Run to Love: Triple R Series #1

Run to Love: A Triple R Novel

Chapter 1

~Presley~

BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!

4:30am. Seriously, time to get up already?

I had accomplished the ridiculous schedule five times a week for the last two years, which only indicated how insane but committed I was.

Maybe I should be insanely committed?

I threw on workout clothes and swiped my gym bag and packed garment bag from behind my door. On the way down the hallway, the corner of my bag grabbed a decorative metal stand—which held nothing, but according to my roommate, “Its spirit told her it was meant to be there.” This spirit-feeling, sixth-sense sensing, people-loving roommate, better known as Willow Harper, would be up in less than an hour for her morning shift as assistant manager and sous chef at the local coffeehouse, but she was sleeping peacefully now. Avoiding the urge to un-Zenly fling the shelf out the window, I deposited the spirit-filled metal back to its original location and tiptoed away.  

“Bye!” Willow yelled from the comfort of her bed. “Love you, you loud bitch!”

“Sorry,” I half-lied. “Love you, too. Bye!”

The late-April morning drive blurred by and I arrived at Run-Ride-Rock Gym well before my 5am training time. My stretching routine was completed in full-on zombie-mode. By ten after the hour my personal trainer still hadn’t strutted his way to the warm-up area and that wasn’t like him. I snagged my towel and water bottle from the floor and made my way to find out what was going on at the front desk. Even though I had met her before at the gym and a couple of times at outside social functions, the young woman manning the front desk wasn’t high on my list of favorite people; if anything, she was at the top of my most loathed.

“Hi, I’m Presley Bradenhurst. I have a standing 5am appointment Mondays with Mitch. Is he sick today?”

The receptionist, a human yardstick with a giant blonde horsetail high on her bobble-head, turned and her baby blue eyes glared her sentiments. “Oh, yeah, I forgot to stop you when you waddled in. Mitch was fired Friday. Someone probably left you a phone message not to bother to come in today.” She scanned me up and down and sneered, “…or ever again.”

What? He was fired? Why?

I cleared my throat. “I don’t think I received a phone call. Since I’ve already paid for the 100 Session New Years Special and I’ve only used about thirty, I’ll need to interview for a new personal trainer. Can you set up an appointment for me to talk to Blake, please?”

“I’ll see if I can work it into my schedule,” the snarky blonde replied. “Sorry, I meant his schedule.”

Typical.

“Hi, there.” The deep and serene voice was friendly. I spun with a smile on my face.

“Hiiii,” I said, stretching the word for so long I was positive drool trickled from my cavernous mouth.

A cocky smirk tilted the attractive young man’s lips…his luscious and kissable lips.

Great.

A swipe of my hand to my mouth verified that I was in fact drooling. The response was typical for me. It was bound to happen again as my nervousness around the opposite sex kicked into overdrive.