OGs: Deep Down (8 page)

Mike ran his hand through his hair and grimaced. Jesus fucking Christ.

He hadn’t seen anything happening this fast. Ever. In a day his father had the mirrors replaced and everything cleaned out. In two days Sara had organized the schedule, which included all sorts of shit that would keep Kyra there every day, except for when she had to pose in the community center. On day three, they not only already had women signing up for the courses, but a waiting list too. Through all this, he’d tried to talk his dad out of the whole idea. Offered to pay for the mirrors himself, for the remodeling, for the loss of income, whatever, as long as it kept Kyra away from the gym. He’d yelled, threatened, begged, and bribed. It hadn’t worked.

In just a bit over a week, Kyra had taken over his gym. His life, actually.

“That shit doesn’t start for another forty minutes,” he growled, glancing at his watch.

Sara grinned. “Well, you know watching Kyra is a treat in itself.”

He grunted a curse. Didn’t he know. He’d been dealing with this for a whole week—the fucking aerobics/dance lessons that had him so hard he couldn’t think, and the mainly male peanut gallery that had him so enraged he was seeing red.

He navigated the crowd of women, trying not to peek into the room where Kyra was dancing. He really, really tried but couldn’t pull it off; his eyes, damn them, strayed. As fucking always. She was so beautiful. Laughing, pissed, even sad she was gorgeous, but dancing…dancing she was something out of this world. Whatever the rhythm, it was as if the music wrapped her up, pushing her forward. She had that cheeky attitude too, her whole body moving perfection.

It was damn difficult, but he managed to tear his gaze from her and get his legs moving.

Goddamn it. He should have never touched her again. It had taken him years to claw his way out of the bottomless pit of despair caused by her rejection. Now the feel of her soft skin was again on his fingertips. Haunting him. That kiss too. Her taste, her smell. Her smile. Her whole self.

Now that Kyra was back, so were those dreams, the ones from which he woke with a raging, weeping hard-on and gasping for air, his heart squeezed in a tight fist.

He’d done relatively well at the beginning by avoiding her, but that technique was turning out to be useless, because wherever he went, there she was. Or so it seemed to him. Hell, he couldn’t go for his early swim in the pool after his regular run with Max without her being there leading the water-dance classes, smiling and generally bugging the living shit out of him. Eight frigging o’clock in the morning. Didn’t those crazy grandmas, including his, have anything else to do at eight o’clock?

She had invaded his habitat one inch at a time, and she’d concluded by taking over the gym, his sanctuary. Now he truly had nowhere to run.

He finished his coffee in one gulp, crumpled the cup, and threw it in the trash before heading for the tatami.

“Here you are,” he heard as someone pulled at the hem of his T-shirt.

In spite of himself, he smiled. “Hi there, baby girl. Escaped for some coffee.”

Sam looked up at him with big gray eyes. “And me? Nothing for me?”

Mike reached for his back pocket and handed her a lollipop. “Here.”

Beaming, she grabbed it and hugged his thigh tight, smashing her face against his pants. “You remembered.”

Yeah, she had him well trained.

As if having to deal with seeing Kyra in the gym wasn’t bad enough, now he had Sam following him around all the time. Supposedly she was to be there only for a couple of hours twice a week, but in reality she’d been there almost every day. At first she’d trailed his dad as he ran errands and fixed things. Soon, though, she’d switched, and wherever Mike went, she went, with that sweet smile of hers and those adorable dimples. Shooing her was totally impossible. He’d tried several times, but he couldn’t be rude to the kiddo. Not that she would have taken offense. She’d have brushed it off and continued shadowing him, asking questions constantly.

If in a bit over a week Kyra had taken over his life, her little girl had done it in an instant with a smile. As he finished his class, he noticed Max coming his way, a frown in his face.

“Man, do you know where my students from the kickboxing class are? I’ve been waiting for them in the ring for over ten minutes. No one has come. Was class canceled and you forgot to tell me?”

“No, not that I know of. Fuck.” A sudden suspicion invaded him, and he headed for the room where Kyra was, Max following him.

