Going the Distance (7 page)

She snapped her fist back in place. She tried a few more punches, but surely her hand was taking more of a beating than the leather.

“Okay, watch me a sec. Pretend I got two working feet. When you throw the punch, use your whole body. Drive that back hip into it. That's where the power comes from, not your hand. Your fist is the grille of the truck, but your hip is the engine, giving you all the momentum. Grille won't do any damage if the truck's not moving.” He demonstrated as best he could, balancing only the barest weight on his cast. Even with that handicap, his punch met the bag hard enough to rattle the chains suspending it from the ceiling.

“See that?” He threw a couple more, then to Lindsey's mingled worry and delight, he stripped his shirt right over his back. “Watch my hip.”

Oh, how she watched. His hand and arm and waist and leg all worked as one, twisting so the impact uncoiled like a whip.

“Okay, I think I see.” Saw more than just the technique—saw every intricate shape twitching along Rich's side and down his arm, plus that evil, evil muscle that crested from above his hip and dove down the front of his track pants. What the heck was that thing called? Should be called the
Sexalus maximus
, if it wasn't already.

“I need to twist into it more.”

“Exactly.” Rich hopped aside and Lindsey took his place.

She threw her next punch in slow-mo, but the difference was obvious.

“Better. Let your heel come up.”

She tried a few more, and they began to land with nice loud thwacks. “Ooh, this is fun.”
Thwack, thwack.
Rich poked her ear again.
“
Ow, jeez.” She kept her fist up between punches.

“Try a jab now. Switch your feet—good. That's called orthodox stance.”

“Oh! I actually knew that.”

“Keep punching with your left.”

He adjusted her form until she was landing the punches with that delicious
thwack
once more.

“Very nice.”

“You think?”
Thwack.

“Hell, yeah. You better be first in line once Wilinski's officially welcomes women.”

“Let's not go nuts.” She tried a combination, a jab then a cross with her right hand.
Thwack-thump.

“Don't forget that hip. So...”

“Yes?”
Thwack-thump.

“This on-again, off-again cockroach-boyfriend...”

Between punches, she raised an eyebrow in Rich's direction.

“Is this the guy you were seeing that night you and me...” He trailed off, letting a pointed look fill in the blanks.

She dropped her fists. “The night of the tournament?”

“Yeah.”

“We were broken up, but yeah. We were together for over five years. That was one of our many off-again periods.”

He frowned.

She wiped the sweat along her temple with her wrist. “What?”

“Nothing. Just being nosy.”

“No, what? We weren't together that night. If that's what you're asking.”

“Jenna said you guys were. She texted me in the cab.”

Lindsey replayed those moments, the ones that had left her so confused and deflated—Rich's face as he'd read the screen, the immediate cooling of their activities. Her stomach twisted. It hadn't been
his
other woman that ruined things. It had been her boyfriend. Her
ex
-boyfriend. And he'd spent the past ten months thinking she was a cheater?

Crappity shit-crap.

“If I kept Jenna informed of every time Brett and I broke up, she'd fire me as a matchmaker.”

Finally, Rich smiled.

“So never fear, I didn't try to cheat on anyone with you, if that's why you're being all cagey.”

“Nah.”

She shot him a look, unconvinced.

“Maybe a little.”

Cute.
And incredibly troublesome. Like a bolt, her infatuation was back, with all those doubts put to rest.

Rich straightened, turning back into his usual cocky self. “Just don't like the idea of being anybody's rebound. Tucked way down there on the supporting card.”

She smirked. “Bet you think you're main event romantic material, don't you?”

“Oh, I know I am.”

“You better watch that ego. If it gets any bigger you'll go up a weight class.”

Inside though, this was no joke. They'd spoken enough in the past minute for their mutual interest to be embarrassingly plain. It scared her, as much as it had excited her ten months ago. Her life was a wreck. She knew better than to get involved with someone, whether that meant putting her heart on the line or merely sharing her body for a night. And with Rich, she didn't have the first clue which was at stake. Needing a distraction, she turned back to the bag, finding her rhythm with the jabs and crosses.

“Well, anyhow,” she huffed. “I'm not looking for a rebound or anything, so...”

She sensed his nod in her periphery. “Understood.”

“Plus you're above that role, apparently.”

“Hey, I didn't say that. Said I didn't like the idea. Never said I was
above
it. I get beat up for money. What kind of standards you think I got, exactly?”

She got the bag with a sharp jab, then turned to Rich. “Charming.”

