It was a decent argument except for the fact that Carmen wasn’t the only one who’d observed Felix’s questionable behavior around Ella. Drew had said something similar but a bit cryptic when he’d come over to say hello to them the day Drew had come down to film Ella’s class.
“Does he come in here a lot?” Drew had asked when he’d left the classroom.
“Not really” had been Ella’s vague answer.
“Not at all” would’ve been a more correct answer. The only other time he’d gone into her class was the day they’d all walked in so Drew could talk to her. But already even back then Ella had a feeling why she was asking. So she hadn’t wanted to give Drew too much to speculate on. The idea that Felix might actually be interested in anything with Ella still felt so preposterous it made her face hot.
All Drew had said after that was “interesting.”
Ella refused to refuel that uncomfortable topic, so she hadn’t asked her what she meant. She finished gathering herself in the ladies’ room and finally walked out toward her classroom. Carmen was already headed her way with that look on her face. That overly excited I-have-something-to-tell-you expression. What now?
“Is it true?”
“Is what true?”
“That you and Felix were sharing a juice and holding hands?”
Ella felt her face flush instantly. “What?” She tried her damnedest to act as though the very idea was farfetched as it should be. “We weren’t sharing a juice.”
Carmen’s eyes opened even wider. “Oh my God, you’re blushing. You never blush.” She stopped in front of Ella, forcing Ella to stop too. “Please tell me you’re not keeping something this big from me. I’m your best friend! That would be like a mortal sin or something. You’d be breaking some kind of rule or code, a very bad one with, like, massive bestie repercussions, Ella!”
They were turning a few heads, and Ella shushed her. “Do not shush me!” Carmen said in a very loud whisper then thankfully lowered her voice. “Was he or was he not holding your hand?”
“Yes, he did,” Ella finally conceded as her silly friend gasped, smiled big, and then brought her hands over her mouth, practically jumping in place. “But not like what you’re thinking. We were talking about my mom, and I got a little misty-eyed, so he touched my hand and maybe picked it up for a few moments. Jesus, that got around fast. Who told you?”
Ella tried to sound annoyed to cover up the mixture of excitement and utter fear she was suddenly feeling. This was getting too real. Not only had it really happened and not in the toned down way she’d explained it, but word about it was getting around this fast?
Before she let the fear paralyze her and the thrill of this make her lose sight of reality, she reminded herself once again this kind of flirtation was probably something that came so naturally to a guy like Felix. And that’s all this was. Nothing more. She wouldn’t let her heart run with this, over-thinking this like her mind was already doing. More than anything, she could not, would not, get caught up in something like this. If there was something she knew already, while she could easily control her reaction to many things—easily manipulate her nerves to appear to be undaunted even under the most intimidating circumstances—her heart was a whole other story.
She had no control over what it felt or did. The unrestrained pounding it continued to do now even as she tried to appear carefree about this whole thing was further proof of this. Her only choice now, if this was really happening, was to go into full protective mode. Protect her heart at all costs or pay dearly if she chose to believe even for a minute that this might be anything more than a flirtation—a flirtation that she needed to steer far, far away from.
~*~
Felix
It’d been well over a week since Felix’s conversation with Ella at the juice bar. Since then, they hadn’t had a conversation where he felt as close to her as he had that day. He finally decided to address something he’d been wondering about. It might help him get his shit straight. If he at least had a schedule to work with, he could work out a way to casually run into her every day until he could figure out what the hell he was going to do about this. So far all this time he hadn’t known if she was coming or going.
Over a month since he’d begun his informal training, Felix was still trying to figure it out, but by then he knew one thing for sure. He was very attracted to her now. Not just in that usual he-could-already-picture-her-under-him way. Not that the thought hadn’t crossed his mind—more than once. Ella was constantly on his mind now, and he hadn’t even kissed her. Aside from that one time he got to hold her hand for too short of time, there’d been nothing more than exchanged smiles and prolonged gazes. He was fairly certain she’d picked up on his attraction to her, but beyond that there was nothing more. How was it even possible that he could feel so hung on someone he’d yet to even kiss?
