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Luke laughed, pulling the door to the gym open. “Is that what you’ve been researching?”
“I’m covering my bases,” Lydia said, stopping at the front desk and taking a long drag from her water bottle.
Luke couldn’t resist squeezing his own water bottle in her direction. Lydia yelped, then laughed, hurrying away to the showers.
“Ew. Can you not sweat all over the desk?” Dara shooed him away, wrinkling her nose as she wiped down the counter.
Grinning, Luke headed for the showers to wash off the last eighteen miles. As he let the hot water soothe his muscles, he considered the next month of Lydia’s training plan. The race was the first weekend of November, and they’d just hit eighteen miles. Luke figured he would build her up to twenty miles in a couple weeks, and then start tapering off the distance until the race to give her muscles enough time to recover.
Luke finished in the shower, changed and headed back to his office to make notes. He found the door open and Lydia sitting on his couch, her still-wet hair pulled up into a knot at the top of her head. “Hey,” he said. “Thought you’d be halfway home by now. You want to see your updated mile times?”
Lydia shrugged. “Maybe later. You want to get a drink or food or something?”
Luke’s immediate reaction was to say yes, but then he caught himself. He remembered an innocent invitation like this one months ago, after their evening touring the youth center. An invitation that had made everything complicated. Lydia glanced up from her phone and caught his eye. Luke looked away, worried she might be able to read the thoughts he was having.
“I’ve got a lot of paperwork to catch up on,” he said, the excuse weak.
“Oh, come on. I know you don’t have any other clients today.”
He couldn’t help his smile. “And how would you know that?”
“I asked Dara to check your schedule.”
Luke bit the inside of his cheek. The last thing he needed was Dara meddling. Jules already knew how he felt, and he didn’t need any more pushes in a dangerous direction.
“We should celebrate,” Lydia said, getting to her feet.
“Celebrate what?”
“The fact that I beat you back to the gym.”
“I feel like we need to look up the definition of a cheater,” Luke said.
Lydia groaned playfully. “Fine. I will get you a drink for hurting your feelings by winning the race.”
“Oh, well that makes mereallywant to go.”
“What if I promise to let you win the next one?”
Luke glanced over at her, and Lydia made an X over her heart.
“Thanks for walking me back,” Lydia said as she led Luke up the steps of her building. She shivered, that autumn chill sweeping across the city as the sun set. It wasn’t actually that late, but the sky was darkening earlier and earlier, and Luke felt like things were about to change. The marathon was getting closer. Soon there would be no need for weekend long runs and friendly postrun drinks. If nothing changed between them, then soon everything would. “Want to come up for a bit?”
Luke hesitated. They’d gone out for one drink. A strictly friendly drink. He knew he should say good night and walk back to the subway. Maybe it was all the thoughts of things changing or maybe he was just curious to see Lydia’s apartment—to gain the insight that could only come from seeing where and how someone lived—but instead of walking away, he nodded.
Lydia smiled and led him upstairs. The space was tiny, but impeccably neat, just as he imagined it would be. What really caught his attention was the copious amount of indoor plants. They filled shelves and dangled from the ceiling, stretching toward the massive windows in the living room.
While Lydia secured two beers from the fridge, he crossed the room to look out the windows. The sun was setting and he could just make out the peachy bands of the sky. “Nice view.”
“I know, right? It’s what sold me on the place.”
He turned to her desk, which was more of a drafting table. The wall above the table was filled with framed sketches. “Did you draw all these?”
She nodded. “A few of them are from college. Others are more recent, just buildings I like around the city.”
“You really are fantastic at your job.” He glanced over and could tell she was fighting a smile. He walked back across the room and she handed him the beer.
“To kicking your ass on that run,” Lydia said, raising her bottle.
