Sailor spent that night tossing and turning with mental images of Ace Montgomery in workout clothes and herself removing them. In her first images, his muscular body was smooth and perfect, kind of body-builderish. Then she remembered what Harper had told her about his having been stabbed. She realized he would be scarred. Would the scars be dark slashes, or white lines? Would they feel different than regular skin to the touch? She knew nothing about scars on the body; her scars were all ugly memories of childhood. She settled on the image of white lines and imagined lying beside him, tracing them with her fingernail, and then planting her lips on them and moving her mouth along the muscular flank, smelling his manliness.
No, damn it. He was her employee. He was only there to work for her for a short time, and then he would go back to Kentucky.
An image of his tight ass on that motorcycle.
Thoughts of the beautiful sturdy man being carved up by human traffickers, thoughts of him lying bleeding.
Was that a man to fantasize about?
Did he need to be cared for? Maybe it was time that he stopped being a protector and that someone protected him.
That was what she was going to do, taking him to yoga class. By encouraging him to practice yoga, she was caring not only for the man’s bodily healing, but also for his spirit. Yoga was a healer of mood and personality as well as a tool for flexibility and general health.
But her Monday yoga class was also kind of a ladies’ chat-fest. If she didn’t make certain everyone knew he was a member of her staff, not a date, they would talk about it for days or weeks.
Or maybe they would no matter what she said.
She didn’t know Lilah Rosenfeld well. She would go see the woman on her way to The Hole that afternoon and take her some, well, some nicer-tasting tea maybe.
Weary still after a night of sleep broken by confusion and horniness, she arranged her outfit for the evening’s work, something more casual, maybe. Hmm…she decided on a pair of khaki Nili Rotan military style capris and a sky blue blouse with rolled-up sleeves, and hung the outfit on the back of her bedroom door. Imagined that Ace Montgomery walked through that door and took her in his big arms, and imagined then lacing her fingers behind his neck and pulling his face to hers.
Shit, what was wrong with her? She couldn’t bang her employees; that was sexual harassment. Sexual fantasies weren’t like her, either; if you wanted something, you made a plan to get it, or else you recognized that you didn’t want it enough after all. You didn’t just think about it to get through the day. Either she was going to make a plan to bring the big man through that bedroom door, or she wasn’t.
He was her employee, so she wasn’t.
Those big shoulders.
Damn it.
In the shower, she ran through a list of vendors to call, paperwork to complete, errands to run, all necessary after the yoga session.
Those treetrunk legs.
Shit.
He was only one floor away from her.
She put on her yoga outfit, then put on a little waterproof liquid foundation, eyeliner, neutral grey eyeshadow, and mascara. She didn’t usually wear makeup to work out, but it seemed the polite thing to do since she’d have a guest that day. In the kitchen, she woke up her laptop and checked work email.
She had an email from an address she had never seen before. Normally she didn’t open those, but in this case the wording in the preview screen was all she needed to see. It read: You bitch. You have no respect. Its allready costing you costumers. Ill make sure it costes you money to.
Well, that was new, but not surprising. She forwarded it to Ace, then texted him about it, adding a message to meet in the street in front of the brownstone.
His answer came. ACE: Right I’m headed down now. I’ll check the email first.
She stood on the sidewalk for a few minutes holding her gym bag and her car keys before he appeared.
His sweat pants and Yankees t-shirt were obviously freshly purchased. The pants still had a size sticker on them, around the waist level, which she should not have noticed because she was not, not looking at his crotch and not, not, not imagining what was just millimeters under the dark blue cotton.
“I’ll drive,” she said. “In case you have some back pain right after the session.”
“No problem,” said Ace. “I’ve done yoga and stretching before, you know.”
“When? By the way, you might want to peel off that sticker.”
He looked down, saw the sticker. He tilted his head away from her, but she still caught a delicious shy smile as he peeled the sticker away. “Yoga and stretching comes along with martial arts training,” he said finally. “Been a while, though. I never liked it much.”
