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“Hey, that’s solid advice. It’ll take this from a negative two to a solid four point five.”
“Negative two?” he said, feigning shock. “Is this the part where you tell me not to quit my day job?”
“I think you’re pretty good at your day job.”
“Speaking of,” he said. “Come over here.”
“I want to see my numbers. But I’m trying not to think about how few weeks are left between now and the marathon and how many miles I still have to run.”
He rolled his chair back so she could see the figures on the training plan. “We’ve got six...almost seven weeks, and you’ve been making great progress,” he insisted. “I’m not worried.”
“Says the professional,” she teased, though she leaned over the training plan to indulge him.
“Look how far you’ve come from where you started,” he said, tapping the first page. “A few months ago you could barely run a mile.”
“I think barely is overstating it. I wasn’t that bad,” Lydia laughed, snapping her head around. He was a lot closer than she’d realized. Close enough that she could smell his shampoo and see the stubble that trailed down his jaw. Her eyes flickered to his lips. A little closer and she could lean down and kiss him. Her stomach did a somersault at the thought. What was she doing? God, this was where Lukeworked. This was hisoffice. She immediately put some space between them.
She should know better than to mess around with mixed signals.
Her thoughts skittered to Jack and the ridiculous feelings she’d been sitting with for the better part of the afternoon. Just this morning she’d been avoiding him, but then she’d learned that he’d canceled on a client to prepare that presentation for her. As they’d laid out a tentative plan for their combined proposal, some part of her had wondered if there was something more to his apology. Was it all in her head? Had she read that instance as wrong as she’d just read this moment? She hadn’t expected to still be harboring a crush on Jack after everything, but his sweet gesture had caught her off guard, and that’s what started her thoughts tumbling again. Maybe shewasn’toverthinking things. Jack had asked to be her partner, so even he must have thought they’d make a good pair in some capacity. And Jack was the kind of partner she’d always imagined herself with, right? Was it really so wrong to think that maybe their miscommunication was behind them?
“Are you okay?” Luke asked.
“Yeah, good,” Lydia lied, heading for the door. “We should get out there and start doing burpees or whatever.”
“Burpees?” Luke said, sounding as confused as she felt.
“I’ll see you on the floor.” Without even a glance back, Lydia fled his office.
Eighteen
Luke
“Is it over yet?” Lydia asked, her cheeks flushed with an end-of-September chill. The shift in the weather had been a welcome treat after pushing through her training plan on the hottest days of summer. He just hoped the weather continued to cooperate a month from now when Lydia was actually running the marathon.
Luke glanced down at his watch, then looked over to see her teeth gritted. They’d only just passed seventeen miles. They had just under one more to go to round out at eighteen today. “Not quite. How’re you doing? Do you need to take a break?”
He’d just started to slow when her grimace lifted into a smirk and she breezed by him. “Kidding!” she called. She glanced over her shoulder, threw her head back, and laughed at whatever look was stuck on his face. “Don’t tell me you’re getting tired already!”
Luke picked up his pace to catch her as she giggled. They’d run the East River Greenway again, enjoying the changing autumn leaves, just as he’d promised. After they’d reached Battery Park, they’d cut up through the city, with no exact route in mind, building up the miles as they headed in the general direction of the gym. Eventually they’d opted just to finish out the miles circling Madison Square Park.
“Race you back!” Lydia darted off the path, checking for traffic as she ran across 5th Avenue. Luke slowed, getting caught in a crowd of pedestrians. When the group cleared, he hurried after Lydia, but she’d started sprinting, and he knew then that this was a race he was about to lose.
Luke pushed himself harder, his lungs burning, the muscles in his legs aching, but the sidewalks were too congested for him to close the distance, and as he crossed 6th Avenue, he spotted Lydia slowing outside the gym. She dropped her hands to her hips, her long hair plastered to her neck and the back of her shirt, her face crumpled up in victorious pain as she sucked in air.
“Ha!” she said, her face smoothing. She threw her arms up in victory as he approached.
“You cheated,” he accused her.
Her laugh was bubbly and infectious. “How?”
“I didn’t even know we were racing!”
“I literally yelled ‘race you’ at the top of my lungs!”
“Yeah, after you’d already made sure I got caught in a giant crowd of tourists.”
“It’s not my fault you weren’t paying attention. You’ve gotta be prepared for anything when running. Changes in the weather. Rogue pigeon attacks.”