Not just that, he still wasn’t even sure what, if anything, he should do about it. He couldn’t even bring himself to ask for some kind of schedule from her. Not even something simple and innocent like are you usually here in the day or evenings. Half the time he had no idea if she’d be in that day or not. Asking her or anyone else still felt risky. Someone would wonder why he wanted to know, and he still wasn’t sure of that answer. Why did he want to know so badly?
And then it happened.
He walked into the upstairs break room around lunch time, hoping it made sense that she’d be up there since there was no self-defense class between twelve and twelve forty-five. He started to smile when he saw her at one of the tables, giggling into her hand, until he saw who she was sitting with. Camera boy. The guy Drew had brought with her the day they’d filmed parts of Ella’s class for her documentary on the gym. More grating than seeing her laugh so sweetly at whatever it was he was saying to her was that he knew they’d long ago finished the documentary.
That strange feeling in his gut—the one he’d felt even that first night at the pizza place—and the one he’d felt every single time he’d been around her since, was back. Only this time it felt different. This time there was a kick to it, and he gulped, deciding on whether or not he should go talk to her. He wasn’t sure he could keep himself from being a dick to camera boy.
“You eating up here, Sanchez?”
Felix turned to see Noah and Hector walking toward him. “No, I was, uh . . . just looking for someone.”
Hector turned to see who he’d been staring at. “And you found her?” He smirked.
Noah turned to look in Ella’s direction too. Fucking great.
“Ella?” Noah asked.
“No, not Ella,” he lied. “One of the guys I’ve been working with.”
Hector turned to look at him, still smirking. “You sure? Because you looked like you were getting ready to go talk to Ella and, uh, her friend there. Who is that she’s having lunch with?”
“I dunno,” Felix lied again, looking around trying his damnedest to look uninterested in Ella and her friend. “The guy I’m looking for isn’t here. I’ll talk to him later,” he said and started to walk away.
“Oh, I know who that is,” he heard Hector say. “That’s the guy working with Drew on the documentary: Conner. Charlee mentioned he had a thing for Ella and would be coming down to ask her out.”
Felix stopped in his tracks and spun around. Hector’s head fell back and he laughed. “I fucking knew it!” He shoved Noah in the arm. “Didn’t I tell you?”
“Tell him what?” Felix asked, glaring past him at Ella and camera boy who were now joined by Drew. Drew sat down next to the guy, pecking his lips, and Felix knew he’d been had. “You’re an asshole,” he said, shoving Hector and feeling like an idiot but at the same time enormously relieved.
“What?” Noah asked confused as Hector continued to laugh, bringing his fist to his mouth.
“You should’ve seen your face.” Hector was laughing so much now Drew and Ella were now looking their way.
Felix smiled, grabbing Hector by the shirt,
and pulled him roughly out of the small break room.
“He’s the sap Drew talked about at the pizza place,” Hector explained, still laughing as Felix let go of his shirt but not before shoving him again. “The ‘sweet guy’ she was considering going out with. I guess they’re a thing now.”
Hector still laughed, and now Noah was smiling big too. “You into Ella, Sanchez?” he asked.
Felix glanced away, annoyed that he hadn’t been able to make it even a few weeks without someone noticing. He shrugged. “I think she’s cool.”
Hector laughed again. “Charlee’s gonna love this. She called it from day one.”
Felix had been ready to jump all over him about not saying a damn thing to Charlee or anyone for that matter. It was bad enough these two knew now, but his second comment got him. “She did?”
Had he really been that obvious? Even back then? The smug smile on Hector’s face was answer enough, but he went on anyway. “She said you looked struck that first night we all went to Barros. Man”—he shook his head in mock disappointment—“I even argued with her, saying you don’t get struck, and she said everyone does sooner or later.”
