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“So great,” she gasped.
“Try inhaling and exhaling through your nose and mouth at the same time.”
“Why? Does it look like I’m about to pass out?” She wondered if he would catch her if she did. How mortifying would that be, and in front of all these people. Lydia sucked in a sharp breath through her nose.
“Try it,” he said encouragingly. “It’ll engage your diaphragm for maximum oxygen intake and help expel carbon dioxide more quickly.”
Lydia opened her mouth as she inhaled and exhaled, focusing on her breathing as they counted down mile two. It was trickier than she expected, and part of her felt like she was about to accidentally catch some nasty flying bug in her mouth, but Luke was right about her breathing becoming easier, so she was loath to change anything, no matter how ridiculous she might look.
She glanced over at Luke, trying to emulate his form: arms bent but relaxed, gaze straight ahead, shoulders in line with his hips, leaning slightly forward. He practically glided beside her, seemingly unbothered by the heat or the beads of sweat that gathered at his neck. She’d never thought this hard about running before. Wasn’t this supposed to be natural for humans?
“Almost there,” Luke said as they neared the end of their final lap.
Almost there was not close enough, and the moment they passed the tree Luke had selected as the lap marker, Lydia collapsed onto the lawn, her back to the grass, face skyward. Luke walked over and knelt next to her. “How’re you doing?”
Her chest heaved, and she thrusted her arm in his direction. “I think I’ve passed away. Check my pulse.”
Luke indulged her, pressing his fingers to her wrist. “Hate to break it to you, but you are still very much alive.”
“You’re sure? You’ve got the medical training to determine that?”
“I do in fact have an official pulse-checker certificate somewhere in my office.”
“The one that’s conveniently under construction?”
“That’s the one.”
“I’ll believe it when I see it.” Her chest still heaved, and she didn’t know if she should be embarrassed by the fact she was more breathless now than she’d been during the run.
Luke sat down on the grass next to her, checking his watch.
“What’s the verdict?” she asked, glancing up at him.
“That actually wasn’t bad. You averaged about twelve minutes per mile. As you build up endurance, we should be able to shave some time off that.”
“Endurance,” she said. “Can I buy that somewhere or—”
He smirked. “Unfortunately, you’re going to have to acquire it the old-fashioned way. A lot of hard work.”
“Pretty sure I could buy it in California. They probably have endurance bars. Maybe they add it to their smoothies.”
“Well, until you figure out how to buy your way out of exercising, let’s head back to the gym. I want to walk you through all the equipment on the floor to make sure you know how to properly use everything for the days when you’re training on your own.”
“Runningandgym school in one day,” Lydia complained. “Yuck. If I agree to eat really,reallyclean, can we cut out like one training session a week?”
Luke shook his head. “You already have two rest days, but that reminds me. We have to talk about protein.”
“This is probably not the time to tell you that I plan to go straight to Gramercy Kitchen for a mimosa tower after this, huh?”
Luke got to his feet. “You’re going to crush that by yourself, are you?”
“I like to reward my pain and suffering.”
“I do foresee a lot of suffering in your future.”
Luke reached down for Lydia’s hand and yanked her to her feet. He might have pulled a little too hard, because she went stumbling toward him. He caught her in his arms for a brief moment before she righted herself, but that didn’t stop her from flashing back to the moment she’d collided with him in the gym. She flushed, turning away as she said, “I guess I should just make a standing reservation then.”
“It’s the least you deserve after all this hard work.”