There they were. Around twenty guys, their kickboxing attires in their hands, were standing on the far wall, gawking, their eyes almost coming out of their sockets, their jaws slack. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. He should have guessed this was going to happen. The same fucking thing had gone down with the other three classes that had already started—the hip-hop, the butts and abs, and the Ultimate Disco Dance workout. Having fifteen women jumping and sweating to “It’s raining men, hallelujah” had caused some serious damage among the males in the gym. After all, the only classes for women they had before this aerobic madness were self-defense. Not much ass swaying there. Things had changed quite a lot since then. One just had to look at those slobbering idiots trying very unsuccessfully to hide their hard-ons, which, by the looks of it, were dislodging the groin protection they had on.

Praying for calm, he stood in front of them, hand on his hip, scowling, and clicked his fingers. “Out of here,” he uttered between clenched teeth, trying not to disturb the class.

No one acknowledged him. The ones whose view he was directly obstructing ducked, so he turned around to see what had them so enthralled they couldn’t stop drooling. His own jaw dropped to the floor. Kyra was sitting backward on a chair, flushed and sweaty, her legs totally opened at each side, slowly arching up and down, moving with the music, her long hair pooling on the floor. She did something with her arms and then pulled up, flinging one leg over the chair and again bowing her back, both legs now high in the air.

His cock stood at full attention so fucking fast he wasn’t sure it hadn’t ripped his pants. No wonder all the guys had their helmets covering their junk.

What the hell was this? Exotic aerobics, Sara had called it. Granted, he wasn’t an expert, but this was as far from aerobics as it could get.

It was closer to fucking. Much closer.

“Wow.” He heard Max by his side. “No wonder they didn’t make it past this. We should move Kyra to some room at the back of the gym. At least like that I could catch my guys on their way there and drag them to the kickboxing. Or not,” he added as Mike growled.

“I want to try that,” Sam said from behind him.

“No, you don’t, baby girl,” Mike said and turned to the guys, his fists closed so tight, he couldn’t feel his fingers. “You have two seconds to get the fuck out. Any motherfucker standing here after that will get his sorry ass handed to him,” he all but snarled, not caring now if he disturbed the class or not. It was all he could do not to beat the shit out of them for staring at Kyra. And at Sara, who was also there.

Max whistled, motioning to the back of the room. “How good is your insurance, man? Because Christy is there. If my bro walks in and finds his woman going all
Dirty Dancing
on the chair in front of this pumped-up audience, he’s going to go feral.”

“Cole will have to wait his turn.” Because the one who was going to go ballistic was him. From the corner of his eye he could see Kyra warily looking at him, but they hadn’t stopped the lesson.

“What’s wrong with her left shoulder?” Max asked in a low voice.

“Don’t know.” Mike had long ago noticed she favored her left shoulder, moving it as little as possible, but she was so skillful and so smooth when dancing it was barely noticeable.

Max glanced at Kyra, then at him and shook his head. “You’re fucked, my friend. In more ways than one. And not only because of Cole.”

“I can handle this,” Mike grunted, pushing everyone out.

“Sure as shit doesn’t look like it,” Max mumbled by his side.

Yeah, it didn’t look like it to him either.

This was a fucking mess. His father had to understand that this couldn’t continue. The gym was not equipped to handle this amount of estrogen. It was full to the brim with testosterone. A powder keg. Before he could find his dad, his grandmother stopped him.

“Did you see the exotic aerobics? I wonder if Kyra could work a class like that for seniors. Walkers would give an interesting spin to it, huh?”

Mike didn’t know whether to cry or laugh. “Don’t start with me.”

She reached for him. “Mike, I need a favor.”

He snorted. “Forget it.”

He was still mad at her for her stunt in the last modeling class. He’d decided to bail out of it, and although he knew almost every frigging single guy in Alden—and half the married ones too—had offered to pose with Kyra, he’d hoped his grandmother would pick someone sensible. Not a horndog, which excluded about 99 percent of the applicants. Maybe someone blind. Or armless. Or better yet, both. Did she? Of course not. She’d informed him the day before the lesson they were going with not one, but two male models. Both firefighters in their twenties. Creative positions, she’d said. He’d gritted his teeth but hadn’t caved in. Whatever, he didn’t care. Did. Not. Care. Then, after a sleepless, horrendous night, he’d found himself stalking to the community center five minutes before the painting lessons started, threatening the shit out of the two guys, and sending them packing while he took their places.

