“Hello?”
My ears pricked up at the familiarity of that voice.
I snapped my head around and there he was, not on all eight TV screens as I was used to seeing him, but just one person standing right in front of me, on the other side of my front desk.
Liam “Am I Seeing This Right?” Wright.
“Oh, hey, look, Hudson, it’s that guy you always make us turn every TV screen over to wa—”
My elbow found Zander’s side, and thankfully, that just so happened to be where his shut the fuck up button was located.
“Hello,” I said in as normal a voice as I could muster.
What the hell was happening here? How was it that Liam Wright was standing right in front of me, looking all sorts of weatherman-gorgeous? He must have come directly from the studio, because he was wearing the same outfit he’d had on earlier in the evening.
Suddenly, I wished that the counter wasn’t so high so that I could look down and get a better view of his amazing…
I snapped myself out of that inappropriate, unprofessional thought by saying, “How—how can I help you?”
I tried to smile. I think I might have been smiling. I couldn’t tell. I couldn’t feel my face, or my feet, or my hands, anymore.
This was precisely the reason why I had avoided approaching him six times before. I was turning to mush.
“I’d like to join the gym,” he said. His voice just sounded so familiar, which I guess made sense, since I’d been hearing it every day on the news for the last eighteen months. “Oh, and I’ll need a personal trainer as well.”
Was it possible to be both floored and speechless at the same time? The answer to that question was a resounding hell yes. Trust me, it was coming from a guy who was on the floor, unable to speak.
“We can definitely arrange that,” I said after a much-too-long silence. My eyes were glued to him as my hand tapped around the counter, desperately searching for the paperwork and a pen.
“Here you go,” I said, once I had finally found them. I looked down and was surprised to see my hands trembling. I quickly pulled them back and placed them firmly on the counter.
Why the hell was I shaking?
I mean, I had seen the guy in the flesh six times before. Although now that I thought about it, every time I had seen him, I’d started to shake and feel a little light-headed. I’d just assumed that was because Porter was around, and he tended to have a mildly nauseating effect on people.
“Do you have a trainer available? I’d like to start as soon as possible. Preferably tomorrow morning, please,” Liam said as he looked up from the paperwork he was filling out.
“Yes, of course,” I said, and then my brain left my head because the next words out of my mouth were, “My name is Hudson Madden. I’m the owner of Elite Fitness, and I would love to turn you on…”
Shitty shit, shit, shit!
I cleared my throat. “Take you on.”
