Whoa, Paige thought. All righty, then. She said, “That’s helpful, anyway. Elimination’s always good.”
Something else might have happened there, too, because Jace wasn’t looking nearly as closed-off as before. He asked, “About done?”
“I thought you’d never ask.” She stopped pedaling, slid off the bike, and her leg buckled beneath her as a jolt like a red-hot poker stabbed into her sciatic nerve. She staggered, grabbed at the seat, hauled herself upward as smoothly as she could, then tried to smile and said, “Definitely time to go.”
He’d been off his bike the moment she’d started going down. Reflexes like lightning. Now, he was at her side, his hand at her elbow. “All right?”
“Oh, yeah.” The muscles in her butt and hamstring had seized up now, and she’d started to sweat. Damn it. She should have stretched more today, but she hadn’t had time, what with Jace, the store, and… Jace.
“Paragliding, huh,” he said. “Bad landing?”
“Uh… yeah.” She barely knew what she was saying. Damn, that hurt. She breathed through it, tried to stretch out her hamstring without him noticing. “Something like that. I’m good.”
He still had his hand under her arm, was helping her toward the locker rooms. “Sorry. I should’ve shut this down a while back. I knew that was hurting.”
“And here I thought I’d been doing such a good job hiding it.” She didn’t say it through her teeth. She hoped.
“My job,” he said. “Former job. Squad leader. Which is all about paying attention.”
“Oh, I needed that,” she muttered. “Extra hotness points for you. That’s just great.” The pain had eased a little. She’d make it. They’d reached the women’s locker room. “I need to stretch this, massage it for a while. My car’s just down at the store, so you can head on out.” She stopped. “Damn. The chickens.”
“The chickens?”
“Yeah. I need to shut the chickens away. Has the sun set? It has, hasn’t it?”
“Close. Nearly seven-thirty.”
She swore under her breath. “They need to be locked in, or something will get them. Listen, if you don’t mind showering at home, could you grab your stuff while I grab mine, then give me a ride to my car? I really need to get home. Stupid chickens.”
“I’ll tell you what,” he said. “I’ll go right now and lock them up. How about the goats?”
She’d reached for the door handle, and with that motion, the hot poker was back. She let go, put a hand against the wall, tried to lean against it without showing she was, and said, “Uh… really? OK. Chickens—their pen and their coop both. They both have to be shut. Opossums. Coyotes. Et cetera. For the goats—uh, more hay. Give them water.” She tried to think. “Put the babies in their own stall so they’re separated. You have to, uh…” Her leg was on fire. “Give them treats to get them in there. I don’t want to ask you, but it would really help. If I let those chickens get killed…” She didn’t say, Lily will kill me.
“Here’s what we’re doing, then,” he said. “I’m leaving straight away and doing all that. Then I’m coming back to collect you.”
“You don’t have to do that. That’ll take…” She couldn’t think.
“Yeah. Forty-five minutes, I’m thinking. During which you get in the sauna, let your muscles relax, and massage that leg. Then I come collect you, grab us something to eat, and take you home.”
“You don’t have to.”
“Don’t be stupid. Forty-five minutes.” He took a few steps, then turned and said, “And do not come out and wait for me. I’ll send somebody in to get you, and then I’ll wait until you’re ready.”
“Why?”
He got still again, frowned at her, and finally said, “Chalk it up to being your neighbor.”
It would get better. It always did. You rode the waves until they passed.
The gym was emptying out now. She’d spent way too long on the bike, but she’d wanted to talk to Jace. It had been comfortable. Or something else. She hadn’t done anything to jeopardize Lily, though. She hoped.
She couldn’t think about it any more. A few more twists on the pain dial, and she was going to be on her back on the floor, sobbing. She gritted her teeth, wrenched her shoes off, and couldn’t manage her clothes. The effort of hiding the bullet wounds was beyond her, and she couldn’t show those. Instead, she hobbled into the shower fully dressed, turned it on, leaned back and put her heel against the wall, and may have cried a little.
Stretch it. She tried to breathe through it, to let it go, and it barely worked.
Sauna. This time, she used one of the two curtained cubicles designed for the modest, and she remembered to put a towel around her waist, too, after she undressed. Then she stepped inside the cedar-lined room, blessedly empty of anything but steam, sat on the lower shelf because there was no way she was climbing up higher, and rode those waves.
It took a long time. There was nobody in the locker room at all by the time the front-desk minder came in, and Paige was sitting on the wooden bench with her dress on again, massaging her leg.
She’d pulled her skirt down at the sound of the door, but kept working her lower quad and hamstring. “Hi.”
“Uh… hi.” The young woman averted her eyes, even though Paige wasn’t even wearing the holster. “Jace Blackstone is outside. He says if you’re ready, he’s waiting for you.”
“Right.” Paige got to her feet. “Tell him I’ll be right there, will you?”
“We’re about to close, that’s all.” The woman still wasn’t looking at Paige.
“I’ll be right out. Two minutes.”
When she walked out with her tote, which was a whole lot heavier now with the sodden workout clothes in it, Kelli looked around from where she was leaning against the front desk talking to Jace and another man, who was clearly hanging around for more time with the sexy trainer. He smiled at Paige, so Lily probably knew him.
“All right?” Kelli asked.
Paige straightened her carefully-straight back a little more. “Sure. I’m fine.”
Jace came forward fast and took her bag right off her shoulder, looking grim. “Goodnight,” he said to Kelli, then nodded at the others as well. “Thanks.”
“Take care,” Kelli said. “And consider that introductory session,” she told Paige. “You won’t get fit if you injure yourself starting out.” To which Paige did not reply.
She waited until they were in the parking lot, then asked Jace, “Are there woman commandos in the Australian army?”
“No. Door’s open to them, though. That’s since my time.”
“Ah.” She accepted his hand up into the truck and tried not to shiver at the bite of the evening air. When he climbed in and started the engine, she said, “I’m guessing you’re sorry about that.”
“You guess wrong.” He glanced across at her. “Your choice. I can either drop you at your car, or I can take you home and bring you back in the morning. Makes no difference to me. I ordered a couple sandwiches from the Red Rooster. We can go get them on the way, or I can bring them by your place.”
She realized she had her head resting against the window glass. Stop being helpless. She sat up. “My car, please. And you don’t have to bring me a sandwich.”
He said, sounding much too patient, “I know I don’t have to. I was ordering one, so I ordered you one as well. I told you. Your choice.”
“Right. My car.”
He didn’t say anything, just drove the couple blocks, pulled in beyond her, and said, “Right behind you with the sandwich.” And she tried to climb down with grace, and failed.
But at least she’d be in her own car.