He grinned, and she wanted to smack him nearly as badly as she wanted to kiss him. Her blood was coursing too swiftly, her body agitated from the conversation and the exertion. It was infuriating, wanting someone this much, being this close, but knowing how doomed an idea it was. After a few more punches, she tugged the gloves from her hands and passed them to Rich.

“Thanks for the lesson, but I need to catch the train.”

“That help clear some of your angst away?”

“I think so.” Though sexual frustration had taken its place, filling the void to brimming. All this time, that's what had wrecked their flirting? That he thought she was a lousy girlfriend?

“What?” Rich asked.

“What, what?”

“Why'd you look so sour?”

She sighed. “So that's what you thought this whole time? That I was awful enough to cheat on my boyfriend with you?”

“I dunno. Or maybe you were drunk. Don't get mad—we barely know each other. I got no right to judge you. Hell, I got no right to judge anybody with some of the shit I used to get up to. I just knew what Jenna told me, and I didn't want to be that guy.”

“Well,
I'm
not that girl.”

“I know that now.”

For a long time they stared at each other, until Rich broke the basement's eerie silence.

“I thought about you. While I was away.”

A chill cooled her sweat. “Thought about me how?”

“I didn't want to, but the way things got interrupted...” He licked his lips, the gesture seeming more flustered than seductive. His gaze had dropped to her mouth, but he snapped it back to her eyes. “I dunno. I just thought about you. About what we started in the back of that cab.”

Fool that it was, her heart soared in her chest. All this time she'd worried he'd completely forgotten about her, gone cold on her as quickly as they'd heated up.
I thought about you.

“I thought about you, too.”

Again, those dark eyes zeroed in on her mouth. “How about that.”

She pursed her lips, so utterly unsure what she wanted. Her body knew. She wanted Rich, wanted him so badly it hurt. But if they kissed—or more—and she awoke hung up on him all over again... He didn't do relationships, and he'd told her as much not even an hour earlier. Lindsey didn't want one herself just now, but she'd lost sleep over Rich, over a
kiss,
and developed an unhealthy obsession with the man. It was already out of control. Best-case scenario, they came to a mutually enjoyable arrangement until he left again, once his foot healed. Worst case? His itch got scratched and Lindsey wound up with a broken heart the next time he went frosty on her.

“I better go.” She pried her gaze off his and tore the Velcro from her wrist, unwinding the tape. He felt so...so close. She suspected she was the kind of girl who could handle a casual arrangement. In theory, but not with this man. Anyone but Rich Estrada. Her attraction was too strong, her heart too banged up to survive the fallout.

He hopped to grab his crutches. “I'm taking a cab if you want to split it.”

“No, thanks. I...I don't trust us in the back of a taxi.”

“I'll walk you to the subway, then.”

“No, really.” Shy, she finally made eye contact, finding him smiling. It reminded her to breathe.

“I'm quick on these things,” he offered, waving a crutch.

She shook her head. “My life's such a mess right now. Sorry.”

“I'll be a gentleman.” That grin said his words weren't to be trusted.

“No.” She tossed the wadded cotton tape onto the mat. “Thank you for all this, but I have to go.” She grabbed her bag and headed for the stairs, and over her shoulder added, “I'll see you around.”

By the time she was striding through the foyer, her heart was pounding. She felt as if she'd just fled a mugging. Such a stupid impulse, yet when the door locked at her back with a snap and she gulped that cool night air...she'd escaped. Barely.

She aimed herself toward Park Street, speed-walking so she wouldn't miss the final train.

She realized then why Rich frightened her. Because he stirred things in her that Brett never had, not even when they'd been freshly, happily, madly in love. Rich wasn't even her friend. She didn't really know him, couldn't say she trusted him, certainly couldn't predict how he might be after they messed around.

But she knew if his reaction was to ignore her or lose interest...it would hurt more than she wanted to admit. And how could he
not
lose interest? She was just some woman who worked in the same building as he did. Rich had surely spent the better half of the past year drinking champagne with hard-bodied ring girls and fight groupies. Lindsey hated herself for even having these insecurities at twenty-seven, but come on—if Rich was a jaguar, she was a tabby. Convenient. That was her selling point, surely.

I thought about you.

Maybe. Just maybe he had. But she'd wasted too much time herself on thoughts of what had nearly been, hung up on a man who belonged to the whole damn world.

As she boarded a Green train, she thought, just once she wanted to feel like the shiny one. The one in the center of the photo, the scene-stealer. She wanted someone as shameless and sexy and electric as Rich to look into her eyes and make her feel as if she was the only person in the room. She wanted that look, and she wanted that body. She wanted the greedy, nasty sex his smile had promised her.