Rebecca had smiled that all-knowing smile that rubbed him the wrong way. When he tried laying her out, she batted her lashes innocently, like she had no clue what he was referring to. Much like what she was doing now—batting her lashes and ignoring the fuck out of him.

“I told Greta I would bring Sam to her. Kyra is going to stay here for a couple more hours, and then she has to go over the contract with your dad. It’s going to get too late for Sam to stay here.”

“What does that have to do with me?”

“I’m not feeling so hot, and Greta can’t pick Sam up. I need you to get her home.”

He didn’t want to start driving Sam back and forth and sure as hell didn’t want to get attached to her either. He was already in deep enough shit.

“Can’t Mom or Sara take her?”

“Your mother went to Boston and won’t make it back in time. Sara is taking all of Kyra’s lessons.”

“What about Wilma?” Usually Wilma drove his grandmother and Sam to Greta’s and spent the afternoon.

“No can do. She had an accident.”

“What? Where?” he asked, alarmed. Wilma and Greta were as dear to him as his grandmother.

She reached for her cell, pressed some buttons, and handed it to him.

It was a thread from the OGs’ message group his grandmother, Greta, and Wilma shared.

The first message was from Wilma, and it had come half an hour ago.

I was driving to Alden, pedal to the metal, when my tits blew off. Waiting for AAA. Can’t make it to you.

Next message:
Damn autocorrect. My TIRE blew off, not my tits.

Next one:
Those blew off a couple of decades ago. One day they were there, next day bam! Gone.

Oh man.

There were other messages. He ordered his eyes to look away, but he wasn’t fast enough and involuntarily caught something from the next text, this time from Greta. Something about hers shriveling away.

Yep. Scarred for fucking life.

“Grandma! Seriously?” he said, returning her damn phone.

“What?”

“Too much information. Is Rachel on her way?” Rachel was Wilma’s granddaughter and Mike’s right hand when it came to keeping the old ladies in check.

“Yes. And you should have stopped reading after the first text.”

He tried; God knew he tried. But apparently his brain-eye coordination was lacking.

“Anyway, you’re done with your classes for today,” she continued, as if it wasn’t a big deal she’d seared his retinas. “You are it, my boy.”

He opened his mouth, but before he could say anything, Sam started jumping and pulling at his T-shirt like crazy. “Cool! Do I get to ride in that big, shiny truck Gram Rebecca showed me?”

Hearing Sam calling his grandmother Gram made his heart ache. Man, Max might be right; he was fucked.

Sam looked so excited, and his grandmother genuinely tired. Too tired to walk there.

“Don’t get used to it,” he mumbled to his grandmother, and then he turned to Sam. “Okay, let me get changed.”

“Yay!”

By the time he came out of the dressing room, Sam was already waiting for him. “Come on, baby girl, your carriage awaits.”

She giggled. “Can we stop by Arnie’s for ice cream?”

That girl had a sweet tooth only second to her mother’s.

He wasn’t sure if she was allowed to eat ice cream before dinner, so he turned to his grandma. The old lady just smiled. “I’d sort of promised her. No need for you to hurry back. We have everything under control here.”

“Arnie’s it is,” he replied with a sigh. He knew without a shred of a doubt his sister Lisa would kick his ass if he let his nieces get their hands on ice cream before supper, but he wasn’t going to ask Kyra. They hadn’t spoken even once after the Shack, and he wasn’t going to start now.

On the way to the truck, as Sam chattered, she reached for him and slipped her small hand into his. When he looked down at her and she smiled at him, his fucking chest squeezed painfully.

How the fuck was he supposed to protect himself from this? Not only was he stupidly gone for her mother, had been for most of his life, but now this little girl was forcing him to love her with every gesture, with every smile. And he so didn’t want to love her. Getting attached to them was a heartache waiting to happen. He didn’t want them because he couldn’t keep them.

Kyra had left their relationship. Had walked away and fallen in love with someone else. Not Mike. He hadn’t gotten to walk away. He’d gone down on his knees so fucking hard it had taken years to get back up.

He had the feeling that this time, if he didn’t protect himself, he’d fall down and never get back up.