Chapter 23
AT FIVE MINUTES to six the next morning, Justine sipped the last of her espresso and then groaned as she got out of her car and shuffled across the street toward the Crossfit box. She’d had barely four hours’ sleep. Stella, the Harlows’ bulldog, had whimpered until Justine had let her up on the bed. The dog had proceeded to snore and fart all night long.
But she really is a sweetheart, Justine thought as she entered the gym. What had happened to frighten her so badly? What had happened to the—?
“Justine? Hi.”
Justine startled and looked over to see Paul, the guy with the nice smile, nice eyes, and no wedding ring. He was stretching his hip flexors against the wall.
“Hi,” she said, realizing that she must look like hell. She hadn’t even had time to run a brush through her hair before she’d run out the door.
But Paul didn’t seem to mind. He just grinned, said, “Trying to keep up with you yesterday put me in a coma at work.”
She flashed to the grueling workout they’d endured the day before. “Sorry,” she said, moving to get a jump rope to warm up. “What do you do?”
“I teach English.”
“UCLA?” she asked. It was the closest university she could think of.
“No,” Paul said, his face falling slightly. “Bonaventure. Charter school.”
Justine felt like she’d slighted him somehow. Instead of starting to skip rope, she said, “Teaching is a noble calling. A way to change lives.”
Paul brightened again. “I like to think so. My students. They’re everything.”
“That’s really nice,” Justine said, smiling as she started skipping. “You make a difference.”
“I like to think so,” he said. “What do you—?”
Before he could finish, the coach called the class into the group warm-up, three rounds of Russian kettle bell swings, lunges, and inchworm push-ups.
Ten minutes later, sweating, feeling her muscles burning to life, Justine prepared to start the actual workout, a twenty-minute AMRAP, or As Many Rounds As Possible in twenty minutes, of five handstand push-ups, ten wall balls, and fifteen box jumps.
“Handstand push-ups?” Paul moaned. “Is that even possible?”
“Took me five months,” Justine said, kneeling on the floor, getting ready to kip herself up against the wall.
“You’re bionic,” Paul said, and moved off to another part of the gym.
Justine watched him go, thinking how nice it was that he really seemed to love his job, saw it as a calling. It was rare these days to meet a guy who wasn’t chasing money or power or whatever, a guy who—
“Go!”
She threw her feet overhead, balanced against the wall, and started to grind out the workout. One, little sister. Four more now.
When it was over, she’d done twelve rounds in the allotted twenty minutes. Not the best in the gym, but a perfectly respectable showing given the lack of sleep. She peeled herself off the floor as Paul staggered up and said, “This is bad. I’m supposed to give a lecture on Moby-Dick in my AP class, and I feel like the harpooned whale.”
Justine laughed. It was an absurd line, but she liked it. A funny guy too.
“So,” Paul said. “That guy who picked you up yesterday?”
Justine hesitated, then said, “My boss.”
“Oh,” Paul said, looking relieved. “What do you do?”
As a rule Justine didn’t like talking about what she did, especially with single men. When they found out she worked for Private, many of them were intimidated. One guy had recently told her he couldn’t date a woman who was capable of discovering his deepest secrets.
“Actuarial,” she said. “Boring.”
“Sounds fascinating, actually,” Paul said, glanced at his watch. “Feel like grabbing a cup of coffee before work? It’s only seven.”
For a second Justine was tempted, but then she shook her head. “Can’t. Sorry, I have to be on a flight to Mexico at eight.”
“For actuarial work?”
“As a matter of fact,” Justine said. “Rain check?”
“You bet,” he said, beaming. “I’d like that.”
“Good,” Justine said, and left.
She ran across to her car, thinking that maybe the romantic part of her life was not such a mess after all. She had opportunities on the horizon.