“You do know she’s Nellie and Abel’s little project, right?” Noah’s voice warned. “They really like her, and Nellie’s hoping she’ll take her up on the offer of a full-time position here. If you screw this up—”
“I’m not gonna screw anything up,” Felix said suddenly feeling defensive. “All I said was she’s cool. I haven’t even decided what, if anything, I wanna do about it. I told you about the Grecco meeting I had. I doubt I’ll have any time for any kind of social life once that gets going, much less a relationship, and she’s too sweet a girl for anything less.”
Hector patted him on the shoulder. “If you’re leaning on maybe going for it and let me tell you”—he laughed again—“that look on your face says you are, I’d make up my mind soon if I were you. According to Drew, she’s considering going out to dinner with that cop friend of hers again, something she hasn’t done in months.”
Felix gave him a look, and Hector lifted his hands in the air, eyes full of humor. “I’m not lying this time. Drew was over last night. I heard her telling Charlee. Drew even offered to do a double date thing with her because she said Ella’s not one hundred percent sold on the idea. But I guess the guy’s been really persistent.”
It suddenly dawned on Felix. “Is that why they’re here today?”
Hector’s brows jumped up. “Good question. I don’t know. Could be.”
Torn for a second, he glanced at Noah then back at Hector, who both looked at him blankly with no answers. He could hardly believe he was doing this, but he headed back toward the break room.
Chapter 9
Ella
Drew and Ella hadn’t even finished speculating what Hector and Felix’s strange little outburst had been about when Felix walked back in the break room. Conner had laughed, listening to them as the two girls—mostly Drew—had gone at it. She’d been certain Hector had been teasing Felix about Ella. They all watched as he walked toward them, smiling sheepishly.
“Maybe he’s coming back to tell us what was so funny,” Drew offered as she crunched down on her celery stick.
Their conversation and Drew’s speculating had already gotten Ella’s heart pounding in that way she had zero control of calming. Watching him approach them only made it that much harder to stay calm.
“Hey,” he said, lifting his chin in Drew and Conner’s direction. Then his eyes were on Ella, and her insides fluttered as they always did now when he looked at her.
“Care to tell us what the joke was?” Drew smirked.
That flattened his smile a little, but he kept his eyes on Ella even as he shook his head. “You know Hector. He was just being an ass. Can I talk to you for a minute?” he asked Ella then glanced at Drew and Conner and back at Ella again. “Alone?”
Ella gulped, trying to keep her cool, but she knew better than to so much as glance at Drew. Without even looking at her, Ella already knew what she was thinking. “Um, sure.” She nodded, standing up slowly and looking around. “Where?”
Felix glanced around, too, then back at her. “Outside?” His eyes suddenly darted down to the table at her small Ziploc bag of cherries. “Unless you’re not done with your lunch.”
She shook her head quickly. “I wasn’t having lunch. That was just a snack.”
Drew lifted the baggy and held it out to Ella with a huge grin. “Take them with you.”
Ella took them and started walking away before Drew could do or say anything Felix might pick up on. As much as her insides were going absolutely nuts, she reasoned this didn’t mean anything. He could just want to talk to her about the classes or the breast-cancer-awareness walk.
Why alone?
It was what her head kept screaming despite her attempts to drown it out. She stopped trying to rationalize it. She’d know, soon enough. Instead, she concentrated on staying calm and collected. She even managed to glance at him and smile as they walked out of the employee lunch room.
“Did you decide on whether or not you’re taking the full-time position here?” he asked as they reached the escalators.
She exhaled slowly, relieved that it was business after all that he wanted to talk to her about. But it worried her. Was Nellie losing patience with her? Is that why she’d sent Felix to ask her instead of asking herself?
