Either way, she knew exactly when not to push, and he appreciated her for it.
He pinned his bib to his shorts, then jogged to her side. After she attached her number across her stomach, she reached her arms above her head, and arched her back. Mac knew she was stretching, knew for once she wasn’t deliberately trying to get a rise out of him…and still she did. The snug purple spandex hugged her breasts, and his fingers itched to reach out and touch her as lightly as she’d touched him.
Fuck, this was getting bad. It was easier to ignore the attraction when she was provoking it, but the awareness of her was becoming constant, evoked simply from her standing there…he couldn’t ignore that. And was beginning to think he didn’t want to.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” a masculine voice boomed overhead, startling Mac out of his alarming thoughts. Thank God. “Thirty seconds.”
Gayle bent her leg behind her and grabbed the top of her foot with both her hands. Stretching. He probably should do that. Anything right now to keep from watching her. He followed her lead.
“You’re going to love this,” she said as she switched legs.
“How long is the course?”
“Four miles and fifteen obstacles.”
“Three…two…one.” A boom sounded, and runners started to sprint down the roped-off section of the parking lot.
Mac hopped from foot to foot, warming up his muscles as he waited for the crowd to thin. Since they were toward the back of the line, their progress forward was slow. Once they got past the bottleneck at the starting line, things opened up, and they were able to set an even pace. He set his stride to Gayle’s, making sure to stay beside her. Through the mile jog across a street and into a more tree-thickened area, he found himself anticipating the obstacles, wondering what they would be. Had he known he would be doing this today, he would’ve studied the course, found out what to expect, made sure there weren’t any surprises. Come up with a game plan.
Gayle had taken that away from him. Made him just be in the moment. And there was a thrill to it he’d forgotten he missed. At one time, he used to be a go-with-it sort of guy. What would it be like to be that guy again? Did he want to be that guy again?
He sneaked a glance at Gayle. Maybe. At least while he was here.
They came to an open field with tires spread out on it. He and Gayle each grabbed one and sprinted about fifty yards then tossed them onto a growing pile on the other side.
“The first few obstacles are just to warm us up,” she warned as they continued down the path.
“Good, ‘cause that was lame.”
She gave a winded laugh. “Just wait until the mud comes into play.”
“That’s when the real fun starts?”
“Oh, yeah.”
The next obstacle was a wood wall. Easy enough to get over, since it was like climbing a ladder. Afterward, they awkwardly made their way across a thin rope bridge over a shallow gully, then crept across a rather rickety-looking balance beam. As they approached an arched monkey-bar contraption, Mac noted the large mud pit underneath. Shit was about to get interesting.
“You first,” he said. “I’ll start when you’re a few bars ahead of me.”
With his upper body strength, he’d be able to swing across this thing without any issues. But he’d didn’t want to just zip past Gayle.
“All right.”
She slowly—very slowly—swung from one bar to the next. Come on, woman. As she hung from the fifth and sixth bar, he paced along the edge of the pit. She wasn’t going to make it.
Monkey bars were hard enough when they were straight across. Put in an arch, and more muscle, strength, and endurance were needed to complete the task. Gayle was using all hers up just dangling as she worked up the momentum to make it to the next bar.
Mac rubbed his mouth, struggling not to start clapping and yelling at her to pick up the pace. Gayle wasn’t one of his training buddies. He wasn’t at the gym. But the competitive edge ate at him now. Drove him.
When she finally made it to the middle, he wrapped his hands around the first and second bars and quickly monkeyed across. Within seconds, he was beside her. By the way her eyes widened and she gasped, his sudden appearance had startled her. One second she was there, the next she was gone. Right in the sludge below. Fuck, that was his fault.
He glanced down. The sludge came above her knees, and as she struggled to walk, she slipped, landing on all fours. Immediately, Mac let go of the bar. Warm, slimy mud enveloped the bottom part of his leg.
As he mucked his way toward her, worried she was going to be pissed he’d messed up her focus, he said, “Damn it, Gayle, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you lose your concentration.”