But sleeping with someone extraordinary was no substitute for
feeling like
someone extraordinary. And she couldn't handle being cast aside by a man like that. Not at this point in her life.

She got off the T at Brigham Circle, dragging herself the two blocks to Brett's and her building and up to the third floor. Light glowed under their door, and her heart sank. She was too wound up to play well-adjusted friends tonight. Plus it probably looked really bad, her coming home so late, hair wild from her little workout. She smoothed it as she walked down the hall.

The second she opened the door, Brett was striding toward her, still dressed in his work clothes. “Where the heck have you been?”

“At work late. Then I wound up hanging out with—”

He interrupted, saving her the trouble of having to explain. “I've called and texted, like, fifty times!” He shut the door behind her.

“Sorry. My phone's been on silent.”
And I've been avoiding you.
“Is something wrong?”

He nodded, brows drawn together, but he lowered his voice. “Yeah, something's wrong.” He took her arm and led her toward the bedroom. As he pushed the door, light from the hall spilled in to reveal the shape of a body under their covers, a long tangle of curly brown hair flopped across the pillow.

Lindsey felt rattled deep down to her bones. Was this some revenge thing? She hadn't come home on time, so Brett had conjured a rebound to spite her? That was just
psycho.

“What the hell, Brett?”

The lump moved—rolling over, sitting up. Lindsey's heart dropped to her feet. “Oh, crap.”

“Hi, Linds.” Her little sister smiled blearily. “Surprise!”

5

F
OR
HER
FIRST
time ever at Spark, Lindsey called in sick.

Called in frantic, at any rate, waking Jenna just after seven but getting the thumbs-up to stay home. Luckily Thursdays were typically quiet, and the Boston Spark branch wasn't busy preparing for any special events that weekend. Still, it drove home that they were growing big enough that they'd need to hire an additional matchmaker or two in the coming months. A good problem to have.

She sprang into action early, well before Maya would wake—the girl was as animated as a corpse before ten. Today Lindsey was thankful for it, and thankful when Brett left early for work. She could use a few hours to get her head wrapped around this latest development. Maya turning up had made one thing painfully obvious—this routine with her and Brett sticking it out until the situation was more ideal wasn't going to cut it, not with this fresh load of chaos heaped on top of the existing pile. Enough with the waiting. Time for action.

And she had a lead on a place. Exactly one viable lead, and the only thing keeping her from pursuing it was her own stubbornness. That, plus it meant calling Rich.

“Suck it up, Tuttle.”

At nine she rang Jenna's office number.

“Spark, Boston, Jenna Wilinski speaking.”

“Hey, it's me.”

Jenna's tone went instantly sympathetic. “How's it going?”

“It's...God, who knows,” she said with a laugh. “My sister's still conked, so it's quiet, at least. Could you do me a favor?”

“Anything.”

“I need Rich's number. Rich from downstairs.”

“Oh?”
Tick, tick, tick.
Jenna's matchmaking gears were already clicking away.

“He told me about an apartment that's free.”

“Ah. I don't think I have his number, but I'll have Mercer text it to you. You know you can always crash in our spare room if—”

“Um, no. Me, by myself?
Maybe
. But I'm not foisting a teenage girl on you guys.” She'd talk sense into Maya this weekend and get her on a bus back to western Mass by Monday.

“Right. Well, I hope you find someplace. And swing by if you have the chance. I'd love to meet your sister.”

“That's what you think,” Lindsey said drily. “But we'll see. Thanks. Any idea if Rich is working this morning?”

“I doubt it. Mercer was down there at six, opening.”

“I'll catch him when I catch him, I guess.”

“Good luck.”

Lindsey had just gotten the coffeemaker working on a second pot when Mercer's text chimed. She saved Rich's number to her contacts, stomach gurgling as she did so. Why did everything involving that man have to seem so irrationally...
substantial?

After a bracing caffeine infusion, she mustered her courage. Even just hitting Call got the butterflies swirling. Damn crush, making her stupid when she had absolutely zero space in her life for it. She held her breath, heart in her throat.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, given how late they'd been at the gym, his deep voice was scratchy with sleep. “Whoozis?”

“It's Lindsey. Mercer gave me your number.”

“Oh, hey.” A hiss of breath, a grunt as he hauled himself upright perhaps. “Everything okay?”

“Do you think you could put me in touch with your neighbor or her landlord about that apartment? I'm desperate.”