“I’m sorry I’ve taken so long to get back to you guys.” She leaned against the escalator rail and looked up at him. “I just wanted to be absolutely sure before I commit to something so big, because it would mean me quitting my other job. I’ve also been acting as the stand-in assistant manager there until she gets back from maternity leave, and I hate to leave them hanging. But she’ll be back this week. I did tell Nellie I’d have an answer before the end of this week. Did she send you—?”
“No, no,” he said quickly. “I was just curious. Nellie hasn’t mentioned anything about it. I wasn’t even sure if you’d gotten back to her or not.”
“Oh,” she said a little relieved but also confused. “Well, yeah, more than likely I will be taking it. I’m just waiting for this assistant manager to get back before I make my final decision.”
“Don’t rush on my account,” he said as they reached the bottom of the escalators. “No one asked me to ask you. I really was just curious.”
Just curious. Like he’d been about Grayson. The statement only served to rattle her further. She nodded as their eyes locked like they had so much the past few weeks, and the realization set in. This wasn’t what he’d wanted to talk to her alone about. Once again, her insides roiled. They were stopped several times on the way out by people wanting to say hi to Felix. Some even asked if he could pose for a photo with him, but he declined, saying it wasn’t a good time for him.
As they continued to walk in awkward silence, they were stopped yet again, this time by a trainer wanting to introduce Felix to his newest trainee. The exchange between Felix and the young wide-eyed and obviously adoring fan reminded her of Grayson’s blunt words. She’d finally answered his call days after the night at the gas station. Even though she’d insisted that her relationship with Felix was nothing more than a business one and that she’d just met him the day Grayson had seen them together, he still made sure to point out one thing—that Felix’s world and hers weren’t even in the same galaxy.
“You’ve heard all the stories about him,” he’d said. “If he does decide, just for giggles, to make you another notch on his belt, I hope you’re not silly enough to think you’d be any different from any of the other girls he bags all over the world. And I’m being nice referring to them as girls. You and I both know only a whore would give it up to someone she knows she has no chance of anything real with. Don’t lower yourself to their level, Ella. You’re better than that, and you know you deserve more.”
It’d been the same thing Drew had said only Drew said it in a much nicer and subtler way. After
several occasions of seeing Ella’s exchanges with Felix, Drew had come to the same conclusion Carmen had—there was something about the way Felix looked at Ella. She said Charlee had first noticed it during their night at Barros. Drew had been too busy writing things down and conducting her interview to notice, but Charlee told Drew she’d definitely picked up on something from Felix. Unlike Grayson, Charlee’s take on it was far more positive, even romantic. She said she’d never seen Felix like that and thought it was sweet. But then, like Drew said, Felix was the one 5th Street partner she and Charlee knew the least. They hadn’t been around him nearly as much as they’d been around the others. So Charlee could be way off.
Ella hated to admit it, but she’d begun to think the very thing Grayson said before she’d spoken to him about Felix. Despite the number of breathtaking moments she’d been caught in Felix’s incredible eyes and the times when she thought she’d seen some kind of glimmer in them like the day he’d held her hand, her opinion had been the same as Grayson’s. She was still sticking to her protective mode. If, by some miracle, she was next on his checklist of conquests, she had to be smart about this—think with her head not with her heart.
There was no denying his track record with women, and shamefully, after the day he’d held her hand, she had looked it up. Not once had the guy been in a committed relationship. The closest he’d had was with Bianca, and even that had played out painfully in the tabloids for the entire world to see how incapable he was of being committed. There’d even been a pregnancy as proof that it wasn’t all hearsay that he’d cheated on Bianca before she cheated on him with his own trainer and friend. Sadly, Ella had to side with Grayson on this one.
Felix turned to her apologetically as he finished up with the trainer and his trainee. That’s when she remembered.
Grayson. Shit!
Last night he mentioned dropping in on her at the gym today as he often did when he was patrolling alone. Usually, he’d text her to let her know he was outside and she’d come out and talk to him for a little bit. She slowed, glancing around as they nearly reached the front door.