Page 24 of Rough Ride

Without looking in that direction, Sawyer told me, “You’ll be waiting a while. Those guys just started, and they have no fucking clue what they’re doing.”

I groaned internally. Glancing at the guys using the other barbells, it was immediately obvious that Sawyer was right.

Sawyer shrugged those massive shoulders. “But if you’d rather wait on them, be my guest…”

Liz gave me a pleading look.

“Fine,” I gritted out. “But please don’t ogle us.”

He snorted, but said nothing. Then he turned around, facing away from us. He bent at the knees, sticking his ass out as he wrapped his fingers around the barbell. There were two plates on each end of the barbell, a significant amount of weight.

Then Sawyer jerked upright, pulling the barbell up in a violent—yet smooth—motion, resting it on the front of his collarbone. He rolled his elbows back and lowered the weight back to the ground, then repeated the motion seven more times.

“What weight do you need on the bar?” he asked.

“We can do it,” I said.

“It’ll go faster if I help,” he said.

“One fifteen!” Liz said.

As the two of them removed a plate from each side, I said, “You’re going to wear yourself out before tonight’s event.”

“Saddle bronc riding?” Sawyer snorted. “I’m not worried.”

“Maybe you should be. You’re throwing a lot of weight around in here. You might pull a muscle.”

He sneered at me. “Thanks for the advice.”

Liz crawled under the barbell, and I helped spot her while she did a set of glute thrusts. Then I took over and repeated the exercise. It was harder for me; Liz was beating me in the cake department.

I started to say so, but Sawyer was standingright there, pointedly not watching. His presence annoyed me; going to the gym together was one of the few times Liz and I got to hang out besides work.

“Saw you at Billy Bob’s last night,” I said.

Sawyer added weight to the barbell and positioned himself for his next set. “I know. You were offended I ordered from the other bartender.”

“I wasn’t…” I began to say, then stopped myself. “I didn’t mean at the bar. I saw you later in the night. You were watching me.”

He was silent while doing eight power cleans. When he finished, he said, “Want to know why I was watching you?”

I felt my throat tighten. “Sure.”

“Because,” he said while focused on the weights, “you had just shouted Eli’s name at the top of your lungs. And then I watched him practically carry Johnny out of the bar. I was wondering what you had done to them. I figure you poured yourself fake liquor while serving them the real stuff.” He raised a dark eyebrow in challenge.

Damnit. Ihadshouted Eli’s name to get his help with Johnny.

I didn’t respond, and Sawyer took that as a victory. He even smiled—if the tiniest curl of his lip could even be called a smile.

Liz filled the silence with gossip about her brother, who was in a throuple with his roommate and girlfriend. I only listened with half an ear. Whenever Sawyer was lifting, I found my gaze drifting in his direction. The tank top fit his muscular body like a frame around an oil painting, highlighting every single muscle in his upper back, shoulders, and arms.

Liz caught me looking at one point, and raised one knowing eyebrow at me. I rolled my eyes.

At least Sawyer wasn’t constantly flirting with me like Johnny and Eli. He was politely sharing the barbell and otherwise not engaging with us at all.

But as we switched to the next exercise using the same barbell, that kind of annoyed me, too. Why wasn’t he into me? He seemed interested when I handed him a flier that first night, and had showed up at Billy Bob’s an hour later. I’d caught him looking at me a few other times, not just last night when Johnnyneeded help. And out of all the bars in that massive honky tonk, he’d chosen to stay near the one where I was working.

Then why was he totally ignoring me the rest of the time?

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