No need to increase the number of potential recipients of her well-intentioned, if boundary-pushing, advice by giving her access to a Twitter or Instagram handle, too.
“Ale’s pictures were amazing. And really, boosting AM Fitness’s reach to better promote the AllFit brand has been a group effort,” Anamaría explained, cutting a piece of the pork roast next to the large helping of salad on her plate. “Brandon, Sara, and AllFit have posted different images from the photo shoot with Alejandro on their social media platforms, tagging me and encouraging their followers to find me. And with Brandon sharing a teaser about the Key West retreat we’re planning together, things have really taken off.”
She speared the pork with her fork, nonplussed by the bullet train her side hustle had boarded. Astounded by the huge jump in followers, views, and subscribers on her YouTube channel, plus the requests for information about her online personal training programs. Now she was looking into the logistics of creating a monthly subscription service for nutrition and training clients. The passive income potential could really skyrocket, boosting her monthly budget.
Brandon had mentioned the idea to her during a retreat-planning call, and Alejandro was giving her a few key photography and videography tips to improve her posts.
She grinned thinking about the photo shoot she and Alejandro had started in her home gym in the storage space beneath her town house. Started but not finished because they had gotten a little distracted. And disheveled.
His Damn, girl, you look hot, murmured under his breath, but loud enough for her to hear as she’d lain back on the padded bench, had drawn her attention. She’d swiveled her head to where he sat on a black metal barstool, his Canon at the ready. Her tongue made a slow swipe of her lower lip and his camera wobbled. A blazing heat that matched the one burning inside her flared in his espresso-colored eyes as he peered over the top of his Canon, and she had nearly dropped the twenty-pound free weights she held above her chest.
Her body had instantly responded to the lust he didn’t even try to hide from his face. Her breasts grew heavy, their sensitive tips straining against the tight sports bra material. Need pulsed between her legs, swift and urgent. Her weights had clunked to the padded floor, and he’d set the camera aside, his intense gaze never leaving hers. Together they’d maneuvered him to the bench, his shirt and her exercise bra off before his back hit the black padding, her mouth devouring his.
So far over the past two weeks they had christened her sofa, the kitchen table, both the master and guest beds, and for old time’s sake, she had laid the back seats flat in her Pilot so they could make out in a car like they had as teens. Given his injury, there’d been a need for dexterity and creative thinking, but they’d been up to the challenge.
Adding her home gym to their secret list when he’d come home with her after the Zumba class at St. Mary’s earlier today meant she’d never be able to work out down there again without picturing Alejandro’s lean, sculpted body stretched along the weight bench, naked and gloriously ready for hers.
Dios mío, the man might be a genius behind the camera, but in front of it? His hands, his fingers, his lips . . . they did dangerous, wicked, amazing things to her body.
“Verdad, nena?” her mom asked, the question unwittingly dispelling Anamaría’s delectable daydreams.
“Right about what?” she asked. “Sorry, I zoned out thinking about Alejandro. I mean, thinking about something he, um, suggested for my home gym.”
Her face flamed and she reached for her glass of lemon water.
Her mom smiled, that see-Mami-knows-best smirk that usually preceded her “te lo dije.”
She had no idea what her mom thought she had “told her,” but it certainly wasn’t to engage in this no-strings fling with the man Anamaría had never completely gotten over, all in the guise of finally having closure.
She would. Have closure, that is. As long as she didn’t let herself get sucked into considering those pesky what-ifs again. There were none. Only an amicable separation after his exhibit in six or so weeks, when they would go their separate ways.
“You know me,” Luis said. “I only see your posts and stuff when I’m looking over Sara’s shoulder or she sends me a screen shot of something. But she’s been impressed with the way everything’s played out so far for you.”
He nabbed another slice of Cuban bread from the towel-covered bowl in the center of the table, using it to mop up the juice from his pork roast. Oh, the empty carbs her brothers ate, despite her nagging.
“She thinks you and Brandon teaming up is golden, for both of you,” Luis said after swallowing a hefty bite of bread. “And you know she wouldn’t say that lightly.”
“We’re very proud of you, nena.” Her papi nodded from his seat in front of the backyard window. The lights from the Sellers’ house across the canal shone through the wide kitchen window, hovering like fireflies around her papi’s head. “You have worked hard on your business for many years. Growing in smart ways. I think you are ready. It’s good to see you no longer letting anything, or anyone, hold you back.”
For a man who rarely doled out advice without being asked, this was the second time since she’d arrived about an hour ago that he’d made a comment she swore was riddled with subtext. She studied him, searching for some clue, a hint of what he might be implying. His typically calm, judicious demeanor remained unchanged, which made it even more difficult for her to tell.
Maybe she was reading into things. Catholic guilt, instilled throughout elementary school at St. Mary’s and from years living under her devout parents’ roof, was alive and thriving inside her. Her extracurricular activities with Alejandro lately fed it.
While her mami loudly proclaimed her absolute joy that Anamaría and Alejandro were spending time together, Anamaría was lying, telling her meddling mami that Alejandro and she were simply trying to rebuild their original friendship. Facilitated by working together on her videos and photography, while she watched over his recovery exercises and occasionally chauffeured him to and from Bellísima for exhibit planning.
The two of them were being painstakingly careful to keep things platonic when they were out in public. Not wanting to provide fodder for gossip that would inevitably find its way to one of their mothers.
But when they were behind closed doors . . . Oooh, that was a whole different story. One she relished rereading with him every day. And night. Of course, sneaking around meant they had yet to spend an entire night together. To do so would require explaining his absence to his mom and abuela the next morning. Talk about a Cuban mami inquisition to be avoided at all costs.
Anamaría’s Apple watch vibrated with an incoming text. Alejandro’s name flashed on the tiny screen followed by his message: SOS!
She frowned and raised her wrist to reread his call for help.
“Excuse me.” She pushed back from the table, rushing to explain before her parents reminded her of the no phones during dinner rule. “Alejandro just texted me an SOS.”
Papi and Luis straightened in their chairs, eyes alert, as if dispatch had sent a Tone Out sounding through their dining room, alerting them to a 911 call.
“Did he provide any details?” Papi asked, his question delivered in his firm Watch Commander voice.