Page 5 of Finding Romance (Romances in the Building #2)

CHAPTER FIVE

Kasen

“So, you home for a while?” Hutch asks as he spots me. Hutch and I have a routine when I’m home. Three times a week, we get up at zero dark thirty and walk the two blocks to the local gym. Sometimes Bray, Drew, or Gray joins us, but more often than not, it’s just us.

I put the bar back in its holder and look up at my friend. Hutch is a good man. While most see him as silly and kind, I know the serious side of him, the part of him he doesn’t often share with others.

“For now,” I reply as I get up and switch places with him.

“Good. It’s not the same around here without you,” he huffs as he grabs the bar and begins his set.

I glare at him, and he grins up at me. I can understand how he’s a magnet with the women. But it’s strange he’s not had a single serious relationship since living here.

I know he’s had a tough time since the accident.

And I’m sure he’d be a good person to confide in, but I’m not sure I’m ready to air all my dirty laundry, not even to a man I consider to be one of my closest friends.

Sometimes, I feel like a stranger in my own life.

But part of me likes that. I’m like a ghost that can move in and out of situations without being noticed and some part of me finds that cathartic.

Plus, my friends don’t need to know every little thing about me.

And honestly, they seem fine with the little I’ve shared.

“So, meet any women lately?” Hutch grunts as he sets the bar down.

“No,” I reply because it’s the truth.

When I’m home in Scotland, my accent comes out a bit.

The one I got after spending half my childhood with my grandparents in a small town on an equally small island off the western coast. I had plenty of women visiting the island recently that eyed me up and I could have slept with at least three tourists, but I just wasn’t in the right head space.

“Dude!” Hutch says as I miss spotting him and quickly grab the bar. He sits up and shakes his head. “Seriously, are you alright?”

“Yeah, sorry. Just lost in my thoughts,” I admit in a moment of weakness.

“About a certain young woman who is living across the hall from you?” Hutch asks, waggling his eyebrows.

My glare returns and he laughs.

“No,” I lie. I have been thinking about her. I can’t put my finger on it, but she makes me feel…at ease, which is unusual for me. I’m not entirely sure how I feel about it.

“Right. Anyhow, I?—”

“Well, looks like the gang is back together,” Bray says as he and Gray walk into the room.

We do that weird bro-hug thing that I’ve never really understood but just accepted as a strange social norm.

“You guys almost done?” Gray asks.

“Yeah. I’m going to do my cooldown,” I say, hooking my thumb toward the treadmills.

“Great. I’m going to do my run,” he replies as we walk over and get on our respective treadmills.

We always seem to use the same two. Bray hops on the one beside me and Hutch joins us on my other side.

We all run at slightly different paces. Bray is the only true runner of us.

He’s done a few half-marathons. Gray runs but only a few miles.

Hutch does interval training, and I just run at a steady pace for thirty minutes and then walk for another five.

I glance over at Hutch. He always pushes himself even when I can tell it hurts.

All three of us have to yell at him on occasion but he just keeps at it. I admire that about him.

“So, you really don’t find her attractive?” Hutch asks.

“Who?” I question as I increase my cadence. Yeah, I know who, but I’ll play dumb.

“Piper,” he grunts as he tries to keep up with my pace.

“Yes?” a woman’s voice says from behind us.

Hutch goes flying off the treadmill like a cartoon. Bray grips the handles of his to stop himself from doing the same. Gray starts laughing but doesn’t miss a beat. And me, I put my feet on the sides of the treadmill and turn my head to see a gorgeous woman standing across the room from me.

She’s at the door, clearly just coming in for a workout.

And holy hell. She has the perfect body.

I can hardly believe underneath those flowy clothes was all that toned muscle and flawless skin.

Her sports bra doesn’t do her breasts any justice, but they still look perfect.

Her hair is tied up in a ponytail. Her shapely legs look like they should be wrapped around my waist.

Holy fuck! I need to stop ogling her. And shit, did she hear Hutch?

“Oh my God! Hutch! Are you OK?” she asks as she drops her towel on the handle of an elliptical and runs over to check on him.

Hutch dusts off his knees and, with a little help from a nearby stair stepper, stands. “I’m good. Not the first time I’ve gone down and not the last.”

“Damn. That looked brutal,” she says as she looks him over.

He shrugs. “I’ve had worse.”

“I didn’t know everyone from the building worked out here,” she says as she climbs onto the elliptical and starts her workout.

“By everyone, you mean the cool people?” Drew says from the door.

“Hey, man, you are late,” Gray scolds.

Drew shrugs and gets on the last of the treadmills. “I need my beauty sleep and you fuckheads get up before the sun.”

Piper snickers.

“Oh, is this Cornelia’s niece?” he asks all of us.

I nod.

“I’m Piper,” she says as she holds out her hand to him from across the hand bars of their machines.

“Nice to meet you. Clearly, you’ve met the others,” he says.

“Gray, Bray, Hutch, Kasen, and you must be Cam’s roommate?” she asks.

He grins. “Guilty. It’s a full-time job but someone has to do it. I’m Drew, by the way.”

Giggling, she picks up the pace on the machine. Everyone seems to be immersed in their workouts now and something about that is cathartic. Have I missed this routine? I guess I have.

“Does everyone from the building actually come here?” she asks.

As if on cue, Al walks in and sits down over at the leg press.

“Good morning,” he says cheerfully.

“I take that as a yes,” she answers herself with a laugh.

“Yeah, pretty much. Cam and Carly mostly run the trail but sometimes come here when they have free trial days. And Roxy comes here at night a few times a week for a yoga class. Jessa and Troy are not much for the workout thing. And sometimes, Al here, talks your aunt and Margie into doing weight training with him,” I explain.

“The building that works out together stays together,” Hutch teases.

Everyone groans and Piper laughs. I glance at her reflection in the window.

Fuck, she looks hot. The way her breasts move as she increases her pace.

The sweat forms on the skin between her breasts.

I imagine for all of two seconds how salty that sweat would taste if I licked it off her.

“How’s Cornelia?” Al asks, breaking me from my very inappropriate thoughts.

“She’s better now that she has her ankle pinned back together. I think she’ll be back in here in a few months once we get her through some PT,” Piper explains.

I can see in the window that Al is glancing at me and then back at her. Al always seems to observe everyone. He’s a bit like me, except not as quiet.

“I hear you brought her your chair,” he states, glancing at me as he gets up from his set on the leg press and walks over to the next machine in his circuit.

“I did. Figured she needed it more than me at the moment,” I reply, wishing I had my earbuds in because I hate talking this much.

“Did she find the necklace yet?” he continues on as if we all want to talk. I love the guy, but where he could talk to anyone at any hour of the day, I prefer limited conversation, especially before nine in the morning.

“Not yet. I’m worried she lost it at the hospital or in the ambulance,” Piper says with a sigh. “I know it means a lot to her, but I’m not betting on me or anyone else finding it.”

“We could go down to the hospital and ask. Maybe they have a lost and found or something,” I suggest and then immediately shut my mouth. Why in the hell did I offer that?

“Really? Maybe we could go after we work out?” she asks, her voice laced with so much hope I don’t have the heart to say no.

“Yeah, sure,” I grunt as I run.

I look into the window in front of me again and find her smiling and something about that pleases the hell out of me.