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“You play a lot of baseball, coach?” Pedro always called her that, and she had stopped correcting him since meeting the man a year ago. “Or is it softball you girls play?”
“I played softball in high school, but I was always more into tennis.” Paige switched sides. “The idea isn’t that different when you’re trying to hit a ball to a certain spot. Raw power isn’t enough, but neither is a good eye or perfect timing. You need all three. So happens I can help you with that first one.” She pushed her arms out in front of her, back comfortably stretching. “The other two kinda follow after that.”
Once the stretching was complete, Paige walked Pedro to the entrance of the men’s locker room and bid him farewell. She half-heartedly promised to watch his game on TV the next day – he likewise made a false promise to do more yoga.
After that, Paige had a few minutes before her next client arrived. It was a Hollywood talent who had never been to the gym before, and Paige always looked forward to meeting clients new to town – even if they could sometimes be snotty and insufferable.
“Heeeey.” A man in basketball shorts and a simple tank top greeted Paige when she stepped behind the front desk and filled out her report on Pedro’s workout and progress. “How’s dancing with the stars?”
Paige offered a mild snort of amusement to Wesley, her youngest coworker who was technically her employee.When you only own a share in the joint, is he really your employee?This was a man who often cranked up the house music in the gym and went out drinking with some of his hockey-playing clients.And hooks up with them. He likes to think I haven’t noticed, but I have.Paige knew it might bite them all in the ass one day, but Wesley was such a likable guy that no jilted B-list actor or closeted basketball star had yet to crash their Porsche into the front of the West Hollywood gym.I keep waiting for it!Paige hoped it happened while no one was there. Like at two in the morning.
“Pedro and the new girl are the only ones I’m seeing today.” Paige signed her name on the paper and put the clipboard away. Since most of their clients were high-profile, the gym preferred to keep such documentation a bit “old school,” in case someone tried to hack their system. The worst they’d find was how often hot shot action star Jason Jacobs hit the gym when he wasn’t on set.Scandalous.Then again, tabloids always found a way to spin the most innocuous or unsurprising of things. “Speaking of, have you seen my new client?” Paige stood in front of the terminal behind the desk. “Carmen. That’s her name.”
Westley said a chipper hello to the FedEx deliveryman dropping off a stack of boxes.Looks like opening those is good busy work for you later, Wes.It was either protein shakes or disinfectant wipes. Nothing in between.
“I’ve only been up here a few minutes, but you know the acting sect,” Wesley said with a shrug. “Fashionably late. Remember when Chantelle would always show up an hour late, like her concerts, I hear?”
Paige neither laughed nor frowned. “Let me know when she gets here. I’ll be in the women’s locker room for a few minutes.”
“Ooh-la-la.”
That got an eye roll out of Paige, but not until she turned around. Her face was buried in her phone as she took the familiar route to the women’s locker room on the other side of the gym. Her hair had come undone while working out with Pedro, and she preferred to fix it in front of the big mirror instead of fiddling with it in front of clients out in the middle of the gym.
Usually, she was one of the only people in the women’s locker room. Not that afternoon, when she stepped in on someone in a state of immediate undress.
“Sorry,” she apologized. Paige stood in front of the mirror, careful to keep the naked woman out of the reflection. Hair came out of Paige’s elastic band. “Pretend I’m not here.”
A silky voice spoke from behind a sports towel – onenotattempting to cover up those surgically enhanced breasts or the waxy-smooth crevice between two perfectly curvaceous thighs. “No worries. A million people have seen me naked before.” The locker closed. When Paige braved glancing at the woman with supple skin, she saw an ass that knew what it was like to be on the other end of a proper squat.That’s where I would start her out in a workout.Paige chided herself for even thinking about it. There was something deliriously unprofessional about this exchange already.
The woman was still speaking.
“Are you Paige, by chance?”
Hair back in place, Paige turned around. She was a master of keeping her eyes on another woman’s face when in a locker room situation. Something she had perfected in high school when she realized shereallyliked looking at her naked classmates… and not only for the scientific comparison of her own boobs to those of another eighteen-year-old.
“Yes. I’m Paige Powell.” Her hands were on her hips, biceps flexing in the muted light of the locker room. “I don’t suppose you’re my two o’clock.”
Delicate nails reached toward Paige. “I’m Carmen.” Eventually, both women’s hands clasped together in a polite shake. “Carmen Dominguez, although you probably know me by my professional name.” Before their hands broke apart, Carmen’s thin eyebrows waggled up and down her forehead. “Carmen Coyote.”
“It’s vaguely familiar, but I’m afraid I don’t know your work off-hand.”
“I bet some of your male coworkers do.” Carmen chuckled. “I won best actress back in 2019. For a little something called ‘Rearview Girls, 3.’”
Paige bit back her shock.A porn star? That’s new for us.It certainly explained afewthings, though. “I see. What brings you to our fine establishment? I’d think a woman of your caliber would already have a personal trainer lined up.”
“I’ve made those films, sure, but never had apropertrainer. My new agency is setting me up here, though. I’m getting out of the mainstream adult film business and focusing on some more… relaxing ventures of a similar vein. So, I need to stay fit for the camera, but instead of being on a professional set in some New York hotel, it’s my bedroom overlooking West Hollywood. Well, my audience thinks it’s my bedroom, but it’s my office. You get what I mean.”
“Is that what retirement looks like these days?”
“Honey, even suburban housewives have a FansOnly now.”
Paige nodded. “I think we start in five minutes. I’ll meet you out on the mats then.”
“Looking forward to it, Paige.”
Something about the way Carmen said her name made Paige hesitate on her way out of the locker room.I swear it’s not her reflection.Carmen was right in front of the big mirror, her towel draping between her two breasts and nothing else.
Even without ogling on purpose, Paige swore she felt her wife’s jealous stare from halfway across Los Angeles County.At least I know I’m not dead down there.Paige was a professional, though, and that meant no thinking about her clients inthatway.
