Page 61 of Accidental Roommates

I force myself to look away and go to the kitchen. “You want to bring some water?”

“Sure. Do you have an extra water bottle?”

“I’ve got tons of them. I get them for free at the gym. I have one that’s never been used. I’ll give you that one.” I fill it up, then fill up my own and bring them both to the door where she’s waiting.

“Thanks,” she says as I hand her the pink water bottle. “I can see why you never used it.” She smiles.

“Yeah, pink’s not really my color.” I open the door. “You sure you don’t want a shirt?”

She looks down at her bra. “Do I need one?”

Not if she wants every guy there staring at her breasts. I’m finding she really doesn’t have a clue how hot she is, probably because her dumbass ex never told her. He so didn’t deserve her.

“The gym can get cold sometimes. They really crank up the air.”

“Okay. I’ll be right back.”

She returns wearing a tight-fitting tank top. It still shows off her breasts, but it’s better than just a bra.

We get to the gym and I set her up with a gym ID, then give her a quick tour. As we walk around, I keep noticing guys checking her out. She’ll have no problem getting a date. I’m surprised she didn’t get asked out at the pool today. Or maybe she did and didn’t tell me.

“So you never said if you got a date,” I say as we walk down to the room where they have kickboxing class.

“A date?” she asks, sounding confused.

“At the pool. I’m assuming some guys asked you out.”

“Just one. But Andrea said I should pretend not to be interested so I took his number but didn’t give him mine.”

“How are you supposed to meet someone if you pretend you’re not interested?”

“It’s that whole playing-hard-to-get thing. I don’t think it works, but I went along with it because I wasn’t sure I wanted to go out with the guy.”

“You didn’t like him?”

“It’s hard to say. I only talked to him a few minutes. I didn’t feel any chemistry, but he seemed nice so maybe I’ll give him a call.”

“You gotta watch out for those nice guys. They can turn out to be assholes.”

“Are you saying you’re an asshole?” she says in a kidding tone.

“Are you saying I’m a nice guy?”

She smiles, but doesn’t give me an answer. I open the door and we go inside the room.

“They have kickboxing classes here three times a week,” I say. “They’re really popular. You might want to try one sometime.”

The boxing bags are pushed up against the wall. I go over and move one of them to the middle of the room, then grab some hand wraps and boxing gloves.

“You know how to wrap your hands?” I ask.

She shakes her head.

“I’ll do it.” I take her hand and pull the wrap around and around until I reach the end, then secure it in place. Then I do the same with her other hand. The whole time I’m doing it, I keep thinking about how I wish I could hold her hand, like on a date, but how some other guy will get to instead. He better treat her right or I’ll be punching him like I did Liam. I’ll punch anyone who hurts her.

“Before we put the gloves on, I want you to practice some basic punches.” I take her to the mirror so she can see her form.

“Why am I learning with boxing gloves? I’m not going to hit someone with gloves on.”

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