“God forbid I deny a desperate woman,” he said, suddenly sounding alert. “Gimme a few and I'll get her info from my mom.”

She released her breath. “Awesome. Thank you.”

“Why the sudden hurry?”

“There's been a...development. Anyway. I'll talk to you later.”

“I'm sure you will. Later, neighbor.” With those ominous words, he hung up.

Great. Now she might have Rich Estrada underneath her at work
and
at home, in addition to that set of persistent fantasies. She drained her cup and did the only thing she could think of while she waited for Maya to wake. She began sorting her possessions from Brett's.

* * *

R
ICH
WASN
'
T
DUE
in the gym until the early afternoon, but after Lindsey's call he couldn't drop back to sleep. He found his mom in the kitchen in her robe and slippers, leaning so close to her old laptop her glasses were practically touching the screen.

“Mamá.”
He leaned over her shoulder to kiss her cheek and take in that sweet rosewater smell, then dragged her chair back a few inches. “Don't sit so close—you'll burn your eyeballs out. We can't afford to keep replacing your body parts.”

“Or that floor, if you keep scraping it up,” she shot back, but pulled him down by the sleeve and pecked his cheek. “You going to town?”

“In a while.” Ditching one crutch, he grabbed her mug and refreshed it from the pot, added that horrible vanilla creamer she loved and set it by her elbow. “I need Maria's number, if you have it.”

Slow as a glacier, she slid the cursor across the screen to open an email. “Maria from upstairs? Why?”

“A woman who works in the office above Wilinski's is looking for a place.”

“What kind of woman?”

He smiled at the question as he poured himself a cup and took a seat at the table. “A professional woman. Late twenties. She's a matchmaker for that company Mercer's fiancée owns.”

Her eyes widened. “Oh. Maybe this woman, she can find you a good wife.”

“Don't hold your breath,
Mamá.
”

“A nice woman to come home to between all these fights, all these cities. So you won't get distracted. By temptation.”

He smiled wanly. Lindsey was maddeningly tempting on her own. “What kind of
novela
do you think I live in? I got enough women to worry about between you and Diana.”

“Your sister is a good girl,” his mother intoned. She wasn't wearing her cross at the moment but she pressed her fingertips to the spot where it would usually hang. “Up at four-thirty she was, off to the hospital.”

“I know, I know. She's a saint. So you have Maria's number or what?”

She got heavily to her feet, shuffling to the drawer where she kept her address book. Her recovery had gone smoothly, but the past couple of years' surgeries had aged her a decade and stolen her old energy.

Rich swiveled her computer to see what the email was about. Follow-up appointment with a specialist. His stomach soured. He'd banked plenty of savings these past ten months, but without insurance, the bills stacked up fast and thick. Their cushion wouldn't last forever. His body went cold as he wondered what might happen once his foot healed. If he'd ever get his momentum back as a name to watch. Or if his manager would drop him like a lame horse the second he lost his so-called fluke title.

“Here it is.” His mom turned with her open address book in hand. She passed it to him, and Rich put the woman's name and number in a text to Lindsey. As he hit Send, he frowned. A wasted chance to call her. Oh, well. She was probably busy at work. And he could swing by her office when he was in later, ask her in person if she'd gotten in touch. Hell, ask her over lunch, if she'd finally say yes to grabbing a sandwich with him.

It was beyond clear that his head wasn't going to get screwed on straight until he and Lindsey finished what they'd started in the back of that taxi. She could plead chaos for a while, but eventually he'd win her over. Then maybe, once they scratched this persistent, mutual itch, he could put her out of his mind as anything more than the cute girl upstairs.

Upstairs,
he thought with a smile. At work and maybe here, too. She'd be hard-pressed to avoid him, then. He'd be the one who'd have to do the avoiding, anyhow—avoid letting her stare inside his brain the way she had after his Boston win, turning him into some soul-bearing, sentimental blabbermouth.

He stood and drained his mug. “I may as well head in. Grab a workout before my sessions start.”

“You take it easy, Richard. You baby that foot.”

Yeah, the way my father babied himself through twenty years' worth of crippling depression and wound up with a pistol in his mouth.

“Idle hands,” he countered, knowing that one would resonate with her. “And these idle hands are all I got to work with for the next two months. And all they wanna do is punch stuff.”

He hopped behind her chair and leaned in, putting her in the gentlest headlock, ignored her whapping hands and planted a noisy smooch on her temple. “I'll see you tonight.”

As always, when he let her go she fussed with her perm, pretending to be annoyed. “You home for dinner?”