“Do you have a flexibility problem because – you know, because…?” What was the non-flirty way to say it? “Because you have a lot of muscle?”
“I think it’s just from doing less cardio after I was stabbed. Less than I used to do, anyway.”
He didn’t smile as he said it. Was that discomfort? She couldn’t read his expression. What was he thinking?
They got in the car together.
“I’m not a necessarily a cyber-security guy,” he said about the email. “If I want to track down where something like that came from, pretty much I have to look for clues in how it’s written, or I have to talk to people the old-fashioned way. I’ll keep it in mind, though.”
It wasn’t far to the yoga studio she attended, Stretch and Grow of Williamsburg. She paid Magda, the old Russian lady behind the membership counter, one guest entrance fee, and signaled to Ace to follow her to Studio Three. The floor space heaters were blowing like crazy, and the instructor, Esta, a tall blond Jewish woman in her twenties, was already stretching out in her leggings and spandex top. She rolled smoothly to her feet when Sailor entered followed by Ace. Soon Esta and the security man were saying polite hellos.
“You should really consider becoming a member,” said Esta. “Men in particular often focus on weightlifting and cardio training and neglect their flexibility. But once they are practicing for a while, they realize that yoga doesn’t just give exercise benefits – it’s a philosophy for life.”
“Sure, I know,” said Ace.
“We could use a few more men in the studio, too,” Esta added.
Sailor’s stomach tossed with ridiculous jealousy. Esta was a good looking blonde with a great body, taller than she was, able to look Ace in the eye. She pulled Esta aside and whispered in her ear, “Don’t bother. He’s not Jewish.”
Esta nodded.
Gradually the other participants, mostly women, gathered. Marie, a housewife of forty-four with three children, took her position on Sailor’s right. Sailor settled to the right of Ace, who was attempting a half-hearted hurdler’s stretch on his freshly purchased blue yoga mat.
“Why’s it so hot?” he asked.
“Hot yoga. It’s supposed to cleanse you through healthy sweating.”
“Wish I had a water bottle.”
“Oh, they aren’t allowed in the studio,” said Marie.
He frowned. “I don’t mind following rules, but water doesn’t seem like it should be a problem.”
Esta had overheard. “We’re just trying to promote the most salubrious procedures for health of mind, body, and spirit.”
“Yeah, okay,” Ace said.
Esta settled back in the front of the room and fiddled with her CD player.
Two more patrons arrived, two Broadway actors named Clarence and Whittaker, the only men who usually attended the late-morning session. Both short with dancers’ builds, they seemed to come mainly to socialize with each other. Sailor had never enjoyed their banter.
“Hello, darling,” said Clarence, looking at Sailor sort of but really looking at Ace. “I’ll be stretching out over here.”
“You know,” Whittaker said, “I was up at Equity today, and who do you think I saw?”
“Starting in two minutes,” Esta announced.
“Who did you see?” asked Clarence.
“No, guess.”
“It was Lin-Manuel Miranda. I didn’t think he would remember me, since he totally didn’t recognize me when I tried out twice for Hamilton.”
“Twice?” asked Clarence. “How’d you manage that?” He looked at Ace, who was awkwardly attempting some crunches. “What do you think?”
Ace shrugged. “Who are you guys talking about?”
“Lin-Manuel Miranda. You must have heard of him. Hamilton. The show.”
“I might have seen that on the news.”
“You’re not even sure?” Clarence asked.
“I don’t watch the news much.”
Sailor said, “Lay off my employee, guys.”
“That’s a hot show,” said Marie. “I wanted to take my girls, but one twenty a ticket, oy gevalt.”
“Starting in a minute,” Esta called.
“You must know the song ‘Music of the Night.’ From Phantom of the Opera,” Whittaker said to Ace.
“Yeah, I took my granny to see that movie.”
