this insane masochistic ritual regularly; the least I could do was help them out. Maybe I should research starting a line of sports bras? I’d have to become familiar with a whole new range of designs and synthetic materials…
I managed to keep my mind on product ideas and off the screaming muscles in my calves and thighs all the way to the top of the hill, where Lacey got some of her wind back.
“So,” she said, still a little breathless as our finally-slowing feet slapped against the pavement, “you were saying about the book…”
I’d brought up Asher’s gift at the beginning of the run, but hadn’t had much time to go into the details before all the breath was ripped out of my lungs by the voracious monster known as jogging.
“It’s just a ploy, obviously,” I said in between pants. One good thing about hills—the breathlessness they induced could cover up a whole range of emotions you weren’t supposed to be feeling anymore.
“What’s obvious is that he cares about you. He knows what you care about, and in his own clumsy way he’s trying to appease you.”
“So he puts thought into his playboy moves.” I kicked viciously at a stone in my path, sending it ricocheting off a wall. “Well goody goody gumdrops for him.”
“What about his continued support?” Lacey pointed out. “I mean, he pretty much won the bet, didn’t he? He could have pulled out by now.”
“Phrasing!” I sang out with a giggle that would have been louder if I’d had any spare breath to give it.
Lacey gave me a friendly shove. “You know what I mean.”
“Yeah, I do,” I admitted. “I don’t know where he’s going with this. Maybe I’m afraid to know. I’m torn!” I knew what he’d been in the past, and I knew what he was acting like now. But what was the truth?
We ran in silence for a few minutes before Lacey spotted a smoothie joint. “Want a break?”
I skidded to a stop faster than the Roadrunner spotting Wile E. Coyote. “More than anything in the entire world, up to and including world power, world peace, and those Kinder Egg things I had in England that one time.”
Dripping with sweat, we strolled up to the smoothie stand where Lacey was good and ordered a strawberry banana smoothie with low-fat yogurt. I was under absolutely no obligation to be good and therefore ordered a peanut butter and chocolate banana milkshake with coconut shavings and a mile of whipped cream on top.
“Mmmmmm,” I moaned louder than was strictly necessary as I very, very slowly ate the ice cream in front of Lacey. “This is soooooo good.”
Lacey gave me a dirty look, but hey, I wasn’t the one who had to fit into a wedding dress.
“You are an evil woman, Kate Jameson.”
“Mmm-hmmm,” I agreed, dipping my spoon deeper into the thick milkshake. “Evil and satisfied, baby.”
Maybe I shouldn’t have mocked Lacey, because the universe then decided to send along the one thing guaranteed to chase away my appetite: Asher Young, pulling up in his ridiculously futuristic sports car that I didn’t think was cool at all. Nope. Fancy vehicles only impressed shallow women, and I definitely was not impressed by Asher’s car, even though there might be some small amount of pleasure to be found gliding around in it cradled by the supple leather interior and enough lights on the dash to put the Starship Enterprise to shame.
And of course as he got out of the car and sauntered over I saw that the jerk was wearing a loose red shirt that made his skin glow with vitality, his linen slacks alternately clinging and billowing with the breeze, his hair tumbling about in the wind like he was in a goddamn shampoo commercial. Completely unimpressive.
I set down my smoothie, schooling my expression to distaste. “Do you have an app on your phone that tells you when I am in a peak good mood so that you can come along and ruin it?”
What might have been shock flashed across his face for a second, but then it was gone, replaced by icy indifference that made the guilt I was feeling completely illogical.
No, it had been illogical before. Why was I feeling guilty? He was the one that should be feeling guilty, the confusing bastard. Bribe-y auction gift or not. Which I was keeping, by the way. It would have been too rude to return it.