Page 12 of Bodybuilders for the BBW

“Hello, baby girl.” Nothing made Mum happier than when we came around. She gave my younger sister a hug, then held her at arm’s length. “And what’s this about a guy?”

“Yeah, what guy?” I asked with a frown. “This is all news to me.”

“Ohh, apparently you made a big impression at the gym.”

Half the reason our sharing an apartment worked was because Mandie and I didn’t see each other all that often. I was at work or volunteering at the shelter and she was shooting videos in the morning and often attending glamorous events in the evening. Right now I wished she had such an event to go to. Her smile spread slowly and Mum and Dad started looking at the two of us intently.

“No,” I said, trying for authoritative and failing, especially when the memory came flashing back. “No.”

The smoothie, the towel… those abs. I held out a hand to ward Mandie off, but it didn’t work.

“Katie collided with a hot guy at the gym,” my baby sister told our parents with a smirk. “She spilled her smoothie all over him, and apparently that’s all it took for him to be smitten.” A text notification went off, and she peered at her screen. “He’s been blowing up my phone since, wanting Katie’s number.”

“Oh you didn’t.”

Mum slapped a hand over her face to smother her laughter. She failed utterly.

“Some guy at a gym?” Dad’s arms crossed as his brows jerked down in a frown. “What do we know about him? Is he another dirtbag like?—”

Dave. He was going to say Dave. My situationship that kind of morphed into something else, yet was never defined, making it easy for him to twist things to suit himself. He was possessive and uncaring, sweet and a complete pig, depending on what was happening that day. My family had never liked him, and honestly, some days neither did I. The relationship… whatever it was, it kind of had a momentum of its own, carrying me to places I didn’t want to go.

Including the last night we talked.

I blinked, shoving that memory away.

“Rhys is co-owner of the gym I go to,” Mandie told Dad, yet she shot me a wink. That was the half-naked hottie’s name? “He’s a business owner and a good guy.”

“Business owner…” Dad stroked his chin, then looked at me. “You could do worse, love.”

“Is he kind?” Mum was all about my love life seconds ago, but now there was an actual person to discuss, her protective side was coming out in force. “Is he going to treat your sister well? I don’t care if he’s hot. That Dave certainly thought highly of himself and look at the way he treated your sister. Katie doesn’t need a ‘hot’ guy who’s too busy looking at the mirror, not her.”

“Mum—” I started to say.

“She needs someone solid, dependable, and not too full of himself, just like your father.”

She moved into his side and he wrapped an arm around her, staring down into her eyes.

“You saying I’m not hot?”

“You’re a stud muffin and you know it.” Mandie and I recoiled as Mum’s voice became a throaty purr. “All these big, strong muscles.”

“Oh my god, gag!” I said, spinning around as she stroked his chest, but when I did, I caught my sister in my sights. “And do you think maybe you could’ve told me about this situation before you announced it to the parental units?”

“Seemed too good an opportunity to waste,” Mandie replied with a grin. “Now they won’t start hassling me about settling down.”

“So are you going to get this Rhys’ number?” God, nothing threw Mum off the scent. “If Mandie thinks he’s a nice guy?—”

“He has to be,” I replied. “I walked head first into him and spilled my smoothie all over his very nice chest.”

“Well, that’s one way to get a bloke’s attention.”

My father was fighting to hold back a smirk.

“And then when I tried to clean him up with his own towel, I discovered he wasn’t wearing anything underneath it.”

God, that shadowy shape and all it promised had haunted my dreams since that moment.

“Oh, you didn’t!”

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