Some droning Zen-like music emerged from Esta’s speaker. She began a seated stretching routine with leg and arm lifts. Sailor was grateful that something had interrupted the two actors’ banter.
Ace handled the leg lifts fairly easily, but grunted and winced as his lifted his arms. Sailor couldn’t help reaching over. She touched his bicep to get his attention and found her hand lingering there.
“I’m okay,” he said. “Just a little stiff.”
“No pressure,” Esta called. “Work at your own pace.”
“You can relax,” Sailor said. “I think you might be stiffer because I’m here.”
“Uh-huh,” he said. He looked away for a moment, as if hiding private thoughts.
“What? What did I say?”
“Oh, it was nothing,” Ace said.
“I meant, because your boss is here and it’s work-related.”
“Oh, yeah. I understood.” He offered her a slight smile. “No, seriously, problem is, I’m kind of tight, where… You know, the injuries.”
Sailor understood, but Esta asked, “Is it a workout injury, like a pull? Did you try some compresses, or…”
“No, work-related,” Ace said. “Don’t worry. I’ll fight through it.” He sat up, wiped his brow with his sweaty sleeve. “I always fight through it.”
They moved to a knees-to-chest position. Ace seemed fairly comfortable with that, though he didn’t grip too tightly with his arms. Still on their backs, they began a lying spinal twist, moving knees to the floor on either side.
The next pose was cat-cow, which involved arching the back. Sailor always felt this took out the stress kinks for her, but was worried Ace would feel pain because of his lower back injuries. She saw him struggling a little and got out of the position herself to assist, but before she could adjust to help out, he finally, with teeth gritted, got on hands and knees and began to bow his back.
For the pose that followed, Esta distributed some lightly soiled, slightly indented wooden blocks as headrests.
“I’m so sweaty, I might slip off this thing,” Ace said as he lowered his forehead into the curved part of the block.
“Let me know if you aren’t getting some relief in your back,” Esta said as she moved into the child’s pose of knees down, forehead on the block, hands outstretched.
“Naw, I’m good,” said Ace. “But I wish I had a water bottle. Might go get one.”
“Don’t leave yet,” Clarence said. “I think you just being here is good for my sacral chakra.”
“I feel invigorated,” said Whittaker. “My sacral chakra and I are having some great dialogue.”
Sailor said, “Seriously, guys.”
“Do you have a claim on his sacral chakra?” Clarence asked.
Sailor gave him a death glare.
“For our next position,” Esta called. “You’ll bring your hips up. For you newcomers, this is called downward dog.”
“Now I wanna…” Whittaker sang.
“Don’t start,” Clarence corrected.
“Let’s focus,” Esta announced as she modeled the pose.
Ace emitted a muffled grunt of strain. Sailor looked over with concern. His face was red, and his lips were slightly parted. She felt bad for him and wanted to stroke his cheek and rumple his hair.
“Try to keep your palms even,” Esta called. “It’s okay to bend your knees some if it’s painful. Okay, steady breathing.”
They moved through a number of poses. While invigorated herself – because of her default celibacy, yoga was the only thing that destressed her – Sailor was continually distracted by Ace’s struggles. He tilted, groaned, went out of position often, nearly smacked one of the nearby housewives when he swung too aggressively into warrior pose. The man was a warrior, but clearly felt foolish in the posture of one. Had she done wrong to hire him to defend her, given how badly he had been hurt defending others in the past? Could she think of a way to help him get out of the security business and into something peaceful that could give him the chance to tend to his own hurts? Could that free her up to explore these warm feelings that had arisen in her after many years of icy indifference inside?
It happened too quickly for her to react. She was raising her right leg, foot against side of knee, for tree pose, when Ace exhaled and said, "Whoops," and fell toward her. His hands instinctually gripped her torso to keep him from tumbling.
One hand was on her shoulder, but the other was on her boob.
The air went out of the room.
“Sorry, Sailor,” he said as he let go.
“Does that come with our membership?” Marie asked.