Page 7

Chapter 7

APRIL

I ’d scheduled Gabe for his bike fitting before I’d known he’d watch me getting my face kicked (literally) and my ass kicked (metaphorically) at a race the day before.

The funny thing was, we really hadn’t had any availability for a fitting, but I was trying to be nice by opening the shop early for him because I knew his training was a huge chunk of his career.

No good deed goes unpunished , I thought as I unlocked the door for his hulking frame. He put my five foot three to shame with his six foot something ridiculous. Honestly, he should have been a basketball player. At least then, he wouldn’t be standing in my shop resembling an Olympic cyclist in his tri-suit. He looked like a force to be reckoned with, a machine, a pro. With some people, training for triathlons made them lose muscle tone. With all that cardio, you’d blaze through calories, so it was no surprise seeing triathletes with willowy frames. Not Gabe. He was lean, but you could see the contour of muscle under the thin fabric of his suit, which meant he had to be adding weight training to his workout routine and carefully planning out his nutrition—all of this on top of his jobs as a massage therapist and a coach.

“Good morning,” I said, but he’d been the first person I’d talked to that day, so my voice sounded like rocks in a blender. I cleared my throat for a softer, “Morning.”

“Morning,” he said, his voice smooth as butter. Like he’d been up for five hours. Then I considered that. He probably had. I bet he got in a brisk fifty-mile ride long before the first rooster had a cup of coffee. His eyes roamed to my left eye, and he winced.

It had been quite the shocker this morning when I woke up to the plum shading there. I tried my best to cover it with concealer, but it only did so much. I’d considered wearing sunglasses inside, but working with shades on seemed annoying and would probably warrant as many questions as the shiner would.

“Does it hurt?” he asked.

“Only every time I blink.” His face fell, and I had to laugh. “I’m kidding. It’s fine.” Gabe let me guide his bike from him to the trainer we had at the shop. “My legs, however, feel like they are only one hundred signatures away from the petition they need to leave.”

Gabe laughed—a low thing that reminded me of distant thunder.

I bent over to take the back tire off his bike, but he stopped me. “I know how to take a tire off. Rest your legs. We can’t give them any more reason to hate you.”

“Thanks,” I said, watching him quickly hook his Quintana Roo up to the trainer. Trainers were great for indoor bike riding. In fact, I probably did ninety percent of my cycling on a trainer. However, they were great at the shop too. I could see exactly how an athlete rode while the bike stayed stationary .

After he finished, I jotted down some quick measurements before I had him mount.

“Is there anything specific you want me to look at today? Any problems?”

“Can you make me go faster?” he asked, smiling cheekily.

I laughed. “Possibly.”

“Actually, I’m here because my knee has been pinching.”

We were knee-pain twins, then. However, with some luck, Gabe’s issue would be a quick fix.

“Okay. Just pedal nice and easy for me.”

He leaned onto his bars into the aero position and took long, effortless strides. Right away, I could see the problem.

“Your seat is low. Can you hop off?”

I raised the saddle a bit and had him get back on. It took a few attempts to get the adjustment just right, his torso and legs hitting that forty-five-degree angle sweet spot. When I finally had it where I wanted, I told him to keep pedaling to make sure it felt right for him.

It was honestly a little bit of a fight to keep my professionalism at this point. I kept having to remind myself that I had a job to do and that my eyes did not have permission to roam freely up and down the length of Gabe. After all, we were a respectable establishment. Still, I couldn’t help but think I had the best job in the world, a front-row seat watching this beast of an athlete work.

I particularly liked how his calf muscles worked under the red M-dot tattoo. A lot of athletes who completed an Ironman got the symbol tattooed there. It showed that the person with the ink was an absolute badass, albeit slightly insane. I hadn’t decided if I wanted the Ironman symbol tatted on me or not, but I figured I needed to finish the damn thing before I worried too much about that.

“You’ll have to let me know when you’re available for an FTP,” he said as if he was having a nice stroll instead of pedaling at podium chasing speed.

FTP? I couldn’t remember exactly what it stood for. Functional Training Purposes? Or something to that effect. Clay used to have me complete one every so often. Basically, for twenty minutes, you increased effort until you reached an I-never-want-to-sit-my-cheeks-on-a-bike-again point. There were some practical uses for the test—besides the serotonin boost coaches received from torturing their athletes—such as establishing target training zones.

“We don’t do that here,” I said, keeping my eyes on his form, wondering if we needed to move the stem to extend his reach for the handlebar.

“I’m talking about measuring your FTP.”

“Why would I do that?” I laughed, but it was short. “I don’t even have a coach.”

“That’s what I’m saying, April.” We locked eyes. “You do now.”

He stunned me. I let the prattling and whooshing of Gabe’s pedaling fill the space for a moment. “You’re offering to be my coach?” I asked dumbly.

“Yes.”

“But don’t you only coach . . . pros?” He worked for Triple Threat like Clay, but certainly, they were on different levels. Gabe’s athletes were the Monstars from Space Jam, and I was Daffy Duck getting smacked with an anvil at every turn. I assumed he was already on the A-Team that Clay was gunning for.

Gabe laughed, then seemed to weigh my question. “I’ve got some great athletes this year, but I don’t only coach pros.”

“You don’t think I’d be a waste of time?” I was grateful for his offer, I really was, but I couldn’t just accept without making sure he knew exactly what he was getting into by bringing me on the team. “I’m not going to help your coaching portfolio. I’ll never come close to a podium.”

“Honestly, you would look great on my portfolio.”

A second of flattery flourished before logic snuffed it out. “You’ve never coached an Ironman virgin?” I guessed.

“No,” he agreed. “I haven’t.” His nose crinkled. “But let’s call it something else.”

“Pedal faster for me,” I prompted. I’d honestly seen enough, but I needed a moment to think. At this point, Gabe was booking it, and I finally got to see a little bit of perspiration drip from that thick, black hair of his. One drop fell from the scar that sliced through his eyebrow. He wasn’t ugly breathing yet, but his nostrils flared. The pure power in each pedal astonished me.

In all our interactions, he seemed gentle, but judging by his standards, I could imagine him being a nightmare of a coach, a total hard ass.

“What do you think?” Gabe asked, finally breathless.

“We might need to adjust the stem. You can stop.”

He clicked out of his pedals and planted his feet. “I mean about you being my athlete.”

I crossed my arms and chewed my bottom lip, still debating as he dismounted. “I don’t know if you are in my budget. I’m assuming you charge more than Clay.”

He shook his head. “We have to keep the same rates—company policy.”

I frowned for his sake. That didn’t seem right. Gabe coached on a whole other level, didn’t he? I thought Triple Threat had different tiers of coaching .

“But, before you decide,” Gabe continued, “I want to be completely upfront with you.” He paused to wipe sweat from his brow with the back of his arm. “I expect a lot from my athletes. I won’t go easy on you.”

My throat went dry at that statement, which was silly. There was nothing sexual about it. He was setting expectations. But my perverted, spicy-literature-loving mind drew up an entirely different connotation. I broke eye contact and, out of habit, looked at the picture above the counter: my mom with her Ironman tattoo and me with my knockoff design.

I’d asked the universe to send me something, and it had sent me a coach. This could still be my year.

I extended my hand. “You’ve got yourself a deal, Coach.”

Gabe smiled, his large hand swallowing mine whole.