“Nah, I'm not done till seven, and I'll probably stick around for the grappling session.” He didn't have a dedicated jujitsu coach hounding him here as he had in California, and all the skills he'd picked up would go to shit in a blink if he let them. Plus whatever kept his body busy. Whatever kept the darker thoughts at bay.

“You pick up butter on your way home, okay?” she called as he went to grab his gym bag from the laundry room. He shoved a clean shirt and shorts inside and slung it around his chest, checked his wallet for his T pass and swung himself back through the kitchen.

“Butter. Got it. Save me leftovers.”

“Love you, Richard. You be good.”

“Love you, too,
Mamá.
”

Hopping down the front steps to the street, he eyed with longing the car he wasn't allowed to drive until late September. He made his way to the bus stop, leaving one set of obligations behind and en route to the next.

* * *

B
Y
ELEVEN
, M
AYA
was up, and Lindsey's day was suddenly moving in fast-forward. She'd reached that Maria woman and been invited to meet her at one to see the apartment. The rent was at the upper end of what she could afford, but considering she'd budgeted for a one-bedroom and this place had two, it sounded like a great deal. She could always get a roommate.

Maya flounced into the kitchen, wet curls swinging, and plopped into a chair. “What's for breakfast?”

“I need you dressed and ready to go in fifteen minutes.”

Her blue eyes narrowed. “I'm
not
going home.”

Not today,
Lindsey thought. She'd save that fight for the weekend, once she got Maya on her side, let her feel like an adult for a day or two. Surely that's what she was craving if she'd run away from their parents' house. Again. “Not home. I need to look at an apartment and you'll have to come with me.”

“Good—it's way awkward around here. What happened to Brett, anyway? He used to be fun.”

“Being a lawyer happened to him. Now get dressed. I'll pack you a bagel for the train.”

“O-oh, the train.” She bobbed her eyebrows as she stood. “And apartment hunting. Cool.”

Yes, how very grown-up. No wonder Lindsey felt about eighty this morning.

They took the subway to North Station and a commuter train to Lynn, following her phone's directions.

“I like your neighborhood better,” Maya said, taking in the small city.

Sure, Lynn wasn't glamorous, but after a three-block walk, the Estradas' street proved quiet and clean, and the house looked well-maintained. A three-story family setup, connected to an identical one, with sagging decks on each floor but a fresh coat of sage-green paint.

She recognized Rich's beat-up old BMW parked along the curb, but that didn't mean he was home.
Please, please, please don't let him be home.
She had to avoid him until everything calmed down. However long that might take.

Maria was waiting on the front porch, and by the time they climbed the stairs to the third story, Maya was huffing and puffing. “Oh, my...God...too many...stairs.”

“You are so out of shape,” Lindsey teased. To be seventeen again, eating junk food and sleeping till noon and never breaking a sweat, yet still being thin as a rake.

“Don't give me...body image...issues.”

Maria or the landlord had left the place in great shape, the walls freshly painted in neutral tones. The kitchen was super-dated, with matching avocado everything, but the apartment was sunny with big rooms. The walk to the train had been barely ten minutes, the bus even closer, and Rich had vouched for the landlord.

And this place was at the top of Lindsey's list of exactly
one
affordable, available apartment.

“I'll take it.”

“Yeah, you will,” Maya said, clearly wowed by the concept of having an entire apartment to oneself.

Maria was thrilled, as well. She'd clear it with the landlord, and once Lindsey forked over the security deposit and August rent, the place was hers.

Crazy. And if for some reason it didn't work out, she had to stay only through November, when the existing lease was up. She beamed a thank-you to Rich, wondering if he was at work or somewhere beneath her feet.

They said goodbye to Maria out front and headed back to the station.

“Now all you have to do is, like, pack everything and move,” Maya said.

“How handy that I have my little sister here to help,” she said, shooting Maya a look to say she was dead serious.

Maya stared at the ground as they walked, uncharacteristically pensive for a block.

Lindsey nudged her. “What?”

“How long are you actually going to let me stay with you?”

“I don't know. I have to talk to Mom and Dad.”

“Mom and Dad suck right now.”

“Everyone thinks that when they're in high school.”

“No, like, they
really
suck. Like, the way they sucked two years ago.”

Lindsey's heart dropped. Her parents had been through a rough patch a couple of winters back—gone as far as separating for a few weeks. But they'd ended up in counseling and eventually renewed their vows. Lindsey thought they'd seemed tense the last time she'd been home, but she hadn't guessed it might be serious.